Previous Chapter - Neville reflects a leg locking curse back on Draco. Harry and Hermione discuss overseas schooling. Harry and Tom discover what they think was the ritual that helped Lily develop the ritual that saved Harry. Snape referee's a Quidditch Match and Harry gets Malfoy into a lot of trouble with Professor McGonagall.

Chapter 26 - Projects and Poisons

-my-friend-tom-

Time passed quickly for Harry. Tom had Harry working on so many little projects that alongside his school work, study groups, and Quidditch practice he rarely had time to just sit down and think. The little spare time he did have he tried to use to catch up with Hermione and his other friends, but it wasn't much. He was spending much more time studying with them than being social.

With Tom's grudging approval Harry set Hermione on a path to learn more about compulsions. He had lent her a few books of a slightly dubious nature about the field and taught Hermione a number of charms to disguise and hide them. Hermione had also started to spend a lot of her spare time trying to work out different ways in which muggle techniques and technology could help the magical world. They had discussed and agreed that if they wanted to come up with something to test the reaction of the magical world to change, they needed to make sure they were not connected to it if the reaction was negative. Tom's input was pretty obvious in this.

Harry was used to sneaking around, but it hadn't been so much fun until he had start teaching Hermione how to do it. Harry had been rather surprised to see Hermione take on a whole spy mistress persona with such joy. He guessed, but didn't say aloud, that she hadn't had much chance to play make believe in person when she was younger. That he could relate to.

Tom asked Harry visit the Hidden room a number more times to test various spells and rituals on the Diadem with the stated purpose of allowing him to remain in contact when near it or its brothers. None succeeded, but Tom wasn't surprised; not only was such magic very complex and difficult, they generally required power well beyond Harry's level. However it was still used to get an idea what might work when Harry's power level developed further.

Harry hadn't enjoyed the experience at all. During one visit Tom had him cast an exceedingly lengthy spell on the Diadem to remove one of the compulsions on the artifact. The spell had been a success but the time spent in close proximity to the Horcrux had subsequently resulted in Harry being out of contact with Tom for just over five hours. Harry had nearly counted the minutes and had achieved none of the homework that he had been supposed to do during that time.

-my-friend-tom-

"You are making mistakes on purpose?" Hermione almost screeched.

Harry winced. He had tried to lead up to it slowly but no one could accuse Hermione of being slow on the uptake. "Only for things that won't go on my permanent record. Remember about the compulsions and my tutor. I don't want to stand out."

Hermione stood up and started pacing the room as she debated with herself. Harry knew better than to interrupt and just listened, catching the occasional muttered word that escaped tense lips.

She completed four laps of the unused classroom before she finally nodded to herself and returned to the seat facing Harry.

"I understand. Does that mean I should as well?"

Harry grinned, "Of course not. That would be suspicious. You have already set an example of being a top student. If…" he trailed off wondering if he was moving into dangerous territory.

Hermione narrowed her eyes, "If what Harry?"

Harry sighed and continued, "If anything Hermione you should continue acting the same way and only slowly change."

"Change to what?"

Harry reached out and gently took Hermione's hands in his own. "Can I be honest and you try not to get angry at me?"

She took a deep breath and slowly nodded, "Okay. What is it?"

"You try too hard to follow the books. Look, books are useful but they are just as flawed as their authors and editors. You need to be… well... more creative."

Harry felt her hands tighten around his for a few moments before they relaxed again. He was glad that when she replied her voice was relatively calm, "Okay. I guess I understand that. It's just that non-fiction books are supposed to be just that. They not here though are they?"

Her hands gripped Harry's tightly again, but this time it was more of a reassuring grip as she almost seemed to be pleading. "I hate this all lying. Compulsions on all the students, wards to prevent technology to work and now I discover that they are also using books to lie to everyone. That's a betrayal of everything I was brought up to believe in. My parents always made a very clear distinction between non-fiction and fiction in books. Mostly I grew up reading biographies and autobiographies when I wasn't studying. The few fictional books were all the classics. How do I know which book to trust?" Hermione's voice fluctuated between numerous emotions as she spoke.

Harry tried to give her a reassuring smile, "Not every book is full of lies. Some of the authors are just misled. You just need to take in everything with an open mind. Use the scientific method and treat everything you read as only a hypothesis."

Hermione nodded, "That makes sense. Thanks Harry. Is that from your tutor?"

Harry shrugged, "Kind of. He taught me about what to expect from magical books, but the words I learnt in primary school."

-my-friend-tom-

"This is so excellent. Can we make these?"

There was a small pause as Tom reread the page through Harry's eyes.

'I don't see why not. To talk with Hermione over the holidays?'

"Yeah. I wonder if they got the idea from the Mirror of Erised."

'Possibly. Oh.. I see..'

Harry had turned the page and blushed a little, "They didn't!"

'It seems your mother was a little more daring that I could have guessed. This could be the first case of a dirty phone call in hist..'

"Stop! I don't want to hear it." Harry had rapidly returned to the earlier page.

'Is that something you want to do with Hermione?'

"What? No! Well.. no… maybe once.. ahh.. I don't want to talk about it. Can we make these, I just want to use them to chat when we aren't visiting each other. It'd be just like a mobile phone, but smaller and with video."

Tom sniggered, 'Sure Harry. It shouldn't be hard, it looks like she documented the rituals properly. We might have to experiment with how to create suitable mirrors. It's a pity she didn't document how James did that. It might be important.'

"He was good at transfiguration. Wouldn't he have just used that?"

'Probably only for the frame. Transfigured glass wouldn't have had the strength to hold a permanent enchantment like that. Melting and shaping raw sand would be best but probably any sort of glass or crystal that we can find and melt down will do. You've already been taught the spell to tell if an object is transfigured or not. Now you can put it to some practical use.'

"Off to the hidden room?" The hidden room was turning into a great source of bits and pieces for testing magic. Harry just made sure to avoid the section near the Diadem.

'Indeed.'

-my-friend-tom-

"Wait up Harry."

Harry paused and allowed Katie to catch up with him.

"Good practice, Yeah?" she asked as fell into step beside him.

Harry nodded and smiled fondly remembering the freedom of flying his broom high above the others. "Had fun. Looked like Oliver was working you hard."

Katie rolled her eyes, "He treats it like we are playing a league game. Can't imagine how bad he'd be if they still ran the junior league."

"Who played in that?"

"Bunch of people. Hogwarts usually fielded one to two teams per house and occasionally an interhouse team. Some of the trade schools fielded a team, but usually the teams were made up of members of a mix from various schools and the home schooled students. Both the Quidditch Academy's fielded two teams each and mostly dominated the top places. Irish actually had won the championship five times straight before the league folded."

"What happened?"

"You-know-who. They attacked during a match. Lots of people were killed and hurt. They called the season and it never restarted. Only the Academy's still field teams each and since Hogwarts doesn't allow students to leave on evenings or weekends we miss out."

"Tom?"

'Humm? Oh, yeah. Voldemort was on a cause terror bender at the time. Bad memories there.'

"That's terrible."

Katie nodded sadly.

"Harry?"

"Yes?"

"Would you like to go for a walk to the lake with me?"

"Um.. sure, I guess. Just for a bit though, got a transfiguration essay to do tonight."

"You want help with it?"

"Tom?"

'Eh.. Yes Harry? Oh… she's interested in you.'

"What? What do I say?"

'Well since you've actually already done that essay I suggest you say no thanks.'

"Naah. It's okay. Know what I'm going to write. Just gotta sit down and do it."

Katie gave him a small smile and distracted nod before quickly grasping his hand and pulling him towards the far side of the lake. "Let's go this way."

-my-friend-tom-

"So what happened then?"

"Eh.. well I didn't know what to say and after a moment she asked if I didn't like her."

"Ouch."

"Yeah. So I told her of course not. I said I liked her and she was nice and then she went from frowning to all smiles and she grabbed my hand again and said how happy she was that she now had the best first boyfriend ever."

"What?"

"Yeah. That's what I thought. I'm sure I hadn't even answered her question about going out with her and now I'm meant to be her boyfriend. What do I do?"

"What did you tell her?"

"Well. We were almost back at the castle then and she gave me a quick hug and then ran off."

"Oh no." Hermione put her face in her hands.

Harry just nervously shuffled his feet.

Ron choose that point to come running up with Neville not far behind. "Harry, you've got to help." It was still ten minutes before their defense club was due to start and it was pretty unusual for Ron to be on time let alone early.

Harry grasped at the distraction. Any sort of disaster was better than the one he had managed to end up in. "Hi Ron. What's wrong?"

"It's Hagrid. He's gone and got himself a dragon's egg."

Hermione was first to speak up at that startling pronouncement, "But they're very illegal here."

Ron moaned, "I know. Charlie's told me all about the laws. What are we going to do? Hagrid doesn't think there is any problem raising a dragon in his hut."

Harry groaned, this was not quite the distraction he had hoped for. Ron's disasters usually revolved around forgetting to do homework. This was turning into the most complicated day ever.

Hermione spoke what they were all picturing, "A firebreathing massive dragon in a tiny wooden hut? That's just asking for trouble. We should tell him to talk to the headmaster."

Neville shook his head as he joined the discussion, "We already did. Hagrid just said that he was a great man and shouldn't be disturbed with such little matters."

"Little? Dragons aren't little!" Hermione moaned.

Ron shrugged, "Well it's only an egg at the moment, so it is rather small."

Harry and Hermione both rolled their eyes.

"What do we do?" asked Neville.

"Tom?" Harry asked by reflex. Tom had been rather quiet ever since their last visit the the hidden room. The last spell had provided some unusual results and Tom had been busy trying to decipher them. It was all well beyond Harry's understanding.

'Yes Harry?'

"Hagrid's gone and got a dragon egg. He's thinking of raising in his very flammable wooden hut. I want to help him."

'I don't understand why but okay. There is no way to raise a dragon safely locally without massive wards. Not possible without a lot of knowledgeable wizards working in conjunction. You need to get the dragon to a proper reserve. Ron's brother works on one. Get Ron to have his brother pick up the egg and give Hagrid visitation rights or something.'

"Ahh.. Good idea. Thanks."

'No problem Harry. Also find out where he got the dragon egg from. Suppliers of such things can be quite useful.'

"Will do."

Harry passed on Tom's suggestion as his own and Ron told them he would work on a letter to his brother that night. Harry told him to wait until the four of them could arrange another visit to Hagrid to see the egg and convince the half giant that it was the best course of action. Harry thought it amusing that Ron and Neville had turned into Hagrid's most frequent visitors, all because they used to tag along with him and Hermione.

The defense club exercises went well and allowed Harry to temporarily forget his troubles. Harry was working on pairing a dedicated attacker with a defender and arranging two on two battles. Hermione was taking on more of an assistant tutor role now since much of which he taught Harry had already taught her privately.

Occasionally Harry felt a little stab of jealousy when she picked up new spells quicker than him. He knew that if she kept up at the current rate she would eventually surpass him in terms of sheer number of spells and counter spells known. Knowing so many counter spells would be a massive advantage in a fight even if her spells weren't as powerful as his.

Later a teary Hagrid agreed to the plan though he absolutely refused to let the dragon go until it was hatched. He told them it was at a very delicate stage of its development at the moment and needed to be kept warm and secure, and he certainly didn't want to risk it hatching in transport. Sadly, Hermione's research and Tom both agreed that he was, in fact, correct. Plans were made for Charlie's friends to pick up the Dragon in a month. They would transport the Dragon to Charlie. That allowed plenty of time for the Dragon to hatch.

Hagrid easily admitted to winning the egg at a card came and with Tom's prompting Harry had soon wheedled out from Hagrid that he had once again been very loose with supposedly confidential information.

'Quirrell or one of his compatriots I imagine. I guess he's moving forward with his plans. Tonight we should double check the trap and make sure it's all okay.'

"Okay Tom."

'Think you better head back to the common room now.'

"Do you think Katie will be there?"

'Probably.' Harry was sure he could detect amusement in Tom's tone.

Harry sighed.

-my-friend-tom-

Harry had traversed the obstacle course half a dozen times now and he barely slowed as he put Fluffy to sleep, fly over the devil's snare, chess set and put the troll into a deep sleep. Having previously made a duplicate of the flying key meant he didn't even need to waste time chasing the keys around. His sleep spell had also improved and now the troll barely had time to react to the door being opened before it was yawning and looking for a place to nap. Once again Harry had the strange urge to provide the beast a conjured bed. What would Dumbledore think if he found the troll nicely tucked in?

He carefully checked out the potions, those on the table and those connected by the refilling chamber in the adjoining room. Nothing had been disturbed and nothing had been drank. The swapped potion was ready but Harry resisted testing the refilling part of the trap. It was a pain to reset all the levels just right and remove all traces of the tampering.

"All looks fine."

'Indeed. Are you willing to examine the mirror?'

"The mirror? What for? We've got the stone and… well I don't really like that thing."

'I'm just wondering if we can't get a clue as to what type of magic was used to form the glass. Might help us work out what's going wrong with the communication mirrors.'

"Ohh.." Harry sighed. "Okay. That makes sense. I don't need to look into it again though do I?"

'No. You can approach it from the side or back.'

Harry took a sip of the specialised flame freezing potion. He was actually drinking potion taken from the large jar that was set to refill the smallest vial since his own attempts to recreate the potion had been less than perfect. Using it and passing through the flames would have left him slightly singed and butt naked. Potions that affected not just the drinker, but their surroundings were difficult.

After retrieving the stone Tom had expanded on the history of the mirrors and read off a litany of the suffering and troubles that had haunted the various wizards and witches that had encountered the Mirror of Erised and it's ilk over the ages. Now Harry was now near terrified of the thing. That he had been told the worst stories around the time that he had discovered all the compulsions cast on the students certainly didn't lend to him keeping his calm near the thing. He really wanted to smash the thing into a million pieces.

It took him a minute to calm himself enough to create a satisfactory bridge without triggering any of the wards and approach the back of the thing.

'Well done Harry, always good to learn how to face your fears. Now start with the Transfiguration tests that McGonagall has been teaching you.'

Harry started with those and them moved on to more complicated spells to read spell residue and signatures. It was difficult to decipher the remnants of spells cast over a hundred years ago but Harry recognized something easily enough.

"Tom, I think this mirror was made by Dumbledore."

'Interesting. That would mean this is much younger than any of the copies I've heard of. I would never have thought Dumbledore would have created such a thing. Usually only those who have suffered a great loss would contemplate creating such a dangerous artifact.'

"Maybe he lost someone important?"

'Maybe. If so he has hidden it well. None of his many biographies have mentioned such a thing and I read them all.'

"Do you think it's important?"

'It's always important to know as much as possible about your allies and enemies. During the summer I suggest we see if any new biographies have been published on your distinguished headmaster. Now, how about the spells used to create the mirror. Did you learn anything?'

Harry nodded, "The flame spells I detected were all familiar and ones we have attempted, but I did get... well... a snakey kinda feeling."

'Snake… of course… Ashwinder scales. That makes sense. Nicely done Harry, we'll have your mirrors created before Summer.'

-my-friend-tom-

"Why are you hiding here?"

"Everyone is staring at me and whispering again. It's just like the start of the year."

"Well, the news that you are dating is out now."

"But I didn't even want to date. I just told her I didn't dislike her and that I thought she was nice."

"I know that, but that's not what is going around. Story's out now that you are a true romantic. Asked her with a bunch of roses and all."

Harry buried his face further into his hands and both he and Hermione were quiet for a moment.

"You like her right?"

Harry gave a slight shrug, "Sure. I guess. She's nice, fun and is always got a joke or a Quidditch sorry to tell."

There was a longer pause.

"You ever think about kissing her?"

Harry was startled and rapidly shook his head. "Eh.. no.. Not something I ever think about. Never actually… Tom's always teasing me... I mean my tutor. . Oh hell. Please forget I said that."

Harry looked up from his hands and straight at Hermione his earlier embarrassment gone and his voice took on a slight pleading tone, "I promised not to reveal anything about him to anyone. Hermione, please bury what I just said as deep as you can in your memory."

Hermione nodded quickly, "Of course Harry."

"Thanks Hermione. I know I can trust you." He gave her a quick hug.

There was another pause whilst Harry gathered his thoughts, "What do I do now? I don't really want to date, I don't have that much spare time, but I also don't want to hurt her feelings. What do you think she expects from me?" His eyes suddenly widened in worry as he recalled Hermione's previous words, "Do you think she expects me to kiss her?"

Hermione took on a contemplative expression for a moment before a faint blush appeared in her face, "I know I... I mean I think she might. But you should only do what you are comfortable doing. Most second and third years only hold hands and give the occasional cheek kiss."

Harry gave a distracted nod only partially paying attention to her words, "I guess I could do that."

Author Notes: Big thanks to FreelanceBum for proofreading this chapter. Those that have been suffering my poor grammar can breath a little easier.

Thanks again to everyone who has shown their support by following, favoriting or reviewing this story. Every Time I wonder if I shouldn't just pursue one of my more recent ideas I see all the interest you guys have shown and it helps me remember that I'm not done with this idea yet.

Now we are almost at the end of first year and I am facing a hard decision. If you don't like even the smallest of spoilers stop reading here.

I'm vacillating on if Harry should have another encounter with Dumbledore before the year is out, it'd would be similar to that in the book, otherwise event could proceed without Dumbledore being aware of them till later. I won't put up a poll as at the end of the day I still want to make the decision, but if anyone has some comments one way or the other maybe it will help me make up my mind.