"What happened out there?"

"I don't know…" Harry replied. After the fight outside the DADA classroom, Professor Jones had decided to take him to his head of house. Most students still didn't know who she was, so they got a lot of looks as they made their way down the grand staircase.

"Let's start from the beginning. How did he end up on the floor?"

"Like I said, I don't have the faintest idea. Draco cast something at me, and I couldn't move. Suddenly, he dropped to the floor screaming."

"That's very odd. What were you two fighting over?"

Harry felt a bit awkward talking with professor Jones. She was far more casual than any of the professors he had met so far. Maybe it was because this was the first class she had taught. If so, he felt bad for creating a problem for her on her very first day.

"Draco said that my parents had made a mistake in fighting Voldemort… after that, I cast the knockback jinx on him. It worked, but then he got up and hit me with something that made my limbs lock up. He had the nerve to insult my parents again, and smile at me as he did it. I'm not sure what exactly happened after that…"

Professor Jones frowned. "That is very strange. I would say accidental magic, but that seems to be the catch-all whenever we can't explain something. Maybe Severus can shed some light on the matter. After all, he has been teaching here for a decade, and it's only my first day." She turned to Harry with a crooked smile. "Relax, I'm sure Draco will be fine. Don't tell anybody I said this, but I kind of wanted to jinx him myself after just one class."

They reached the door to the potions classroom. By now, the corridors were largely empty. The professor knocked on the door, and they waited. After a couple of minutes, a scowling Snape opened the door. His eyes slightly widened when he saw professor Jones, but he seemed to relax when he saw Harry besides her.

"I take it Potter has misbehaved?"

"I only caught the end of it, it seems he had an altercation with Draco Malfoy. I sent the boy to the hospital, but he did not appear physically injured. I thought you might know what to do…" she replied, speaking faster and faster. Professor Snape seemed oddly uncomfortable. All the stranger since Harry rarely saw the man express emotion of any sort.

"I'll take it from here then." There was a brief awkward moment as they stood at the door. "Bye, Jones," Snape added pointedly. The witch gave a small start and then hightailed it down the corridor. Snape pinched his forehead for a moment, and then muttered in a low tone. "How is it that you have doubled my workload before even stepping foot in my classroom, Potter?"

Harry tried to reply, but the man had already started walking down the corridor. He paused briefly, turning to look at Harry. "Follow me, Potter." Harry hurriedly joined the potions master, having to walk at a near jog just to keep up with the man's long stride.

"Um professor, where are we going?"

"I hear Filtch got some new torture implements over the summer that he wants to try out."

Harry paled.

"Relax, Potter. I'm taking you up to the hospital wing. You are going to make things right with Draco. While we are walking, you can explain to me exactly what happened, starting with why you felt it was a good idea to assault the son of a Hogwarts Governor."

Son of a Hogwarts governor? Harry hadn't know that. Still, it probably wouldn't have changed anything. Draco shouldn't have said what he did about his parents.

"I just found out his father had fought for the dark lord! He then told me that my parents were careless and got themselves killed."

"Well, he's not entirely wrong Potter." The man quickly raised his hand as Harry opened his mouth to respond. "Your parents used a charm that concealed their location from the dark lord. For the charm to work, the location must be entrusted to a secret-keeper. They picked the wrong man for the job. I doubt Draco knows this - he was probably just trying to get a rise out of you. In typical Potter form, you fell for it." Harry fell silent as he thought about what the professor had said. Maybe his parents had made a mistake. That still didn't make it OK for Draco to criticize them. They had died for Harry!

"Tell me about how Draco ended up on the ground."

Harry quickly snapped out of his train of thought. He told the professor about casting the knockback jinx, Draco's counter, and how the boy had smirked at him after insulting his parents for the second time.

"So you say you looked Draco in the eyes as you were thinking of the memory of your mother's death, and the boy fell to the floor clutching at his head and screaming?"

"That sounds right professor. I swear, I didn't cast anything at him."

The professor stopped and stared at Harry for a moment. "You have some innate ability in occlumency. It is not inconceivable that under severe emotional trauma you were able to carry out a legilimency attack."

"What do you mean, sir?"

The man resumed walking, talking as he looked straight ahead. "Legilimency is the ability to enter the mind of another. Of course, it is much more nuanced than that. Most people need to cast a spell to be able to perform legilimency. Wandless, wordless legilimency is generally weaker and more difficult to execute. In addition, even a novice in occlumency - which Draco has likely been taught as Lucius' heir - should be able to defeat untrained, accidental legilimency. Not to even mention the fact that accidental magic is generally chaotic, random, and decidedly unfocused - completely at odds with the mind arts. To further add to the implausibility of the situation, it seems that you placed an emotion or a sensation into Draco's head rather than merely reading his thoughts."

"Is that even possible?" Harry gasped.

"Yes. The dark lord himself was rather fond of this particular trick."

Harry's heart sunk. He did not want to be anything like the monster that had murdered his parents. Even if Draco had said something foul, it didn't excuse Harry's own behavior.

"What are we going to do now, professor"

The man sneered. "So it's 'we' now, Potter? First, I am going to find out exactly what Draco remembers, and then get him to keep quiet. Afterwards, you are going to have detention with me every Saturday evening for the rest of the term. In addition to blocking intrusions, occlumency can help keep emotions in check. It seems like you are innately skilled in the first, but completely hopeless in the second category. I will train you in proper occlumency. If you learn how to keep calm under provocation, it will make my life a lot easier since I would need to spend far less time cleaning up your messes."

"I'm sorry professor, and the lessons bit sounds awesome. Will you also be teaching me legilimency."

"Ha! Dream on, Potter. As if I need an eleven-year-old running around breaking into other children's minds. No, we are going to stick to occlumency, and if I hear a word about you attempting legilimency on a student, I will teach you the meaning of regret."

The remainder of the walk to the hospital wing passed in silence. Harry was excited about the upcoming occlumency training, and didn't want to say anything that might make Snape reconsider his words. It wasn't until they reached the doors that he realized he would have to face Draco, and the nerves sent his stomach churning. The potions master opened the door, and walked into the wing. A middle-aged woman dressed in white robes greeted them, pointing out the bed that housed Draco. The blond boy was sitting up propped against a pillow, and reading a book. Professor Snape raised his hand, and Harry stopped walking. The potions master approached Draco, and spoke with him for a few moments in hushed tones. Seemingly satisfied, he walked back to Harry.

"Go ahead, Potter. I might as well do something of use and see what potions need to be restocked. Make up with Draco. You're going to have to live with him for the next seven years." Harry nodded, and walked towards Draco's bed. The boy was deeply absorbed in the text once more, but looked up as Harry crossed the final couple of meters.

"Hey Draco" he said awkwardly.

"Hi Harry," the boy replied. It felt odd. Harry realized that it was the first time Draco had used his first name.

"Are you feeling ok?"

"Yeah, I feel fine. Madam Pomfrey is insisting I stay here for a few hours for 'observation,' but I'm sure I could leave right now." The boy cracked his characteristic smirk. It looked different to Harry, almost unnatural. It took him a second to realize why - for the first time, it didn't have a mocking undertone. He felt some sympathy for Draco. He didn't pick his father, so was it really fair for Harry to hold his father's crimes against Draco?

"I'm sorry about the flippendo… and the other thing. To be honest, I'm not sure what I did. I wasn't trying to hurt you … I was just so angry…"

The blond boy shook his head. "It was my fault. I provoked you. You're probably right about my father. It's kind of an open secret he was involved with the dark lord. That being said, he is my father. I do have to defend him if he is publicly attacked."

Harry nodded his head. This didn't feel right. Draco didn't seem like the type of person to admit he was wrong. He couldn't help but wonder what caused this change of attitude.

The boy raised his head until his eyes met Harry's. To Draco's credit, he seemed to hear the unspoken question. "When I looked in your eyes - after I had petrified you - I saw something. I saw a hooded man cast the killing curse at a screaming woman. Then he cast it at me. I didn't know what was going on at first, all I could process was the pain in my head. But after the pain faded away, I remembered something. The woman… she screamed 'Not Harry.' That was your mother, wasn't it?"

Harry nodded slowly. Draco paused for a moment, his voice trembling when he spoke once more.

"It felt so real, like I was really there. If the Dark Lord… could do something like that…"

Harry forced a smile. "Don't worry about it, Draco."

"I told Pansy and the rest that I don't remember anything about what happened. It's probably for the best. They are probably going to expect me to try to get back at you somehow, so I might have to mess with you in some way - maybe at potions tomorrow?"

"Spoken like a true Slytherin," Harry rolled his eyes.

"Would you expect any less of me?"

The rest of the day was calm in comparison. On the way back to his room, Harry had gotten some glares from the other first year Slytherins sitting in the common room. In light of that, he had elected to spend most of the evening doing his transfiguration essay in the library. McGonagall wanted a foot on the importance of wand motion for next week. It was a very broad topic, so it wasn't difficult to find material to write about. When he made his way back to the dungeons a few hours later, he noticed that the glares had changed to sly smiles. It seemed like Draco had smoothed things over after he got out, and had probably promised some juicy form of payback.

Breakfast the next day was awkward. Theo and Draco were at their usual banter, but Gregory and Vincent couldn't stop giggling whenever they looked at Harry. He made a mental note never to trust them with a secret. The girls seemed to be split into two camps. Pansy was shooting Harry icy glares throughout the meal, but Ornelle was very warm with him. The rest fell somewhere in between. The Slytherins walked to class together as they had the previous day, but Harry made sure to stay at the back of the group so that nobody could draw on him undetected.

He was actually relieved when he walked into potions. It was another class shared with the Gryffindors, so Harry took a seat next to Neville. The boy looked downtrodden. Harry flashed him a smile as he arranged his supplies on the table, and Neville seemed to cheer up slightly.

"Hi Nev."

"Hey Harry… I just want to say that I'm sorry for not telling you about Slytherin's reputation earlier. It was really cowardly of me to keep that from you just to avoid upsetting you."

Harry clapped the boy on the back. "Don't worry about it. I totally overreacted, so it seems like you prediction was accurate. Anyway, it's all in the past. Let's worry about the future… namely that dark cloud coming our way."

Professor Snape rushed into the room, shutting the blinds with rapid flicks of his wand. He read off the list of names, and then launched into a dramatic speech about potion making. It probably would have been more impressive if Harry hadn't already spent hours with the man. Nonetheless, he was caught by surprise when the potions master asked him several questions. Harry had read through the firs few chapters of his potions textbook the week before school started, so he was able to answer two out of three correctly. That seemed good enough for Snape, and he quickly launched into the directions for the boil-curing potion they would be making that class.

The recipe was relatively simple. Harry paired up with Neville, and the tall boy's experience with magical plants came in handy as they were preparing the ingredients. Everything was going fine, until Harry felt somebody slap him on the back. Hard. He whirled around, and saw Vincent sitting at the table behind him, a smile on his face.

"What was that?"

"I saw a spider on your back, so I brushed it off."

"Why don't you mind your potion?" Neville asked from besides him.

"We could ask you the same thing" Vincent replied, breaking into full out laughter.

Harry felt a shiver run up his spine, and whirled around to look at their cauldron. Red smoke was pouring out of the top. He quickly shouted for Snape, but the potion boiled over a split second later. The viscous liquid solidified wherever it made contact with the table, leaving behind a sticky mess. The potions master slowly walked over and levitated the cauldron off of the flame, setting it on the stone floor.

"Idiots. You're supposed to add the porcupine quills after taking the cauldron off the fire. Longbottom, Potter, detention this evening." The man walked a few steps before turning back around. "Potter, make that two back to back detentions for you since this is the second consecutive day you've caused trouble." Harry saw Draco high-five Vincent from the corner of his eye. He glanced at the blond boy, and received a subtle wink. This was probably mild as far as revenge went, so Harry didn't mind too much.

His detention with Neville was spent scrubbing the table they had fouled when their cauldron boiled over, set to a steady stream of ridicule from professor Snape. When the tall boy left and Harry stayed behind, the potions master dropped the act.

"You really should be grateful, you know. The Malfoys typically aren't so quick to forgive."

"I think Draco may have had a change of heart," Harry replied.

"I doubt it. Speaking of doubt, it is time to start your occlumency training - not that you are likely to master such an art."

Harry grinned - this was more like it.

The occlumency lesson was quite strange. At first, Snape had cast the legilimency spell on Harry several times with no success. Direct legilimency was a new experience for Harry - instead of the faint sensation he had felt with Snape or Dumbledore's previous attempts, he now felt a much stronger pressure in his head. It felt very similar to when he had dived to the bottom of the pool the one time the Dursleys had decided to take him along to the waterpark for Dudley's birthday. Focusing on the pressure dispersed it much like with passive legilimency. The professor was baffled - according to him, direct legilimency was much more powerful than passive legilimency, and Harry's natural talent for occlumency should not have been enough to negate a direct attack.

After a couple of minutes of pacing, the potions master had decided to have Harry work on controlling his temperament in order to prevent further legilimency outbursts. The techniques he taught were similar to those used in traditional occlumency, but with less of a focus on building mental barriers and more of a focus on clearing his mind. This proved to be more challenging for Harry - he actually had to work at it unlike repelling legilimency. Snape seemed to enjoy that not everything came easily to Harry, and assigned weekly 'detentions' for the rest of the term.

The next day was far less exciting. The Slytherins had herbology with the Ravenclaws, and most of the class was spent harvesting leaves from an odd purple plant. Charms with the Hufflepuffs was much more interesting. The professor was unusually short - he had to stand on top of a footstool to address the class. His facial features were reminiscent of the goblins Harry had seen at Gringotts, but far less ugly. The subject of the day was the levitation spell, and Harry found himself among the first to levitate his feather. This earned him a point for Slytherin from Professor Flitwick.

The atmosphere back in the Slytherin common room had calmed down since his fight with Draco. Theo didn't seem to care - he was far too busy trying to set up a trap for any would-be pranksters. Vincent and Greggory still seemed a bit sore, but Harry doubted they would do anything on their own initiative. The girls were doing their own thing, whatever that was, although Pansy still scowled at him anytime they made eye contact. On the whole, Harry's housemates were neither friendly nor mean to him.

Most of the other first year Slytherins had known each other since childhood, and seemed to prefer their own company. At the same time, Harry hadn't given them any substantial reason to hate him. If anything, his fight with Draco had acted as a deterrent since they had seen him put the blond boy on his back through what seemed like wandless magic. The older students were preoccupied with their own lives, and most didn't take the time to talk to first-years. However, this didn't stop them from claiming most of the common room for themselves. Some of them were rather territorial. Rather than risk sitting down in the wrong person's couch, Harry chose to spend most of his evenings in the library.

Ever since his first experience with magical books at Flourish and Blott's, he had been eager to learn more about spells, potions, magical artifacts… everything really. The Hogwarts library was the perfect place to do this. It was giant, bigger even than the showroom at Flourish and Blott's. Some of the books were in other languages or too complicated for him to understand, but the ones that he could understand were quite interesting. At the end of the day, he still preferred the assigned textbooks for most of his classes - they were geared towards beginners such as himself, and were directly relevant to his classes. It was just as well, because the professors seemed to have some kind of bet on who could assign the most homework. The study area of the library was usually populated with students hastily scratching out essays with their quills. He didn't recognize too many first years among them, although the bushy haired girl from Gryffindor - Hermione - was there practically all the time. One night, Harry sat next to her on impulse. She looked up at him with a scowl.

"What do you want?"

"Umm… to do my homework?"

Hermione tilted her head. "Are you sure you're not here to make fun of me?"

"I'm positive."

"Fine." She turned back to her essay with a shrug and Harry dived back into his textbook. He was hoping he would find something to help him complete the matchstick to needle transfiguration, but it looked like it was just a matter of practice. He pulled out his wand and one of the matchsticks he had taken from transfiguration and got to work. Once again, he managed to make the matchstick assume the shape of the needle, but had little luck changing the wood to metal. After a moment of repeatedly casting, he noticed that Hermione was watching.

"What are you thinking when you cast the spell?" the witch asked.

Harry raised his eyebrows. "Thinking? The incantation - what else?"

She shook her head rapidly, her hair bouncing against her shoulders. "You should be imagining the needle. Focus on the metallic color, picture the surface of the needle."

Harry shrugged, and did as she asked. To his surprise, the needle changed to a silvery color. He picked it up, and the surface felt smooth and cool like metal. He flexed the needle, and it shattered between his fingers.

"Ouch!"

"Too brittle - still needs some work."

"I see that now," Harry replied hastily, pressing his pricked finger against his robe. "Where did you learn that anyway?"

"It's in the first few chapters of our transfiguration textbook." Harry gave her a blank look. "You know… the ones on magical theory."

"Oh. I skipped those to get to the spells and wand motion."

The brown-haired witch raised her chin. "You shouldn't do that. Magical theory is really important, even more so than the spells themselves."

Harry looked at her sideways. "Wouldn't the theory be useless without any spells to cast."

"No. If you know the spells but not theory, you can hurt yourself like you just did. If you don't know the spells but know the theory, at worst nothing will happen." With that, she grinned at Harry smugly.

Harry scowled back. Hermione had a bit of an attitude. What she was saying was factually correct, but sometimes how you said things mattered more to people.

"You always have to be right, don't you?"

The girl scoffed. "Now you sound like Ron."

"Maybe he has a point," Harry muttered, turning back to his matchstick.

Breakfast the next day was all about quidditch. Draco and Theo wouldn't stop talking about their favorite teams, last year's world cup, and really anything related to the sport. Even Vincent and Gregory had something to say - apparently, they wanted to be beaters on the Slytherin team. Harry didn't know what a beater did, but the title suited the two boys. Soon, he found out what had gotten the table so excited. They would be having their first flying lessons today - with the Gryffindors no less. Harry wasn't sure how he felt about it. Brooms didn't seem like they could be very comfortable or stable to fly on. He would get a chance to talk to Neville, which was also good, but Hermione would be there as well, which was probably bad. He was grateful for her tips the previous night, he had managed the full transfiguration after only fifteen minutes once he knew what to do. However, it looked like he had opened the floodgates because she wouldn't stop talking about all of her other classes and every single book she had read on magic. He felt kind of bad for her - it didn't seem like she had anybody else to talk to. At the same time, Harry didn't think he could handle being around her for any extended period of time.

As was custom, the Slytherins walked together to class. It would take place on the grounds just outside the castle, and Madam Hooch was already there when they arrived, along with twenty brooms lined up on either side of her. She was slender, and her hair was closely cropped. Her nose was slightly askew, no doubt from a flying accident. That thought didn't comfort Harry, but Theo had said that she used to be a competitive quidditch player, so he figured he figured they were in good hands. The Gryffindors trickled in in pairs and small groups. Ron, Dean, and Seamus showed up together to nobody's surprise. Neville walked in with Hermione.

When the bell struck, Hooch the two houses line up across from each other, each student next to a broom. They were to command the broom 'up.' Harry eyed his suspiciously. It seemed old and shoddy, even for a broom. Nonetheless, he gave it a try and was pleasantly surprised when it shot into his hand. A few people were not so lucky. Hermione was barking orders at her still stationary broom in increasingly frustrated tones, while Vincent looked like he was about to pop a blood vessel in his forhead. Hooch gave individual advice to each of the stragglers, and after ten minutes everybody was able to at least mount their broom. Hermione did a little more than that. As soon as professor Hooch had walked away, the girl's broom began to drift diagonally towards the castle.

"Down! DOWN!" she yelled.

Madam Hooch swore and mounted her own broom in a fluid motion. "Stay calm," she yelled after the girl. Her words seemed to have the opposite effect, because Hermione quickly picked up speed, and her broom started bobbing up and down rapidly. Before Madam Hooch could reach her, Hermione's broom flew down into a nosedive. It crossed a distance of about a dozen meters in less than a second, headed straight for the ground. It didn't look like Madam Hooch could possible make it there in time. Harry willed his broom forward, and it propelled himself towards Hermione. He managed to dive down just under her, and break most of the momentum in her broom. They were just barely off the ground when he made contact with her side, and they rolled over the grass in an uncontrolled tumble. Madam Hooch drifted down next to the pair, deftly stepping off her broom. Hermione sat up, but didn't make any motion to stand. Her foot was twisted at an odd angle, and she began to wail.

"Settle down everybody, there's nothing to see here." Madam Hooch cast some sort of spell at Hermione's foot and levitated the crying girl. "Nice job, Potter. I'm tempted to give you a detention for trying a stunt like that, but you may have saved her life so I'll give you a pass this time." She turned towards the rest of the class, adding "don't do anything you wouldn't do if I was here," along with her most intimidating look, and started walking back to the castle with Hermione at her side. Madam Hooch had barely made it out of sight when Malfoy mounted his broom and hovered into the air. Ron and his friends quickly followed suit, apparently not wanting to be out-braved by a Slytherin.

"You sure you should be doing this?"

"Come up and join me" the blond boy replied. "She said not to do anything we wouldn't do if she was here, and I'm pretty sure we were going to practice flying today."

"I don't think that's how she meant it, but who am I to complain" Theo answered with a smirk before kicking off the ground.

Harry got up and brushed his clothes clean. He felt a bit of pain in his shoulder where he had made first contact with the ground, but the rolling seemed to have absorbed most of the impact. He gave a shrug and followed his house mates into the sky. The broom felt alive beneath him. He only had to will it to turn a certain way, and it would immediately follow his wishes. Apparently, his dive to save Hermione hadn't been a fluke. Soon, he was soaring in circles above the rest of the class, the air streaming through his hair. Theo and Draco had risen even higher, and were chasing each other on their brooms. Within minutes, virtually the entire class had joined in. Some, like Ron and Milicent, looked just as comfortable in the sky as Draco and Theo. Others, like Neville, looked a bit more shaky. Harry rose further up into the sky and lifted his hands from his broomstick. He closed his eyes emptied his mind as he had practiced with Snape. He couldn't remember feeling this peaceful ever. A short while later, his bliss was interrupted by Madam Hooch's arrival.

"What were you all thinking! Come down from there at once!" His classmates drifted down and landed on the grass with varying degrees of grace. The professor turned her gaze towards Harry. "I've thought about your stunt a little longer. Five points from Slytherin for recklessness, and ten points to Slytherin for saving your classmate." Some of his house mates gave a cheer, but quickly fell silent when Madam Hooch turned around to face them. "That's not all. A point each from everybody - Gryffindor and Slytherin - for disobeying my instructions while I was gone."

Malfoy started to speak, but Hooch quickly cut him off. "Would you care to try for two points?" He quickly shut up after that. The rest of the lesson wasn't as exciting as it had been when Hooch wasn't there, but the professor did have a lot of usefully information to share. Harry learned that brooms operated by intent - Hermione's panicked desire to return to the ground was probably what had made her plummet into the ground. He also found out that quidditch tryouts would be the following week, but first and second years were not allowed to participate due to the dangers of the sport and sheer physicality required to keep up with older students.

After flying, the Slytherins had their first astronomy lesson. It took place in one of the towers and fairly late in the evening for obvious reasons. Harry wasn't terribly excited about it - he didn't feel like gazing at the stars when there were so many interesting things to look at down in Hogwarts. Regardless, he put up with the lesson and was glad when it was over. The first years made their way to the common room, which was mostly empty save for a few older students lounging by one of the fires. One of them made a beckoning motion. Harry looked around and then back at the older boy, pointing a finger at his own chest. He received a nod, and so he made his way over to the fireplace after exchanging confused looks with Draco and Theo. As he got closer, he could see a "C" badge on the boy's chest.

Harry stopped as he reached the group. Apart from the boy that had invited him over, there were two other boys and a girl. They were all both taller and bulkier than Harry, and were looking at him as if trying to size him up. After a few seconds of waiting, Harry realized that he was expected to speak first.

"I've never seen that badge before," he said, pointing at the silver "C" pinned onto the leader's shirt. The boy in question grinned, rubbing the badge with his shirt sleeve.

"This badge means I'm quidditch captain."

"Well, what do you want with me?"

The older boy shrugged. "Nothing at the moment. We heard about the incident at the Quidditch lesson this morning, apparently you saved some Gryffindor girl. Why'd you do that?"

Harry raised his eyebrows. "Umm, because she was about to become a Gryffindor pancake? Also, I wanted to test how quickly I could move."

The Slytherin Captain shared a look with this friends, and turned back to Harry. "I hear you moved pretty fast. Tell you what, come to the quidditch tryouts next week and we'll see if you can pull that dive off a second time."

Harry was puzzled. "Aren't first years banned from trying out?"

The older boy shook his head. "Don't think of it as tryout then. You're just going for a walk on the quidditch pitch, and it just happens to coincide with our tryouts. Between me and you, if you do well enough I may be able to convince Snape to let you on the team. On the other hand, if your skills are overblown, we'll still get some entertainment value out of watching you embarrass yourself."

"Gee, thanks."

"Don't mention it. Now run along to your friends. They're having a hard time pretending not to eavesdrop."

Harry turned around and joined Theo and Draco on the couches at the far side of the room. "What was that about?" Malfoy questioned with faked nonchalance.

"Nothing really, the quidditch captain just wanted to invite me to the tryouts next week."

Malfoy's eyes bulged for a second, but he quickly composed himself. "Flint must really be scraping the barrel if he's going after first years. I hear last year's seeker graduated, so I guess it make sense."

"How do you know he'll want me for seeker?"

"What else could you possible do with your build?" Theo interjected. "You can't be a chaser, you'll get pushed or kicked off your broom on every play. Beater is out of the question, even Vincent and Gregory aren't big enough to edge out the guys on the team at the moment. Keeper's a possibility if you're fast enough, but they prefer somebody with longer reach for that. Seeker's the only option. Your small size might actually help you with maneuverability, not to mention speed. Besides, you've already shown you're reckless enough to chase down a snitch."

"You've really thought this through…" Harry replied.

"Hey, what are friends for?"

"Oh, so we're friends now?"

"Yeah, I've got to hedge my bets in case you actually pull this off. But really, I've been busy the past couple of days working on the trap for the dorms."

"Did you figure anything out?"

"Yeah, I figured out that it's way beyond what any of us can do at this point, unless you are an expert in runes and not just in quidditch."

Harry shook his head and made a motion to get up. "I think I'm going to get some sleep. We've got transfiguration again tomorrow morning."

Draco and Theo got up after him. They made their way to the boy's dorm and started walking towards the first-year corridor. They turned the corner, and a sea of red and gold came into view. The walls outside their doors were painted with Gryffindor banners. Vincent's door was open, and the boy's head popped outside the frame.

"The inside looks like that too."

Draco cursed besides him, and Harry opened his own door. True to Vincent's word, the walls, floor, and even ceiling were covered with red and gold paint. He heard Theo speak up behind him.

"Well, at least we won't have to worry about getting pranked anymore."

"I don't suppose you would know any cleaning spells?"

The lanky boy shook his head with a sigh.

Dumbledore looked at the growing stack of correspondence on his table. He massaged his temples with his fingertips. The past few days had been tiring, and it wasn't just that he was getting old - although that certainly played a role. The first week of school was always hectic, but this time there was additional work. Mrs. Zabini - or was it Ms. Zabini now, he could never keep track - had decided to pull her son out of Hogwarts after the boy had been sorted into Gryffindor. It seemed extremely petty to Albus, but he knew better than to argue when there was no hope of changing her mind. Minerva and most of the other staff were busy with the first week of classes, so he took it upon himself to recruit a new student for Gryffindor. After decades of experience, he could generally tell where a student would fit in best, so finding one that would do well in Gryffindor wasn't a problem. Still, Dumbledore had to take the time to drop Blaise off at Durmstrang as his mother had requested, and then go down the list of potential students until he found one that hadn't already started school somewhere else, or was willing to transfer on short notice.

That wasn't even the worst part of the week. When he hadn't seen Quirrel at the sorting feast, he had just assumed the man was running late. It wasn't until the following morning Dumbledore had realized that the defense professor wouldn't be showing up at all. He had been forced to dispatch Snape to contact several candidates for a substitute. Hestia was not his first-choice due to her young age and relative inexperience, but it looked like she was all that was available at the moment. He had toyed with the idea of inviting Alastor to teach, but his skills were more valuable elsewhere. Besides, he did not want the battle-scarred auror terrifying half the student body.

With a sigh, Albus turned back to the letter in front of him. It was written in a hurried scribble, and signed by Quirrel's hand. More worryingly, the parchment had traces of dark magic on it. The magical signature felt familiar, but he couldn't quite place it. It felt broken, only a piece of something he had felt before. According to the contents of the letter, Quirrel had ran into some issues with his research into Vampires, and would be staying in Albania for the next couple of years.

It sounded very odd to Albus. For starters, years seemed like an awfully long commitment, and the letter itself had come on very short notice. He had never known Quirrel to be the impulsive sort. Ambitious, maybe, but certainly not impulsive. He placed the letter within a larger envelope, and magically sealed it. Albus wasn't sure what the magical residue was, so he didn't want to risk it contaminating the rest of his office. He would work on identifying it over the weekend when he had some more time to think.