3. Harry started a new school year
Harry arrived early at the station, put his things in the first compartment of the last car and went to the second last to find his pen pals. Hermione was staying with the Weasleys and he knew there was no chance of that family arriving early. He also didn't know how they would react to Harry's expanded set of friends, having been so isolated until now as he had been.
He just had entered the car and was astonished to see many smiling faces coming out of the compartments to greet him. Instead of accepting the many invitations to seat at one of the compartments, he started a slow walk through the length of the car, pausing at each door to exchange some words with the occupants.
His timing was impeccable. As soon as he turn at the end of the car to return to his own compartment, he saw the Weasleys plus Hermione coming through the barrier in a hurry to embark before the departure. They were so barely on time that he didn't even get off the train, limiting to wave to Mr and Mrs Weasley from the window of his compartment.
His two friends came in the compartment with the train already in movement. Harry helped them to put their trunks in the proper spaces above the seats. As expected, the first topic they talked about was the scape of Sirius Black from the wizarding prison of Azkaban. Nothing much to talk here, because just as Harry, they only knew what was reported on the Daily Prophet, which was not much. It seems that, again, the Ministry was trying to keep control of the information, only allowing a bare minimum to reach the general public.
Soon they were in an awkward silence, as Harry had declined to play chess with Ronald and avoided answering Hermione pestering questions about his activities during the holidays, while Ron had refused to elaborate about his sister's condition and Hermione on how she expected to attend to all the electives she had signed for. His comment that he had dropped Divination and Care of Magical Creatures to take instead Runes and Arithmancy throw his two friends in a shouted discussion over the merits of each elective. Tired of their loud voices, Harry took the opportunity to leave them alone.
He had expected to return soon, but he was having so much fun talking personally with his new friends that time passed without him noticing. He only perceived this when he realized how much the weather outside had changed. It was very dark and the rain was pouring down outside, amid lightning and thunder, when the train suddenly break to a halt in the middle of nowhere. The lights went out and screams echoed throughout all the composition. Alarmed, Harry got out of the compartment to see what was happening, hoping it was still too soon for another risk-of-life situation.
From each end of the car a terrible demon-like creature come aboard. Dementors! He had read of them in that strange biting book he received as birthday gift from Hagrid! He look back to the compartment he had just left, and his resolve to protect all his friends was set. He remembered what he had read about them: there was no known way to kill them, the only protection available was a charm he didn't know how to cast. But he had conjectured about a possible way to deal with them, and was ready to test his idea.
"To me!" he called, extending his right arm ahead, expecting the coming of his intended weapon. It took only two seconds for Gryffindor's sword to came to his hand, but they were two very nervous and uncertain seconds. Now armed, Harry didn't expect for the dementors to approach him, instead charging first one them the other. Each time he rested the sword on his right shoulder and, once near one of them, launched a circular strike from one shoulder to the opposite hip of the creature, roughly dividing them in two equal parts. Instead of falling to the ground, the two halves become dark and bad smelling clouds of smoke and ashes.
Emboldened by success and furious by the danger those creatures put the unprepared students in, he was a blur of movement for the next two minutes, running down and up the train taking away any semblance of life these beasts could have. After he had reaped the fourteenth dementor, no other came and the train restarted its journey. He let the sword go back to wherever was its resting place, and again started to walk the length of the train, now looking to see if anyone was injured.
As he walk, he could see most of the students were looking at him in one of two forms: many with fear, as if still in doubt about his participation in last year's events and all the rumours about him being a parselmouth and the heir of Slytherin, but many more were grateful and in awe of his actions.
The only injured he found was Patricia Kimberly, a first-year on which a trunk had fallen upon with the sudden stop of the train. The corners of the trunk had hit her thighs really hard, and she and her three companions were in still in panic. Harry sat on the floor in front of the girl.
"I think I can help you, but I need to look at your injuries. Do you consent?"
Between falling tears she nod in agreement. Harry carefully put her clothes up until the injured area was exposed. He kindly put his hands over the two bruises and let his magic access the situation. It was badly bruised, but no bones were broken. The girl reacted strangely at his touch, putting her hands over his shoulders and resting her forehead on his, while breathing hard. Harry suddenly became aware of the intimacy of the situation, and how he was also affected by it. What a terrible time to start his puberty!
He look around and found they had attracted a crowd, including one adult who probably was their new DADA teacher. The man look ill and weak, and was distributing chocolate around, urging the students to take it. It seems the chocolate was a good remedy to the effects of dementors, as the students were getting better quickly.
Trying to ignore the public and how pretty and kissable were the girl's lips and how soft and warm her flesh, Harry returned to the task ahead.
"Have you any experience in casting spells?" he asked Patricia.
"Mum just taught me Lumos and allowed me a few tries." she answered in a murmur.
"I want you to concentrate as if you were to cast Lumos, but instead of sending your magic to your wand hand, try to channel it to were you feel my hands resting. Can you do it?"
"I can try" she answered and closed her eyes, concentrating. Harry felt her magic coming and use his to direct hers to the correct places and add some of his to help with her healing. He knew it was working by the sounds of awe of the closer girls around them. He was still too enthralled by the proximity with Patricia to lose contact of their foreheads to look by himself.
"The pain is gone" she said, breaking contact to see her perfectly healed thighs.
Harry reluctantly stood up, already missing the proximity.
"What you just did?" came in Hermione's demanding voice.
"It is called 'healing'" he answered irritated.
"Don't use this tone with me! You never studied healing! How did you do it?"
"Who told I never studied healing?"
"I know everything you do! You don't..."
"GET OUT!" intervened a brunette girl that was in the compartment when Harry came in.
"WHAT!?" replied Hermione, surprised by the intervention.
"He came here to help, and he healed Patricia. What right have you to come here and give him a hard time for helping us? Who the hell you think you are, bitch?"
Before Hermione could engage in a fight with the little girl, the teacher said "Enough!" and put himself between the two. Turning to Hermione, he then said "Please, return to your compartment!"
"But... I... Harry..."
"Now!"
With clear indignation, the girl huffed but went back to her compartment.
Turning now to the boy, the new professor asked: "Harry, what happened to the dementors?"
"They climbed on the train without invitation or a ticket. I expelled them."
"How?"
"Magic."
"No known magic can kill dementors, Harry."
"Then I used some unknown type of magic."
The man passed his hand over his hair. He was too tired to fight against an obstinate teenager.
"You can keep your secrets for now, but I'm sure professor Dumbledore will like more details later. By the way, nice job with the girl's bruises. I never saw something like that."
The man then retreated to the back of the train, leaving the kids with some extra chocolate.
.o0o.
The rest of the journey was peaceful but a little complicated, with many questions and many requests for tutoring. Harry kept out of doing too many promises or revealing too much too soon. Fortunately, the girls accept his need of time before compromising. His actions of courage against the dementors were paid back with hugs and kisses to his cheek. He discovered that his sudden attraction for girls wasn't restrict to Patricia.
The brunette that so callously confronted Hermione was Romilda Vane, and she was a dangerous teaser. But she was also very funny, and made Harry laugh a lot. He also established a good start of friendship with many other girls, with especial attention to some in his year. He wasn't sure of his current situation with his two older friends, but he was sure he wouldn't suffer for lack of company. Now, how to escape the talk with the headmaster without revealing too much?
Author's Note:
If you have read the first two chapters of this story before March 11, 2023, note that those chapters have being re-upload for two reasons: misspelling corrections for Margie/Marge, tumbs/tombs and core/chore (thanks to agentinfinity and ToddGilliss for pointing them to me) and the other was the author's note of the first chapter when I change the lapse of time to 20 instead of 30 years, as using 30 would soon put the story ahead of present real time and I'd be unable to predict what is yet to come (I know this for sure, I never was able to win any lottery prize).