Author's note. Glad everyone enjoyed the part with Sirius and Harry. JK has released some really interesting things about Harry's family although I miss old Pottermore. Just glad I finished it, can't imagine being in the middle of going through it and then losing that site.

Incidentally, JK has confirmed that the fan theories about Dumbledore being Ron and Draco being a werewolf are not true. I don't really know much about the first one but I definitely did not agree with the latter. Because apart from anything else, there is no way that Draco would have been that upbeat and smug at the start of the sixth book. Not only is being bitten really traumatic and enough to land you in hospital for several weeks, its pretty life destroying. Draco would have been a half breed, virtually incapable of having kids and even less so of having untainted ones. I really don't think a fanatic Pureblood would have been coping with that very well. Anyway, that was a small part of my thoughts on the matter and it's definitely non-canon.

I know that Belle is Beauty in French but to English speakers, Belle sounds better as a name than Beauty.

Enjoy and please review.

"Muffliato."

The murmured spell was cast at Ron's bedroom door and Harry sat back on the bed with a sigh. Everyone was downstairs, enjoying the last night before they headed back to Hogwarts and he'd made an excuse of last minute packing and thus, been able to head up to Ron's room for an undisclosed amount of time and unlikely to be disturbed.

Which was just as well as he had something important to do.

"Expecto Patronum!"

The large, majestic form of his stag materialised into view, landing lightly on the floor and turning around to face Harry squarely. Taking a deep breath and concentrating on the spell, he spoke clearly.

"Kreacher, I know the secret of Regulas's locket. And I know how to open it. If you want to talk, come to the Weasley's home, the Burrow before I go back to Hogwarts. My name is Harry Potter!"

With a wave of his wand, the stag lightly leapt forward and vanished in a whisp of smoke. He sighed and sat back, all he could really do now was wait. Idly, he glanced over at his trunk which wasn't fully packed. If anyone did decide to come up, then at least he could look like he was doing something.

However, right now, he didn't really feel like packing so he grabbed a book on defence and started to read it. This was quite a good read, it wasn't dry and the author seemed very enthusiastic on the subject. There were a few hexes he hadn't really used much in the past, they could be quite useful in….

Crack!

Harry dropped the book with a jump and of course, the sharp edge landed right on his big toe.

"Yow!" he yelped, grabbing his foot as the hunched House Elf eyed him with distaste.

"Kreacher is here," he rasped out, looking more wretched than Harry had ever seen him. "Why did you send for Kreacher?"

"Kreacher," gasped Harry, quickly putting his foot down and aware that he wasn't making the best impression. "You….you came."

The House Elf narrowed his eyes and made a slight shuffling move forward.

"How do you know of the locket?" Kreacher demanded.

"Well, this is going to sound unbelievable but, you told me about it," Harry stated seriously. "And I know, how can that be when we've only just met. But I do have an answer for you."

"Kreacher cannot be away from his home for long," the House Elf grumbled, twisting his long fingers together. "Kreacher promised Mistress he would always care for the house."

"I understand," Harry assured him before hesitating slightly. Delicate ground here.

"She….never knew what happened to Regulas, did she?" he said softly. "How the Inferi dragged him into that pool."

Kreacher's eyes widened in shock and Harry almost thought he was going to have a heart attack.

"I know because you told me," Harry said quickly. "This will sound insane but, I time travelled seven years into the past. When I was seventeen, I was your Master and I had Regulas's locket, the original one. I found the note he left but I didn't know who the initials belonged to.

"Master," Kreacher hissed out, almost testing the word.

"Yeah," Harry said with a nod.

The House Elf didn't say anything, just continued to squint at Harry in an undiscernible way. Harry waited for a moment before bringing up a slightly different topic.

"Sirius is the Black heir," he said softly. "So….that makes him your Master, doesn't it?"

"Yes…," Kreacher said, drawing out the word in a very reluctant tone. "Kreacher lives to serve the Noble and Ancient House of Black."

"I know you do," he said carefully. "And that House could become a proper home, I saw it happen. Grimmuald Place went from an old, dangerous building into a warm, comforting place and I could really see it as mine. It was amazing."

"The House of Black is magnificent," Kreacker croaked out. "Unmatched by any other."

"Uh…," Harry mumbled. Even four years early, he doubted it was going to be in great shape. However, it could definitely still be saved so….

"I think it'll be great once it's more….lived in," he said. "I don't know when Sirius is going to visit…..is there any chance you can get along with him?"

"Master Sirius broke his mother's heart," Kreacher said contemptuously. "He was never like Master Regulas, he was a good boy and a true Black."

"I know but he's also the last Black," Harry reminded the House Elf. "Don't you want to see him have kids in that house?"

The House elf considered this before muttering to himself.

"Master was always an ungrateful swine, always being disgraceful. Kreacher wishes Master Regulas was still alive, so much better…."

He was tempted to interrupt the House elf but decided against it. Kreacher had been on his own for several years, there was no point in getting onto him about a habit that had developed from conversing with a crazy portrait. Sirius had never seemed to care about it but it had not endeared the House elf to him. Harry could only hope he could help the two get along during the summer, he didn't want Kreacher hating Sirius enough to betray him.

"…care, Mistress always said…."

"Ahem, Kreacher?" Harry tried and the House elf looked up at him,

"You haven't been able to open the locket, have you?" he questioned and the House's elf demeanour both darkened and saddened.

"I can open that locket," Harry said firmly. "But what's inside will put up a huge fight and I don't want to try and destroy it here. I know that you could Apparate me somewhere else but we do need to be sure we can completely destroy it. I don't really know much about House elf magic but…do you think you could destroy a piece of soul?"

Kreacher stared at him as though he couldn't believe what he'd just been told. Harry opened his mouth to explain further but at that moment.

"Harry dear, are you up there?"

The House elf head swung around, glaring at the door before looking back at Harry. Their eyes met before Kreacher clicked his fingers and disappeared with a crack.

"Wait…." Harry started to say but obviously it was too late.

"Harry!"

Waving his wand quickly, he called out.

"I'm here Mrs Weasley."

"We're all having hot chocolate and marshmallows, dear."

"Okay, I'll be down in a minute," he shouted back to her.

Leaning back on the bed, he let out a breath. At least he'd told Kreacher the most important points before Mrs Weasley had inadvertently interrupted.

…

"Think he'll be back?" Ron questioned Harry as they headed for Gryffindor Tower having just arrived back from the holidays.

After he'd come down for hot chocolate, the rest of the evening had passed in a mad blur, there had been no time to tell Ron what had happened. But it didn't really matter, he just wanted to enjoy himself with the Weasleys and most importantly, with Sirius. Even though they'd spent the last two weeks together, playing Quidditch, visiting the cinema, going out for lunch, chatting, it almost felt like they'd barely seen each other.

In fact, he had to stop himself from mad ideas of sneaking out of Hogwarts and visiting the Burrow with his cloak just to make sure Sirius was safe and well. There was no reason to think Sirius was going to be in any danger, he wasn't on the run, dangerous Death Eaters like Belatrix were locked up, he was in a nice home, he was fine. Actually, the only real thing that would potentially put Sirius in danger was if he Harry was in danger.

But when that no doubt eventual occurred, Harry would take care of it.

"I hope so," he mused. "I know he was frustrated that he couldn't open or destroy the Locket, I think he will come back to me eventually. And even if he doesn't, I'll probably be at the house in the summer so I'll talk to him again then."

"Not gonna send him another Patronus?" Ron asked curiously.

"No, I don't want to pressure him," Harry stated. "I need him to trust me, especially since Sirius….well, you know."

"Yeah, good point," Ron mused before changing the subject. "So, gonna wipe the floor with Hufflepuff again?"

"Baring anything happening…..," Harry said with a grin. "Yeah. So what…

"Harry!"

He stopped talking when he saw Oliver Wood marching over to him.

"Just to let you know, we're resuming training straight after lessons tomorrow," the Keeper stated sternly. "We're on a roll here and I'm not going to let anyone on this team lose momentum. And just because we're playing Hufflepuff doesn't mean we can allow ourselves to relax. We've got to win!"

"The House cup will have our name on it," Harry assured him and Oliver clapped him on the back.

"Good man, you've got the exact attitude that we need," the older boy said jovially. "I wish some of the others have your dedication, keep this up and you might be captain one day."

"Thanks Oliver," Harry said with a grin as Ron rolled his eyes.

"Don't forget, after lessons," Oliver reminded him sternly before allowing the First Years to carry on.

"So that'll be you in five years," Ron said with a smirk. "If you don't get a Bludger to the face."

"As long as you don't get poisoned so I have to use him," Harry shot back.

"Well you shouldn't have girls trying to feed you love potions," was Ron's argument.

Harry deliberately glanced down at his undersized, still rather scrawny body.

"Oh yeah, I'll be beating them off with a stick," he scoffed.

"Could be worse," Ron mused as a third year Ravenclaw passed, sporting some rather impressive white acne. "A lot worse."

"Hmm," Harry agreed, trying not to think about how greasy Dudley had become as he'd continued to stuff his face during their early teenage years. He never wanted to look like that, ever.

"Don't forget you owe me a go," Ron reminded him. "On your broom I mean."

"Huh, oh yeah, you can have a go," Harry agreed, it was fun flying at the Burrow but they had a lot more space on the Quidditch field. And no risk of any Muggles spotting them.

"Great," Ron said with satisfaction just as a new voice called to them, a very welcome one.

"Ron, Harry!"

"Hey Hermione, how long have you been back?" Harry asked, spotting several books in her arms.

"Oh, a couple of hours," she said airily. "My parents are going away on a trip so I wanted to arrive back early. Have a nice New Year?"

"It was great, one of Fred and George's fireworks went off in the living room and covered us all in soot," Ron said with a big grin. "Mum was furious but those were some cool fireworks."

"That's good," their friend said breathlessly before launching into what she wanted to say. "I've been thinking over the holidays about students with muggle parents, how they don't really get to show them the magical world. Well, except for Diagon Alley but that's not enough, there is so much I'd like to say to my parents about magic but there's only so much I can explain. There's nothing like actually showing them but since I'm underage, I can't do that. Hogwarts doesn't do parent meetings like muggle schools do so our parents never get to see us being taught and I don't think that's fair. Even if they can never do magic themselves, why can't they participate a bit more in the magical community?"

"Whoa, slow down," Ron complained, holding up his hands in surrender. "So, what are you saying?"

"I'm saying that I want muggleborns to be able to show their families their abilities," she declared determinedly. "I want to show my parents what I can do and I don't want to have to wait until I'm seventeen to do that."

She looked at Harry and said. "If your family was more understanding, would you want to show them the Patronus charm for example? Or how you ride your broom?"

"Uh," Harry said, he'd not really thought about it much before. "Yeah, I guess I would."

"So…..how are you going to go about this?" Ron asked slowly.

"First, I'm going to talk to other muggleborn students and see if they would like their parents to see them performing magic," she stated. "If I can get a good number, then I can start sending some letters to the Ministry and perhaps the Daily Prophet."

"How's this going to work?" the red head now asked as Harry pondered whether or not Hermione would end up blackmailing Rita Skeeter again. He was perfectly comfortable with that idea.

"I thought that since everyone has to visit Diagon Alley, why not have some sort of room where students can demonstrate what they've learned. After all, magic is happening there all the time, it wouldn't matter if we did some wand work," she explained enthusiastically. "What do you think?"

"I don't know," Ron said with a shrug. "No one's allowed to do magic outside of school, they've had that rule for ages. I'm not sure they'll go for it."

"Why wouldn't they, I think it makes perfect sense," Hermione argued back before turning to Harry. "Don't you agree it's a good idea?"

"It's a good idea," he acknowledged. "But we all know what the Ministry's like."

"That's why I need support from the others," she declared before pausing as an idea hit her. "Actually, this wouldn't just be good for muggleborn students, it would be great for everyone to have a chance to show their parents how their doing."

"If you're good," Ron snorted. "I'd like to see Crabbe or Goyle showing their parents anything, be lucky if they hold their wand the right well."

"I'm sure it would be down to the student whether or not they want to do it," Hermione said dryly.

"This isn't going to get a silly name like SPEW is it?"

"I'm not forming a society Ron," she said in slight exasperation at how he said the abbreviation. "So no, it is not going to have a name."

"Okay," he said, before adding. "But if you do give it a name, make sure it doesn't say something like SPEW. That just sounds weird."

"So you've mentioned Ronald," she sighed while Harry tried not to smile.

Some things never changed.

…

"Attention class," Professor Perronneau called with a clap of his hands and everyone fell silent to hear what he had to say. It was the first Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson of the new term

"I'm afraid that soon, I must retire as your defence teacher," he explained with a sigh.

"But why sir?" Dean exclaimed, disappointment clear in his voice. He'd been quite enjoying having a defence teacher who leaned heavily towards the artistic side of things.

"Ah Dean, it was only ever temporary," Perronneau said with a sad smile. "Our esteemed Headmaster could not find anyone on such short notice when Professor Qurriel suffered his accident and I had always been curious about what it was like to teach an official subject."

He gave them a little wink, he always liked to joke about how his subject had no Owl grade so there was no high pressure exams.

"But let us not be too sad," he declared with a smile. "I am not gone quite yet and you still have your projects to complete. I hope you have all been working hard on your reports over the holidays?"

"Yes sir," came the chorus of answers.

"Wonderful," he said happily. "Now, we are going to continue with a little painting for a bit and then complete some course work."

"Professor?" Hermione asked, raising her hand. "Do you know who our next Defence teacher will be?"

"Well, since it would only be for half a year, I believe Professor Dumbledore is looking to bring in a Ministry worker," he mused, smoothing down his goatee as he did so. "The focus would be on studying for exams….."

There was an audible groan at this. They really liked Perronneau's teaching style, they began with something fun and once they were relaxed, they did more traditional coursework. It meant they were progressing quite nicely and even the trio were enjoying themselves despite the fact first year defence was incredibly basic for them. The art was completely different and provided enough of a challenge that they had no complaints for the course.

"Now, now, it is not all that bad," he said with a calming gesture. "It is good to learn exam study, you will really need it in a few years. Come now, gather your things and we can begin."

Author's note. Sorry for the long wait in this chapter, I hope everyone enjoyed it. Until next time.