Thank you for tuning into another chapter of A New Life... I'm not sure how much I like the title and I may change it... maybe you have some ideas? :D I'd love to hear them if you do. Sorry though that it has taken so long to update this chapter, but I have had a lot on helping my aunties and grandmother move houses like a week after the other and then I was caught up in the real world, but now I am free to re-enter my imagination, at least for a while :)

Chapter 4:

Months passed and Christmas came. Draco and Neville went home for the holiday, but I was staying here. It was nice to be able to wander the castle without worrying about my friends knowing anything about how I know all of these places... it was a little bit of freedom, but I did think that I would be alone for Christmas... that is until I met the Weasley twins. I had met them before, but I hadn't thought that I would like them, they were really not anything like their little brother. They did however get my attention when they played pranks on their brother for things that he had said or done against me and my friends (even just to other Slytherins in general). I'd enjoyed watching them harass their brother, but I only approached them after one morning when they had fed him a potion that would make him sing like a canary for the whole day. We got along quite well actually.

The twins were fun. They want to open a joke shop after school, but their mother wants them to go into the Ministry with their father. They keep on saying to me that if they go work for the ministry they might end up being blowing up their offices. The three of us would often be found chatting and sometimes I would even give the pair ideas for their pranking. It really is interesting to hear their logic. They don't spend too much time on school work but they are really smart and they know how to make people laugh.

Christmas morning was interesting. All the other boys of my year in Slytherin have gone home so I wake up to the empty room and notice at the end of my bed a small collection of presents from my friends. I smile softly at the innocent packages thinking of my friends who id sent my gifts the night before.

Draco got me an expensive quill and ornately decorated pen knife. So like Dray to send me something so elegant yet useful... I can almost picture his smug face if he had been here to watch me open it.

Neville on the other hand gave me a plant with a note

Harry,

Merry Christmas. The plant is a hybrid of a plant that reacts to its owner's emotions and a plant that that reacts badly to sunlight and releases a poison that can be harmful to people who haven't bonded with the plant. You can use it to protect your things and don't worry the poison isn't fatal and Madame Pomfrey has an antidote on hand so feel free to have it wherever you want it.

When the plant is fully grown it'll have flowers that'll be purple when it's happy and red when it's sad.

I'd better not see any red flowers

Neville

I smile at the gift knowing how thoughtful it was of the boy to give me such a gift. The plant looked like nothing much more than a few black vines at the moment, but I would make sure it was happy. Placing the black pot under my bed I move to the small box and read the note saying it was just a small gift from the twins for their appreciation of my help on their... project. Inside the box are a collection of potion vials and a note detailing what each one does. Smiling me turn to the last package in confusion... who could this have been from? After checking the parcel for cures and other such things I open it, though still cautious.

Inside the paper was a cloak, one that I had seen many times before in my past as a human. My father and brother had owned it, the invisibility cloak of Ignotus Paravelle. Touching the fabric that was like water beneath my fingers I see a note fall from the fabric.

Harry,

Your father left his in my possession before he died, I believe it's time it was returned to you.

Use it well.

The note was not signed, but I believe that it was the headmasters hand writing. What is that crazy old man thinking, telling a first year essentially that they should sneak around the school after curfew? There is something going on that the fool refuses to tell me, not that I have asked him, but isn't it odd that the man hasn't spoken to me once during my schooling started? Wouldn't it be expected for the leader of the light to make sure that the boy who lived was firmly on the light side of the war, or did they think that I have no mind of my own and wouldn't be able to be on the other side? And that is not to mention that I don't like or trust Quirrell. The man is just too innocent and frightened to be behind anything like letting a troll into the school.

Why would that man be in the dungeons during Halloween anyway, when he should have been at the feast with all the other teachers? Not to mention how the troll got into the castle in the first place? It seems as though the man is trying to frame someone else for his doings and unfortunately it seems the most common suspect is Severus. Being how he is it's not hard for teachers and students alike to believe that he is up to no good.

Over the next two days, whenever I get the opportunity, I follow the trembling man. He often moves around the corridor on the third floor, the one that the headmaster said was forbidden on the first night at the school. Whatever the reason for it being blocked off can't be good if Quirrell wants to get past it, but this is a big clue to what the annoying man wants to frame Severus for.

Finally determined to do something I gather the invisibility cloak and sneak out of my room after dark. Being one of the only Slytherins to stay behind for the holidays is paying off. It means there are less people to try and stop me.

Once I leave the common room I put on the cloak and using my vampiric abilities I make my way quickly to the third floor. There is something off about the door and a horrible stench coming from the other side... almost like a wet dog. Getting through the door with a simple 'Alohamora' and the scent makes sense as I come face to face to face to face with a three headed dog. A Cerberus. Standing in the abandoned corridor on top of a... is that a trap door? That must be the key to what Quirrell wants in here. The massive beast is guarding something important and Quirrell is wants to steal it for some reason or another, but what exactly is being hidden beneath the school?

Suddenly interrupting my thoughts a sharp pain in my head originating from the lightning bolt scar that I received during the early years of my vampirism alerting me to the danger within. Deciding I have seen enough for the night I return to my dorm all the while thinking of what could be hidden within the school that the teacher would be willing to go to these lengths to steal it and valuable enough to be hidden within the depths of one of the most renowned magic schools in the world. During my contemplations I notice an outdated newspaper resting on one of the other boy's bed side tables.

"GRINGOTTS BREAK IN LATEST!"

I remember hearing the gossip going on about it. Nobody would shut up about it worrying if Voldemort had returned to steal something of value from one of the high security vaults and didn't get caught... the vault that had been targeted had been emptied on the same day mere hours before the break in. Could the contents of that unknown vault be hidden on the school under the trap door guarded by the three headed dog? All the pieces seemed to fit, but if that was really the case why wasn't the entrance warded better? It would be a puzzle for the rest of the holidays.

Not even Draco couldn't understand it when I managed to tell him after returning to school. It was actually Neville who accidentally gave me an answer, when he suspiciously said "It's almost as though it's meant to be simple. I mean if you got through with a first year spell... maybe... I know it sounds stupid, but if they had enough information about it, it sounds as though a first year could manage to get to whatever is being hidden there..."

Neville was criticizing the barmy old man, but something about what he said stuck with me. Could the man really be that stupid as to allow the defences surrounding an object that is no doubt dangerous and powerful be that simple that a first year could make it alive? But then the note on the cloak came to mind, "Use it well", and the fact that I managed to enter the corridor so easily. He seems to already have taken to organising events so that I would learn about what is being hidden. That barstard is meddling in my life, but he doesn't seem to have realised that he needs to earn my trust and I will not simply give it. Snarling curses to the fool in my head I laze about in the library as Nev helps Draco with his Herbology homework. I wish I wasn't in the body of an 11 year old, I could really use my mate right now. Out of the corner of my eye I see the pair beside me getting along despite their difference of house and upbringing. Both purebloods, but on different sides of the war, well hopefully not for long.

Well I think there is as good a place as any to pause before the next chapter :D please review and let me know what you think about it. Hopefully it won't be long before I release the next chapter.

Laters!