Harry carefully carried his broom down to the Great Hall and sat with his friends but ate nothing. His throat was too dry and he felt like vomiting as he watched Ron devour enough for both of them.

The twins came over to give him words of encouragement and he nodded at them, not really sure what the two said.

Eventually Wood came over and collected Harry, leading him out, giving him a bit of a pep talk that Harry didn't hear.

Inside the boy's side of the Gryffindor changing room he dressed quickly, wondering if the girls were changing as well, remembering his accidental viewing of them the last practice when one of the twins shoved him into the girls' side of the locker room. Angelina had wrapped her towel around herself, winked at him then said, "come back when you're a fifth year and i'll give you a show. And maybe a little more." He turned bright red as he stammered apologies and excuses about the twins pushing him in then fled, the laughter of the girls following him as the twins asked if he saw anything good.

He flushed again as he remembered it, remembering fighting down the terror afterwards. He had expected the three to prank him but instead they had just lightly teased him then all three kissed his cheek as he froze.

Harry shook his head slightly to clear it as Wood gave his pep speech for a few minutes. When they started out to the field, Wood stopped Harry as the first year moved out. "Get the snitch or die trying," he told the still dangerously impressionable child.

Harry swallowed the lump in his throat and nodded carefully.

~•~

The match started in nasty weather, rain and a strong wind had blown in during the time they got ready.

Even with the torrential downpour, the Slytherins were able to run the score up to 120 to 90 once Katie was sidelined due to a bludger being repeatedly aimed for her.

Harry, pressing his broom to its utmost ability, decided to forget about the snitch and instead began dive-bombing the Beaters.

His third dive was interrupted by lightning and a flash of gold, hiding next to the Slytherin keeper.

Harry leaned down, cutting down on wind resistance as he tried to line his foot up with the Keeper.

His two-fold plan mostly worked. His hand clasped around the snitch and his boot slammed into the Slytherin's jaw, knocking him around roughly.

But Harry's boot was caught and it forced him into a three-gravity turn that had him catch the hoop with his waist, sending him cartwheeling.

Professor McGonagall and Madam Hooch caught Harry by transfiguring a tree into a massive angled air mattress and an impediment spell—respectively, slowing him and changing his trajectory—it wasn't the first time the two had worked to slow an out of control quidditch player. Hooch was the first to arrive.

"Gryffindor wins!" Hooch called out after blowing her whistle as she knelt down, checking him over more thoroughly than her original cursory examination. The Gryffindor team and the staff began surrounding them.

~•~

Harry awoke in the Hospital Wing to find Sirius once more sleeping in a chair, a tray covered with various candies and cards, and a CONGRATULATIONS banner with a drawing of him kicking the Slytherin sleeping across from him.

Madam Pomfrey came in and awoke the Slytherin.

Harry was surprised to see him smile at Harry as he rubbed his jaw.

When he was let go, he stopped to say, "Really good tactic but next time? Go for the guts. If they're vomiting, they're out of the game and humiliated at vomiting on themselves instead of just humiliated for getting out. Next time, Potter. Want the tooth you knocked out as a trophy?" He asked, dropping it on Harry's bedcover.

Madam Pomfrey rolled her eyes. "Children." She gave an in-delicate snort and pronounced the Slytherin well enough to leave then once the boy was gone, turned to Harry.

"Shirt up. Let's do a quick checkup for parasites since I've got you here then you can go up to the dorms, I'll have Cappy pop your gifts up to your dorm room when you go."

After she was done, Sirius walked him up to the dorm. "Ron gave me a play-by-play. As your honorary uncle, I'm very proud of you. As the person your mum and dad entrusted to make sure you grow up safely, fly safer! Your mum is going to have words with me and her words were always sharp. But keep winning!"

Harry grinned.

He gave Harry a hug then Harry opened the door to the common room. A party was going on and as soon as Harry stepped through, a bottle of butterbeer was placed in his hand and a Gryffindor Quidditch flag draped over his shoulders. Katie Bell gave him an accidental peck on the lips—he turned his head into her kiss when someone distracted him—for his dive-bombing the Slytherin beaters which turned him rather red and set the teasing on both of them.

When the party was near its end, Harry went up to his dorm room and added the Slytherin's tooth to a small tray then asked, "Who's he again?"

The Keeper flipped the dossier open. "Marcus Silverfang. A halfblood from France whose father had been killed by Death Eaters for marrying a muggleborn and not supporting them. His last year."

"So probably not a worry," Harry muttered.

"And bonus, new trophy that you can actually show off!" the Keeper said. "Shall I have a Lightling craft a new fitting for it to wear as a necklace? Or perhaps a setting for a ring? It would look good on a thumb ring, Master. a human tooth would be good luck." The skull, skeleton, and hide were decorating his personal lounge in the Redoubt. Each Wielder had their own lounge though most Wielders moved an item or two from another lounge into their own, leaving replicas of the original item as a static display. Harry had yet to do anything so his Lounge had a utahraptor skin rug, the bones rewired to look like they should, and the skull sitting on the fireplace mantle was from some sort of Plesiosaurus his grandfather had told him.

"How is a human tooth good luck?"

"Adora Belle Deerhart's On Adornments, page 312," the Keeper said. "The Potter library has a copy but so should Hogwarts."

Harry chuckled and dropped onto his bed.

The rest of his dormmates began arriving as he stared up at the canopy of the bed, wondering who had enchanted a mirror onto it. Sirius had mentioned it had been on there since at least the seventies but had been in a different year's room.

He liked the idea that this dorm was theirs for the seven years but felt sorry for first years next year when they'd have the highest floor as their dorm room for the next seven years.

"Harry, wanna play Battlemages?" Neville asked.

"Tomorrow after homework?" Their little group always met up with the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff first years in the First Year Common Room and all studied together after classes ended until dinner though Harry occasionally had practice instead. Some Slytherins also came, mostly Greengrass and Davis or Nott and Zabini, both pairs of people who avoided Malfoy and his little group of his bookends and Parkinson.

Neville nodded.

"Whose tooth is that?" Dean asked, noticing it as he picked up the tablet he had left on the shelf on Harry's desk.

"Silverfang's. He gave it to me as a trophy."

"Really?"

Harry nodded. "He suggested I go for gut hits so they vomit," he said as he sat up. "He seems nice enough."

"But he's a Slytherin!" Ron said.

"So is Aunt Andi and you love her cookies," Harry said. She was rather insistent on being called Auntie Andi pronounced to rhyme but Harry refused to do that when she wasn't around, pronouncing aunt Ont. "It's if they're purebloodists we need to worry, not their house."

Ron closed his mouth. "Really? But she married a muggleborn!"

Harry yawned. "Going to take a shower."


Harry closed his homework—Hermione had set out notes and the like for him to follow since he missed the meet due to practice—then turned and looked around the armoury. It had very little in it save a few targets and a box of treats the Tonkses had sent him—the weapons were all in an anteroom stacked and stored in oil clothes to protect them.

He pulled his satchel on and picked up the box then whistled to get Hedwig's attention. "I'm going back to the dorm now. G'night."

She flew towards him and circled him three times then flew towards the open window.

Harry shadowstepped to the small room beside the stairwell to the Headmaster's office—a suggestion by the Headmaster to ensure his privacy—then headed back to Gryffindor tower.

In the common room he sat down and Hermione asked, "Did you finish your homework? Want me to check it?"

"Yes. Meh," he replied then held out the tin of halloween candies. The little pumpkins cackled once they were picked up and didn't stop making lame jokes until you ate them while the skeletons drawn on the chocolate bars danced little jigs and the candy corn was on an actual candy cob that regrew the corn when you took it off until the enchantment wore off, usually after week or so Andi had written. Harry had already shucked it enough times he had a pillowcase full of candy corn. More to see if she was correct than a lust for the candy. Until he had tasted it. It was much better than muggle candy corn.

"Thank you," she said as she took a pumpkin.

Harry smirked as she took great relish in biting it in half to shut it up.

"What did you have for dinner?" Sophie asked as she sat down. She had left dinner early to finish a letter home. "I got sushi!"

"Some kind of pasta," Harry said. "With layers of veggies and stuff. Kinda like lasagna."


At breakfast the next morning, Harry was absentmindedly building a sandwich—due to a dream of the ninth Wielder who had spent decades in Norway and was used to breakfast sandwiches—and turned when the twins called his name.

"Huh?"

"Your breakfast is really tall," one said.

Harry looked and realized he had a waffle on the bottom then a sausage patty, a pancake, a fried egg, a slice of french toast, some scrambled eggs, another pancake, bacon, a slice of jam covered toast, and hash. "Oh."

"Ooh, breakfast sandwich contests!" one suggested.

The other twin nodded. "But we must have rules. Ease of eating."

"Presentation!"

"Taste sensation!"

"All meals!"

Harry tuned them out. As long as whatever they did didn't hit him, he didn't care. Instead, he looked for a Hufflepuff. When he saw the right one, he flicked his paper airplane. It went up high, doing loop-the-loops and barrel rolls until it reached the ceiling then flipped downwards and went ballistic.

It stuck in the girl's hair and she reached up. She looked around, annoyed as she opened it then she began laughing. The girl turned to Harry and gave a thumbs up then showed her friends who all giggled.

"What was that?" Hermione asked, somewhat disapprovingly.

Harry disassembled his sandwich tower into smaller ones. "Her parents run that game and toy shop in Diagon Alley. I was asking her if she has any of their catalogues I could have."

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Why didn't you just ask her?"

"Because the girls in Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff giggle every time I try to talk to them," he replied in an exasperated tone that made Hermione, Sophie, and all the girls in earshot giggle and Harry scowl as the older boys laughed at him.

One fifth year boy looked like he was about to say something to Harry but the fifth year girl prefect shook her head, grinning.


Harry closed the box and thanked professors Flitwick and Vector.

"It'll be tonight in our common room. Then if it goes well, I thought maybe in the Great Hall after dinner on Saturdays?"

"I expect a full report," Flitwick said. "And I'll speak with the prefects as well."

Harry nodded and thanked them again as Flitwick put a spell on the box to give it wings for an hour and a compulsion to follow Harry instead of the boy having to carry it through the castle again.

He walked out and found Sophie waiting. "What're you doing here?"

"Waiting to talk to Professor Flitwick. I didn't understand why the spell worked even though I mispronounced it in class."

"That's easy enough to explain," Professor Vector said as she followed Harry out. "The words and movement are just a codification, a way to make sure you are thinking the right effect you want. Those practice wands have you study the spell before you started school so you have a head start in a way."

"Quite," Professor Flitwick said. "As time goes on, as you are more learned and know what you want your magic to do, it will do it. But if you only think you know what you want, then the magic will fail."

"But you said saying that one spell wrong made a buffalo land on someone."

"Hyperbole. A type of joke. To make people pay attention and not fool around. The spells we start out teaching with rarely have dangerous effects when mispronounced."

"Oh."

Harry had decided to wait and walk her back to the common room, so now they were on their way, the box flitting around, reminding Harry of the puppy their neighbor had gotten their daughter. It gamboled around madly following the girl around.

"Why would they tell us a lie?"

"It's the same as your parents telling you not to swim after eating, I guess," Harry said.

"You can swim after you eat‽"

"I went diving after eating," Harry said. "Using gillyweed so I didn't need to surface for an hour!" He explained the use of it and how he had swam the barrier reef and she stared at him in awe.

"I want to do that!"

"Maybe you could come with us for a few days in the summer. Even though it's winter time there, I think, it's really nice. And the island we stayed on is private. I know my friend is going with us for a week or two. There's enough space we could easily invite you, Hermione, Neville, Ron, and Tonks if she has time off from training."

When they got back to the common room Sophie went to change while Harry placed the box on a table. "Stay."

It ignored him and tried to follow. A sixth year looked over from where she sat, reading. "Problem?"

"It's still trying to follow me."

She chuckled as she stood. Her wand out, she showed him a simple sticking charm, telling him it would last three hours at the most, and after a handful of tries, Harry got it stuck to the table. "Thanks!" He placed the note signed by Professor Flitwick telling students not to touch then went up to change for dinner.

Ron was sitting at Harry's desk, laboriously writing a letter. "Hey, I need to switch it to my wardrobe."

"Hu—oh, okay," he replied and moved to his bed, glaring at the letter.

"Who're you writing?" Harry asked as he stared at his shirt choices. He decided on a plain red shirt as Ron gave up and tossed the letter aside.

"My sister. Mum said I had to write every month telling her what school is like. But this month is like last month."

"Make stuff up," Harry suggested as he tapped his wand to his charmed laces. They tied themselves as he picked up his overrobes.

"Eh. I'll finish it later. Going down for dinner?"

Harry nodded.

~•~

Sophie and Hermione moved apart and Harry sat down between them while Ron sat a few places down, by Percy who had pointed at Ron then the seat next to himself. "What's this meeting about?" Ron asked.

"Wanna come up here, Harry?" Persephone, the seventh year prefect, asked. "This is your thing after all."

Harry stood and turned to the students. "Okay, so Sirius sent some—huh, all S words."

"Alliteration," Hermione said. "When all words start the same."

"Assonance is when they all sound alike," a helpful upper year said. A couple first and second years giggled at the word.

Harry nodded. "Fine, uh, so Sirius sent this. It's a game for groups." He opened the box and the cards flew out, stacking themselves, the box of markers then leapt out, a large poster floated up and waited behind Harry, and finally, the hopper jumped out, its crystal balls chiming with delightfully warm tones.

"Anyway, this game is called MAGIC. It's a game of chance for a large group—"

"Is this like Bingo?" a muggleborn asked.

"Yes," Harry said. The muggleborns all nodded, the younger ones looking excited.

Harry had them pass around the cards and once everyone had one, he decided it would be easier to lead them through a game than just describing it. "So it's a very easy game. We played it in Melbourne," Harry said, not mentioning it was with muggles. "The caller—that'll be me for today—will draw a marble. the marble will have one of the letters from magic on it and a rune. That letter and rune will appear on this board so you can easier match it if you haven't taken Runes. The runes on the cards are random so if you do have the peorth rune but it's under I, not under the M, you can't mark it.

"So, let's give a game a go."

Harry spun the hopper then reached in and drew out a ball as the last of the markers were passed out.

A few minutes later, Sophie jumped up excitedly "BING—err, I mean MAGIC!"

Harry checked her card. "Excellent!" He handed her a stack of seven galleon sized chocolate coins.

"So, that's how it's done. Now, normally, the cost of two cards is one knut and the prize will be some sort of chocolate gift box or some sort of amusing magic trinket except the last game of the night where it'll be bigger. Who would like this to be a game that we play once a week or month in the Great Hall after dinner?"

Everyone raised their hands and excited whispers burst out.

"Very good," came professor Flitwick's voice and he stepped out of of the concealing magic he had placed on himself. "I'll have a quick word with Al—the headmaster and the others but unless there's major issues, you should be okay for a weekly game on Saturdays after dinner."

Harry thanked the professor as Hermione collected the cards, studying the runic arrays on the back. "What do those do?"

"Anti-cheating, cleaning, and randomizing once they go back in the box," Harry said. "Remus designed them. We're opening MAGIC halls in Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade and if those go over well, we'll have MAGIC nights in various pubs around the country with themes. You guys want some butterbeer?"

His group of friends nodded and Harry handed Ron a handful of sickle and a knut to get the butterbeers from the machine.

Sophie and Hermione helped him pack the stuff away as Neville asked, "Do you think a plant version could be done?"

Harry nodded. "Remus had ideas for lots of versions. He's gonna send them as time goes on."

"Who's gonna call them?" Hermione asked.

"Huh?"

"You know, call the numbers and stuff? Are you going to?" Sophie asked.

"Oh, no. Professor Babbling is. She was really excited about something that might get more people interested in Runes. And she said she's gonna play it in class occasionally."

~•~

The next day Harry had to field dozens of questions from the other houses about the game. He told them all they could check it out easier on Saturday than him explaining it.

When Saturday finally rolled around, nearly every student was in the Great Hall for the first game of the evening.

By the end of the night after thirty games, Harry was chuckling as Ron walked back from his winning the final game with a wicker erumpent horn filled with enough candy to choke an actual erumpent.

Hermione accepted the chocolate frog he offered her while Harry was both disappointed he hadn't won a game and relieved as people might think it was rigged if he did.

Once everyone had left, except Harry and his friends and the professor, Harry sat down and unlocked the card dispenser then dumped the coins out. He took out three at a time, dumping two into a bucket with the Hogwarts crest on it while the third coin got dumped into a Crown Royale bag.

Finally, Harry put the last coin in. "Almost nine galleons," Hermione said and Harry nodded.

Ron blinked. "Wow!"

"Sadly, it all goes to Sirius," Harry said, sealing the bag shut. "I think that our three galleons almost covers the prizes."

"I'll mail that for you, Mr. Potter," Professor Vector said and Harry nodded. He tucked it into the Hogwarts bucket and handed them over then the group headed back to their dorm.

"Want a frog?" Ron asked Harry and Sophie.

Sophie shook her head as Harry said, "Tomorrow?"

Ron nodded.

Back in their common room, Harry nodded at the comments from other Gryffindors about how much fun they had and stopped to say loudly "If you have ideas about the game, write them down and let me see them at breakfast tomorrow," then turned and headed up to his dorm room.

He dropped onto his bed and wished he was nine or sixteen so they were on the first floor instead of the sixth floor of the dorms.

The other boys soon trudged in and they found Harry lying on his bed, reading a comic book. "Is that the new Batman?" Dean asked excitedly.

He nodded. "I'm almost done. My other comic books are all read, you can look them over."

Dean picked up the new Superman and X-Men comics as Ron sat at Harry's desk, trying to finish his letter home. His sister had had a hundred questions he had never even thought of asking his brothers about Hogwarts.

~•~

Harry returned from the showers to find Ron groaning. He had eaten enough candy to make him sick. Rolling his eyes, Harry pushed the rubbish can next to him then flopped onto his bed, burrowing under the covers and shedding his towel then pulling on the shorts he had left under the covers. the damp towel got flung out onto the floor.


Professor Sinistra smiled as she watched the first years stifling yawns and trudging away from the tower then she turned and saw someone had left a scarf behind. She picked it up and checked the tag. Sophie Ellis-Bextor's. She called for her house-elf and had her deliver it to her bed then finished making sure the room was clean of students' belongings.

~•~

Harry, not very tired after Astronomy class, studied the runes that permeated the knob dagger: Mann, Ac, Giefu, Isa, and Cen. Man, Oak, Gift, Ice, Torch. They spelled magic in English. But in Elder Futhark they spelled nothing. And yet, as an array, they worked to link enchantment arrays to other arrays instead of just using elhaz, the symbol for the Bifrost, in ways that made the spells more effective on some items.

This doesn't make any sense, Harry thought. Those links work on this but they won't work on other items!

He scowled and put it away, picking up his latest letter from Bill, a mass of protection spells that would alert him the moment Harry got them disassembled.

Harry slipped a cursepick from his bag, touching it to the paper, the cursepick causing the runes on the paper to shift when he pushed them away. He moved the array that prevented all other arrays from being tampered with and pressed the sneaky pete against those four. The ink began to bubble then evaporated away. The spell was gone, leaving the linking charms unlinked. Harry dropped the sneaky pete and the cursepick then wrote a simple spell, one that would slowly deteriorate over time then cast the spell on the page with his holly wand. "Vitiavisti," he muttered.

The page exploded in his face and Bill's laughter was loud for a moment before fading away.

Growling, Harry shoved his stuff into his satchel and closed his eyes tightly, trying to forget he had failed and fall asleep.

~•~

Bill chuckled when he saw his notebook flash red. Harry had failed his little test. He powered up the same sheet of magic and put it in an envelope then sent it off to join the outgoing mail. Maybe this time Harry will look for the invisible ink before starting, he thought, smirking.


Harry closed the book Hermione had lent him. It was more of a pamphlet—of new books available from Hermione's favorite muggle bookstore—but it discussed the various genres of books as well. Cyberpunk, magitek, and steampunk were his goals, he realized. He wanted to combine magic, computers, and mechanics into a bridge to magicals living on Mars.

"Thanks," he said as he handed the book back. "Magitek is a much better term than technomagery."

She looked in the book. "Oh, yeah, definitely. Shame it's illegal."

Harry nodded. "Though you can get a dispensation. That's how the Wireless came to be. The original was a real radio with some serious enchantment work to link it to another radio. They acted like a phone."

"How do you know that?"

"Remus told me," Harry said. "He was explaining how they worked. They had to get a pardon or something and there was a pretty big fine for messing with muggle stuff but the fact that Ampére ended up really rich and his family still owns the wireless stations."

"So there's no competition?"

Harry shrugged. "Maybe? I dunno. I'll ask Remus if you want."

She nodded and he wrote it down in his notebook.

"How far are you on your research?" Hermione asked.

"Completely done," Harry replied. His fabric research was complete and they had ordered the material for 100 satchels pre-cut and trimmed already save for the dragon skin. They were waiting for the next Opaleye dragon to be harvested. The reservation that maintained them had four coming up for harvest and they had promised to make sure the hide sold to Harry Potter would be as flawless as possible. They were very careful since Opaleye hide was, while not the rarest, the most versatile and therefore was the most sought after.

"What's the difference between hide and skin?" Hermione asked.

"Hide comes from the legs and belly where a dragon has plates of armour, skin comes from the rest of the body and wings where it's not got heavy plating and just has lighter scales. The thicker hide is to keep the body safe from the ground and stuff. The scales're almost completely clear and'll be shredded and used to help making the thread potion."

She nodded. "Is there anything we can use the plate for?"

"Another personal project," Harry said. He was paying for it all so it had been decided all components they didn't use were his. "Gonna use them to make buckler or a wankel shields with mine and Sirius's new family crest."

"You have a new crest?"

"He does. He hates Toujour Pur so he's branching a new family line if he ever has children and using Lux in Obscura. It means the Light in the Darkness."

"Oh. What's the Potter crest say?"

He did't tell her the Wielder's motto in absentia lucis, tenebrae vincunt but instead said, "Orbis non sufficit, I think? I don't know what it means, though." His grandfather had gotten distracted as they discussed it by something on the telly. He had an enormous crush on Lorraine Kelly and had asked Sirius to find out where she lived.

Hermione wrote it down. "I'll look it up. I think sufficit means sufficient or enough though."


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