I don't own Harry Potter and don't make any money with this fiction

Currently, I'm not really good at writing regularly - I hope this will change once I have finished my exams in about three weeks, but I cannot promise anything. I really hate it, not being able to write the way I want to...

Both Finwitch1 and a guest have wondered about whether the teachers won't miss Harry - they will, and the issue will be addressed in one of the following chapters (that part is already written, actually). They will start looking for him and everything, though I haven't yet decided when Harry will be discovered.

One Mirror, two Elves

#

The next morning, Harry woke up from the sound of hundreds of hungry students hurrying towards the great hall for breakfast – or at least this was what Harry deduced from the trampling noise. Yawning, he stretched his limbs and finally got up from the nest of jumpers, shirts and trousers he had built yesterday. He hadn't wanted to crumple his nice new robes which had already helped him not to violate the second most important rule, so he had left them in his trunk.

Shivering slightly, he opened the door of his cupboard. First of all, he needed to find a bathroom.

Twenty minutes later, Harry was silently cursing the much-too-large castle. He was quite sure that even though they were wizards, the inhabitants of Hogwarts had to use toilets and stuff, too, so there had to be bathrooms. But although he had opened (or, in some cases, tried to open) what had to be 50 doors already Harry hadn't found a single loo. If he didn't find one soon...

Finally, when it was almost too late, Harry descended the stairs that led to the slithering common room and it was at the base of the staircase that he found it - a glorious, wonderful bathroom.

When he had emptied his bladder, he went to the sink to wash his hands. Just when he was about to turn away again in order to resume his search for his new colleagues, a snappish voice called, "Comb your hair, ragamuffin!"

Harry whirled around. "What?" he asked, and when he didn't spot anyone who could have addressed him he added "Uhm, hello?"

"Impolite as well, I see," the same voice spoke. Harry twisted around and even looked into the stall he had just vacated – he couldn't possible have overlooked someone, could he? But then, he had been in quite a hurry to get his trousers down in time and hadn't exactly paid attention to his surroundings.

"Who are you? Where are you?" Harry asked once he was sure that he hadn't missed a hidden wizard or – and he blushed from the mere thought of it – a witch.

"Not the brightest one, are you?"

This time, instead of looking for a person or any other creature with an almost human voice, Harry concentrated on the direction the voice was coming from. Whatever it was, it must be somewhere near the sink...

"Now, I don't like repeating myself, but I will make an exception for you just this once. Comb. Your. Hair."

"Are you the mirror?" Harry blurted out, flabbergasted.

"What else, you nitwit?" the voice sounded rather cross by now.

"But – but-" Harry stammered, not at all sure what he wanted say. That mirrors weren't supposed to talk? How anything without a mouth could talk? Why a mirror bothered about how Harry looked when his very own family hadn't cared about it? "I don't have a comb," he finally mumbled.

"Hmpf," the mirror replied, and suddenly, a comb appeared on the rim of the sink.

Naturally, Harry only stared at it.

"What are you waiting for?" the mirror demanded.

Carefully, Harry approached the sink. It really seemed to be an ordinary comb. When he reached out to take it, he hesitated for a few moments, his hand hovering over the innocent-looking item. He felt the same kind of tingling sensation he had felt yesterday when making sure that the door to his cupboard was safely locked. The tingling didn't seem to be hostile, though, quite the contrary, Harry thought it felt really nice. Therefore, he decided that he could risk touching the comb.

When nothing out of the ordinary happened once he had touched it, Harry felt almost disappointed.

"What?" that was the mirror again, "not good enough for you? I'm only a mirror, you know, if you want to have some high-quality brush you need to ask someone else."

"How come you can make a comb appear out of nowhere?" Harry asked curiously.

"Well, I'm a mirror, am I not? Of course I can produce combs for messy little wizards like you!" Harry was sure that the mirror would have sneered if it had had a face.

"I'm not a wizard," Harry murmured, too quiet for the mirror to hear. Then, a thought struck him and his expression brightened up. "So, uhm, can you perhaps make food appear as well? Treacle tart, perhaps?" Harry asked rather eagerly. His stomach gave a rather loud grumble as if to emphasize the importance of Harry's question.

"I'm a mirror, you chump!"

"Oh, ehm, I suppose that means no, then?" Harry asked unsurely.

"You really should take great care not to open your mouth in the presence of Professor Snape, you know. He cannot stand imbeciles and you seem to be particularly slow. But then, since you are down here you must be a Slytherin yourself, so perhaps the Professor won't be too stern with you... Anyway, you can tell your little housemates that I don't care that they prefer the bathroom next to their common room, oh no! I don't care that these little snots think that only mirrors with at least a golden frame are worthy of showing them their reflection – and I'm not jealous of this stupid git of a mirror in that pompous bathroom down the corridor, oh no, you can tell them that! I wonder why you actually have the audacity to enter this bathroom and disturb my peace – if you think I need your pity you are quite wrong! Now, why don't you hurry along and join your spoiled, whiny little classmates-"

The mirror would probably have rambled on for quite some time if Harry hadn't interrupted it. "I'm not a student! I'm a house elf!" he said indignantly.

"Of course you are, and I'm Joanne K. Rowling," the mirror snorted.

"Who?" Harry asked curiously. He felt as if he should know the name...

"Don't read very much, do you? Anyway, you're certainly not a house elf!"

"Of course I am!" Harry insisted, "I'm the new house elf, and I really need to find my colleagues. You don't happen to know where the staff's quarters are?"

"Well, most of the time the house elves are in the kitchen, except for the nights, of course, when they clean the castle. The kitchens are just down the corridor, there is an entrance for teachers and students behind one of the portraits – well, actually it's meant to be only for teachers, not that anybody cares – but the house elves don't use this one, naturally. They use the one through the broom cupboard next to the statue of Emmy the Eviscerated Elf – have never understood why they have put such a statue next to the entrance, well, they're barmy, that lot. But anyway, you aren't a house elf so I shouldn't have told you- hey, come back! I'm not finished! You uncivilised, disobliging brat!"

#

Harry had beamed at the friendly mirror when it explained in detail where he would find the entrance to the kitchen, where he would not only find his colleagues but hopefully get breakfast as well. Excited as he was, he didn't even wait for the mirror to finish but ran out of the room as soon as it had mentioned the gross statue. It couldn't be difficult to find a figure like this.

Sure enough, Harry found the statue and the broom cupboard next to it in less than five minutes. Taking a deep breath, he knocked.

Nothing happened.

Patiently, Harry waited for almost two minutes, but when still no sound could be heard from the other side of the door, he hesitantly tried the handle. He didn't want to appear rude by just barging into the kitchen but he didn't want to be even later than he already was, either.

The inside of the broom cupboard looked just like an empty broom cupboard would look like, but there, in the left corner, was a door barely as high as Harry. Looked as if he was a particularly large house elf, then.

Again, he knocked and this time, it took only about ten seconds until someone answered the door. Harry stood up straighter when the door slowly opened. He desperately hoped that they would forgive him for being late and not send him back to the Dursley's immediately. He rather liked the castle and really looked forward to cleaning such a beautiful place. It was so much better than cleaning the boring house of his relatives!

"Wha- what can Wimpy do for Master?" the house elf who had opened the door squeaked.

Harry gapped. The creature – a house elf, obviously – didn't look like him at all. It had large, pointy ears, enormous eyes and a snout. Compared to the size of its body, the elf's head was much larger than Harry's and the creature was more than a foot shorter than him.

His shoulders slumped. And here he had thought that finally he had found other beings like him, somewhere he belonged. But apparently, he had been wrong. He wasn't a house elf. However, he wasn't a wizard either, that much he knew for sure. A freak like him couldn't be a wizard. Wizards didn't have to do chores the entire day as Harry had done his entire life, wizards weren't practically slaves for their respective family, wizards could leave their family whenever they wanted since they already had wizarding clothes, wizards could make things happen while Harry couldn't.

Before Harry could dwell further on these depressive thought, a thought struck him. Or rather, he remembered a paragraph from the book about house elves he had read. 'The physical appearance of house elves varies greatly so that an attempt to distinguish a house elf from other, similar magical beings such as wood elves, goblins and many other creatures only by means of appearance is bound to fail. The most striking feature all house elves have in common is their complete and utter subservience. As no other known magical being has a similar trade of character, it is the most fool-proved way to differentiate between the different species.'

But this meant it didn't matter how Harry looked! He was still a house elf, even though he looked different than – what had been its name? "Uhm, I'm sorry, but what was your name again?" Harry asked politely.

"Wimpy, Master Sir."

"Hello Wimpy, I'm Harry. I'm the new elf. I was meant to start yesterday but I only arrived in the evening and then I didn't find anyone of you and the letter that told me that I had gotten the job was rather vague – well, I'm really sorry, I hope my tardiness hasn't caused any problems..." Harry trailed off when he noticed that Wimpy was staring at him wide-eyed. Well, even wider-eyed than what seemed to be normal for the elf with the extraordinary large eyes.

"Wimpy elf, you Master," the elf finally squeaked, its voice even higher than it had been before.

Harry shook his head. "No, I'm a house elf, too. I know I look different than you, but I really am an elf. Not all elves look the same, you know, I have read a book about us, and even wizards know that we look different."

Wimpy shook its head desperately. "Master wizard, Sir, no elf! Wimpy elf, but no Master!"

Harry sighed silently. This was getting rather complicated. But then, he couldn't really hold it against Wimpy that he (or she? Harry wasn't sure) didn't believe him that he, Harry, was an elf, too. Just a few minutes ago, Harry himself had doubted whether he was a house elf, and Harry had read a book on elves! And if Wimpy's grammar was anything to go by, he hadn't read much during his life, if at all. Harry knew that this happened to some elves, that their family didn't care about the elf's education. At least the Dursley's had allowed him to attend primary school.

"Perhaps you could take me to the head-elf so that we can clear up this misunderstanding?" Harry asked.

"Wimpy can do this, yes, Wi- Wimpy can," the elf nodded fiercely.

And without further ado, Wimpy took Harry's hand and pulled him through the door into an enormous kitchen. Curiously, Harry looked around. Four long tables stood in the middle of the room and a fifth one was placed perpendicular to the other four at the far end of the room. Actually, it looked rather similar to the great hall were he had found all that pudding.

Wimpy led Harry through the entire kitchen and so the boy had plenty of opportunities to see other house elves at work. When he passed them, many of his future colleagues looked up from their work. As soon as their eyes fell on Harry, they started gaping. Harry smiled and waved at them, but this seemed only to increase the gaping.

To Harry's great displeasure, he noticed that most elves looked similar to Wimpy. Apparently, whoever was responsible for hiring new elves had a penchant for this particular type of elves. Harry wondered why they had now taken him, a completely different kind of elf. Perhaps the wizard who had chosen all the other elves had retired? Or there might be a new law that forced Hogwarts to employ different types of elves. He knew that there were similar laws amongst normal human beings, he had heard Uncle Vernon complaining about having to hire someone called 'Paki' who was, at least in Uncle Vernon's opinion, similar to Harry. Dimly, Harry wondered whether he should ask if Paki could come to Hogwarts as well...

Just then, however, his thoughts were interrupted by Wimpy's high-pitched voice again. "Just knock on the door, Master Harry Sir, Bossy call you in then." and with that, the elf quickly hurried away, back to work.

Taking a deep breath, Harry did as he was told. He could only hope that the head-elf was more knowledgeable about the various looks of house elves.

#

"Enter!" a raspy voice, slightly deeper than Wimpy's but still rather high, called.

"Good morning, Sir, I'm Harry, the new elf. I was supposed to start yesterday. I'm sorry I'm a day late, it was kind of hard to find the right place, I have never worked in a castle and all the corridors and doors and cupboards are kind of confusion. But well, I'm here now, and I really hope I haven't caused any difficulties." Nervously, Harry – who had, until know, spoken more to his feet than to Bossy – eyed the head-elf. He, too, looked similar to Wimpy, except that he didn't seem to have any ears at all. Though it was quite possible that they were hidden somewhere amongst all his hair that seemed to sprout from the entire elf's head, Harry supposed. Even his eyes were barely visible. He seemed to be really old and his skin was several sizes too big for him.

"The new elf? Then Professor Dumbledore... all right, yes, I see... but you're not an elf – are you?"

Harry got the distinct impression that Bossy had difficulties comprehending what was going on. Perhaps he was one of the elves the man he had overheard yesterday had spoken about?

"Yes, I am," Harry stated firmly. He knew that it wasn't really fair to take advantage of the old elf's confusion, but if it meant that he was less likely to be sent back to the Dursleys, Harry was all right with this. He didn't want to go back to the place where he didn't have any contact with other elves, where he would be all alone again and being made feel like a freak. He simply had to stay in the castle!

"So, ehm, but you look... you not Master, then?" Bossy sounded doubtful, but not as much as Wimpy had. Harry took this as a good sign.

"Uhm, well, I might look a bit different, I know, but I'm not a wizard or even a normal person. I have worked for a family until know, but then I got the invitation to work at Hogwarts and I accepted."

Bossy gave him a bleary look before he began to sort through a pile of paper that lay on the desk in front of him. He got more and more frantic when he didn't seem to find what he was looking for and papers started to fly across the entire room. Finally, the elf gave up and turned his gaze to Harry again.

"Well, ehm, then, if Master Professor Dumbledore tell you to work at Hogwarts, I sure everything be right. Though you really look like..." the elf's gaze became unfocused again and he stared right through Harry. Unnerved by his boss's eyes, Harry started to fidget, which seemed to bring Bossy out of his musings again. "Yes, then... you need a place and - what work be you good in?"

Harry straightened up. This was easy, his relatives had taught him well. "I'm really good at cooking, dusting, sweeping, moping, doing the laundry and cleaning bathrooms. I don't need much space either – a cupboard would be plenty!"

"Good, then, this be very good, yes. You work with cleaning elves, then, we be too plenty in kitchen already. Wimpy show you elf quarters now, you need to sleep at day. You cannot clean while students around – this be very important, do not forget, no, no! Very important, yes, very important..." again, Bossy stopped speaking in favour of staring into nothingness – which was better than staring at him, Harry thought.

The door behind Harry opened and he whirled around. The head-elf must have some means to call his subordinates, as it was Wimpy who had opened the door and was just now asking Bossy what he could do for him.

"Show new elf elf quarters for cleaning elves. And feedroom, too, yes."

Wimpy looked at Bossy doubtfully but nodded. "Wimpy do this." she turned to Harry. "Mas- Harry follow Wimpy, please. We go to elf quarters."

Harry nodded eagerly. After a quick good-bye to the head-elf (which the latter didn't seem to register at all), he followed Wimpy out of the room.

Next Chapter: Moving into the elves' quarters, clothes and a really, really strange elf named Hildy.