NINE

'Where did you go?' Blaise complained as Harry slid into the waiting seat between himself and Theo. Harry was pleased that he held enough sway for there to be a waiting seat, but didn't comment.

'To the pet store. Morning girls.'

The group had doubled in his absence, and now everyone but Lillian was here. Lillian wouldn't be getting back from a trip to Northern France until only hours before the Hogwarts express left the next day, so they had settled in.

'Potter, I read the most outrageous article the other day.' Pansy greeted him.

Harry had been keeping up with the prophet despite Xeno's sarcastic remarks, and could guess which article she was referring to.

'Ah. Me and Sirius did not in fact invoke a duel to the death-'

'I should hope not.' Pansy interrupted.

'Mmm… Yes. Sirius is still alive after all.'

Pansy spluttered, obviously she hadn't thought Sirius would be the one dead.

'Did you meet Black?' Daphne spoke up for the first time.

Harry frowned internally. There was something off about her today. She seemed hostile, although it didn't seem to be towards him, and her tone wasn't aggressive, more curious.

'Yes. He chased me down at my relatives.'

'I thought you told me you couldn't be attacked there.'

Harry's eyes sparkled with mirth. 'You're right. I can't, especially not by Voldemort's men.'

A rather large wince collectively went around the table, but Harry ignored it. Daphne seemed to push past it too, honing in on the supposed paradox.

'But Black did attack and-'

'Does your mother really have an unfounded love for your father's sister?' Harry interrupted her.

Daphne snarled at him. 'That was a blatant lie! Skeeter is a pathetic attempt at what a reporter should be who-…' Daphne trailed off.

'Hmm.' Harry grinned.

'You are insufferable.' Daphne moaned. Laughter ran around the table.

'But Black really did turn up?' Draco pushed.

'Yes.'

Harry could see he was frustrating his fellow snakes with his non-answers, but that made it all the more fun.

'Mother was distressed.'

Harry had to try extra hard not to laugh now. Seems he had well and truly won over Narcissa.

'Well Sirius is her cousin.'

'And your Godfather.' Draco pointed out with a smirk.

Harry raised an eyebrow at him. Draco had sounded rather gleeful in announcing it, and Harry belatedly realised that Draco had been building up to a political attack with that. As far as Draco (and assumedly all the other Slytherins, judging by their sharp indrawn breath) was aware, Harry didn't know his Godfather had sold out his parents. Of course, it would fall rather flat, as it wasn't Harry without all the facts at all.

'Hmm, yes. The secret keeper too.'

This time Millie started choking on her milkshake, as she had been unfortunate enough to be drinking when Harry replied. Harry purposely only responded by one raised eyebrow at all the chaos his (lack of) response had caused.

'You knew!' Draco spluttered.

Harry turned on him. 'He is my Godfather.'

Draco glared at Harry, but Harry just ignored it, pretending to concentrate on scooping the remaining crushed peanuts from the caramel sauce on his plate. Apparently Draco couldn't catch a hint this morning.

'Of course, if it was me,' he said quietly, his thin mouth curving into a mean smile, 'I'd have done something before now. I wouldn't be sitting around like a good little boy, I'd be out there looking for him.

Draco seemed to pause, as if waiting for Harry to react. Harry didn't.

'Maybe you'd rather not risk your neck.' He pushed on, obviously thinking he'd had an effect on Harry. 'Want to leave it to the Dementors, do you? But if it were me, I'd want revenge. I'd hunt him down myself.'

Harry let the tiniest of cruel smiles dig at the corner of his lips. The Slytherin group had tensed completely, as Draco hadn't been even remotely subtle in his jibes. The political game had begun.

'Well.' Harry finally replied in a silky tone. 'If it were you, I hardly think it would matter. You'd be dead.'

'I am just as capable of fighting Black as you are.' Draco snarled. It had become so obvious that even a firsty Hufflepuff would have spotted the power plays, but Harry didn't lose composure at all.

'No doubt.' Harry drawled, even though he seriously did doubt it. 'But I wasn't doubting your ability to fight Black.'

'You just said-'

'No.' Harry cut him off. 'I was doubting your ability to survive his betrayal in the first place. After all, Daddy dearest was under imperio the whole time.' Harry let just the tiniest hint of sarcasm leak through then stealing a little from Bellatrix and adding a hint of a babying tone, but kept his tone low enough that no one outside of their little group could hear. 'You probably would have been handed over tied up in a ribbon.'

The whole Slytherin group seemed to reel back in shock. Relatively speaking, Harry hadn't made a political move in the last two years. He had seemed content so sit below Draco, excepting over Quidditch. That had probably been ignored as well due to his association with Theo, who was a Quidditch nut. What's more, Harry had until now, pretty much pretended not to have an opinion on the fact that the majority of his friends' parents had matching tattoos. He hadn't pulled weight politically because he defeated the Dark Lord. As Grace had pointed out in the hospital wing the year before, he hadn't taken advantage of being a Parseltongue, which would have won him at least a decent shot at King. As far as Slytherin was concerned, Harry just was not political.

It had been a very conscious move on Harry's part, but it ended now.

Around their group eyes narrowed, and a subtle shift happened. Vince and Greg leaned just slightly towards Draco, who drew himself a little taller. Pansy moved her chair closer to Milly, and Tracey reached over and borrowed a napkin from Daphne. Theo and Blaise shared a glance, then to Harry's amusement, tilted their chins up in unison.

'So do excuse me, Draco, if I don't go running off to fight my Godfather in a, frankly, Gryffindor manner-' That was practically a slap, and Pansy let out an outraged noise, but it was quickly snuffed. 'But I shall take the Slytherin approach.'

And the beauty of that statement was that none of them could ask what the Slytherin approach was without admitting they didn't know themselves. Which was quite lucky, as Harry didn't really have a plan for answering.

Harry wasn't sure how long they would have sat in awkward silence (Draco seething), but Theo's brother Rebo took that moment to apperate in to the alley with Flint, and spotting the group of Slytherins nearby, quickly approached and started raving about the Firebolt and how much better it made Quidditch matches. Theo easily joined the conversation, and Harry even refrained from commenting again on Draco buying the team brooms, leaving the group in a far less political frame of mind. The shift had been made however, and when the girls eventually demanded that they had heard enough about Quidditch for one day, the group broke into three smaller groups to do the last of their shopping.

Pansy and Milly rushed off to buy some more ink and quills, and Draco was followed by Greg and Vince, heading towards Gringotts. Daphne, Harry noticed, seemed to hesitate just slightly, but in the end joined their group, claiming Harry's arm as they headed as a group towards the apocathery. Tracey loyally followed Daphne. Harry didn't complain about Daphne taking his arm for the walk. It wasn't really outdated in pureblood fashion, even if she had never done it before. He was a little wary, as it had obviously been some sort of political move towards supporting him. Harry couldn't figure out why however, and it frustrated him.

Harry was wary of the subtle divide in their group. Watching the Slytherin's carefully over the last two years, Harry was very aware of the social ladder in-house. He knew that it would be important if Voldemort ever managed to come back, especially for him. His fellow third years were in a particularly good spot in terms of vying for King or Queen, as third year was unofficially the year politics in Slytherin started. Before that any false moves were usually forgotten or forgiven by elder housemates, as there was an unspoken understanding that first and second year students were still children, and finding their feet. In the same respect, any big political moves lost a great deal of impact, as they weren't taken seriously by most of the house. But it was (more often than not) a third or fourth year student who took over from the previous King or Queen. This was mostly because they were overlooked until that point, and could start an attack without too much previous political weight holding them back.

What Harry couldn't understand, was why Daphne was seemingly throwing her chips in with his. He did know that in the original timeline Daphne and Blaise hadn't teamed together. It was a move that confused Harry more and more as he grew to know them. Draco had some serious backing through family, and now that Harry saw all the Slytherin politics as well, Draco seemed less of an idiot of throwing around the phrase my father will hear about this. To a Gryffindor, he had just looked like a snobby child, but to a Slytherin Harry, it became apparent exactly why he had done it, and that it had actually been a conscious choice.

Despite this, Daphne and Blaise were both big players individually, and together could probably have taken control of Slytherin without too much fuss. Before meeting them, Harry had just assumed that they couldn't share. A joint ruling wasn't uncommon, even if one usually led the other just slightly.

But Daphne and Blaise got on excellently (or they had), and Harry had been making mental notes of their weakness just in case he had had to take them down as well. It was rather brutal, but that was how Slytherin politics were. Harry had decided the moment he accidentally landed in Slytherin, that if he was going to be a snake, he was going to be the best.

Whatever was happening with Daphne would need to sort itself out soon, as Harry had no interest in a political disaster further down the line. It hadn't by the end of the day, but Harry refused to deal with it in a public place like Diagon Alley, as that would no doubt backfire on him spectacularly. The group seemed to be delicately be balancing on a knife's edge however, and by the time he finally said goodbye and headed back to the Leaky almost seven hours later, Harry was exhausted.

Harry returned to his room just before five, and spent an hour and a half-hour organizing his new books and debating with Apep over the new rat. Eventually however, Harry gave in to hunger, and headed down to the bar for dinner. He didn't get too far.

Harry was halfway along the passage to the bar, which was now very dark, when he heard a pair of angry voices coming from the parlor. A second later, he recognized them as Mr. and Mrs. Weasleys'. He hesitated, he had forgotten about their argument over him in the first timeline, and hadn't really expected to overhear it again. He hadn't even realised the Weasleys were staying at the Leaky again this time.

'…makes no sense not to tell him,' Arthur was saying heatedly. 'Harry's got a right to know. I've tried to tell Fudge, but he insists on treating Harry like a child. He's thirteen years old and-'

'Arthur, the truth would terrify him!' said Molly shrilly. 'Do you really want to send Harry back to school with that hanging over him? For heaven's sake, he's happy not knowing!'

'I don't want to make him miserable, I want to put him on his guard!' retorted Arthur. 'Black has already found him once and-'

'Exactly! And look who he ran off to.' Molly interrupted.

There was a long pause, and Harry cringed in annoyance. Eventually Arthur spoke in a calmer and quiet voice. Harry had to strain to hear it.

'Just because Harry has friends from Slytherin does not mean he is turning dark. He is still just a thirteen-year-old boy with a murderer after him. He is lucky to have survived the attack in Surrey. They say Sirius Black's mad, and maybe he is, but he was clever enough to escape from Azkaban, and that's supposed to be impossible. It's been three weeks and the only person who's seen Black is the person Black's after. Harry could have been killed just like that.' Harry heard Arthur click.

'But he's not dead, he's fine, so what's the point -'

'The only thing we know for sure is what Black's after -'

'But Harry will be perfectly safe at Hogwarts anyway. You don't need to get involved.'

'We thought Azkaban was perfectly safe. If Black can break out of Azkaban, he can break into Hogwarts.'

'But no one's really sure that Black's after Harry -'

There was a thud on wood, and Harry was sure Mr. Weasley had banged his fist on the table.

'Molly, how many times do I have to tell you? They didn't report it in the press because Fudge wanted it kept quiet, but Fudge went out to Azkaban the night Black escaped. The guards told Fudge that Blacks been talking in his sleep for a while now. Always the same words: 'He's at Hogwarts…he's at Hogwarts. And he's already tried once!'

Arthur let out a frustrated sigh, which Harry suspected came through clenched teeth.

'Black is deranged, Molly, and he wants Harry dead. If you ask me, he thinks murdering Harry will bring You-Know-Who back to power. Black lost everything the night Harry stopped You-Know-Who, and he's had twelve years alone in Azkaban to brood on that…'

There was a silence. Harry leaned still closer to the door.

'Well, Arthur, I still don't see why you should tell Harry.'

'I won't let Lily and James' boy wander round willy nilly when he needs to be safe!'

'You barely knew them!'

'Yet I'd like to think, that they would have warned our kids, had the situation been reverse.'

Harry could hear Molly grumbling, then someone crossing the room.

'Molly dear, he saved our little boy.' Harry could hear the hint of pleading in Arthur's voice.

'You must do what you think best, I suppose.' Molly allowed. 'But you are forgetting Albus Dumbledore. I don't think anything could hurt Harry at Hogwarts while Dumbledore's Headmaster anyway. I suppose he knows about all this?'

'Of course he knows. We had to ask him if he minds the Azkaban guards stationing themselves around the entrances to the school grounds. He wasn't happy about it, but he agreed.'

'Not happy? Why shouldn't he be happy, if they're there to catch Black?'

'Dumbledore isn't fond of the Azkaban guards,' said Mr. Weasley heavily. 'Nor am I, if it comes to that…but when you're dealing with a wizard like Black, you sometimes have to join forces with those you'd rather avoid.'

'If they save our children from -'

'- then I will never say another word against them,' said Mr. Weasley wearily. 'It's late, Molly, we'd better get everybody started on dinner…'

Harry heard chairs move. As quietly as he could, he hurried down the passage to the bar and out of sight. The parlor door opened, and a few seconds later footsteps told him that Mr. and Mrs. Weasley were climbing the stairs.

Harry settled in to a garlic bread starter at the big table across the middle of the bar. It wasn't his usual spot, but Harry felt very charitable towards the Weasleys and knew they would have to sit at this table to all fit. His prediction was well founded, and Arthur and Percy entered the bar first. For a second Arthur tensed up, but then seemed to shake himself together and approached Harry.

'Excuse me Mr. Potter, do you mind if we share the table, there is rather a lot of us.'

Harry smiled up at him. 'Not at all. It is nice to see you again Mr. Weasley. How is Ron?'

Arthur winced just slightly 'Much better. Thank you for enquiring. Have you had a good holiday?'

Harry laughed. 'Other than running in to Black?' Harry paused but then grinned. 'An excellent one. Best yet.'

'About that-'

'Harry!' Harry looked away from Arthur to see the twins emerging from the stairwell.

'Boys!' Percy said pompously as Fred and George bolted across the room towards Harry, barely missing running over a waitress in the process. 'Mr. Potter is enjoying a quiet tea, you shouldn't disturb him.' Percy then turned to Harry. 'It is a pleasure to meet you, Harry.'

'Hello Percy. I see you are Head boy, congratulations.'

Percy swelled. 'Thank you. I hope you're well?' Percy enquired pompously, shaking hands. Harry sighed internally and tried not to laugh.

'Very well, thanks -'

'Harry!' said Fred, elbowing Percy out of the way and bowing deeply. 'Simply splendid to see you, old boy -'

'Marvelous,' said George, pushing Fred aside and seizing Harry's hand in turn. 'Absolutely spiffing.'

Percy scowled.

'That's enough, now,' said Molly.

'Mum!' said Fred, as though he'd only just spotted her and seizing her hand, too. 'How really corking to see you -'

'I said, that's enough,' said Molly, depositing her shopping in an empty chair. 'Hello, Harry, dear. I suppose you've heard our exciting news?' She pointed to the brand-new silver badge on Percy's chest. 'Second Head Boy in the family!' she said, swelling with pride.

'And last,' Fred muttered under his breath.

'I don't doubt that,' she said, frowning suddenly. 'I notice they haven't made you two prefects.'

'What do we want to be prefects for?' said George, looking revolted at the very idea. 'It'd take all the fun out of life.'

Ginny giggled.

'You want to set a better example for your sister!' snapped Molly.

'Ginny's got other brothers to set her an example, Mother,' said Percy loftily. 'I'm going back up to change for dinner…'

He disappeared and George heaved a sigh.

'We tried an ancient Egyptian curse to force laughter,' he told Harry. 'But it had no effect.'

'Although Mum did catch us and stop it midway through.' Fred pointed out.

'Not sure it mattered.' George sighed heavily.

Dinner that night was a very enjoyable affair. Tom the innkeeper outdid himself, and the seven Weasleys, Harry, and Seamus (who was apparently staying with Ron) ate their way through five delicious courses.

'How're we getting to King's Cross tomorrow, Dad?' asked Fred as they dug into a sumptuous chocolate pudding.

'The Ministry's providing a couple of cars,' said Arthur.

Everyone looked up at him.

'Why?' said Percy curiously.

'It's because of you, Perce,' said George seriously. 'And there'll be little flags on the hoods, with HB on them—'

'— for Humongous Bighead,' said Fred.

Everyone except Percy and Molly snorted into their pudding.

'Why are the Ministry providing cars, Father?' Percy asked again, in a dignified voice.

'Well, as we haven't got one anymore,' said Arthur, 'and as I work there, they're doing me a favor…'

His voice was casual, but Harry couldn't help noticing that Arthur's ears had gone red, just like Ron's did when he was under pressure. What he couldn't understand was why the Weasleys were getting the cars, which Harry knew perfectly well had originally been for him.

'The minister suggested you might like a lift too Harry. He knew you would be staying here tonight.'

Arthur still tried to sound casual, but Harry had to bite down on his tongue hard not to laugh. Ah, that would be why.

'Thank you Mr. Weasley, that would be lovely.' Harry managed to keep a straight face.

Arthur looked very relieved.