A/N Updated edit as of 29/07/2014, with added details of James' Halloween prank. (For a more detailed background to the prank a fuller account can be found on my profile under the title 'James' Halloween Prank' *plugs shamelessly*) Enjoy ;)
Harry smiled as he walked up the track to the castle door. Despite the business and stress of his job, he always enjoyed returning to Hogwarts for guest lectures. It was after all, his first real home. Despite the memories of the Battle of Hogwarts, it was still to his mind a safe-haven.
He smiled wryly as he entered the Entrance Hall, and was mobbed by some of the older students, asking about Defence theory.
"And Professor Carter's really good, he knows all about non-lethal hexes, he's even better than Professor Spinnet!"
"That's good to hear, but I'm a bit busy now Alyssa."
Harry extracted himself from the horde of NEWT students, laughing somewhat. A small path formed between the gaggle of slightly awed younger students as he made his way to where he could see Rose and a tiny blonde girl with huge dark brown eyes.
"All right Rosie?" Harry asked, and then noticed the lack of his son. "Where's Al?"
"Detention." She said rolling her eyes as she did, and looking as Harry noticed scarily like her mother as she did.
"Another detention?" Harry chuckled "what for – I know he got one for hanging all of James's underwear off the Astronomy Tower, but that was last week, wasn't it?"
"He had a mud fight with Mouse, but they...'accidentally' got Professor Hendricks in the face..."
The girl next to Rose giggled, a sunny infectious noise, and Harry glanced at her "Aren't you going to introduce me to your friend, Rosie?"
Rose blushed, the tips of her ears turning crimson.
"Right, Uncle Harry this is Becky."
Becky smiled and waved at Harry from behind her hair.
"Hi Mr Potter."
A disturbance at the entrance to the Great Hall interrupted them, and Harry laughed again.
"I don't care if you haven't had lunch yet, neither of you are going anywhere near food looking like chimney sweeps. No buts!" Minerva McGonagall continued over the two filthy boys' complaints. "Besides Potter, your father is here, so I expect he might like to eat with you, and the rest of your siblings? Both of you go and clean that filth off this instant!"
Harry greeted his younger son, who came over to greet him, then hurtled off towards the other, rather soot stained figure who was going up the stairs, jumping them two at a time.
"That was Mouse I take it?"
Rose paled, but nodded. Her friend, Becky, answered for her, as it seemed that Rose wasn't going to be speaking any time soon, for some reason.
"That's him, Mr Potter – Rose an' Al met us both on the train"
Harry nodded, remembering the very hurried letter that Albus had written in his first week about meeting a muggleborn girl on the train who had been slightly upset about some of the more 'traditional' purebloods.
"Shall we go up, then?" Harry asked. "Professor carter has kindly lent us his office so we can have lunch up there." he chuckled at the memory. "I think his exact words were, 'that way you won't get mobbed by autograph hunters. You and this Mouse are welcome to join us by the way – you and Rosie can tell me what exactly Albus and James have really been doing." this last was directed at Becky, who looked slightly daunted, but nodded.
They were midway through the story of why Albus had put all of James's underwear on the Astronomy Tower, when there was a knock at the door of the Defence office. Becky ran over to open it, and promptly stuck out her tongue at her very pink faced, but now clean friends.
Whilst Albus ran straight over to his dad, Mouse hovered at the door slightly, something that didn't escape Harry's attention – he wasn't after all Head Auror for nothing. Inviting the boy to join their conversation, the events of which Albus was now rapidly denying, Harry frowned. This boy, Mouse, was an enigma. He looked familiar with his blond hair, grey eyes and pointed chin, and his voice, from the little he'd heard of it, was tantalisingly close.
It wasn't until the boy had offered his hand to shake in introduction that the penny, that hat been beating at Harry's skull, made a clangorous descent into place.
"Mouse, Mr Potter, it's an honour to meet you sir."
Harry laughed.
"You don't need to be so informal, Mouse, although, if we're on the subject of names, how on earth did you get a nickname like Mouse from Scorpius Malfoy."
Do not laugh at your son and his friends Harry told himself as Albus, Rose and their friends took this in. Unfortunately for Harry, this was rather difficult, considering the various looks of stunned amazement, slightly gormless disbelief, and rather sheepish embarrassment.
Albus was the first to break the silence.
"You mean you don't mind, dad?" Harry looked at his son who's face, which whilst no longer gormless, still looked slightly shell shocked.
"Why should I? I spent most of my school years suffering from prejudice because I looked like my dad – unjustified mind you. I think it'd be pretty hypocritical to judge Scorpius because he looks like his. Mind you," Harry continued, grinning as he returned to his seat. "I wouldn't tell your dad you've made best friends with a Malfoy Rosie – he might never recover!"
The laugh he got from that almost drowned out the shy 'thank you' that Mouse whispered to his best friends father.
Definitely not like his dad Harry thought, then pushed aside his philosophical thoughts in favour of finding out what other mischief the younger part of his family had been up to when James finally arrived.
The rest of the day went far too slowly for Mouse as not even Minna's lesson on the differences between wizarding and muggle Halloween celebrations could draw his interest. Not when the smells of what promised an absolutely mouth-watering feast were drifting up from the kitchens below, and when James had accidentally let slip at lunch that he and the twins were planning an extra-special Halloween prank.
It wasn't until the chalk hit his nose that he realised that Minna had been trying to get him to answer a question for at least a minute. He shook his head and tried to look as if he'd been considering the question.
"Um, pumpkin?" Mouse asked hopefully. The collective laughter from the rest of the room told him the correctness of his answer, as did the half scornful, half pitying look on Minna's face.
"Pumpkin? five points from Gryffindor for not paying attention in class."
"But!"
"I can make it ten and a detention Mouse, don't think I won't..."
Mouse gulped. Minna was using her teacher voice.
"It's still not fair." He muttered to Albus. "Look at Avery."
Albus glanced at the boy his friend had pointed out and snickered. Avery was staring blindly into space, with a small trickle of drool on his chin.
"Yeuch. Still, Professor Grey was talking to you for like a minute. Maybe next time you should look at Rosie's notes before answering, I mean pumpkin? Really?"
"Or maybe" Rose whispered across the table to them. "You should have actually been paying attention, and certain people wouldn't need to copy my notes."
Unfortunately, Rose hadn't mastered the evil glare her mother had perfected in her school days and looked more like a grumpy cat, than anything else.
"Cut him some slack Rose," Becky cut in and Mouse shot her a grateful look. "It's pretty hard to concentrate with food smells every where."
"Ahem."
The four of them guiltily looked behind them to see a rather unimpressed Professor stood behind them, and whilst Rose hadn't managed the 'look' yet, Minna, on the other hand, most definitely had.
All in all though, Mouse was exceedingly glad when the bell for the end of lessons rang out, and they could upstairs and change into clean robes and hats, (despite the lack of usual wear their uniform hats got, they were compulsory for official feasts), and then head down to the Great Hall.
"Wow." Becky said, as they entered, something Mouse rather thought was an understatement. Being from a pureblood family, it wasn't as if he'd never seen magical decorations before, but he had to admit, Hogwarts did decorating on a scale he had never even seen before.
Hagrid's specially grown pumpkins, ten feet tall, with full Halloween scenes carved out decorated the walls, whilst dancing skeletons floated around just below the ceiling, and bats flitted in and out of the cobweb strewn candles. Some of the Hogwarts ghosts, although their numbers seemed rather less than usual, formed strange aerial displays and music echoed from the walls.
"Wow." Mouse agreed.
It was a shame however, that he couldn't appreciate the food as much as he might have liked, because he, like the rest of the Gryffindor table were rather more jumpy than usual...
"What do you look so happy about?" Victoire asked James as he and his friends took their places at the Gryffindor table.
"Oh, nothing in particular. Should be a good feast though, eh Vix?" James asked nonchalantly.
Despite her cousin's suspicious behaviour, Victoire merely glowered at him and turned to her friends.
A Cheshire Cat grin spread over James' face as the pudding course arrived, one matched by those on Lorcan and Lysanders' faces. Looks that had the rest of the Gryffindor table highly nervous and many of them had start to check their food for tampering. Albus, and Rose had started to glance meaningfully between James and Victoire, making it nearly impossible for either Becky or Mouse to keep a straight face.
James gulped worriedly, and Mouse finally let out a snicker
He's scared that Al doesn't think they're even after the Astronomy tower...
But James needn't have worried, as fun as it was messing with the annoying prankster, the first years were far more interested in what was going to happen than telling tales. The suspense rose as Lorcan Scamander drew his battered watch from his robes and he, his twin and James crowded round it.
"5...4...3...2...1...ladies and gentlemen, we have lift off!" Murmured Lorcan, and he and Lysander high-fived. James, on the other hand was too focussed on the staff-table, waiting for the results to take effect.
Mouse followed his gaze
Come on...why is nothing happening? He thought disappointedly, but then - There! He laughed as the first hints of the practical joke came into effect. Minna's skin had begun to pale, her usually relatively neat auburn curls rearranging themselves into a birds nest as the spells and potions transformed her into a very dead looking zombie. Nat was next as his hair slicked itself back and fangs appeared in his mouth. Then, Hendricks the psychotic Potion Mistress became a banshee and Hagrid, a muggle version of a werewolf. The spell spread throughout the teaching staff and finally was complete. The whole lot of them looked as if they'd stepped off the set of a muggle horror film. Even McGonagall.
A stunned silence rippled through the room, and for a moment there was utter quiet.
"What's going on?" Professor Carter's voice broke the silence and Mouse cringed. His cousin was blind, he wouldn't know what on earth had happened.
"It would appear, Professor, that a person or persons unknown, have spiked the staff's food, and has through spell work contrived to make us all look as if we were going to a muggle Halloween party." Minna answered him, her voice shaking a little.
But not with anger...
"Really..." Professor Carter started to reply and the entire student body tensed with bated breath as they waited for his reaction. When an indignant screech came from Professor Hendricks as she saw the extent of the prank in a conjured mirror, any modicum of self-control that anyone possessed was gone, and the entire Great Hall of Hogwarts resounded with laughter.
James, Lorcan and Lysander leant back in satisfaction at a job well done and waited for the noise to abate.
And then froze as Victoire stood up and revealed she'd known of the plan the entire time, and had only wanted to see if they could pull it off. Although those weren't quite the words she had used.
It wasn't until some time later that the students finally left the Great Hall, the Professors having collared the Unholy Trinity for assurances that yes, the charms were only temporary. (The Unholy Trinity being the nickname that Minna and Nat had dubbed James and his friends after the resoundingly successful practical joke.)
"That was brilliant." Becky said as she wiped tears of laughter from her eyes. "Can I please marry your brother?"
This sent Mouse and Rose of into more fits of laughter, at the look of horror combined with a Weasley blush which had just spread over Albus' face at the thought of Becky marrying James.
"I thought I was going to die at the look on Hendricks' face." Mouse finally managed to choke out."
"Brilliant casting too." Albus grinned, having finally removed the image of his brother's wedding from his head. "Wonder what made him think of that?"
"Lily, probably." Rose said as she jumped over the trick step "I hope they don't lose Gryffindor any more points." She continued frowning slightly. "Between, you, them and Freddy, we really can't afford to, you know."
Mouse, Albus and Becky groaned collectively.
"I hadn't thought of that." Becky admitted. "Will they really take points off?"
"Hope not." Albus said. "Mind you, Gryffindor managed to win a few times when Uncle George was in school."
"As if they never lost any points!"
"Like your mum didn't get them back for being such a know-it-all?"
Mouse started to tune out the cousins bickering, sharing a resigned grin with Becky. But just then, he thought he heard music?
It wouldn't do much harm to go find out, could it? Mouse asked himself.
"Guys?" he asked, interrupting Rose and Al's argument. "Can you hear music?"
His friends looked at him as if he had gone insane.
"No..." Rose and Becky said, in unison, although Albus suddenly didn't look so sure.
"Maybe?" he said, frowning? "Wanna go check it out?" he asked, grinning suddenly.
Rose tutted and rolled her eyes.
"It could be anything and you just want to find out what it, that I'm not sure even exists, is? Because that's not like poking a hyppogriff with a stick."
"Lighten up Rose!" Albus replied. "Hey Mouse, wait up!"
Mouse had gone on ahead, not caring if his friends followed any more. He just wanted to hear the music properly."
"Um, Rose? Al?" Becky asked, "I don't think Mouse is going to wait for us, like."
"Good point that, girl" Al said, "Good thing I came prepared." he said and pulled a wad of silvery fabric out of his robes, then vanished behind it.
"Woah." said Becky eyes wide, "is that?"
"An invisibility cloak?" Rose replied, yanking her under it. "It is, just don't ask now." she continued muttering to herself as the caught up with Mouse at the opening to a door she was sure hadn't been there before. "We're going to get in so much trouble."
"Mouse?" Albus asked, then turned to the girls stricken. "I don't want to alarm any one, but this is what he looked like when he went 'sleep walking'. And I can hear the music too..."
He heard the voices behind him, but he didn't really care. The singing of his lady was so close now, he could feel her presence in the room. He walked further into it, determined to find her, serve her.
"Bloody hell." Becky groaned to herself, as they kept a firm hold on Albus, although he was dragging her further forward. Rose meanwhile had darted forward, to try and snap Mouse out of his trance, or whatever it was that he was in, but he seemed drawn to some box that lay before, them, the only colourful object in an other wise bare stone room.
I really don't like this...She thought, and guided Albus to where Rose and Mouse were now standing. In the corner of her mind, the p[art that was now running on a mix of fear and adrenalin, she noticed that the box that lay on the plinth before her seemed to be covered in rubies, emeralds, sapphires and topaz, and to have an intricately carved story on the sides. Then she saw that Mouse was about to open it...
"Mouse, no!" he heard the cry but ignored it. His lady's voice was calling him, telling him that when he opened the box, she would be free from her wrongful imprisonment, free to let order and safety and love into the world. So he opened the box.
"Oh bloody hell!"
Mouse blinked confused. What's Becks talking about? He wondered, and then it was too late to wonder. He had seemingly just opened a box from which now music was blasting out, a painful cry of exultation, combined with near blinding white light and swirling colours, red, blue, yellow, green. And then the shock wave hit and everything was dark.