Harry Potter and Rawenclaw's Diadem

by Hermaine

Three months after the Battle of Hogwarts, Harry in the late evening is enjoying his memories of the happiest birthday in his life, until while drifting into sleep he has a dream showing him that Voldemort is still alive and is planning to rise even more powerful than ever. These doubts take the trio of the friends along with Ginny back to Hogwarts. Was it really just a nightmare?

7. Chapter 7: The Struggle of the NEWTs

Chapter 7: The Struggle of the N.E.W.T.s

The morning of the following day, the Wednesday, came and Harry woke up hearing the wake-up alarm of his wristwatch; he got up and silenced the sound, feeling sleepy. He quickly dressed up and went into the small adjacent toilet room to wash his face. Clean and fresh, the young man approached Ron to wake him up, who was still snoring in his bed. He was now much more joyous when he thought about that now he will be able to get on with the long-awaited thing – he had to find the Diadem!

Harry pulled off all the blankets from Ron's body, exclaiming: "Rise and shine!"

"Meh, what time is it?" Ron growled, rolling in his bed.

"It's practically half past seven," Harry replied. "Let's go for breakfast."

"Where did you get so much energy?" Ron wondered. "After yesterday I would love to sleep until noon."

"Come on, you'll get your sleep as much as you want at your old age. The others are already downstairs," Harry added after the joke, looking at the empty beds of Seamus, Dean, and Neville.

"Okay, okay, I'm getting up. I wonder what kind of lessons are we going to have today?" Ron asked suddenly.

Harry said, laughing, "You sound just like Hermione. Haven't you become friends with her lately?"

"Seriously, Harry, why are you so terribly happy at the very morning?" Ron wanted to know.

"It's very simple – we are back again at Hogwarts and we really do need to find the Diadem! And maybe this year we are going to find out how a more or less normal school year at Hogwarts looks like – so, let's go for breakfast! I suppose both Hermione and Ginny are already waiting for us in the Common room," Harry explained as Ron started to get up. His friend looked like as if he was willing to give away anything for a few more hours of sleep.

"Alright, I'll wait for you downstairs," Harry said before he went out of the boy's dormitories and stepped down the spiral staircase. There were other students, also waiting for their friends to go with them for breakfast. A huge amount – or practically all – of the freshly sorted first years stared at him with their mouths open. They didn't even bother to turn away when he incidentally looked at them; he didn't see Hermione and Ginny anywhere. Fortunately, Ron had managed to freshen up and leave the boy's dormitory in record time as he stepped down the stairs – his hair was just sleeked, however, there was a possibility that he actually wasn't able to see himself properly in the mirror of the toilet because of his swollen eyes. "Let's go then," he said as he stopped next to Harry; hopefully the previously mentioned first years won't start to make a song and dance about Harry Potter and his team.

"Let's go then," Harry agreed without hesitation and hurried to the hole, concealed by the huge portrait from outside. He was followed by Ron and as it turned out also by the huge crowd of admirers. As he went down the hallway, he noticed having a trail consisting of before mentioned first years, a bunch of second year and third year girls, and also a couple of boys who suspiciously loudly were discussing the performance of the Chudley Cannons during the Quidditch season this year. Ron was constantly yawning next to him and was reluctant to engage in any conversation, so Harry went down to the Great Hall with all his weird crowd of companions. Looking over his shoulder, he had to suppress a chuckle – to his group of followers had also joined several little Ravenclaw girls. Of course, they all were whispering vigorously as they cast a not so shy look at him, giggling and blushing. Or maybe they were looking at Ron?

"You know what, Ron? I think half of these girls are following right after you," Harry whispered to his friend, smirking.

"Don't be ridiculous!" Ron yawned as they both entered the Great Hall.

"Seriously, those girls just whispered something about you. They like your unruly tousled hair," Harry explained, barely suppressing a laugh.

"Humpf, those little girls," Ron chuckled; however, he instinctively put his hand in his short, vivid red hair and tousled them even more.

As they both got to the Gryffindor table, naturally, meanwhile followed by all the pairs of eyes in the Great Hall, they soon found Ginny's bright hair and Hermione's bushy mane. Trying to do the impossible, that is, not to draw any more attention, they hurried to their girlfriends and quickly sat down. The table was already loaded with freshly prepared breakfast – as usual in Hogwarts, there were several kinds of omelets, pancakes, buns, piles of cheese and bacon, and also Harry's favorite pumpkin juice.

"Hello guys," Ginny greeted them.

„We did already come down here because we just couldn't stand that incessant staring of those first years," Hermione explained, half whispering.

„Aha, and all of them followed us all the way here, staring exactly like that. I was almost beginning to feel creepy," Harry agreed, looking around. It seemed like there was a horrid amount of students who whispered to each other while watching them little bit too closely, especially the young ones at their own table.

„I wonder what kind of lessons there'll be for us today?" Hermione thought out loud.

„Yes, I wondered exactly the same thing this morning," Ron finally spoke as he now appeared almost awakened and even in a rather satisfied mood.

So they continued with their breakfast, talking about the upcoming classes, and when there came the owls the greatest majority of the students stopped to stare at them like they were some kind of exotic beasts in the Zoo. However, it turned out that the attention of the young Gryffindors was attracted by Neville, who, of course, was now a legendary celebrity. Harry had learned how to live with all kinds of expressions of his fame for the past seven years, and Ron, as it seemed, quite well liked to be admired, whereas Neville felt anxious when he was constantly in the spotlight. Before his heroic deed he had always struggled since he was so often criticized and doubted for never being a good enough wizard, so the excessive amount of everyone's attention made him feel very uncomfortable. He didn't do a single thing in order to gain his fame, but he had rather done everything only in order to stand against the impossible Voldemort regime. As he had previously admitted to Harry – he thought that any Gryffindor would have done the same thing if placed in his shoes, so he didn't think he had deserved the undying glory as a hero. Harry back then had argued that not every Gryffindor actually would have succeeded with it even though he or she would have wanted to, so there was a solid ground why Neville had actually deserved such an admiration.

„Good morning, friends," Neville greeted them as he sat down next to them.

„Hello, Neville," they all responded in unison as Hermione put down her copy of the Daily Prophet in which the most important news today told about the operations set by Aurors, which unfortunately haven't been successful, and a concert of the Weird Sisters, and there was also an interview with the members of the Malawi team who had won the Quidditch World Cup.

„Did you visit Pomfrey?" Ginny asked.

„Yes, I did. I decided to listen to Hannah's advice. Pomfrey quickly disinfected my wound. Of course, she huffed why I hadn't come yesterday, but this little scratch is nothing. Last year I had much more serious injuries," Neville said, smirking, as he picked up a golden brown toast.

„But how did you cope with that? That day of the Battle, you looked like smashed with injuries and bruises all over your body, but now you have practically no scars left and everything is fine with your health," Hermione asked, sounding interested.

„Well," Neville began thoughtfully, „Hannah had then learned the very basic healing spells, so she was getting good at healing the smallest wounds. Terry started with the brewing of the disinfectants and the analgesic potions, and afterwards he learned to make other medical potions too – we just had to ask the Room of Requirement the potion ingredients – then we all smeared our bruises with them and everything was alright. And you already know that Terry was indeed very good at Potions since he got the Outstanding mark in his O.W.L.s, when Snape was our teacher."

As they ate the breakfast and talked about the past year, Professor Sinistra, the new Head of the Gryffindor House, came to them a few moments later. Slughorn, Flitwick, and Sprout also were going around the tables of their respective Houses – they were dealing out the tables of the classes for this school year.

"Harry, Ron, here you are – take your list of classes for your seventh year," Aurora Sinistra said as she tipped with her wand to two parchment sheets and gave them to the both young men, then she moved forward along the Gryffindor table, giving the lists also to the girls and Neville, mentioning to Hermione that McGonagall had asked her to tell Hermione that she and Draco Malfoy will be waited at the Headmistress Office on Saturday at 9 AM.

"Just look at this," Ron started, "today we have double Alchemy in the morning and then one Potions lesson. Oh well. It's a pity I couldn't snore a bit longer," Ron said, smirking, as he looked at Harry. "Hermione, look, but you've got no lessons this morning; you actually didn't have to get out of the bed this morning," he said, chuckling. Hermione just rolled her eyes.

"But did you notice that we have a very few lessons in other days, too?" Harry asked, studying his quite scarce table of classes. "Look, Monday – only the third lesson, Herbology; then on Tuesday – the second lesson, Charms; Thursday at the very morning – Transfiguration; but on Friday, all morning is empty – the Defence Against the Dark Arts is put just after the lunch."

"So it means that Wednesday with those three classes is going to be the busiest day of the Hogwarts school year for us," Ginny agreed.

"I like such an empty schedule," Ron commented. "Maybe at least this year we wouldn't have to study while our hands get cramps." He was satisfied with this thought as he put in his mouth a huge bite of fried egg.

"You aren't serious, Ron. It's the N.E.W.T. year and you do hope to have more free time and less homework? You're so naïve at your age," Hermione announced as she shook her head, grinning. Ginny, Neville, and Harry chuckled.

"For me the Wednesdays and Thursdays are free of the lessons, but I suppose Hermione, as usual, is right – I think the professors will know how to give us a lot of work to do," Neville agreed.

"Then let's go get ready for the work?" Harry addressed Ron and Ginny. They nodded in agreement, and as they quickly finished with their breakfast all three of the young people stood up and went back to the Gryffindor Tower to get their school bags, textbooks, and stationery.

"In which classroom, we are going to have the Alchemy?" Ginny asked, standing in her place in the Common Room and studying her list of classes. Meanwhile, in the Common Room, the students of the younger years was hurrying around, bringing things out of their dormitories and putting them in their bags.

"Here is said it's in the East Wing in the Classroom number 9. I'll look at the map," Harry quietly said as he pulled out the Marauder's Map of his mokeskin pouch. He whispered, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good," and a moment later he saw the lines twisting like black snakes over the parchment, and the little black dots began to pace through the castle.

"So, the East Wing, Classroom 9," Harry began to look for their destination. Ginny stood to his side and pointed her finger at the fourth floor of the East Wing. "It's here," the girl exclaimed.

"The fourth floor – it's at the very top of the East Wing," Ron said, "Then the classroom should be full with sunlight."

"The classroom is empty at the moment," Harry added, as there wasn't a single dot on the map in the classroom. However, a mass of tiny bubbles was flowing out of the Great Hall – other students have started to make their way to their classes, slowly pacing up to the first upper floors to follow their path to the Gryffindor or Ravenclaw towers, while other bunches of students went down to their Slytherin or Hufflepuff Common rooms in the dungeons of the Hogwarts castle.

"I wonder, where's Hermione at the moment?" Ron asked, interested, as he had started to search through the Great Hall. "Oh yes, there she goes out to the Entrance Hall. But who's next to her? Anthony and Tom?" Ron sounded surprised; then he leaned closer to the map and tried to read the full name of this Tom, squinting his eyes as the tangle of the dots was jiggling and wiggling. "Tom Marv… Tom Marb…" The fine letters were really difficult to comprehend, and there was a big crowd of other bubbles with student names coming by Hermione, so that all the inscriptions blended together as Ron could barely even make out the very name of Hermione.

"Ron, Hermione is going to be just fine, and after two hours you could look at her as long as you wish," Harry said, smiling, as he didn't want to dwell on the actions in the Marauder's Map, so he removed the lines from the parchment. "Mischief managed," there sounded a quiet whisper from the young man's lips; although it was not true at all, the map instantly turned into an empty sheet anyway.

"Yeah, yeah, I know that, but who was that Tom with whom together she was going out of the Great Hall? There isn't such a student in our year," Ron objected as he, his friend, and his sister started their way to the classroom of Alchemy.

"He could be a first year or any other student. She is the Head Girl after all," Ginny simply said.

"I suppose you must be right," Ron said thoughtfully. "It's just – it seemed somehow suspicious that he actually was named Tom," Ron tried to explain his idea, half stuttering, after they all had climbed through the exit hole of the Gryffindor Tower.

"Ron, I see you thought about Riddle right away, but it's impossible that Voldemort could be at Hogwarts at this very moment, besides, the castle is full with people and now it's a broad daylight," Ginny said, listing the reasons to ground her argument. "In addition, Tom actually isn't a very rare name. Didn't we have at least two Toms just among the first years?"

"That's right. I remember one of them was Tom Marble," Harry added as they had gone down the hall to the huge hall of staircases, where in the seven story height, there were wide staircases built around the room, connecting West and East Wings of the castle as well as other towers, auxiliary buildings, and extensions. "And I totally agree with Ginny, because Hermione would definitely recognize the danger, if there is any," Harry said, smiling soothingly at his friend.

"Okay, okay, the idea just struck me – you know – there was all this experience for us in our fourth year, and the first year was so crazy I don't want even to mention it," Ron growled.

"Ron, you're doing it right – I think Moody would be proud with you. He always said that we need to be on constant vigilance," Harry reassured his friend with a smile, also remembering the old, durable Auror. "I suppose it was that first year Tom or maybe somebody from Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff. So, we've arrived at the fourth floor of the East Wing," Harry said as they had gone around the enormous Staircase Hall, being greeted by several portraits. "Now we just have to go down at the end of the hallway."

They went around the corner and saw that the door on the right side of the corridor had just opened, and the students were slowly entering the classroom. As they went inside, Harry, Ron, and Ginny saw a breathtaking room – they had been in a more amazing classroom only at Divination lessons led by Firenze. As Ron had hoped earlier, the room was indeed full with light, since the sun shined over the rows of the tables placed together in pairs, making a desk of four seats. Since the classroom was in the corner of the castle, the large, wide, arched, mosaic-topped windows here were more than usual, as they made a row along the left side of the classroom and along the opposite wall. And on the right side of the room by the wall, there were shelves and drawers full of various magic tools that apparently could be useful in any kind of Alchemy works – there were a wide variety of sticks: metal, wood, quaking and humming, and there were also chests, plain or inlaid, as well as other items, all as one reminding of different golden shades. But the most unusual of all was the setting of the corners of the room. There was a light shining out of them as if out of nowhere, and each corner was in a different color and texture at least three steps wide – one of the corners shone with white glow, like a swirling air, another corner was colored red, just like a flame, the third one looked like yellowish blue or green, waving like sea water, but the last one cast a brown shadow over the stone floor, however that brownness seemed to be full of life as if at any moment out of the stones there would break out the sprouts of the grass.

With admiration for the strange illusions, Harry, Ron, and Ginny sat down by the desk pair on the right side of the classroom. The tables weren't many in the room, so there was plenty of free space here. Soon the other places by the desks were taken by Harry's schoolmates – he noticed among them also his friends Anthony and Terry, Hannah, as well as Draco Malfoy and two Slytherin girls, sisters – Daphne was from his year, and to his much surprise here was also Romilda Vane, sitting next to her friend.

Suddenly, the door closed, and a tall, meager wizard entered into the classroom clad in dark blue robes and slowly paced to the front of the class. Turning to his students, he pushed his glasses up on his nose closer to his high forehead and addressed all of them who were gathered here.

"Good day, dear friends. I am Professor Philip Flamel, and this year we're going to have the pleasure of sharing these exciting Alchemy lessons all together, and I am so immensely happy that you have gathered here in a rather unusual large number this year." The teacher smiled upon them gesturing with his hands as it truly would be his greatest satisfaction.

"Alchemy," the professor continued with a somewhat stricter voice, "is the teaching on how to do the transfigurations with the help of potions in order to make them to remain permanent. It could even be said that Alchemy is the science of the permanent transfigurations," he finally added in a half whisper as he bent slightly forward. However, Harry didn't really understand what was so special about these permanent transfigurations; Ron and Ginny also seemed to be a little bit confused – after all, McGonagall had shown them countless times how to do the transfiguration that changes something or conjures something up from thin air, lasting for a long time. Looking around, Harry saw that the vast majority of the other students also hadn't perceived the importance of this statement, whispering to each other in confusion; only a few Ravenclaws from his year sat with their mouths open and listened intently.

"Therefore, in order to learn the very foundations of the knowledge of this remarkably subtle and fine art, we are going to begin with the basics of the theory, then I'll introduce you to the basic alchemical potions and the Element Symbolism, and finally you'll have to learn to control one of the four basic elements of which we are going to talk about a little while later. And if you are going to be a diligent and obedient students, I promise you to reveal the most important wisdom of Alchemy," the professor continued, slowly casting a glance all over his students. "Perhaps someone could say to me right away what this wisdom could tell?"

In the classroom, many hands were shot in the air instantly, including Harry's, Ron's, and Ginny's – Hermione had shed the light upon them on this subject already in their first year at Hogwarts.

"Oh, I see the honorable Mr. Harry Potter has attended our simple lesson. Please, will you give me the answer?" meager Professor Flamel said, sounding truly intrigued.

"The main goal of Alchemy is to make the Philosopher's Stone," Harry replied. "It can make you immortal and turn anything into gold."

"It's absolutely correct, Mr. Potter!" Flamel said, pleased. "So, I promise you to tell the very essential knowledge which is needed to know how to produce this legendary stone of magic." Then he looked at Terry and Anthony, who still listened in to the every word the professor said with their mouths open, and added, "However, you Ravenclaws, don't get too much excited, because then later I'm also going to tell you why it's never possible."

Terry immediately shot his hand in the air and objected, "But Professor, how can it be that the Stone is impossible to produce if it once had belonged to Nicolas Flamel?"

"That's right, young man – what's your name?" – "Terry." – "Terry, you see, the creation of the Stone requires special conditions and even more special ingredients which can't be found in ordinary public pharmacy stores. Besides, nowadays it's forbidden by the strictest law to acquire the essential ingredient needed for the production of the Stone, as well as this ingredient is also extremely rare." A wave of whispers flew over the classroom – the art of making the Philosopher's Stone seemed so tempting that upon hearing about the forbidden component, of course, did rose the first thought in everyone's mind – was it really impossible to find some loophole in this law?

"But may I ask one more question, Professor Flamel – where's located the famous Stone of Nicolas Flamel now? I recall there was published the information about his death in the Daily Prophet a long while ago. Then, the Stone can't be with him no longer anymore since it was able to provide the immortality?" Terry wanted to know.

"You are one observant young man," professor praised him with a smile. "It's indeed true that my grand-grand-grand and a lot more grand-father, Nicolas Flamel, had once deposited the Stone to safe storage to none other than the former Headmaster of the Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore."

In the classroom, the schoolmates were quietly murmuring to each other, "Yes, yes, I remember now – didn't something happen to Harry in the dungeons seven years ago?"

"But what happened then with the Stone?" Terry was inquiring further. "However, Dumbledore actually had never had the Stone. He also died," the young man of Ravenclaw House finished with a barely audible whisper.

"Actually, it is not very clear to me either. I suppose Harry Potter could be the best to give this answer. Am I right Harry?" Flamel asked, watching him closely and inquisitively. But his look through the glasses seemed to be full only with curiosity, without any reproach or condemnation.

"Well, there isn't much a secret about it," Harry began, being hesitant of his explanation, "everyone knows Dumbledore was fighting Voldemort back then, and since Dumbledore had heard from Nicolas Flamel that someone had tried to steal his Stone, the Stone had been hidden in Hogwarts so Voldemort couldn't get it. Back then seven years ago, Voldemort had almost succeeded to access the Stone, but then I intervened and took away the Stone from Voldemort's grasp. Then after Dumbledore told me that the Stone had been destroyed." While he was telling his story, there was a deafening silence in the classroom, with everybody trying to catch every word of his – because this event had never been revealed to the public.

"Thank you for your response, Mr. Potter, but now I really want to draw your attention to a worldlier part of Alchemy." As he saw dissatisfied faces, he smiled knowingly and added, "Of course, I understand very well that the Philosopher's Stone is a temptation for every wizard, and that's why I promise you to return to this topic before Christmas. On condition, if you are going to be good students. But now I would like to welcome everyone to get acquainted with all four basic elements of Alchemy."

And for the next part of the lesson, the professor told about the fire, the water, the earth, and the air as the core elements of Alchemy, each time with a flick of his fingers making to surge up the element in the respective corner. He linked these elements with the number four, which in Arithmancy illustrates the meaning of stability, endurance and constancy. In the second lesson, the young people had to choose a corner and element, and try to affect it without using a wand. The teacher's demonstration had seemed to look so simple when he had told about each element, but when Harry had to challenge the air it just kept only quivering as it had done all the time before. Ginny at least managed to get a tiny breeze that moved his hair.

Suddenly, there was a rush in the opposite corner – there in the corner of the fire, Terry had managed to summon a huge tongue of the flame. But in the corner of the earth element, Daphne had flowered a bloom of a tiny dandelion between the stones of the floor.

"Excellent, excellent," the teacher praised his students, "I didn't hope that even one of you'll be capable of surging up these elements at the very first try. It took me a while to move even one of them, so don't be upset if you didn't manage to do it yet. I'm sure you'll be able to reveal your talent on Alchemy later on. And now, as you're being diligent students of N.E.W.T.s, I expect you to be prepared for the next lesson, in which I'm going to introduce you to the basic principles of the interaction between these four elements. And try to practice the controlling of the elements as much as possible. Goodbye until the meeting on the next Wednesday," said Philip Flamel as he ended the class; then he flicked his fingers and the shimmering illusions of the corners vanished. Now here it looked just like any other ordinary classroom. It was indeed strange, this fine art of Alchemy.

Looking at the table of classes as they went out of the classroom, the students started their way to the dungeons to attain the next lesson by Slughorn – Potions. Of course, there started the flood of chattering about what had happened at the last two hours. One of the students said he had felt the wind, the other – the vibrations of the water, one felt like his feet had immersed into the ground, the other one had thought she had become hot like fire. Stepping down to the dungeons, the chatter of the seventh year students soon turned to the secret ingredient of the Philosopher's Stone, where, naturally, sounded out even more wondrous ideas with each passing second. "Maybe there's required some Pixie Dust." – "Are you crazy? You can get those everywhere!" – "How about the Basilisk fang? The hatching of a Basilisk is forbidden nowadays." – "I think this creature has to have more powerful transfiguration properties," Hannah interjected the conversation of her Ravenclaw classmates; she had asked Slughorn to allow her to study Potions at the N.E.W.T. level this year in order to be able to pass the admission examination of the healer courses of the St Mungo's Hospital.

Taking a place at the classroom door and waiting for them to open at any moment, Harry was standing next to a Slytherin girl. When she said her guess that maybe the secret ingredient was the tears of a poltergeist, he noticed something unusual in the girl's appearance.

"Daphne, what's that?" he asked the Slytherin girl, pointing to her ear.

She pushed her hair away from her ear, revealing a nasty, blackish outer part of her earlobe.

"This, Harry, is a proof that the Slytherins also had fought in the Battle of Hogwarts against You-Know-Who. Madam Pomfrey offered me to heal this injury after the Battle, but I wanted to keep it as a remembrance," Daphne explained, looking intently at Harry with her pale blue eyes. She has always been one of those shy Slytherins who wasn't yelling out all kinds of insults, she usually just sat quietly and learned and, as it turned out, had also fought on his side in the war. In addition, as she was born in the respectable Greengrass family of pureblood wizards, she was also a remarkably beautiful. Harry had never seen anyone with such crystal clear ice blue eyes.

"Um, I didn't know that. Thank you for telling me this," Harry felt awkward and didn't know what he should answer to her. Fortunately, the classroom door was already starting to open and also Hermione had hurried over to them.

They all four sat down on the bench, taking their seat in the middle of the classroom. However, Ron still couldn't finish his talking about the Alchemy lesson.

"But I think the idea of a non-transformed Boggart is the most accurate. It is actually impossible to capture it before the shape-shifting. And it's got incredible transformation skills. Do you remember the third year with Lupin – that Bogart could practically change into everything," he said, knowingly emphasizing the end of his sentence.

Harry smirked as he remembered Snape in the clothes of Neville's grandmother, while Hermione snorted next to him. Harry looked at her questioningly.

"Ron, you are talking about the ingredient needed for the production of the Philosopher's Stone, is it right?" Ron nodded in agreement.

"Please, just don't say that you've already read all about it," Ron said, sounding incredulous.

"Read about it? Of course, the alchemists don't write anything what this ingredient exactly is, but you don't have to be a genius to guess it. Especially if you know something about Dumbledore's achievement," Hermione strictly said in one breath.

"Dumbledore – what's the matter with him?" Ron didn't understand.

"Wait a minute; Dumbledore had done some research with Flamel, right?" Harry began to remember something.

"Hermione, aren't you thinking about those experiments with the dragon blood?" Ginny asked.

"Exactly, Ginny," Hermione spoke in a very quiet, whispering voice, because Slughorn had already greeted everyone and was about to start the lesson. "How do you think why he had bothered himself so much with that dragon blood; it has long been known for its extraordinary magical power, including the potential for transfigurations. But I wouldn't be very surprised if the dragon needed for the Stone very well could be extinct. And for now – shush – Slughorn's beginning the lesson," Hermione shushed her friends, now wishing to hear only the Potions Master.

Hearing her suggestion, Harry right away imagined a fantastic king of dragons in a height of a huge giant, clad with golden scales as armor and spitting fire high in the air with widespread wings…

"… and that's why you've got only one Potions class in a week this year of N.E.W.T.s," Slughorn said, and Harry suddenly switched back to the present and realized that now he should've been listening to the professor. "It means that I expect you to be very diligent in preparing for these lessons. I'll inform you at the end of this class for what you need to be ready for the next time, so you'll have a whole week to get ready for the theory and brewing of potions. If it will be necessary, I'm expecting you to spend some additional time to prepare also the needed ingredients for the potions, therefore I no longer accept the reservations of the seventh year students that there wasn't sufficient time," he warned his students about the set order in the N.E.W.T. year and soon after smiled in his walrus-like moustache.

"But now, on a happier note, let's get started with the theory of potions. This year, we're going to begin with the essences or extracts of different elements and substances; I think this might be particularly interesting for those who have chosen to study the subject of Alchemy. Today we could try to extract the Sleep essence out of the sneezing of the forest pixies. You could read about the extraction process in more detail in the Borage's book on one hundredth and fifty-seventh page," Slughorn explained as he lifted up from his table one of a few jars with a bluish-green pastel-toned substance.

"The sneezing of the forest pixies is well known among the magizoologists for their drowsiness; the leavings of the sneezing can then be collected in the form of the dust from plant leaves which have been sneezed by these forest pixies. I'm very fortunate because Hagrid walking around the Forbidden forest had found a little nest of these pixies, but to put Hagrid to sleep, there's needed something much stronger than this," Slughorn chuckled quietly as he put his hand on one of the jars. Harry had begun to suspect that Slughorn truly may have become friends with Hagrid after the Aragog's funeral. "That's exactly what we are going to do today – our task will be to extract the component of Sleep from this sneezing powder, so that our resulting potion could be able to drowse even a… an elephant," Slughorn slightly hesitated before he told this resemblance. "I will determine the quality of the saturation of the essence by looking at its spectral color – if you have managed to get rid of the green undertone, I'll count this potion as successful; if you'll be lucky enough to saturate your potion with the purple tone – then I will rate it with Outstanding. And now, everyone, get ready your mortar and pestle and come here to get some powder. Just don't toss around with it – if you breathe it in, you'll be sleepy for the rest of the day!"

Harry along with the others went with his bowl after the bluish-green powder. Everyone slowly and with a little crowding got a full pestle with powder using a spoon and then returned to their places and started to pour water in their cauldrons out of their wands. Harry looked at his new Borage's book – the Prince's book unfortunately had burnt in the Room of Requirement – and it said that to obtain the simplest essences the raw material had to be heated for half an hour on a slow, steady fire, stirring it counter clockwise, evenly and constantly.

Putting all the powder into his cauldron, he watched as it got wet and sank down, then Harry made a small fire under the cauldron and began to stir his mixture as Borage had told him to do. He remembered Prince once recommended stirring the potion every eight time in the opposite direction; maybe it might prove to be effective now, too.

Casting a glance at Hermione at the other end of the double desk, he noticed that, of course, she had such a steady fire as no one else in the classroom; the flames of his fire sometimes were flickering to the one side or another under his cauldron.

The lesson was already slowly approaching to its end, and Slughorn had started to walk around to look at the work done by his students. Mainly he nodded and said that it was good enough for the first time, and then he made a remark for some Hufflepuffs of Ginny's year that the color of their potions lacked richness, and Malfoy hadn't managed to get rid of the green undertone. Having come to Harry, the professor made a smile, feeling glad again that Harry had indeed inherited his mother's talent – his essence had lost the undesirable green color as well had even got a purple tinge. In addition, after stirring the potion following to the old advice of Prince, Harry had brightened his potion to the saturation of indigo color. Hermione also got an appreciative praise for her outstanding violet tone, although her potion was not as rich as Harry's, however Slughorn seemed to be the most delighted as he reached the tables taken by the Ravenclaws.

"Terry, that's an outstanding potion! You have outdone even the very Harry Potter. Look – do you see what a great essence he has! Ultraviolet, moreover fully saturated. Outstanding, it's outstanding. Sure enough, I haven't seen such a perfect essence since… well since a very long time ago," Slughorn continued admiring Terry's work, stuttering for a brief moment.

To the last remaining students he no longer didn't give much attention, just looked at them with a nod, and then the professor returned to the front of the classroom and asked everyone to submit a vial of the potion made today, then he announced that for the next lesson they need to be prepared for extracting the Fire Essence, besides the raw material must be provided by themselves. Finally, the lesson was over and everyone went to the exit of the classroom. Soon Harry, Ginny, Ron, and Hermione had come near Terry and Anthony. Hermione couldn't resist herself from asking Terry how he had succeeded to make such a potion.

"Oh, it's quite simple – I just put out the fire under the cauldron for a little while in each ten minutes, so the powder sinks down at the bottom of the cauldron and then the essence was released much faster," Terry explained as if anyone could have thought about that. Hermione thanked for the answer, but then cast a confused look at Harry – where did he get such knowledge from? Harry just shrugged as he confirmed that he had only used the old recommendation of Half-Blood Prince to change the direction of stirring.

So they slowly climbed up to the Great Hall speaking about their potions, and soon there on the tables should show up the dishes for the lunch. Also other students came to sit by their plates, and Neville joined their group as the endurance of the tables began to be challenged by the mountains of fried potatoes and pieces of mashed meat as well as a battalion of the juice jugs. There began the tinkling of the plates and cutlery, and Neville wanted to know how they had done in their first lessons.

"Can you imagine – in Potions, Terry surpassed Harry and even Hermione!" Ron exclaimed right away to his friend.

"Oh, I'm not very surprised about that. Last year, Terry was our Potions Master in the Room of Requirement, but Hannah practiced healing spells more. Then, they both healed most of our injuries. In any case, I definitely have to thank them a lot as well as the Room of Requirement for the providing of the necessary literature, otherwise now, I might not have a half of my face," Neville explained.

To Hermione and Harry it sounded credible, but Ron wanted to know something else while he was eating the cabbage and carrot salad.

"Listen, Hermione, but who was that Tom with whom you walked out of the Great Hall this morning?" Ron asked as soon as he had swallowed his mouthful of the salad and then after instantly put in his mouth a huge pile of potatoes.

"Who's Tom? Why are you asking me such a question, Ron?" Hermione inquired, sounding confused as she leaned back and narrowed her eyes.

"Hermione, it's very simple. Harry took out the Marauder's Map to look where exactly we have our Alchemy lesson, but then Ron, of course, was – oh, where's Hermione, where's Hermione," Ginny explained, at the end beginning to mock her brother acting as if she was searching for something very carefully on her napkin. Harry restrained himself not to start to laugh out loud and saw that Hermione also put an effort to not make a wide grin as she had tightly set her lips, while Ron's ears had turned bright red.

"It was just that next to you, there was that dot with the inscription 'Tom', but we don't actually know any Tom," Ron murmured so quietly that the end of it was barely audible.

"Maybe it was Tom Marble? I recall we had such a first year. As I went out of the Great Hall, I was constantly surrounded by lost first years. It took me all morning while I managed to take them all to their classes," Hermione told them, thinking back about her actions in the morning.

"Ginny already told him the same," Harry confirmed with a nod.

"Ron, you see? You just need to listen to Ginny more often," Hermione joked, but Ron only rolled his eyes, "Anyway; I didn't have time to go to the Trophy Room this morning."

"Neville, we're going to the Trophy Room after the lunch," Harry began, "to search for – well, you know – the Diadem," he muttered at the end quietly as he leaned closer to his friend. "You can also come to help us. And you could also tell it to Luna."

"Yes, of course, with the pleasure," the young man replied cheerfully as he drank his pumpkin juice, but then he remembered something. "Only I think she had Divination class right after the lunch. Then she won't be able to join us if we now go straight to the Trophy Room."

"Wait a minute, the fourth lesson ends at quarter to 2 PM. I don't think we could really manage to find that Diadem so quickly." Ginny argued wisely. "Let her come to the Trophy Room after her Divination class."

After eating the last morsels of potatoes and drinking empty their glasses, they were ready to go on the search for the Diadem. Neville took his time as he went to the Ravenclaw table and told about their intention to Luna. Then the five of them headed for the Trophy Room on the fourth floor of Hogwarts, going their way up the magnificent marble staircase to the first floor, where a little distance further was the incredibly huge Staircase Hall with wide winding stairs all around the hall. As Hermione knew to tell, the Hogwarts History says that the stairs had moved all around here in the ancient times, but due to too many victims they had been soon rebuilt motionless with rigid railings.

"We're already at the Trophy Room," Ginny announced, gesturing with her hand to the hall in front of her, as the young people on their way had lively discussed their thoughts about how to start the search. They all went right away inside in the never locked room full of cups, medals, and honor badges. There were no people here, but in the middle of the room they saw something new that hadn't been there in the previous school years. There was a statuette depicting a boy with the glasses and with a scar in the shape of a lightning bolt on his forehead, who had raised his hand in a victory, holding a wand with a dim light shining out of its tip. Underneath the statuette which was in the length of about the half of a human hand, there at the foundation, was a flat square with the inscription:

Harry Potter

the Savior and the Bearer of the Light

not only to Hogwarts,

but also for all the Magic World.

May 2, 1998

In the memory of those who have fallen.

Everyone looked at the newly created glazed figure with amazement, except for Harry himself – he immediately turned away after reading the inscription. He didn't want to look at anything that praised him for the job he hadn't actually done yet. This made his mood very glum.

"Let's get started with that Diadem," he hissed to his friends a moment later.

The others flinched from Harry's angry order, looking at him, but they nodded right away and turned their attention to the glass cases. They arranged between themselves, which shelves and cabinets each of them were going to check. So they examined everything very carefully, looking at countless medals and plaques, as well as at the lists of Captains of Quidditch teams or lists of Head Boys or Head Girls.

"That's interesting – Snape even hadn't appointed Malfoy for the Head Boy in the previous year, but instead of him it was Ernie," Run suddenly spoke up, examining the list of the Head Boys where the last entry for the 1998/1999 academic year told 'Draco Malfoy'.

"That's right," Neville confirmed. "Although, there were rumors going around here that they just wanted to get him on their side because he was one of the few purebloods. At first, they tried to recruit me too, but I didn't allow them to get me."

"But, if we think about it now, it was more likely that Snape just wanted to have as little terror in the castle as possible. Ernie would never hurt anyone," Harry said thoughtfully, telling his suspicion.

"You meant to say – couldn't hurt any innocent child. He kicked several Death Eaters in their asses," Ginny added, tilting her head lower and looking through her forehead.

"Who needs to be kicked in his ass?" Smiling, Luna came into the Trophy Room.

"What? We've spent here almost an hour already?" Neville was in shock. "We haven't even looked at anything yet."

"I told you we wouldn't have found anything so soon," Ginny objected.

So it took another hour for them to examine closely all the trophies. Unfortunately, there wasn't anything that looked even remotely similar to the Diadem, nor was there anything else suspicious – there were only completely common cups and medals with as much as common names or achievements. Nothing suspicious at all.

Then Luna suggested that they should check also all the panels on the wall because if the Diadem was here somewhere, it was likely hidden somehow. Naturally, Accio Diadem! also failed to work. So they took a look at the wooden panels at the bottom of the walls. For a moment, they thought they have found something. Ron excitedly called everyone to tell he had found some kind of void behind the wall. As everyone went over to him and investigated it more closely, they actually found a loose board and with their hearts pounding they shone a light in there to see what's inside. However, to their disappointment, there were only tufts of cat wool – apparently Mrs. Norris used to nap down here, perhaps even quite often. Hermione even dared to touch and feel through the cat's nest, but there was nothing more than some chewed mouse skeletons. After spending a few more hours of exploring the panels, their first day at Hogwarts was closing to the evening. They felt tired and frustrated.

"It's ten to 6 PM. Let's go to the dinner?" Harry suggested, looking at his wrist watch.

"Ok, let's go. On the way, we could think about more ways how to examine here everything," Ron agreed.

"We haven't checked the traces of magic on the panels and elsewhere yet," Luna added.

"I was more thinking about that Voldemort would've hidden that Diadem of his just like his other treasures," Hermione thought out loud.

"What do you mean?" Harry asked, going down the large staircases with his friends.

"I mean he could have hidden it more likely behind some Parseltongue key," Hermione explained.

"Perhaps your Sneakoscope could be useful?" Ginny offered. "It may detect the Dark Arts too, as something forbidden."

Thinking about all these options, they came in the Great Hall, where most of the students had already gathered for dinner. As they decided to return to the Trophy Room tomorrow with the Sneakoscope, the Extendable Ears, and Hermione's Revealer, they sat down at the long table – Luna took her seat at the Ravenclaw Table – and they all turned their attention to food.

The meal passed without any incidents, only one or two girls or some first years were looking suspiciously dreamily at them. The five of them went back to the Gryffindor Tower, discussing again their failure of today in the Trophy Room. As they arrived at the portrait of the Fat Lady in her enormous pink dress, Hermione gave her the password, "Victory."

"Cheers to you too," the Lady in pink replied as she opened the door to their Common room. The room was already half full – the children were sitting in chairs and around the tables talking and playing Exploding Snap, and then there was a bunch around four chess players, and somewhere in the middle of all these chattering students, were napping some cats, including Crookshanks. As they stepped through the hole behind the portrait, suddenly, it seemed as if the Common room had become mute. Although, their classmates didn't seem to pay much attention to them, but the younger ones, especially the first years, were looking at them with their eyes like saucers glistering under their hats of Hogwarts uniform. Among the children there immediately started the chattering, and they hurriedly vacated the seats they had occupied in front of the fireplace.

Harry actually didn't know how he should feel about this. That was the last thing he wanted now to sit among these intrusive first years, besides this year they really were so awfully many, and he didn't have even the slightest liking to discuss his great feats. Harry glanced at Ron, who had always liked to shine a little bit in the spotlight, but also the expression on his face told that his friend had no desire to be in the middle of the first years which were looking at them as if they were ready to devour their heroes like hungry wolves.

"I swear they are like tiny, starving Erklings," Ron sighed, "Really gives me the creeps."

They saw several unoccupied sofas near the door of dormitories and quickly hurried there. Seated, the young people hoped to be able to talk and laugh and, most importantly, to discuss carefully their next plan for the inspection of the Trophy Room, but there didn't go by more than ten minutes as the members of younger years had slowly started to make a crowd around them. Soon enough, they had lost their shyness to ask some questions being overly interested in to the last detail of their adventures, dealing with Voldemort and his Death Eaters. However, at the onset of the crowding questions Hermione said she wanted to go to the library and left her friends in the hold of the first years, which were hungry for adventure stories.

Soon Harry allowed Ron to speak mostly, because he was more willing to rethink again carefully what had happened today. There could be more things he would like to have, but even more glory he needed the least. Lately, he quite often had the urge to just sit and think. He wondered for a brief moment whether it's a thing that happens to all people as they grow up – that they simply need some moment of silence and reflection, or is it so because he had gone through so many worries and dreads, and it all had to slowly filter through his mind? As he continued to dwell on his reflection, Harry could hear Ron telling the first years about the Sword of Gryffindor and Neville confirming that he had actually cut off the snake's head with it and that the Sword indeed had truly once belonged to Gryffindor. Naturally, the eyes of the little listeners lit up like rubies – it was obvious that each of them wanted to prove that they could be true Gryffindors as well. At that moment, Harry's dislike for the obtrusive little children vanished – because they wanted only one thing, they wanted to know how it's like to be brave. It was just a pity that they were too young to understand what this braveness actually costs. Right now they were listening as if everything Ron and Neville were telling was some kind of fascinating hero story about knights at ancient times.

As Ginny felt her boyfriend to dwell on his gloomy thoughts, she took his hand and smiled at him.

"Listen, if you feel tired and want to be alone, go upstairs. We're going to deal with these little pests here," she whispered in Harry's ear as she leaned closer to him.

Harry nodded and excused himself that he needed to go upstairs to the boy's dormitory. Most of his admirers cast sad glances after him, but they didn't dare to object to him. Harry had run seven floors upstairs on the winding stairs and now stood in front of the two doors labeled with "Seventh Year", and he entered through the one where below was his name in the list along with Neville, Ron, Dean, and Seamus.

Closing the door behind him, Harry entered the empty and peaceful room. Dark red curtains hung down the windows, making a dim twilight in the room, and outside behind the windows, the sun was just touching the treetops. At least here he could lie down in his own four poster bed and think everything over carefully. His mind turned to Voldemort, the Trophy Room, Neville, and, of course, Ginny; he thought about Malfoy and Skeeter and other rather common but unpleasant things until the room had sunk into deep darkness. He had been lying in bed like that probably for several hours when suddenly, Ron and Neville entered the dorm room, both smiling and chatting happily. After them soon came also Dean and Seamus, ready to go to sleep.

"Oh, Harry, I see you ran away from those savages on time," Dean said, smirking.

"Yes, I did," Harry confirmed, still thoughtfully.

"They were sticking to us all day long. We couldn't even eat breakfast properly," Seamus added. "When they got to know we had also participated in the Battle of Hogwarts, they started to bombard us with questions – How was it? How dreadful were those Death Eaters? Did you really have to fight against the Dementors? I've heard that Hogwarts had been surrounded by a whole bunch of You-Know-Who basilisks, was it true?" After this question the guys laughed as they sat on their beds.

"Oh well, and one of them even wanted to know if Harry had really flown here on the back of a dragon and had burned You-Know-Who alive, because, you see, his father has a job at Gringotts, so he had told him that you had got the dragon out of there," Dean told what he had heard this morning, barely suppressing his laugh.

"Actually, this isn't very far from the truth," Ron stated, "we really got here with a dragon."

"Is that really true? I didn't even know that," Seamus admitted in surprise.

Harry and Ron both quickly explained to their classmates how they had done it four months ago. Although, they had concealed the fact of breaking into the Gringotts to the Daily Prophet, so it was not known to the wider public of wizards, nor had they told anything about the Horcruxes, except mentioning that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named had put on himself some kind of protection which had to be destroyed before he could be defeated.

"But why did you have to get into that vault at all?" Dean didn't understand.

"You see, Voldemort had provided himself with extra security, such as let's say amulets; so we needed to find and destroy them," Harry revealed to his classmates so much that he didn't have to go into details about the Horcruxes. Of course, Seamus and Dean wanted to know what kind of amulets they were.

Hesitating for a brief moment, Harry looked in his mokeskin pouch and soon took out the Slytherin's Locket and the Hufflepuff's Cup. His classmates gasped as they saw them.

"The Founders' treasures," Neville breathed. "It's a pity they've been destroyed," the young man stated as he took the ruined and ulcerated relics.

"Thank God, he didn't get our Sword," Seamus said, happily as he grinned at Neville.

"And the item of Ravenclaw," Dean said, "I guess that monster must have found it. Then that's what you were searching for that night, Harry?"

"Exactly, but the Diadem got burned in the Fiendfyre when Crabbe burned down the Room of Requirement," Harry confirmed, feeling a thorn of guilt pricking into his stomach as he said it, because it had hardly been the real Diadem that got burned. "Actually, what's going on with the Room of Requirement? Does anyone know something about it?"

"This morning, feeling nostalgic, I walked down the seventh floor before breakfast, but McGonagall had insulated the part of the hallway along the Room of Requirement. Besides, as you get closer to it, it feels unpleasantly warm," Neville told his observations of today.

"Probably McGonagall wouldn't dare to open it alone and especially now when the castle is full with students," Ron reasoned. The others nodded in agreement.

After a while of talking, they began to feel tired and called it a night. There will be a new day tomorrow with new impressions, duties and talks.

It seemed to Harry that the night had passed in an instant, and it was already Thursday morning. Having dressed and washed his face, he put on his glasses and went down along with Ron. As he got downstairs in the Common room, there was full with the younger Gryffindor students. Exactly as it was yesterday, they were accompanied by a bunch of enthusiastic fans, but this time they didn't hesitate to ask a constant flood of the questions – Harry had truly no doubt that this was the reason why they hadn't met Hermione and Ginny also this morning.

"Harry, were you scared when you fought in the Battle?"

"And what about the dragon – did you really stand against You-Know-Who riding on the dragon?"

"I heard there was a whole army of the giants, is it true?"

"Does You-Know-He really has huge teeth with venom like snakes have?"

"I was told he had all kinds of dark creatures with him – enormous spiders, Dementors, then those huge orange snails that spit venom, and there also had been a horde of Swooping Evils raiding the battlefield from above, but the castle was surrounded by three-headed snakes and basilisks that can kill with a single glance."

"Their imagination really doesn't cease to surprise me," Ron murmured, smiling beside him.

Luckily, their route wasn't too long, so after listening close to a hundred fabulous versions where Harry barehanded faced a hundred of Voldemort thugs, the young men finally came to the Great Hall at the Gryffindor table and could breathe out a sigh of a relief as they sat down across to the girls.

"They didn't leave you alone either?" Hermione asked. "It seems the most pressing topic right now is whether the dragon was just for you or for each of us." Hermione chuckled after she had told them.

"Aha, and each of us had also the Sword of Gryffindor and the Philosopher's Stone in our pockets," Ron laughed, luring out a smile on Harry's and the girl's mouths.

"At least here at the table, we can have our breakfast in peace," Ginny said with appreciation.

Harry nodded in agreement and put an omelet on his plate and poured pumpkin juice into his glass. As he ate breakfast and chatted with his friends, there soon arrived the post owls as usual in every morning. A simple, brown owl landed next to Harry, stretching its leg towards him with the envelope tied to it. It wasn't a big surprise for him to receive a letter – in May, he had almost drowned in the rain of the thank-you letters, but now fortunately, they were sent to him in reasonable quantities. Then, many had wanted to thank him for being able to come out of their hiding places and for meeting their loved ones again, and for returning to their homes. Once there was a letter seeming suspiciously heavy and it was strangely humming, so Arthur had took it to the Auror Office – as it had turned out, it was indeed a nasty Flesh-Eating Curse, presumably sent by some Death Eater or his relative.

However, now, only some Mrs. Gwyneth Gladys still regularly used to send him an encouraging word, but though, he remembered her owl looking different. But it didn't seem that this letter could be dangerous in any way, so Harry untied the letter from owl's leg curiously and opened it.

Dear Harry Potter,

I sincerely congratulate you on the last four months since the victory over the He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

I hope you still remember me, once glorious and outstanding Professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, a five-time winner of Witch Weekly's Most Charming Smile Award, and Oder of Merlin, Third Class, Gilderoy Lockhart. I feel overwhelmed with proud because the very knowledge I have provided to you has ultimately turned out to be essential in gaining the victory over the darkness and had made such an important contribution in saving the whole Magic World.

And thanks to the young, responsive healer apprentice here at St Mungo's who had also once studied in the brilliant Ravenclaw House, I have this unique opportunity to send you my autographed photo, Harry, so the invaluable contribution I have made in your education never leaves your memory. Thanks to you for the rest of my life, I am able to say with the pride that I have been your Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Forever yours,

Gilderoy Lockhart.

Having read the letter, Harry just barely restrained himself for not laughing out loud. And just look at it – in the envelope, there really was another piece of paper, thicker than the letter. It was a photograph autographed by Gilderoy Lockhart, in which he winked with his eye as flirty as he used six years ago; only the signature on the photo was not as curly as he remembered it before. With a grin on his face, the young man gave Ginny and Hermione the picture of the handsome blond across the table.

"Who would have thought it!" Hermione said, chuckling.

"Judging the letter, it sounds like he's going to be fine soon," Ron concluded, grinning. The girls also agreed with Ron, after reading the letter.

While the owls were still flying in and out of the Great Hall, the usual owl with the Daily Prophet descended next to Hermione. After paying five Knuts, she browsed the newspaper, but there wasn't anything noticeable, just that Malfoys were planning to open a new pharmacy store on the Diagon Alley.

"So let's try to inspect the Trophy Room again after Transfiguration? We still have to try the Parseltounge and maybe in addition to Sneakoscope, Extendable Ears, and Revealer we'll be able to think of something else. If we wouldn't discover there anything, then let's go to the kitchen next?" Harry summarized his intentions, wanting to get the agreement of his friends to his plans.

"And maybe we could visit Hagrid tonight," Ron suggested. "Who knows, perhaps he accidentally gives us some kind of idea."

"It's not a bad idea," Hermione agreed as she put aside the Daily Prophet and drove a knife over a block of butter to smear a thick yellow layer of fat on her toast.

"But we can't actually ask him anything. It's better that nobody knows anything aside us and Neville and Luna," Ginny stated.

"You're right. Besides, you already know how chatty Hagrid is," Ron said knowingly as he ate the beans he had put next to his omelet. Harry smirked – Hagrid really liked to talk much, and they had gotten to know a few things from their friendly giant they shouldn't have, but once Hagrid had blurted out important information to very Voldemort. Therefore, they couldn't be too careful with this matter.

Soon the breakfast was over and other students were slowly lifting up their school bags and going to their classes. And they did the same – leisurely walking and chattering, the friends strolled to the ground floor of the East Wing of the castle, where there had always been the Transfiguration classroom.

"Hello," as they arrived, their classmates greeted them, gathered here and waiting for the door to open. Harry glanced at the wristwatch, which indicated that there were still fifteen minutes before the lesson.

"Listen – do you know anything about this professor?" Ernie asked after he had greeted the Gryffindors, who had just arrived.

Harry, Ron, and Ginny shook their heads, but Hermione started telling that he was the successor of the famous Emeric Switch, who had written their Transfiguration books, as well as their new professor was certainly very skilled in Transfiguration since he was doing research and publishing his results in the Transfiguration Today. Seamus knew that Emerald Switch was a classmate of McGonagall, and Anthony confirmed that Switch indeed had researched Transfiguration very seriously and had regularly published in scientific magazines his articles on his experiments of partial transfiguration – an extremely sophisticated and ultra-modern, unexplored subject. Terry agreed the statement of his fellow Ravenclaw, vigorously nodding his head.

"It sounds like he is an ace professor," Ron commented.

"Actually, why we wouldn't have a great teacher? Nobody wants to be the professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts anymore, but teaching the Transfigurations could be a matter of honor," Ginny said wisely.

The classroom door soon opened and all the gathered students went inside and took the seats as they like at the double seat benches. Of course, Harry chose to sit next to Ginny, but Ron and Hermione took their seats behind them. The classroom looked like usually with its high ceiling and its slender, tall, roman windows with diamond grid pattern, casting a warm and pleasant sunlight over the room.

At 9 AM, the door closed and their current professor of Transfiguration came through the side door of the classroom. He was a man with a brown hair freckled with few gray threads, and he wore on his angular face a look exactly as stark as McGonagall.

"Good morning, my dear Hogwarts seventh years, who have come here to learn the final subtleties of Transfiguration before you are going to take the one of the most important examinations of your life – the N.E.W.T. exams," the professor spoke expressively as the students listened to him intently without making a noise.

"May I tell you an anecdote?" the professor of Transfiguration asked, but then continued without noticing them to nod. "Do you know what a N.E.W.T. student has to know?" Not expecting anyone to answer, Switch immediately went on, "A N.E.W.T. student must know everything that is written in this book," professor said as he lifted up the copy of A Guide to Advanced Transfiguration. "But what does the assistant of the professor need to know? – The assistant needs to know where to find this book. And what does the professor need to know, you may ask? – The professor actually needs to know where to find his assistant," the teacher finished his joke with a grin on his face. There were few students who chuckled softly; however, Harry had a rather terrible feeling that the professor didn't tell this joke just for the sake of fun.

"And this is going to be the joke we are going to do this year – you'll have to show that you're capable of demonstrating skills at the N.E.W.T. level in all your seriousness and this is what's going to be required at the end of this academic year – to know everything," Switch said with a stern face, but then he made a small smile and added, "But don't worry too much, because you have had the pleasure to study the fine art of Transfiguration with the great Professor McGonagall, who, of course, had proven to have excellent knowledge and skills in this subject even when herself was just a student. Therefore, I have no doubt that for most of you the task set by me to be prepared for the N.E.W.T.s wouldn't cause any difficulties at all."

Although, Harry had some doubts about this statement, especially after a skipped academic year, he thought it might be actually difficult to turn the beetles into buttons, let alone demonstrating something more complicated.

Meanwhile, the professor went on, "I suggest we could dedicate this lesson to repeating general knowledge, and leave the requirements of N.E.W.T.s to the next lesson?"

Everyone nodded in agreement, and the teacher began with the most common Switching Spell, asking his students to turn a pencil into a spoon. Luckily, Harry still remembered how to do at least that, but the next task – turning the same spoon into a lizard – was actually a challenge for most of the students. Ginny's lizard had a tale with metallic gloss, but Harry had only managed to turn the bowl of the spoon into the lizard's head and it oddly writhed on their table.

It wasn't new to him that his wand was excellent in battle and responded well in crucial situations, but when he needed to maintain constant, focused attention, he wasn't always able to do that. Perhaps that's why Potions and Transfiguration seemed so difficult to him, because these subjects demanded the understanding of the whole process, and he had to hold on his will until the spell was finished. Harry concentrated, but this time he didn't succeed the tail which looked like a handle of the spoon. Meanwhile, Professor Switch had come to his table.

"Oh, Harry Potter, I see you have to practice it more. The summer hasn't been good for your transfiguration skill," he said half-jokingly. "Great job, Miss Weasley, just when you finish the transfiguration, try to rotate your wrist more to get a really neat finish." Then he went two steps further to Ron and Hermione and exclaimed with delight, "Excellent! Miss Granger, right?" Smiling shyly, Hermione nodded in approval. "Your transfigured lizard is flawless and besides of an extremely rare species – it's the fire lizard or Salamander." Then the professor bent his head closer to it to look at the fiery glowing creature more carefully. "And indeed – do I really see it correctly that you have added the Fire Words to it?"

Now the whole class was looking at Hermione with admiration. "Yes, I thought it wouldn't be a good Salamander if it didn't have the properties of the Fire element," Hermione replied, lightly blushing at the admiration she received from the teacher.

"But when did you cast those words? I didn't hear a single word from you – did you really do it without saying it aloud?" the professor was truly pleasantly surprised. Hermione answered with a weak yes.

"Outstanding, outstanding, you've definitely earned ten points to Gryffindor for this," Switch rewarded her. But then someone spoke nearby.

"Professor Switch, wait a minute! But wasn't the task to turn the spoon into a lizard? If I remember correctly the theory of magical creatures, then the Salamander technically is an amphibian, not a lizard." This objection was said out loud by Terry Boot of the Ravenclaw House.

Harry heard Ron scowling behind his back that Terry had found something so absolutely unimportant to argue with – Hermione's work was undoubtedly perfect.

The professor thought about the question for a brief moment, slightly tilted his head. "I accept your objection – please, tell me your name!" – "Terry Boot." – "Terry, you are actually right, but it doesn't change that Miss Granger has performed absolutely perfect transfiguration, therefore I'm going to forgive her this tiny detail that a Salamander is rather a frog with a tail than an actual lizard. And now, please, show me how you have performed your own transfiguration?"

Switch walked over to Terry's and Anthony's desk and lifted up Terry's lizard to show it to the whole class as he widened his eyes with surprise. There was a tiny dragon sitting in his palm and sneezing fiery sparks. "A dragon! Indeed, a winged, fire breathing lizard. Outstanding, outstanding, Mr. Boot! You've definitely also earned ten points to Rawenclaw. I'm so happy to work with such talented students," the professor exclaimed about his students, being obviously delighted. As he went further to the rest of his students, he didn't see anything more remarkable than those two works, although Ernie also got praised for his lively lizard, which, though, looked like the most common little reptile usually warming itself in the sun in the gardens.

They ended the lesson as soon as they had repeated Vanishing and Conjuration spells; for the most part of the students they had no difficulty with it. "I had forgotten completely everything," Ron sighed as he went out of the classroom, walking next to Harry, "At first, I had a hard time since I could just conjure up legs to my spoon and nothing else. Thank you, Hermione, for your help. What would I do without you?" He smiled gratefully at his girlfriend. Hermione smiled back to him and she seemed to be in a rather good mood after the lesson; just a few times she murmured to herself as they went to the Trophy Room, "Oh, an amphibian, right? What's the difference!"

After arriving at the Trophy Room, they were ready to indulge again in their quest of the finding the Diadem. It turned out that Neville was already there, who had been searching the room alone during the first lesson. Unfortunately, he couldn't tell anything delightful to his friends. So they decided to try the Parseltounge; maybe it could open some kind of a secret passage.

The friends worked hard together as they searched over and over again through the room all the way to the last gap in the walls and floor, but it seemed that the Trophy Room was truly nothing more than just a room full with only trophies and the nest made by Mrs. Norris. The searching after the lunch was no success, though they did it with a replenished strength and enthusiasm; so Harry felt quite frustrated as at half past four o'clock he offered to finish the inspection for today. The others also agreed with him. Neville and Luna had their own business, but the remaining four friends decided that it was time to visit Hagrid.