A/N: I don't really write humor. I'm not good at it. Don't judge.
Chapter Twenty
Talent
Care of Magical Creatures was interesting during October. There were another three injuries, bringing the total tally for the third years up to five. Malfoy, Goyle, Michael Corner, Hannah, and Crabbe had all been hurt at one point or another by Hagrid's insane fascinating for the unsafe creatures. When Malfoy first got hurt, there were rumors that his father would bring about a complaint about the creature that nicked his son's arm, but nothing came of that. It had – Harry sort of remembered – been a problem in the fabricated world. Yeah, the more interesting, dangerous creatures were a lot better than flobberworms. They spent a several class periods on the border of the Forbidden Forest, talking about centaurs. It was awesome. They also spent time on ashwinders, post-owls, squids, a variety of normal house-hold pets, and some of creatures that Lupin was teaching in DADA. Most Gryffindors loved the class. Most Slytherins despised it, but the lines between the houses were quickly becoming something that no one took into account anymore.
And Harry hadn't been involved. It was a history changing event at Hogwarts, and for once, Harry could sit back and honestly claim absolutely no involvement. And he loved it.
Friday, October 22nd, the rumor started circulating that the ten remaining Slytherin purists were to be completely and totally shunned for the weekend. Marcus Flint, Terrance Higgs, Adam Yaxley, Maria Flint, Roger Montague, Elizabeth Higgs, Draco Malfoy, Gregory Goyle, Vincent Crabbe, and Pansy Parkingson were not to be spoken too or acknowledged during the weekend. On everyone else's house, they were to join a rebelling against the segregation of the house cup. A petition was put forward that would change the house cup and adapt the Quidditch cup in subtle manners. Anyone who signed the petition was told to not accept house points during the weekend and the following week. It drove Snape batty with all the Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws walked out on him when he screeched at them for not caring about the point system. It drove him even crazier when most of the Slytherins walked out with them. Snape and his gang had lost power within the Slytherin house. No one knew were the petition had originated. No one knew who had started the rebellion.
The teachers, well, mostly, didn't vocally support it. Snape and Dumbledore vocally condemned it. Some of the non-Slytherin students were openly, vocally, abrasively critical of the petition. But Harry and his friends signed. Most everyone he knew signed. And Aurora stopped taking and giving points. Flitwick, Sprout, most of the prefects, Babbling, and Lupin cut back on their use of points, almost entirely. Vector and McGonagall lessened the amounts of their given and taken points. Binns didn't change. Hagrid openly gave Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Gryffindor as many points as he could give while taking points from Slytherin. It was only his efforts that kept the point counters anywhere close to even. But then someone talked to him. Then Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Gryffindor shot into the negatives, hitting some couple hundred negative in just a week. Nearly every single point taken from those three houses came from Snape or Dumbledore. Slytherin remained at about 106 points.
Someone – she wouldn't say who – approached Hermione and roped her into the recording the points that Snape took from people in his class. Someone – no one really knew who – had leaked the point situation to a reporter at the Daily Prophet and the story had made second page news (but only because the Cannons had won a game; nothing can be more news worthy and sensational than that). And Harry loved every minute of it. For once, everything didn't focus around him. For once, he wasn't the one running the rebellion or openly hated or, or… It was wonderful. He had friends. He had a multitude of friends. There were more and more people he was growing to trust. Sally-Anne had returned, and the four Hufflepuff girls spent an increasing amount of time with him, Neville, Hermione and their other friends. Wayne, Justin and Ernie seemed to come with them.
Wood, much to his consternation, had signed the petition and he, along with Diggory and Davies stopped practicing. Instead, Harry worked with Cedric Diggory and Cho Chang as the three good seekers at Hogwarts to organize pick-up games nearly every night. Each night, one of the three of them or some other older member of a Quidditch team would organize a game between whoever showed up. Harry only made it to two or three, but they were absolutely brilliant fun. Younger players were encouraged to come to these, so Harry finished meeting nearly all the second years. Zach Wood, Sapphire Vaisey and Sebastian Urquhart, all Slytherin second years, showed a lot of potential talent as a chaser team.
Zachary Wood was the third Wood, in actuality. There was Oliver, Sally, Zach and Diana. And… Harry double checked to be sure, but Kenneth confirmed it. The Woods were the only family to have a kid in each house. It was Harry who then gathered the Woods together and convinced them to become spokespeople for the ever growing house unity. They didn't need much prompting. The school was already upside down as it was.
And in the mix of all the chaos came Halloween. The 31st was a Sunday; the Saturday before, most every third year and above went to Hogsmeade, although Harry had told Sarah that if she wanted, he'd stay and help her finalize their show. She ordered him to go. Harry loved Hogsmeade. He traveled around with Hermione, Neville and Able, who showed him the sites in the morning. Kenneth came and stole Hermione away for lunch. Which Harry thought was a little odd, but he figured he'd speak to Kenneth about it when he had the time. Harry and his friends ate lunch at the high end restaurant in Hogsmeade: Vanilla's Season. It was Harry, really, who invited Able, Neville, Eddie, Nora, Selene, Persephone, Tracey and Millicent to dine on his dollar. But that didn't exactly happen. Neville insisted on paying for himself and Millicent. Persephone paid for herself and Eddie. Able picked up Nora's and his own tab. Tracey haughtily insisted on paying for her own meal. That left Harry and Selene. She ended up paying for their entrées. Harry bought everyone's drinks, appetizers and desserts.
It was a fun meal. Eddie and Persephone made a bit of an odd couple, but the way Nora and Selene complained about it, they'd been dancing around each other long enough. Neville and Tracey got in a lively dispute over some law that was up for review in Wizengamots. Harry watched his friends, all eight of them. All eight of them. And he had more friends. Way more friends! It felt so incredibly good… the stuff feeling he got after sharing a gigantic chocolate lava cake with Selene for desert was another memory he'd use for a patronus. It just felt so good! After lunch, Eddie and Persephone took off together, Selene, Tracey and Millicent decided to show Nora a true wizarding clothing store, and so Neville and Able ended up by themselves again. Able made a comment about how being friends with the Boy-Who-Lived attracted more girls. Harry jokingly slugged him. Neville pointed out that it was true. Harry sighed and protested that they were all his friends. Neither Neville nor Able contested that fact.
They found the fourth year Gryffindor girls not long after that. Mary, Eliza, Queenie, Katie, Demelza and Dakota waved hello and stopped the boys for an extended chat. Katie looked like she was handling the village very, very well. Following that, Harry led Able and Neville off the main road and down a few residential blocks until they reached the corner of Lunar St. and D'monde Court. The Enon house was mostly closed off and rather dark, but the locked door responded to the correct version of Harry's portfolio key and the three boys stepped inside the three story residential building.
It was large, spacious, and probably really comfortable. The lights came up automatically, welcoming the Gryffindors into a large, very airy feeling first floor. The first floor had nearly no walls in it; a very visible set of stairs were set into the far back corner. An ornate fireplace graced one wall. Harry figured that this would be the perfect place to hold a dance party or something. And it was his. A crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling; it wasn't lit, but it still looked gorgeous. Everything appeared to be in good repair. They headed for the second floor.
There was a kitchen, a few bathrooms, a dining room, a living room, a study with a few personal journals in a bookshelf. Harry flipped through the journals while Neville and Able explored the rest of the second floor. He eventually just grabbed the two that looked most interesting – one talking about some potions experiments and the other what seemed to be a long winded rant about participating in Wizengamots. Harry figured it would give him a different perspective on that governmental body. The third floor was divided into four bedrooms. The master bedroom was huge. The bed was huge. The house was really cool. He could conceivably host Neville, Hermione, the Spinnet girls, and the two Vanes in this house, as long as they didn't mind doubling up and sharing rooms. The rooms were certainly large enough to share.
Harry found another personal journal of the last leader of the Enon family and stuffed it in his bag. He wanted to get to know his benefactor, just like Cornelius and Opal Bartholomew… There was also attic space tucked behind some of the bedrooms, but it was full of stuff and Able decided that they didn't have time to explore it because they'd promised Sarah that they'd come in early to put the final touches on their presentation for the following day. So they left, locked up the house, and promised to help Harry inventory the attic during the next Hogsmeade weekend.
Sunday was a blast.
Most of the Gryffindors were up early, getting last minute details in place. Angelina and Dean were rushing around, having somehow ended up as the two kids in charge of the whole thing. Dean had done an excellent job putting together a program that he let Harry and Seamus see ahead of time. Towards the end of the program was one act entitled: "OMG! It's HARRY POTTER!" It said it was being performed by the fifth year boys. Harry felt a little sick, thinking about what the Fred, George, Kenneth and Lee could do with that title. Harry's act with the other two Harry's was the third act to go. His act with his other friends was last. Good; he'd have time to change from costume to costume and still watch a majority of the show. The show was scheduled to start at three, and then run until six, which was about an hour before the Halloween feast. Jitters among the Gryffindors ran high as their out of house friends laughed at them or provided comfort.
Harry spent most of the morning with Paradise, Lily, Vicky, Charles, James and Jack, helping them prepare for the comedy skit they had put in order.
Three pm rolled around.
The Hogwarts auditorium was full of students and teachers.
The curtain lifted. The show began.
o.o.o.o.o.o
Eliza Kirke opened. She sang a song, detailing the history of Hogwarts. Only Dumbledore recognized that nearly every line in her song was stolen from the Sorting Hat's song from different years. It was actually a very accomplished feat.
Eric Kettleburn and Sarah Bathsheba followed. They sang a parody of a Celestina Warbeck song. It was hysterical. Sarah was playing Celestina and Eric a guy who sang about how he hated her songs. "Celestina" just took that as encouragement and sang louder and awfuller and her dancing got worse. At one point, Sarah did the chicken dance. Muggleborns and halfbloods lost all control of their laughter then.
Then it was time for a skit entitled "Confusion." In the program, it said only that Confusion was being performed by "Harry." Harry Potter wobbled out on stage in a very obvious white beard and white wig. Both beard and wig straggled down to his toes and he kept giving the illusion that he tripped over his own beard. He settled, in an old, slow manner, on a throne-like chair in the middle of the stage. To almost everyone, it was obvious he was supposed to be Albus Dumbledore. Harry Bellwood, in a Harry Potter wig and glasses darted on stage, looking around with wide eyes. The two of them exchanged a few cryptic words about socks. No one but Dumbledore understood that – and he looked a bit affronted. Then Harry Bailey jumped on stage, wearing a ninja costume and a Harry Potter wig and glasses. The seven minute play then proceeded to reveal that they were all Harry Potters. They were constantly talking over each other and trying to be the most Harry Potter-ish of them all. It wasn't particularly funny, and Bellwood lost character near the end and starting giggling, but it went over well. The skit ended to all three Harry's shouting their names at each other. They ran off the stage to applause from most people, but a glare from Dumbledore.
Harry got out of his costume and into his narrator robes before joining his friends in one of the reserved boxes of the auditorium. Angelina had made a point of making the boxes available for Gryffindors who had already gone or were waiting to go so they could still see the show.
The six first years Harry'd been helping put on a rendition of a Shakespeare comedy that he had no frame of reference for. Hermione and Able found it particularly amusing, especially because they messed up the Shakespearean language so badly. Harry did get that; it was very amusing to here an eleven-year-old stutter over seemingly foreign words.
Both Cormac and Ron attempted, albeit separately, to be stand-up comedians. Neither of them got many laughs.
One of Harry's favorite acts was the juggling show that Angelina, Katie and Alicia did. Angelina opened, juggling three neutral colored balls. Katie and Alicia tossed her more and more balls until Angelina was juggling nearly nine balls. Katie and Alicia started juggling on the side, but they were only doing three balls and some tricks they added to the performance. After a few seconds, Alicia set up a hoop and Angelina managed to throw all nine balls through the hoop without dropping a one. While she was doing that, Katie stepped center stage and started juggling an hour-glass shaped object on a stick. She did all sorts of tricks with that; it was awesome. When Alicia came forward, Katie backed up and let Alicia start with the pins. Angelina stepped up them, put her wand near her mouth and murmured a barely audible incendio. The fire seemed to spring from Angelina's mouth and catch hold of the pins Alicia was juggling. She was now playing with fire. It was awesome to watch. When their act finished, the Gryffindor chasers bowed to ruckus applause.
Emma and William performed a dance. It was gorgeous! It was a ballet piece, Hermione assured him, from some famous ballet. They were both really good.
And then the fifth year boys were up.
Harry had no words to describe the horror.
Fred, George and Kenneth were all poorly dressed as girls, as if they'd taken the time to look like a guy playing a girl. And not the Hermione type of girl. No, this was full blown Lavender-Pavarti-in-six-years type of girl. And they all had copies of Witch Weekly that had a large picture of Harry's face on it and the words: Most Eligible Bachelor. And they were squealing. Squealing. Harry had learned to expect a lot from the twins and their roommates, but this was a bit much. They spent well over two minutes describing in such specific detail why Harry was the most eligible bachelor. It had everyone but Harry in gales of laughter. And then Lee came on stage. And Lee had a Harry Potter wig on, but his glasses were sunglasses and his clothes were the most bejeweled, glitzed out clothes Harry'd ever seen. He looked like a bad rock star. And the girls – em… yeah… - just fawned over him. And it still had everyone laughing!
Harry couldn't take it. It was horrific.
It was Sarah who patted him on the back when he started coughing.
Thankfully, they ended quickly. When the twins ended, the five friends left their box and moved into their positions on stage. Sarah and Neville were in costume. Hermione and Able had their wands ready. They missed the act in between Kenneth's and theirs, but Harry didn't care. When it came time, the lights dimmed to almost nothing and Harry swept out on stage, his dark cloak billowing like professor Snape's. Sarah's first picture, a gloomy castle suffering the torrent of rain shimmered into appearance in the air behind Harry. The narrator stopped, center stage, and looked out at the audience. They were quiet. Breathless. "It's quite a story," Harry began, "and like so many tragic tales, it begins in a familiar location, with a familiar, heart-wrenching situation." He paused and lowered his head. The rain in Sarah's drawing seemed to move, shaking back and forth and appearing to truly rain. A pre-recorded sound spell held a horrific shriek and what was obvious was a girl trying to escape from an abusive situation. But she didn't escape. Harry found Paradise in the audience; she had known this was coming, but still his little sister looked rather ashen. The pre-recorded sound was another scream, a slammed door, and the decisive click of a key. Harry raised his head, staring at the audience. "But phoenixes aren't meant to be caged."
The castle picture faded and was replaced by the inside of a bare tower. Sarah, in her delicate red costume, stood out against the black and white background. It had taken some pretty complicated spells and some very good mime work on Sarah's behave to give the impression that she was truly caged within the tower. Sarah took it one step beyond that, and she conveyed how terrified her character was of the tower and of imprisonment. "She will try to escape," Harry paused again, letting the audience refocus on Sarah as she commanded center stage, if just behind Harry. "But she will fail, because her magic is not yet strong enough. Because she is not yet old enough. Because when trapped, phoenixes are in fatal peril." Here, Sarah mimed a panic attack before the stage went dark and she dashed off the stage. "There are those," Harry said, "that could help the poor phoenix. There is a prince. A prince of water and ice. A prince so different from the phoenix, but he was the only one who dared ride to the phoenix's aid." Another picture of Sarah's showed up, of a Neville-esque prince on a horse almost certainly crafted from ice, riding on and on. Sarah had drawn ten different poses of the knight and horse and Able had managed to string them together in a loop so it appeared like the horse galloped through a snow storm.
"Water and ice and cold. Fire and heat. They are opposites. They were destined."
The galloping horse faded.
"But the powers that controlled the phoenix fought this destiny, desperate to keep it from coming to fulfillment." Here, it was Neville on stage, with a conjured, shining sword in hand. He mimed battling foes from Sarah's drawings. Sarah really had out-done herself on the villain pictures. For a good minute, Neville and the pictures battled and it seemed real. "Through persistence and effort, the prince fought his way to the phoenix's chambers to free her. And this is where the final showdown came about." Neville and Sarah were both on stage now, both in Sarah's tower. From the pictures, a lordly black shadow hung over him.
"They were destined," Harry repeated, his voice slow and sad. "But they could not defeat the powers that be. They fought, long, valiantly," pause, "in vein." It was all acted out behind him, all so visually stunning. "In the end," Harry said, whispering but not whispering, "the prince gave his life to the young phoenix, giving her energy and power and life." Neville crumbled to the stage. Harry heard a cry from the audience. "And this gave her the energy," Harry said, quiet, "to triumph." Here too, Sarah crumbled. No one heard Harry whisper expecto patronum. He held his wand behind his back, and the phoenix knew precisely what to do. The phoenix patronus blared up behind Harry, stretching its wings in a glorious sight of red and gold power. It was the hardest thing Able and Hermione had to do during the performance, shining light on the phoenix in such a way that it appeared red and gold. And they pulled it off. Harry raised his arms upward, framed by the phoenix behind. The black cloak fell from his shoulders and Harry too was dressed in red and gold. "And so the phoenix lived, beautiful, strong, yet sorrowful and broken, for it would never forget the sacrifice given by the prince of Ice and Water and Cold."
The pre-recorded sound of a phoenix song filled the auditorium. The phoenix patronum faded. The lights went out. The stage went black, but the song persisted for a good few seconds as the blackness hung. Harry walked of stage, grateful that Fawkes had so willingly recorded his voice… The song stopped. The act was over. The applause was immense. Harry, Sarah and Neville returned to the stage. They were joined by Hermione and Able. The five took a bow, acknowledging the crowd with smiles. Sarah looked ever so radiantly pleased. They left the stage to get changed into their uniforms. Angelina and Dean took the stage, reminding people to vote for their favorite acts and telling everyone that the results would be announced and rewards would be given at the feast that night. Professor McGonagall had been the one to sponsor the awards. Harry and his friends, all in excellent moods, headed for the Great Hall.
o.o.o.o.o.o
It was a Halloween feast to remember. Mostly because the Weird Sisters – no one but Harry and Professors McGonagall and Sinistra knew where the funding had come from – were set up behind the staff table and were playing during the whole meal. Mostly because there weren't any long tables, only the staff table and a never ending buffet right in front of the staff table. There was even only one table with ten seats; each seat had the name of one of the most despised kids in the school. Not even Ron or Cormac, who no one particularly liked, were so ostracized. It was a feast to remember because for the first time, no one important let house lines blur their judgment. Sure, prejudices hadn't left and there were definitely some pureblood purists outside of the ten Slytherins, but it wasn't a problem. It was epic.
Harry was instantly mobbed by his close Hufflepuff friends. Sally-Anne and Susan had tear marks running down their faces and all four of his female Hufflepuff yearmates wanted hugs. Harry gave them, willingly. Congratulations were being given to Gryffindors all around for an inspired performance. Harry received more 'well done's than he knew what to do with, as did Sarah and Neville and Hermione and Able. Dean was instrumental in getting Sarah to set up the pictures she'd drawn for the performance on one of the walls of the Great Hall, and all throughout the feast, students would go up to the pictures and admire them. Sarah never wandered far from her pictures, and Harry could tell she was very, very overwhelmed by so much praise. An hour or so into the feast, Harry realized he hadn't seen any of the fifth year Gryffindor boys. Hermione pointed out they were probably hiding from him. Harry made a mental note to get them back, sometime. In the future.
The food was spectacular, the house elfs had truly out-down themselves preparing the food. The music and dancing was wonderful. And during breaks in the music, the members of the Weird Sisters would come down and mingle with the students. Musical historians would look back on that Halloween and blame it for the Weird Sisters truly getting off their feet and reaching pop-stardom. Musical historians would also cast blame on the Weasley Twins and Harry Potter for so influencing the Sisters' music so as it could sometimes be almost incomprehensibly funny and incredibly somber and serious, all from the same band. That Halloween truly jumped started the Weird Sisters' fame. Music would never be the same again.
Harry danced a lot during the feast. He danced with Hermione, the third year Hufflepuff girls, with Katie, Alicia, and Angelina, with Selene and Persephone, with Mary and the rest of the fourth year Gryffindor girls, with Tracey and Millicent, with Paradise, Lily and Vicky, with Romilda, with Leann, with Nora, with Su and the rest of the Ravenclaw third years, with Pavarti and Lavender, with Daphne, with Artemis and Pallas and Gracelyn Zale, with big Sarah and Emma and Ruth and Temperance and even Patricia. He danced with girls he didn't know. And, for what Dumbledore and McGonagall degreed would be the last dance of the night, Harry plucked up the courage and dragged an exhausted looking little Sarah away from her pictures and onto the dance floor. It was a slow dance, but both of them were too tired to assign any meaning too it. The song ended and Sarah failed to hold back a yawn. The crowd started to disappear.
It was Percy Weasley and Andrew Kirke who caused the panic. Percy, at least, was at least slightly discrete in the manner he ran towards the Headmaster and the Deputy Headmaster. But didn't manner. Andrew wasn't discrete. "The Fat Lady! She was attacked! The tower was broken into!" Beside Harry, Sarah tensed and instantly looked terrified. He clutched her hand, trying to calm her down.
Dumbledore left the room, hurriedly. McGonagall took charge. "Everyone, stay in the Great Hall. Professors, please round up any students who have already left and return them here." She turned to the band and said something, but no one heard what she said or the band's reply. McGonagall banished the buffet table and conjured up some two hundred plus sleeping bags, all spread out along the floor of the Great Hall. "Everyone, just grab a bag and settle down. We'll turn the lights out when everyone is accounted for."
Harry pulled a nearly catatonic Sarah with him to where Kenneth and Hermione were standing, not far away from Able and Queenie and Neville and Mary. Other people that Harry knew were around. Paradise was actively making her way towards them. All of his friends were looking towards him for advice, Harry noticed. He really did not have the brain power to handle that. "Um," Harry whispered, staring back at his friends, "just do what McGonagall says. Try and get some sleep, okay?"
"What's wrong, though," Paradise asked, her voice high and worried. "What's wrong? What happened to the Fat Lady?"
"I don't know," Harry said, grabbing Paradise's shoulders and forcing her to look at him, "but you're a Gryffindor, remember, Paradise. You're braver than the brave."
She bit her lip, looking uncertain. "But I'm scared."
Harry glanced at Sarah and saw the same sentiment echoed in her eyes. "Me too, Paradise." Sharing personal stuff, Harry reflected, back to the thoughts he'd had when he first told Paradise about the Dursleys. So much had happened since then. But the principal remained the same. Paradise relaxed, but when Harry settled into a sleeping back, she insisted on the one to his direct right. No one protested when Sarah claimed the sleeping back on his left. They didn't know what was going on. They were scared. But they'd get through it. Together.
The lights went out.
The Weird Sisters struck up a lullaby.