Trapped in a Serpent's Coils

Disclaimer: Own HP?* wishes upon a star* I wants please!

" Avada Kedavra"- English

$ Avada Kedavra$- Parseltongue

An Exasperating Eighth:

Finally, after several minutes of walking, Harry and Professor Flitwick had arrived at the Great Hall. Once again, the little family was held captive by the beauty of the Castle as they gazed up at the enchanted ceiling that was showing the sky. Harry gave a start as the Charms Professor ambled passed him still lecturing on the proper wand holding techniques for basic Charms. The group moved to the Head table to join the other teachers. Harry was seated sandwiched between the bat like Professor and a large hairy giant of a man.

"Harry my boy," stated Dumbledore in his grandfatherly tone, "Introductions, Introductions! Next to you, on your right, is Professor Snape, the Potions professor, then to your left is Hagrid…"

By the time the introductions were finally over, Harry couldn't remember even half the names of the people, and he was getting a pounding headache from the grating sounds of the Headmaster's voice. All the teachers turned to Harry and looked at him expectantly. After a moment, he realized that he was supposed to say something to them. Harry opened his mouth… only to let out a loud hiss.

The reactions of the teachers were hilarious to say the least. Most flinched and paled, Flitwick squeaked and fell off his chair, Snape cringed, and Hagrid shrank from him in fear. Harry felt proud of himself, although outwardly he appeared stunned; the first steps to world domination were obviously to terrify everyone you came in contact with.

Dumbledore frowned, the twinkle in his eyes dimmed, and he chided, "My boy, it's not polite to play tricks on others, now apologize."

Harry could have sworn that Professor Snape muttered something about his father, but he was too busy grumbling to his family to take heed.

$Oh, Ajatar, he'ssss ssso ssstupid! He doesssn't even know when hissss own transsslation ssspell ended.$

It took roughly ten minutes, and lots of hand gestures, before the old coot realized he had to refresh the spell. This, of course, led to a lecture on why Harry should have been more dedicated to learning English. Dumbles was quite insistent that, although Harry had only been speaking English for a matter of hours, and with the aid of a spell no less, he should have mastered the language and been able to recite eloquent speeches. Stupid and delusional.

When the rant was over and the last disappointed look shot his way, Harry was sent out to shop with Hagrid; however, Harry had been forced out of the front doors without his parents. He was starting to feel that there was a conspiracy going on... naw, he was just being paranoid. They had almost gotten to the end of the Hogwarts wards when all of a sudden Harry remembered something really important. It took lots of hissing, cringing, and gesticulating before Harry could finally drag a pale Hagrid back to the school.

Once back at the front doors of Hogwarts, Harry and Hagrid were forced to knock and wait a long while before anyone opened the door. During the confusion that followed in which Harry, whose translation spell still had not been renewed, was interrogated for returning so early, Harry's parents managed to run-, or rather slither-outside and hide in the bushes. The covering actually did them no good, as Tähdet spent her time squealing,

$Oh hidesss and sssseekss. I lovesss thisss game. When I ssseeks, I gets to finds the ikle Hideysss kills them all!$

It took another half an hour for Harry to convey his needs, and for Dumbles to refresh the spell, before he was allowed to leave. Harry groaned. If he stayed here much longer he definitely would die of stupid overdose. This day was not off to a good start. With that thought, he dragged Hagrid off again and tried to ignore his mother's evil cackles

Harry looked around him in wonder. Diagonally was bustling and full of life, filled with witches and wizards in sweeping, colorful robes, buy cauldrons, brooms, and other things he'd only heard of in stories.

At this point, Hagrid was half dragging Harry along with him to a huge building with parts of it plated in gold. Guarding the doors were some of the strangest creatures Harry had ever seen. Short, but vicious and grim looking, the goblins were not to be trifled with. As he passed them, Harry, being the well brought up hatchling he was, gave the goblin the traditional serpent greeting he was taught to. A polite nod, followed by the hisses,

$It'sss an ikle foodlingssss! Hi ikle foodlings!$

Harry was very sure this was the right greeting as his mother was enthusiastically doing so as well, and his father was pretending not to know her… Yep, everything was normal. The goblins Harry was talking to gave him odd looks but nodded back. Harry was really starting to think people in this world had a thing against snakes. That would explain the funny looks he got sometimes. The only other explanation was his half crazed grin and that couldn't possibly be it.

Harry was led up to a counter where an annoyed looking goblin was waiting. "Key?" it demanded.

Hagrid spent minutes pulling… Ajatar knows what, from his pockets before handing a keycovered in something (Harry didn't really want to know) to the goblin. It wrinkled its nose in disgust before sharing a despairing glance with Harry. After approving the key, their goblin yelled for Griphook and a skinnier, slightly less threatening goblin materialized. Harry and Hagrid were then directed to a rickety looking cart that Harry wasn't sure wouldn't disintegrate when he touched it. As he got in, Harry could have sworn the goblin's eyes shone with a disturbingly familiar sadistic light uncomfortably reminiscent of his mother. That and the scared looks Hagrid gave the cart as they got in set off alarm bells in Harry's head.

Then the cart took off.

A/n: I finally got a chapter over 1,000 words long! Proud of me? Sorry if this chapter is a bit haphazard, but my brain was basically soup by the end of it. I would like to thank my amazing beta, Alice's Lover, for being so helpful and awesome and for putting up with me! You have endless patience… * squeals happily and glomps again* Well, hopefully, the translation spell thing is cleared up now, because rereading it now, even I got a headache tracking what I did with it. Yeah, I don't understand my own brain… Anyway, please review 'cause I loves you so much! Please let me know your opinions!

GoodNaughtyGirl- Thanks! I'm very happy you found it funny! About the last sentence, I know right? Lost count of how many times I've said something like that to worry my friends! Although now they've all started to doubt my sanity…

Ceti H. Black- Thanks! I love that you like Tähdet, she's so fun to write! 1,000 words! I did it, I kept my promise!

Charm13insomnia- Thank you! Glad you like it!

Stardust of Orion- Thank you! I do agree with you about Mme. Pomfrey though. I don't have anything against her and I have absolutely no clue how she ended up so bad.