Dressed, Harry and the rest of his dormmates left their room and found Hermione and Sophie waiting. "Which classes do you think we'll have first?" Hermione asked, excitement making her eyes shine.

Harry shrugged, wondering why Sophie had waited as well but shrugged it off. More friends was a good thing, even if he wasn't sure if she ranked as one yet.

Dean and Seamus drifted off a bit as their own conversation—read argument—on football's merits didn't interest the others.

Sitting down to breakfast on the first day, all students were there. As the Heads of Houses began passing out schedules, Dumbledore put down his mug and stood.

"Good morning to all your shiny little faces, eager to begin your education. Or not so eager nor ready but resigned to attend class." There was laughter and he smiled. "Your Prefects should have discussed some of the changes in the school but I shall expand while we eat."

Harry made a waffle face as he listened to him explain the new Year Common Rooms off the library were for cross-House interaction, how the vend devices were an experiment with helping to make sure students had access to extra supplies easier, a new menu system where breakfast would be as it always was and the lunch and dinner menus would be different. "The new meal system is quite interesting. When you sit down, instead of reaching for a spoon or fork to serve yourself from food in the center, an already plated meal will appear. As for what type of meal, you can select from the menu that is appearing now." A menu appeared at all place settings. "As you can see on the menu, you can select what type of meal plan you want. World cuisine where you get to try new dishes from around the world, United cuisine which is from our Islands only, or if you have a specific diet such as vegetarian or vegan or allergies, just write those in. Or it you dislike certain foods in the same area as allergies." Harry wrote in black olives, turkey pastrami, and turkey bacon then circled world cuisine.

He noticed Neville and Ron chose United while Hermione and Sophie also chose world.

"I wonder why the new food system?" Hermione asked.

"House-elves wanted more work, probably," Neville said.

Harry nodded. "Our house-elf always feel like there's too little to do. She bribes me with cookies to make messes." The boys laughed.

"What are house-elves?" Hermione asked.

"Domesticated kobolds," an older student said. "Very, very powerful creatures that live to serve. Literally. Non-domesticated ones live only a few years. Domesticated ones can live two centuries if they're bound to a house or family. They're rare though. Hard to entice new ones and they rarely breed if domesticated."

"Or an island," Harry said. "They're really nice. I'll summon mine later so you can meet her."

The Headmaster had continued on, now discussing how new brooms had been purchased for flying classes and an updated astronomy tower was being assembled.

Harry was reading his schedule when he heard someone call his name.

"Oh, Madam Pomfrey. Did he find you?"

"Yes. After classes, please report to the hospital wing. Mr. Longbottom, you're short a potion as well. Here."

"Oh."

Neville drank the potion and grimaced then thanked her.

"You missed a potion during your St. Mungo's appointment?" Seamus asked. "How?"

"They were out."

"Do we all have the same classes?" Harry asked.

"Yes. Slytherin and Gryffindor share classes," an older student said. "We're usually the most populous House while the snakes have the least students. The other two have usually the second most and second least and usually about the other half of the year's students.

"Core classes are Monday Wednesday Friday with flying classes and the like on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Then in third year, your electives are on those days." Harry realized he was a prefect when he saw the pin. "You should bring your books and stationery but leave your potion supplies in your dorm. The house-elves deliver them to just outside the room before class."

They finished eating then went to grab their books.

In their first class, Professor Flitwick called Harry's name and upon seeing Harry raise his hand, fell over backwards from his stack of books.

Harry and Dean were out of their seats and halfway to helping him when he popped back up. "I meant to do that!"

The students giggled as he laughed at himself.

Nearly all the muggleborns did significantly well enough that he commented on it halfway through the class.

Hermione raised her hand. "It's because we all bought P-WANDs," she said to the muggleborns' nods and Harry's immense feeling of satisfaction and a cha-ching noise he barely didn't vocalize.

"What?"

Hermione took hers out and demonstrated it.

"Ingenious! Who is selling these‽"

She pointed at Harry who sighed. "Not me. My godfather. Based on my grandfather's design and Mr. Ollivander's prototype. Next year they'll be on sale to everyone but Sirius met with the muggleborns during the summer and sold them prototypes."

"May I borrow this until dinner?"

Hermione nodded and took out her manual for it then handed it to him. Harry noticed hers was much thicker than normal due to sticky notes added to what looked like every page.

Ron looked angry until Harry leaned over and suggested he try a different grip on his wand. Four casts later, his feather jumped up.

After class as they were heading to their next class when "Harry Potter!"

He turned at the high pitched voice and saw a blonde boy heading towards them.

"I'm Draco Malfoy. Perhaps no one's told you but wizards of renown should have the right sort of friends," he said, sneering at the Gryffindors.

"Like the children of people so weak minded they can't fight off an Imperius? Or bigots who cloak their hate in traditions they don't even understand? Begone." Harry quoted his grandfather as he belittled the blonde.

Draco gaped at him as his cheeks turned an angry pink. "Wait until my father hears of this!"

Harry turned back, his wand in hand as he moved forward. The two fat boys moved forward to stand beside Malfoy while the Gryffindors arrayed themselves behind Harry unconsciously.

"You're so dumb, so unable to deal with your betters you run to daddy to fix what you break? Malfoy, we might be eleven years old but you act like a four year old." The Keeper was prompting Harry, helping him to show he was a better choice in the posturing of children.

Harry turned and was one step away when they heard "Mr. Malfoy!"

They all turned to see one of the new staff, Professor Ambergris glaring at them and Malfoy aiming his wand at Harry's back. "Fifteen points for aiming a wand at another student in the halls! Slytherins, stay here. Gryffindors, go on to your next class!"

"It's the same class," a Slytherin protested to another lost point.

In Transfiguration, the Gryffindors all sat in the last three rows of seats so when the Slytherins arrived—late and bearing a note from the professor—they had to sit in front of the Gryffindors. The nine Slytherins had to sit with the wands of Gryffindors at their backs.

Reading the note, Professor McGonagall glared at the students. "One detention Mr. Malfoy, with Mr. Filch. Let us see if we cannot break you of bad habits!"

"Potter had his wand out too!" Malfoy protested.

"His wand was aimed at the floor!" Ron protested.

"One point from Slytherin and one point from Gryffindor. Students raise their hands in my class." Ron flushed.

"Wands out in the halls is not against the rules," she finished. "Doing magic or aiming your wand at another student is."

The class ended up being a near-clone of Charms. While no one completed a flawless transfiguration of straw to string, the ones who were closest were the muggleborns and Dean ended up demonstrating his P-WAND.

~•~

Ron sighed as he sat down at lunch. "How much are those wands?"

"Eh, I'll send you one. Your brothers were really good teachers, seems only fair. But they'll be a galleon a year. The prototypes have all seven years of spells and cheaper workshops in the summer for five galleons. The production models will be two sickles a workshop and only have one year's worth of spells. And be customizable. We'll be doing models for adults too, I think. Like auror and other job specific models."

"Why?" Dean asked.

"I gotta rebuild the Potter finances," Harry said. "We're not broke or anything but not doing great."

With class over, they headed up to History of Magic class. Harry had debated bringing a pillow after Sirius's description of the class but decided that he must have been exagerrating.

It turned out Sirius had not been and Harry spent the whole class updating his armour plans.

He leaned over to Dean and whispered, "Would you guys mind if I put up some posters?"

Dean leaned over to ask Seamus and Neville while Harry asked Ron.


Harry walked into the Hospital Wing and sat down on the little couch, looking at his Potions book. Snape had been extremely unpleasant. He was glad he only had him for a year since the Darklings were aching to eviscerate him.

The door of her office opened and Professor Dumbledore exited, followed by her. "Ahh, Mr. Potter, how was your first day? Are you feeling unwell?"

"A check-up, Albus."

"It was good, sir. All the students who had our P-WANDs did well."

"Yes, during lunch Professor Flitwick and I discussed making them required."

Harry's eyes widened as a steady profit of fifty or more galleons a year with other wanded nations looking at Hogwarts requiring them would make them debate the same flitted through his head.

"How goes other issues?" the Headmaster asked.

"We're still looking for a place for the thing."

"Last night I had an idea about that. I will discuss it with your godfather tonight."

When he was gone, Madam Pomfrey told him to get up on the nearest bed then she waved her wand, summoning a privacy screen.

He pulled up his shirt—he had changed into BDU trousers and a tee shirt then pulled on overrobes, hating the dress style of robes but liking the trench coat style—revealing a scar. "It looks kinda like Cardiff, right?" Harry asked.

She smiled at that. "Yes. How are you eating?"

"I finish my plates and occasionally eat dessert. I don't mind the scar."

"Very well, then a quick check of your alimentary system then you may rejoin your friends. Lie back."

He watched the magical image of his guts rise up then she zoomed in on the stomach so she could look it over inch by inch.

"Can this spell be recreated by runic arrays?"

"Yes. At St. Mungo's they use them to save time. Are you thinking about becoming a healer?"

"Thinking about using them in another project."

"Ah. Well then, off you go. See me before you leave for Christmas for another checkup."

"Yes, ma'am. Where's Gramps?"

"Reading. Would you like to speak to him?"

"No, I'll talk to him later."

He left the hospital wing and headed back to the dorm.

~•~

Before dinner, Harry and his dormmates were deciding the best spots to put up his guitar, Iron Man, Holyhead Harpies, runebreaker, and dragon morphology posters.

"What's all that?" Neville asked, gesturing at the runebreaker poster while Dean admired the Iron Man poster and Seamus leered at the players. Ron had gone down early.

"My family has always been independent curse-breakers and dragon-breeders." Neville nodded. "So both of those posters are in the fields," he said as he put the Morphology poster up on the end of his bed so he could see it from his desk but it wasn't visible from anywhere else. "Ron's older brothers were my tutors last year. They made the posters to help me study."

The guitar went on the wall next to his bed with some of the tamer photos from the meeting around it.

He stuck the family photos to his headboard then looked at his pocketwatch. "Dinner time."

In the Great Hall, he sat down across from and at an angle to Hermione and next to Sophie. His plate immediately appeared, a rhombus with seven types of sushi.

"Excellent," he said as Ron and Neville looked perturbed.

"But it's raw!" Ron said as Harry picked up a california roll with his chopsticks, though rather clumsily. Sirius had become a big fan of sushi while they were in Australia.

"It's supposed to be," Hermione said. "It's from Japan."

"Why?" Neville asked.

"Well all these types are actually cooked," Harry said, "except that one. I think it's Toro, the really expensive kind of tuna. And I don't know why they serve it raw but it's really good."

"I hope I get sushi soon," Hermione said. "But this stew is amazing. I think it's this Ethiopian stew I read about."

Sophie nodded. She had gotten the same meal as Hermione.

"We could go ask the elves," Harry said as the Weasley twins leaned over Ron's shoulders.

"Hey, Ron. Sorry we didn't say but we're really proud of you for getting into Gryffindor."

"And send mum a letter about it before she sends a howler! You can add yours to ours if you finish it soon."

The first nodded and stole a slice of garlic toast from the small plate that came with Ron's spaghetti bolognese.

"Is that that sushi stuff?" one asked and Harry nodded.

"Lee raves about it. Looks pretty good too."

"You guys want to try it?"

They nodded and picked up Harry's other California roll then each tried half. "That is good," they said as Ron looked at them in shock.

The twins left when Lee walked over and Harry opened his notebook, adding runic array diagnostic system under the armour column.


Harry finished part of his letter then looked around the common room until he saw a prefect. "Can you make copies of this? I need two more."

"Sure. The spell is Gemino."

He demonstrated the shape a few times then actually cast the spell twice, took a self-inking quill out and uncapped it then etched two silver runes on the two sheets. "This rune will keep them from degrading."

"Thanks!" Harry said then went back to finish writing his letters.

The first paragraph was just that he had been placed in Gryffindor.

He started Licorice's letter first.

The first day of classes was pretty fun. All the students who used a P-WAND to practice did really well compared to those who didn't so make sure you practice with yours, okay?

There are a lot of new professors and more are coming next year, they say.

Planning on making more of that salty licorice soon? I have only one piece left from my birthday batch.

He wrote a few more things then signed and folded it. He put her name on it then flipped it back over and placed a pair of red and gold ribbons over the flap and dripped violet wax on it then pressed his Potter and Black rings into it.

His letter to Tonks asked about how her first day of training went and if she planned to spend Christmas in Australia with them then he did the same, also using the TONX ring on the black wax he used for her letter.

His letter to Sirius wasn't much longer except he added that he needed a half dozen or so P-WANDS to sell to students who wanted one.

With his letters done and Sirius's sealed with scarlet wax—Harry made a note to buy regular wax instead of charmed wax, the random colors were annoying—and headed down to send his letter.

As soon as he got close to the owlery, Hedwig flew right towards him.

"Hey, this letter goes to Sirius. I'll send these others with school owls."

She glared him into submission and he took a step back. "Fine, you can take 'em all!"

He got her harness on—a silver torc with leather strips that made up a vest design with a pouch connected—then he flung her up into the air.

"She keeps you in your place," an older girl with Ravenclaw tartan ribbons in her hair. "I'm Sarah Millicant. Can I get your autograph for my little sister? Her name's Greer."

"Oh, uhh, sure?"

She opened her stationery set and took out a picture of him at the station for the Hogwart's Express the day before she had clipped from that morning's Daily Prophet. He signed it and she thanked him then headed off. "This is going to be the best christmas gift ever."

Harry shook his head then headed down the tower and back into the school.

In the common room, he smiled as he watched Ron and Neville teach Hermione and Sophie exploding snap.

He said goodnight and headed up to bed.

As soon as he closed his curtains, the Keeper and two other Darklings appeared at his beckoning.

"You're to reco—how do I say it?"

"Re-con-noi-ter," the Keeper replied.

"Yes, that, the school for recreating the map. From three in the morning until four. The Headmaster said that's the best time. He also wants you to report any areas that need repair."

The two Darklings nodded, gave a Roman salute, then jumped up into the shadowy area of the canopy on his bed.


Harry stood with the girls bracketing him and Ron and Neville outside them and the rest of Gryffindor surrounding them in an unconscious c shape.

Neville was fiddling with the remembrall he had received that morning as they waited, trying to remember what he had forgotten. Harry had been a little surprised at breakfast it didn't magically tell him what he had forgotten but the twins had explained it was there to improve one's memory, not be the memory.

Hermione had suggested keeping a list of things he needed to do, offering to help him make the list and Neville accepted the idea.

The twins had asked if that didn't negate the purpose of the remembrall. Hermione had replied that repetition builds memory better than just trying to remember.

Harry shook it off as Madam Hooch came out, carrying two bundles of brooms. "Sadly, we have to use the old brooms one last year before our new ones arrive. Nimbus has elected to build new brooms for the school expressly for this class at a great discount. So," she said, putting them down, one bundle on the Slytherin side and the other on the Gryffindor side, "collect a broom, place it on the grass beside you on your wand side, and wait."

She walked along, giving some encouragement to those who looked nervous before moving to the side.

"You will first tell the broom to rise to your optimum height, you will wait until I tell you to then you will mount, then once more wait."

"Up," Harry said.

His broom instantly rose.

He noticed Sophie's did as well while Hermione's shuddered. Neville's did nothing while Ron's rose a little bit then fell back.

They kept trying until finally Ron's and Hermione's rose. "You have to want it, I think," Sophie said softly to Neville.

Eventually, all students had raised their brooms and their instructor began looking at their grip, changing how they held them for most save Harry—who had dreams of other Wielders flying to fall back on, Ron who had older brothers who taught him, a few purebloods, and one halfblood. Harry found it especially amusing to see Draco get told off for an improper grip after all his bragging about flying.

Neville, nervous as always, somehow accidentally took off. Harry presumed it was due to the broom more than thoughtlessness, though.

Less than a second later he had fallen and Harry heard the crack of a forearm breaking. He had found after all the dreams of Wielders encouraging cooperation and being injured themselves, he could reliably identify broken bones by the sound of the break.

Hooch told them to stay where they were as she escorted him to the Hospital Wing.

Moments later, Draco saw the remembrall on the ground. "Look at what that baby left behind!"

Lavender told him to leave Neville alone and he mocked her for it as he scooped it up.

"Give me the remembrall," Harry said, heat in his voice.

"No, I think I'll leave it where he can find it." Draco took off on the broom.

Harry followed him into the air, intense feelings of the perfectness of flight threatening to overwhelm his desire to get the orb of his friend back.

Draco turned and saw Harry bearing down on him at speed.

Harry pulled up and held out his hand. "Now, Malfoy."

Malfoy sneered and threw the item at the castle.

Harry flew after it, catching it with one hand as his left foot pushed off the castle reorienting him towards the other students, just under a window he didn't notice Professor McGonagall standing at.

As he landed to claps of the Gryffindors, they heard "Mr. Potter!"

"Bugger!" Harry grunted.

~•~

Harry sat down for his detention with Professor McGonagall. She handed him a roll of parchment and a quill. "Write what I dictate. Head it to your godfather."

Harry nodded nervously.

Dear Sirius,

He looked up, waiting.

"Today I was selected as Seeker for the Gryffindor Quidditch team."

He stared at her in shock and she smiled, looking like a cat that ate a very hard to catch bird. "Well?"

Harry started writing.

~•~

The next day at breakfast, Harry received a large tube and a red letter. "Oh, no!" Ron said. "A howler!"

"What's a howler?" Hermione asked.

"It yells at you," Neville said as Harry hesitantly opened it.

"HELL YEAH!" Shook the whole Great Hall then the letter exploded into masses of fireworks, parts of them spelling out GO GRYFFINDOR! and POTTER 7!

"I'm older than my godfather," Harry muttered to Sophie and Hermione's great amusement.

"Well, possibly more mature," Hermione corrected.

The information of Harry being on the team was disseminated by the rest of the team as Harry and Ron peeked at his new broom in its carrying case.


The first month of school had been much like muggle school, Harry decided, only instead of everyone avoiding him due to Dudley, now everyone wanted to at least speak with him once save Malfoy, his bookends, and a few other Slytherins. Harry was polite and didn't rebuff the Death Eater spawns among them but didn't seek any of them out, allowing Ron to attempt to glare Slytherins away after a short while.

At breakfast on the first Sunday in October, Harry affixed a notice to the Gryffindor bulletin board while prefects in other houses did the same.

As soon as he stepped away and headed to the door, most students moved over to see what it said.

LAST 7 PROTOTYPE P-WANDS!

Want a chance at a P-WAND? A raffle ticket for a low numbered prototype is only 1 galleon, a significant savings!

To purchase a ticket, see Professor Flitwick or Professor Green. Drawing will be held after the winter leaving feast!

Hermione and Sophie and the other Muggleborns were immediately setup upon and bombarded with questions about the wands.

When Harry sat down for dinner next to Ron, he asked, "What does low numbered mean?"

"Ah, each one has a serial number on it just below the crystal."

Ron took his out and looked. "Oh. Number ten. Out of how many?"

"I think seventy-eight or seventy-nine prototypes were made."

"What number is yours?"

Harry shrugged. "It's in the dorm, I'll look later. But I don't think it has one."

"How many tickets can a person buy?" asked a Hufflepuff who walked over to them.

"As many as you want but if you win one, your other tickets won't get you a second," Harry said. "And if you spend more than seven galleons, you've kinda ripped yourself off 'cuz this summer we'll have them on sale and you can pimp them out with House colors or other looks."

The boy looked confused by the last but but nodded and went to spread the information while those closest to them moved down to pass on the news.

Hermione and Sophie joined them and Ron asked, "What numbers are yours?"

"Six," Sophie said.

"Mine is twelve."


The small group—Harry, Ron, Hermione, Sophie, and Neville—was still seated in the First Year Common Room, having finished a study group on Charms and Transfiguration. Hermione was editing Neville's spelling while Sophie and Ron played chess. Harry was just relaxing, wondering if the artificers Sirius had told him and Tonks about could really make a Walkman—or better, his boombox—work in Hogwarts. Their work was technically illegal in Britain due to the misuse of muggle artifacts laws but at the same time, Harry had a writ from the International Confederation of Magicals that allowed them to circumvent those laws. But not for selfish uses.

But testing on a small scale, he thought to himself. Would that be violating?

He opened his ideas notebook and wrote it down. Hogwarts was at three ley lines and had over a millenia of magic users in it. If it worked here, it would work anywhere.

"What's that?" Hermione asked.

"It's my ideas for things to do after school. Okay, I talked to Sirius last night and he suggested I start a project. Something cool, unique, maybe something that I can market or at least use. Want to make it a group project?"

The girls and Neville nodded, Hermione quite eagerly while Ron nodded, unsure.

"It's Monday so on Friday after class let's come back and we can discuss our ideas."

~•~

Friday after class found the group sitting at the same table, waiting on Hermione and Neville. They arrived a few minutes later than planned.

"I forgot my books in the Greenhouse."

Harry nodded, taking his notebook out and uncapping his quill. "Any ideas?"

"A CD player that works here?" Sophie suggested.

"That would break the law," Hermione said.

"Not exactly," Harry said, "if we could create a device that could read CDs magically. But that would be really hard."

"A CD holds music on it," Hermione explained for the purebloods. "Like records but they hold an hour of music instead of twenty minutes per side and are much smaller."

Hermione was flipping through a book, grumbling. "None of the books in this school have indexes or adequate appendices."

"That's an idea," Harry breathed, having thought the same thing.

"What do you mean?" Neville asked.

"What are the books with everything in them but short?"

"Dictionaries?" Sophie asked. "Or encyclopedias," Hermione added.

Harry nodded. "Encyclopedias. That's the one. It's not something for us but…," he trailed off as he wrote.

They waited, Hermione going back to what she had been looking for while Sophie went back to writing lyrics and Ron took out his chocolate frog cards and had Neville quiz him on the information on the back.

"Okay, done," Harry said. "Sorry but the idea was too good. We get a bunch of experts together and they take every book in every field, get it down to the easiest to understand writing, then publish a different book for every field of magic."

"Encyclopedia Of Magic?" Hermione suggested. "Encyclopedia Magicka," Sophie suggest at the same time.

"I wrote down Encyclopedia Arcane. Or arcana? My handwriting is horrible," he groaned. "Anyway, the name can wait. I'll ask Sirius and Remus what they think of it.

"Any other ideas?" Harry asked as he put bits of colored spellotape on those pages so he could quickly find them.

"We were talking about my brother's auror bag," Ron said, gesturing at Neville. "His dad had one but he can't use it because it's locked only to him. What if we made our own?"

Harry breathed in, his cheeks pink, excited. "Yes!" His grandfather had explained them before and making one for himself was on his list.

"Auror bag?" Sophie asked.

"They're like regular satchels but they have sorting charms, multiple flaps, undetectable expansion charms, switching charms, changing charms, they're just super useful," Neville said.

"What's an auror?" she asked.

"The police," Harry said, writing in his book. "But like the gun carrying ones, not a bobby. My dad was one with my godfather and Neville's dad. His journal said that your dad was very good."

Neville nodded, looking at Harry a little surprised. "C-could I see it?"

"Yeah. I'll ask Sirius to make a copy for you, he mentions your mum and dad a few times. Some of the stuff in it is about my mum, though, so I'll leave that out. He wrote poetry about my mum."

Sophie and Hermione exploded into giggles at Harry's tone of shock.

"I'll write Bill a letter and see if he can tell us what spells are on them," Ron said.

"Tell him I say hi."

Ron nodded as he started writing.

~•~

A week later, Harry got packages. Inside the largest box was a hopper, hundreds of cards, markers, and stacks and stacks of cards. Instead of saying Bingo, they had MAGIC across the top and used runes instead of numbers. Harry grinned.

The second box had three copies of Battlewizards for the Common Room and a note saying more copies had been sent to the school and professors to go in the other common rooms. He saw one big change had been made. Instead of two colors of pegs, Sirius wrote they changed color to signify hits magically. Setting those aside, he opened the last box. A high end Battlewizards set for himself with another change. One side was specifically for him while the other half of the game was set to be usable by anyone. The high end models were like chess sets with a wizard—or in Harry's case, a witch that looked like a cheerleader and bounced around like one with a Californian accent—designed to be used by one person specifically and a rename to the game: Battlemages. He picked up the other cases and saw parquet insets that said BATTLEMAGES in contrasting wood to the dark purple-black wood used for the case.

He placed it in his wardrobe and left the three for the dorm out for the house-elves to place downstairs then flicked his wardrobe to desk mode and sat down to write. Licorice had a number of questions about Hogwarts he had to answer before she released her hostage of a large bag of her candies.

"Bill wrote!" Ron said excitedly as he burst into the room. "And it's good news!"

Harry turned in his seat. "Oh?"

"Lemme go get the girls," Neville said from behind him.

After a little bit, they heard a siren sound and rushed out to see what it was. Neville was lying at the bottom of the girls' stairs that were now a slide.

As Dean was helping him up, Professors McGonagall and Green arrived. "What happened?"

"Neville tried to go up the stairs," a third year girl said then giggled. More girls also giggled.

"I was trying to tell Sophie and Hermione that we're ready to discuss our project."

"Boys aren't allowed up the stairs," she said, touching her wand to the rail, causing the slide to turn back into stairs. "Next time I suggest asking a girl to pass a message." She chuckled. "Your father attempted the same but for wholly different reasons.

"Carry on children."

"What?" Sophie asked when the professors were gone.

Harry and the boys led the girls up to their room only to find a table had appeared that was big enough for them all with high backed chairs.

"Thank you," Harry said just in case. A house-elf must have been nearby when they originally discussed a meeting.

Sitting down, Ron read his letter aloud.

"'I had a spare bit of time and began studying my bag.'"

Then he remembered the larger words and passed it to Hermione.

"'In commercial products, a certain type of spell is used called a spellmaster hex. When used, it creates a type of matrix in the item where a person can study an item and learn if there are any harmful spells, essentially disassembling something magically without harming it but won't remember the spells used later nor can they write them down. Your friend Harry has a bit of training in this but he's not ready to disassemble artifacts yet.

"'Interestingly, the bag I own doesn't have this spell. Nor does about a third of the bags of other cursebreakers I work with. Therefore, here is a list of every charm, hex, jinx, runic array, and and a couple curses used to make the bag as well as the potions and products used.'

"'If you're going to try to make a product for sale, remember to use the spellmaster incantation too. Harry knows that spell already.'"

She looked at the next three pages. "There's just a personal message on the last page to you Harry."

She passed it over and Harry looked at it then smiled. It was a reminder that Harry still owed Bill a piece of Licorice's licorice.

"Okay, let's break down the list and we can all research the spells—" he had only included the names, not the actual incantations "—and parts and then figure out how to make a prototype," Harry said.

Hermione nodded. "Sophie and I will do the spell research. Neville, the plants parts?" He nodded. "Ron, the fabric research?"

"Sure. And I could look up the runes too." He had not realized how well he knew them until Neville reminded him that he had been studying them on chocolate frog cards for years. Underneath each bio was a rune from the three most common alphabets and its name and common and uncommon uses.

"If you're doing the runes, how about you do the fabrics, Harry?"

He nodded. "Perfect. We can meet again on the first of November." Two weeks. "Should be enough time to learn a bit.

"Now I gotta go, Professor Dumbledore wanted to talk to me."

Hermione passed out the list of things each needed to learn as Harry left the room.

"Why did Dumbledore want him?" Sophie asked as Dean walked into the room.

"The Headmaster's helping his godfather buy something," Ron replied.

In the Headmaster's office, Harry sat and waited.

"Apologies," the Headmaster said as he entered the office. "There was an incident in the Forbidden Forest. Tomorrow Sirius wished to know if you wanted to visit the potential site for your businesses?"

"Can I?"

"Yes."

"I'll just shadowstep home then. Oh, we're all working on a project. Where should I look up what fabrics to use in magic stuff?"

"For robes?"

"For an auror satchel. Bill checked his and whoever made it didn't use the spellmaster hex so we have all the spells to use!"

"Ah, in the housekeeping section in the library. And then the books on pelt animals. Is this a field you're interested in?"

"No. At least I don't think so. But as a project to just make our own? Fun."

He nodded. "I've always found self-directed goals taught me so much more than school ever did. That doesn't mean to stop paying attention in class, though. I myself set three goals a year and accomplished fifteen of them before I finished school."

Harry grinned. "What time should I go tomorrow?"

"After breakfast."

~•~

Harry attempted to shadowstep into his room and saw a flash of blinding light before being thrown roughly back into the small office his grandfather was using.

"Windows open?" Charlus asked.

"There was a bright light."

"Windows open," he confirmed. "Call for Sinister to close the curtains in your room."

"Sinister, Service!"

They waited for a few minutes then she appeared. "Master Harry is not to be calling Sinister while at school!" she reminded him sharply as she continued stirring a bowl of something.

"The curtains in my room are open. It needs to be dark in my room."

"Oh! Sinister was airing out Master Harry's room!" She apparated away.

When Harry appeared this time, the only light was from the candles that sputtered to life at his presence.

"Sirius?" he called out as he left his room.

"Sitting room," he heard called back.

He found Sirius reading the Prophet and Remus reading the Guardian as soft music played.

"Are we going now?"

"As soon as the car arrives," Remus said. "We hired Mr. Wallace. His disability seems of no issue to us."

"Okay," Harry said and flopped down on his favorite seat, a huge white shaggy marshmallow beanbag. It was horribly out of place in the sitting room Andromeda had furnished with antiques that would have cost Sirius obscene amounts of money if they had not been items already owned by Sirius's family.

Sirius put down the Prophet. "How are classes?"

"Fun. We decided on a project. Auror satchels."

"Harry Potter branded satchels would sell incredibly well," Remus said, letting the paper droop so he could look at Harry.

Harry nodded. "Sophie and Hermione are looking up the spells, Ron's going to look at the runes, Neville's doing the plant stuff, and I have to research the cloth and leather."

"And how is your… more esoteric training going?" Remus asked.

"Eso-what?"

"Advanced, specialized, only understood by a few people. Specifically your Wielding," Sirius said.

"Oh! Mostly dreams still, practicing getting the spells right with my P-WAND. I've been trying to visualize the perfect form for my Darklings but they're still all blobby."

"Perhaps armouring them?" Remus suggested.

"Oh," Harry thought. A horde of foot tall Iron Men and War Machines greatly intrigued him. And once he understood the workings of guns, they would as well.

His thoughts were disrupted by the knock at the door then Sinister announcing Wallace into the room. Harry scribbled the armour idea in his notebook then scrambled after the adults.

~•~

Harry had expected them to purchase an old warehouse or a few floors in a high-rise somewhere. This was a castle, bigger than Hogwarts.

The old woman waiting for them shook Sirius's and Remus's hands and nodded at Harry, recognition blooming in her eyes.

"Dumbledore Castle is—"

"Professor Dumbledore has a castle‽" Harry exclaimed.

She laughed. "It's called Dumbledore Castle because of the stone it's clad with. Black stone with yellow veins. Dumbledore is another word for bumblebee."

"Oh," Harry said, a little disappointed. "Malfoy always talks about manors and I know the Bones have an old Manor in Wales and the Potters had three places at one time. I thought maybe all old families did."

"The Blacks used to have a nice defensible chateau but mother bullied father into selling it to help fund You-Know-Who. Now we just have the London place for when the Wizengamot was in session. Dumbledore possibly has or had a large home. I should probably drop by Grimmauld Place and evaluate for selling," Sirius mused aloud to the woman perking up. "Anyway, condition of the castle?"

"You'll need to get the dwarves in to shore up the foundation and hire the goblins to redo the charms and hexes protecting the place and a dozen or so holes in the roof need repaired. And new cladding in a lot of spots. It's why it's selling for so little. Only thirty thousand. It's safe enough to go in but I'd suggest bubblehead charms in case of mold and the like. And not to let Mr. Potter explore on his own.

"And if you do elect to sell your place, I have the lowest commissions in England!"

"I'll owl you with our offer if we decide to go ahead." Sirius had no plan to spend 30,000 galleons on a building needing as much work as this castle did. The craftwork would cost another 40,000 easily.

Once she was gone, Sirus waved his wand to check the door and nodded. Remus opened it and Harry summoned an obscene amount of Darklings. "A full map of the place."

They gave Roman salutes then rushed off as the Keeper began drawing.

"Your cartography skills are incredible," Remus said, watching him work.

"The fourth Wielder taught the Scribe." His Lightling counterpart. "He was more of an explorer than a curse-breaker, letting others explore the ruins he found."

After twenty minutes, they set out to look the place over.

"I like this room," Harry said. The walls, even rotting as they were, revealed it once had incredibly detailed carvings depicting stories of magical events. "If they can be properly restored, this would be a great library."

"Speaking of libraries. The Encyclopedia Arcana idea?" Remus said. "It is brilliant. We spoke with various Master level wizards and they want to partake."

"It was mostly Hermione's idea," Harry said. She had added a lot of ideas to his initial idea.

"This castle, especially if we have various other things like an Encyclopedia being written, well it's a perfect cover for my intelligence network," Sirius said.

j"The castle is so massive you could hide every magical only settlement in the world inside it," Wallace said, surprising them all. "Sorry, but you wanted me to remind you when it's lunchtime."

Harry looked over to the corridor the Keeper had been working in but from where he stood, he couldn't see him.

"Ah, right. Let's see what Sinister packed for lunch," Remus said.

How big is the castle exactly?" Harry asked as he picked up a piece of fried chicken and looked at the castle from where they sat on a safe section of the outer wall, nearly two hundred feet up.

"Each of the seven sides is nearly twenty four hundred feet long," Sirius said, reading from the parchment. "The main tower is two hundred feet taller than the building—it's almost twelve hundred feet—with the three next being twenty feet shorter but their spires are the same height as the main tower. The seven residential towers at the corners of the building are fifty feet taller. Those will make great research offices, I think. The main tower would be our offices and administration," he suggested. "The three towers could be the intelligence offices while the first floor and the second of the castle is research for the encyclopedia."

"How much is the refurb gonna cost?" Harry asked.

"Don't worry," Sirius said.

Harry pulled out his notebook, making notes.

Done with that, Harry asked, "Why is her cold fried chicken better than the school's hot fried chicken?"


The night came that Harry had been dreading for some time.

He knelt in a hendecagon, drawn with the blood of a freshly killed dragonling—the runt of the clutch, its magical power more concentrated. Inside the hendecagon, a septacle, made of freshly made charcoal, Harry's own blood, and seven desanctified salts was painted around a nearly foot thick three by five meter pelt of giant skin.

Placed upon that were more items, clustered in groups of five.

Harry picked up a brush loaded with dried bicorn blood, blackened powdered silver, and griffin albumen and began drawing upon his naked body runic symbols he had practiced nearly every night since school had begun.

The Keeper nodded as Harry painted with sure strokes.

The last two symbols were drawn on Harry's eyelids carefully—all three ingredients were unpleasant in the eye, and his armour began to form, undulating and disappearing as it attempted to cover the runes but failed.

Harry whimpered in pain as the Darkness fought against the controlling runes, attempting to break free of its mortal master.

His eyes began to glow a chilling purple and a scent of lavender and sulfur filled the air as the power strained, sending him to his knees in pain.

Nascent potential power began flowing differently, now directed from his mind to his arms.

The Dark Arms themselves formed, corporeal manifestations of the Darkness, undulating skeletal snake forms headed by the skull of a deformed looking deep sea creature, snapping at each other then turning their baleful glare on the Wielder.

Even in his great pain, Harry's mind pushed him to force his will on the arms, dissipating them and shoving the power into the pelt and the items upon it.

The pelt began to come apart like croissant dough as it was sliced into 20x16 inch sheets of parchment.

Unicorn sinew and goblin fang came together and began to sew the parchment together as the hair flashed away in blinding white flames while gold foil sealed the parchment after the vampire blood dyed the parchment black.

The other ingredients began to mold themselves around the leaves of giant parchment, becoming foils, dyes, and the leather binding upon a pair of stones laminated by centaur glue.

A feather from a dire owlbear, a firesac from a veela, liquified gold, and a prepubescent vampire's fang compacted together into a black and gold quill, its ink cavity eterna-filled with the blood of fae.

Laying before a nearly unconscious kneeling Harry lay his Book of Shadow, literally. Until it was placed upon the shelf of the previous Wielder's Books of Shadow, it was little more than a thick rectangle of heavy smoke.

A loud crack resounded and Harry collapsed in a dead faint, the stone around him cracking in a spider's web.

The door slammed open and Sirius, the headmaster, and Charlus rushed in.

"Was that supposed to happen?"

"Sirius, get him to the hospital wing. He'll need some skelegro and some muscle rebuilder," Charlus ordered as Albus stepped aside to let the Keeper retrieve the tome.