Oh, Harry thought, the first time a House Elf saw him watching them too much and decided to explain to the boy what they were.
"I'm one too," he said excitedly. Finally, everything made so much more sense. He hadn't known that they had a name here. He doesn't know why he looks like a human when he's one of them, clearly, but he's never felt more certain that he finally figured out his place in this world. He knows where he will be when he is seventeen and Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon need not care for him anymore.
"I don't know how to read and write either, and I do all the chores at home, all the cooking and cleaning, and all the laundry. I belong with my family. That's why I don't fit in here – they want me to study but I'm not one of them," Harry explained happily, eyes bright, making eye contact for the first time in a long time.
"But you'se looks like one of them," The house elf contested slowly, brows furrowed.
"Oh, please don't tell. I really am very good at cleaning," Harry promises, "and following orders."
The house elf tilted her head but then finally nodded.
"Tippy understands. If you is a house elf, then we will not tell. And if your family sends you here, you can help."
Harry released a sigh of relief. He had only been here for a few days and he had tried to clean and help, but it was hard finding someplace where he didn't interfere with others.
"Do you have a house elf name?" Tippy asks and Harry hesitates. He can't tell her Freak, Aunt Petunia was very clear on that, but these house elves are just like him. Surely telling them about being boy would be acceptable, right? Harry wishes he had the clarity of being at home. Aunt Petunia is very clear on what Freak must and mustn't do.
"Boy," he finally whispers, unsure if he is doing what Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon want, but hoping they will understand that he needs to help here, to have something familiar.
And that's how Boy is inducted among the house elves. He now gets regular small meals in house elf portions. He helps cleaning and tidying but struggles with imitating house elf magic. But he is learning and adapting, getting better and more helpful.
The headmaster is informed that a new house elf had joined temporarily, called boy, and that his family sent him here for the school year. Albus asks the house elves to pass on his gratitude and to make sure that boy doesn't help, hinder or otherwise interfere in any way with his classmates. The house elves accept the task and then tell boy not to speak and just ignore any classmates or the headmaster may punish him.
Harry knows what punishment is like with the head of the household – Uncle Vernon – and has no intention of incurring the headmaster's disfavour. He attends classes in the back, furthest away from everything. He cannot see the board and everything more than an armlength away becomes increasingly blurry. But he cannot read, so what need would he have to see the board?
Listening classes are easy; Aunt Petunia often recited a list of things he had to do and Harry had a very good memory and finds it easy enough to retain. He doesn't understand the usefulness, but he does retain it. Wand classes are not too terribly difficult as he can imitate what needs to be done from those around him.
The difficulty comes in potions.
The one class Harry really does want to excel in because his head of house and the teacher for this class knows that Harry is a house elf, he thinks. At least he talks like he does. And punishes like he does.
Harry cannot read the recipe – either on the board or in the book. The instructions are never read out. Harry follows what his classmates do but he isn't told quantities or the importance of stirring a certain number of times – not that he could count, but he can repeat. Either way, it's a disaster.
It's not like Harry doesn't try – he does! But after the first few times he's told to do it alone – which is much better, in his own opinion, as it doesn't threaten to violate the headmaster's rule by collaborating on a potion. Apparently, Harry's worse than Neville but he's learned to use the trick he used at home all the time and by withholding his magic from the potion and not allowing it to seep into the potion, he only makes sludge, but has stopped creating corrosive acids or poisonous gas.
It's a step in the right direction, he thinks.
Nevertheless, he fails, time and again. In addition to that, he never hands in homework. Harry doesn't understand why they expect a house elf to do homework – and the house elves in the kitchen frequently commiserate with him about unreasonable demands from former masters which they full well knew the house elf couldn't fulfil. It's about the punishment, they say, and pat him on his hand.
Harry nods. He has seen the glee in Vernon's and Dudley's eyes, the malicious smirk curling around Aunt Petunia's lips. He does know.
So he submits. He goes quietly into the forest with the giant. He helps in the greenhouse. He does anything they ask, quietly and compliantly.
But he still doesn't turn in homework.
In the end, the other Professors simply assign him detention with his head of house, after weeks turned into a month and a half of daily detentions (including weekends) without reprieve or sign of improvement.
Professor Snape again proves his knowledge of house elves and Harry in particular. He's assigned cleaning old cauldrons or the classroom usually.
The gloves he bought second hand had holes in them before he started – after scrubbing vigorously for hours, they have all but disintegrated.
Harry remembers how dazed he was when he was five and asked Aunt Petunia for cleaning gloves and she slapped him around the head and his ears rang.
So he knows it's part of the punishment and doesn't ask. His magic usually helps him heal anyway.
While the Professor brews potions or grades essays, Harry cleans. His hands often bleed, but he is used to cleaning up his own blood and it doesn't set in the cauldron.
The Professor never looks at him, not after the first time. Harry has proved himself capable of cleaning and at least he can be proud of that, of not needing supervision for this, of the Professor trusting him enough to take care of it without looking over Harry's shoulder.
And he is, but Professor Snape still occasionally asks him questions and Harry tries to answer, but without going against what Aunt Petunia told him. It doesn't usually end well, although some are worse than others as Harry has no acceptable answers to give.
"Why do you persist in refusing to hand in homework, Mr. Potter? Hasn't this gone on for long enough?"
"Yes, sir. Sorry, sir."
Professor Snape knows well enough by now that Harry's apologies are never a promise not to repeat the action.
"Do you even know any other words, Mr. Potter?" The man asks with tired exasperation lining his every word, even though his gaze doesn't shift from the papers in front of him.
Harry blinks.
"Yes sir. What would you like me to say, sir?"
Another sigh.
"It's Professor Snape. And I would like you to tell me why you aren't doing your homework."
A pause.
"Sorry, Professor Snape, sir."
Another sigh.
"Far be it from me to stop your desperate need to clean cauldrons if that is your wish. But you will eventually understand the effect this has on your education. If you continue like this, that will be all you will be allowed to do for the rest of your life."
Harry understands it's a threat from the tone and behaviour but he doesn't understand the threat. How could doing what he is meant to do anyway be a threat? But he knows better than to ask; it also makes him wonder if maybe Professor Snape doesn't actually know that Harry is a house elf who looks a little bit human, only much smaller.
"Yes, Professor Snape. Sorry, Professor Snape, sir."
The teacher lets out a huff.
"Finish up and leave my sight, boy. I have had enough of your insolence for tonight."
He called him boy again, so he must know, but it's very confusing and contradictory. Still, Harry does as he's told and reports to the head of the house elves that he was insolent with Professor Snape. Punishment, he knows, is always more lenient when you're upfront than when you try to hide it and are discovered.
The house elf assigns him smaller rations for three days and harder tasks. Harry nods, glad that his food wasn't taken away entirely and does as he's told.
Most days are long now. Harry attends his classes as he's told. He gets up at five like he did at the Dursleys and helps out in the kitchen – his magic is much better now, a month in, at doing what it needs to in the kitchen. Especially now that he's fed regularly and it only needs to heal his hands. He attends classes, takes a meal in the kitchen and completes more chores and then back to afternoon classes and finishing up with detention with Professor Snape. After detention he's back to doing chores until around midnight or one am.
Recently, Professor Snape allowed him to help with ingredient preparation as well.
"No gloves, Mr. Potter," came the order as soon as he stepped through the door.
Professor Snape now occasionally even leaves him alone with the cleaning or prep work, although Harry suspects he remains close by.
And he's shown how to prepare and dissect the various plants and animals the Professor needs him to. Aunt Petunia never showed him how to cook that clearly, so Harry focuses intently on how his teacher handles the slug, in this instance, how he holds and uses the knife and then imitates his actions in precisely the same fashion which gets him an analysing stare for a moment followed by curt nod of acknowledgement.
Harry's chest brightens at the unsaid praise but he knows better than to smile in front of this man and quickly ducks his head to continue with the task.
Professor Snape is kind. He doesn't hit Harry even when he is clearly frustrated with Harry refusing to do as he's told, he doesn't withhold food or water, he doesn't lock him in or anything. He just makes him do chores – chores which help Professor Snape – and while he does occasionally berate him, it's nothing on the scale of what his family at home says even on a good day.
So Harry turns up straight after classes instead of after dinner. He helps Professor Snape instead in the kitchen – the other house elves are impressed that he is allowed to assist the man as he usually tells the house elves not to bother they would only make it worse. Not Harry, though. Harry is allowed to come.
He doesn't ask a single question, doesn't make eye contact, doesn't lift his head and acquiesces to everything the Professor asks of him. Sometimes the Professor forgets he's there and only realises when he finishes up for the day and looks up to see Harry still there, at midnight, cleaning or cutting. Professor Snape then tells him off for not alerting his teacher to the time and sends him off. Harry receives punishment from the head elf, as is normal, and heads to bed.
And then there was the Troll in the dungeon. The headmaster tells everyone to go back to their common room – so Harry heads into the kitchen to await his orders. What he hadn't expected was to be told that the house elves were told not to interfere in teacher's lessons and that, as a teacher had corralled the troll into the school somehow, they were duty bound not to interfere unless they received an explicit order otherwise.
Except for boy, because his orders were his family's, not Dumbledore's. And there was a little girl cornered in a bathroom.
Harry didn't know much magic, but he did know how to hold something shut – so that's what he does. When the troll assaults the door, it doesn't give in.
It holds.
Sweat sits on his brow, his limbs are shaky, but Boy holds the door because the house elves told him to. Because the ones who are like him and were ordered away, asked him to help when they couldn't. They took him in and hid him from these wizards and witches, the ones who still try and tell him about his talented and hardworking parents – who always handed their homework in, by the way, Mr Potter.
So even when it takes many long, looong minutes for the teachers to come, the door doesn't bend or break under the troll's mindless assault and Harry remains hidden in the corner. Tippy who was with him – just watching, never helping, pops him back to his room with a bit larger a portion than he normally east and some fruit juice – which he's never had except for the first few days here when he forced himself to imitate human eating. He protests the increased food but is told he needs it for the large exertion and that he is to eat all of it, despite having already had lunch that day (two meals a day, Harry wonders wide-eyed, this is insane).
Still, he follows orders, eats it and is surprised when he holds it down, noting the satisfied look in Tippy's eyes, he bows his head in submission. He shouldn't have doubted her – she clearly had much more experience than he did.
He is also informed later on that the troll-night was the night his parents died. Harry blinks and nods but doesn't know why that would or should mean anything.
What Harry never expected is for the detentions to dwindle and for Harry not to be welcome with Mr Snape anymore.
"I have larger concerns than your petulant teenage rebellion, Mr. Potter," the Professor intones distractedly, when Harry turns up, waving him away. Harry doesn't know what that means.
"It's your life and far be it from me to tell you how to ruin it. I have better things to do with my time."
And, oh, Harry hadn't felt pain in his chest for some time. Those words had hurt; Harry had thought he was helping his Professor, that he was allowed in earlier because Harry was good at doing as he's told and finishing his tasks. But he should've remembered how often Aunt Petunia told him to hide in his cupboard because she's 'sick of seeing his face' once he finished his chores.
Biting his lip, Harry nods and leaves, as ordered and goes back to the kitchen for his next set of duties.
What happens next, he's not sure of, but he knows that he didn't want anyone to see him anymore, was desperate for no one to pay attention to him.
And it works.
Like magic.
Eyes glide over him. They know he's there, but now he doesn't get called, no one talks to him or interacts with him. It's not just their eyes, it's like they can't think of him for long either, their attention wavers and is distracted easily.
Harry isn't sure what to make of it but when he tells the head house elf, it's the second time he gets a second meal the same day, to celebrate this amazing success and in the hope that he would share it with the other elves.
"We are to not be seen or heard," Sock explains with a serious tone when he notices Harry's bewilderment. "But we haven't been able to figure out how to be there but also not, like you. This is big, Boy," she says and although Harry isn't sure he understands, he nods anyway.
The year passes in a blurry mess – although the holidays allow Harry to fully focus on chores with the rest of the house elves and they make a bit of progress, finally.
There's some sort of fire in the giant's wooden hut with some furore and a lot of people for a few days – strangers – traipsing in and out of Hogwarts. Then there's the weird thing at the end of the year where one of the teachers dies in front of a mirror? Harry isn't sure he heard that right, but shrugs. Not his concern.
He is advised that he passed, by the skin of his teeth, due to his success in the practical exams. The only reason he doesn't summarily fail is that he actually made a potion – it's a burn salve which Professor Snape has had to make ad nauseam in front of Harry and Harry has always learnt that no matter what you do, splitting your focus and paying attention to any person around you, always pays off. It would probably be the only recipe he can replicate, so it's very lucky indeed that this was the one chosen as the final year-end exam. Harry scrapes through but has no illusions about doing so for another year.
No matter, Aunt Petunia will tell him what he needs to do, he's sure.
A house elf visits him during the holidays.
Harry is very puzzled but mostly upset. The house elf is disloyal to his family, trying to betray them. What kind of house elf is he. He mentions punishments and Harry nods and tells him that they're for his own good, that punishment is to make sure he learns to do better next time. It's no reason to betray his family.
The house elf's face falls and his eyes water, but he nods and disappears without saying another word. Harry gets punished for the loud noises later, but he doesn't mind. Hopefully he helped the elf; he cannot even imagine betraying Aunt Petunia or Uncle Vernon – or Dudley – to anyone. Who would do that to their family?
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