5. Harry started to see the full extent of evil in the world
When Harry and Susan came back from their tour there was a little crowd waiting for them in the Entrance Hall. Some were Susan's friends wishing to gossip about her 'date' with Harry, some were a pack of Gryffindor girls wanting to just be around Harry and the rest were Harry's other pen-pals wanting to know about schedules for him to teach them his PVD theory and how to do magic his way. They also had discovered his finger on the new self-study possibility that McGonagall had announced before the meal, and thanked him effusively.
Astoria Greengrass was one that made a bee-line to him so she could leave her sister behind. Daphne was annoying her due to her choosing Gryffindor over Slytherin, but her mum had written Astoria a letter congratulating her for seeking fulfilment of her ambitions and her cunning in hiding her true colours under a Gryffindor outfit, so she was happy to ignore the little tantrum of her older sister. Anyway, she had some really important for Harry.
"Hey, Harry! Dad sent you a letter" she said to the boy while retrieving the missive from inside her robes.
Harry smiled at the girl that already have gained some space in his heart. She was gorgeous, smart, vivaceous and had a very critical mind able to translate any wrongs she sees in the world in funny and sarcastic comments that freeze everybody around with the boldness and directness she delivery them. He already high valued each moment expended near her.
The letter was about the selling of the basilisk body. Lord Greengrass was really an honest dealer, giving Harry a good deal. They now just have to settle some details to conclude the business.
Being still early, he directed the group to a nearby unused classroom, made them seat and walked to each one for a brief review of their advances and difficulties, giving each one some clues and some new exercises to practice. At the end he asked them if this way of helping them would be acceptable for the two next weeks, while he think of a place and a schedule for the more advanced lessons he was planning to give them. He was happy they all agreed with it, as it was simple and fast for him.
Again, his path to the dorm was marked by a continuous alternation of girls at his side. There was something really special in this simple and innocent contact that put a goofy grin in his face all the way up to the seventh floor.
.o0o.
That night Harry was in his bed, thinking if that 'dating' thing could really resume to things so simple as a walk around the grounds hand-in-hand when he started feeling like something was out of place. He was only on his sweat pants and a T-shirt. He put his shoes and invisibility cloak and let the dorm to investigate that strange feeling.
He was half expecting to find Tabitha, the homesick girl of yesterday, sobbing in some corner of the common room, but nobody was there and his feelings were pointing him towards the door and out Gryffindor's tower. He past the stairways without feeling the need to go down to the lower floors, continuing in the direction he knew the Ravenclaw's tower to be.
He reached the entrance of Ravenclaw's tower to find a little blonde girl curled up in the floor. The light wasn't helping, but he still was able to see much more of her skin than he had ever seen from any other girl. In fact, except for a Hogwarts robe way too large for her little frame, she wasn't wearing anything else, not even shoes.
Harry sat next to the head of the girl, removed his invisibility cloak and started to kindly run his hand over her hair, whispering for her to wake up. She did, and to his surprise her first words to him were "Hi, Harry Potter. Do you think we can have some pudding? My tummy is empty."
Harry called for Willy, who brought them chocolate pudding and, at Harry's request, called for Morag, the Ravenclaw Harry was better acquainted. While waiting and eating, Harry tried to find out why the girl was in such situation.
"Who did this to you and why?" he asked her, only then remembering he didn't know her name and should have started by introductions.
"I'm Luna Lovegood, but people call me Loony. They think I'm a freak, and don't belong in Ravenclaw..."
Their little chat was interrupted by the return of Willy.
"Great Harry's friend is right behind the door, but she can't leave. Something is wrong with the door, Great Harry!"
Harry got up, asked Willy to call professor Flitwick urgently and started to examine the door. Willy came back a moment later telling him that Flitwick would arrive there momentarily.
"Please, tell Morag we called the professor to help. Soon we will be opening the door" he asked of the elf before returning to the exam of the door. Luna was curious about what he was doing and asked: "Are you trying to cancel those spells over the normal charms of the door, Harry Potter? Those with the reddish tint?"
"Can you see magic, Luna?" Harry asked surprised.
"Yes, I always could."
"Well, for now I'm just studying them. I'll remove them after professor... Oh, hi professor Flitwick. Thank you for coming so fast."
"Mr Potter, Miss Lovegood, what are happening here? And why are you wearing robes half-meter longer than you, Miss Lovegood?"
"Some people don't like my presence in Ravenclaw..." she answered.
"And we can find out who are bullying her by the magical signatures present in the spells they left on the door to block her entry. Can you see magic, professor? The spells with a reddish tint, over here" completed Harry while pointing to some places at the door.
"Unfortunately not, Mr Potter. And I'm impressed that you can. It is a very uncommon ability" answered Flitwick.
Harry almost told the professor that the ability was teachable, but decide to keep his secrets for a while longer, and see if could extract a vow of secrecy from the professor before letting it out, so he change back to the matter at hand.
"With your permission, instead of just disable the charms, I want to use them to make a detector of sorts. It will permit the normal use of the door, but will glow a bright red light whenever the caster of one of them cross this threshold. This way you would be able to identify and punish the culprits of this bullying."
"Can you really do this, Mr Potter? It is quite advanced magic" asked the professor suspicious.
"Well, I have been studying a little ahead in some topics, professor. With everything that has happened the last two years..." he tried to explain. "I see" said Flitwick, and Harry was sure the intelligent professor saw more than what was shown and was curious. Harry would need to talk with the professor soon, and ask for his help, or his plans could well go to naught.
Luna was delighted to see Harry at work with his wand (he was not performing wandless magic in front of Flitwick). She asked for explanations at each step while he was dealing with the first spell and was able to predict and mimic each step with the second spell so well that Harry let her deal with the third and final spell by herself, to the enjoyment of professor Flitwick. Seeing Luna dealing so well with it make the professor less suspicious about Harry's capacity to learn all that by himself, with clearly renewed the boy's confidence that his secrets could be preserved.
Soon the door was open, and Morag reunited with them. Flitwick was soon using his spell-enhanced voice to wake up the students of his house and calling them to the corridor outside. For three times the passage of a sixth-year girl made the top of the entrance shone red. When the last one crossed the door frame the three were blushing as bright as the door, already predicting the severe punishment waiting for them.
.o0o.
"Poppy, what happened? Why am I here?" asked Dumbledore as he woke under the care of the nurse the next morning.
"I don't have idea other than you fell unconscious yesterday morning while talking with Mr Potter. Albus, you are a very old man. What have you done? Did you get too nervous with the boy?"
"Uh, no, I don't think so..." he said while reviewing his memories of the past day. He focused on his talk with Harry, he asking the boy about Amelia... yes, he remembered what he had done and why he was here.
"Oh, I'm now remembering. It was my own fault. Well, I'm feeling good now, thank you for patching me up again. Can I go now?"
"Most surely not! You will take your breakfast here, I'll then give you a complete check-up and only then I'll tell you how much more time I'll require you to stay."
.o0o.
Even with his little adventure, Harry had had a good resting night so he decided to resume his physical exercises at mornings. He put a shorts, t-shirt and trainers and went down from his dorm to find a group of young girls already waiting for him.
"Good morning, Harry. Where are you going like this?" asked Patricia.
"Good morning everybody! Did you sleep better this night, Tabitha?" he asked from the girl he had cuddled the first night.
"Better, but I prefer sleeping with you. Can I?" she answered teasing him mercilessly.
With his face reddening, he chose to answer Patricia's question instead of the last one: "I'm going out on the grounds to exercise a little. I found that being in good physical shape help me with my magic too."
"Can we go with you?" asked Astoria, excited by the possibility of establishing a daily routine in common with the boy she admired so much, and was soon followed by others asking to join too.
"Yes, you can accompany me, but do you have some more appropriate clothes?" he replied.
"I don't" sadly said one of them just to be chorused by several others, but they were soon comforted by some muggleborns offering to lend some exercise clothes to those who hadn't.
"Okay, I'll wait here for five minutes. Whoever isn't here by then can catch up with me later outside" he said and was in awe with the speed the girls climbed to their dorms to change.
.o0o.
Snape was having his breakfast in the Great Hall when McGonagall came to him with a pile of parchments.
"This is your updated call lists. I noted you will have 2/3 of our time cleaned out, so I'll suggest to the headmaster a proportional reduction in your payments."
"You what!?"
.o0o.
Harry was going down the last flight of stairs to the Great Hall after his exercises and a quick shower, now accompanied by the full lot of young Gryffindor girls and some from Ravenclaw, when he saw Snape coming out from breakfast with a murderous look. He was happy to not be seen by the bitter man as he was coming a little later than usual for his breakfast.
The girls who exercised with him had told the others about their morning activities and he knew that tomorrow he would have the entire pack following him. They were totally inexperienced in physical activities and he had to lose some time giving them the basic concepts and teaching the most common exercises, but he was very happy with the attention, effort and perseverance they put on it.
He was now at the double big doors of the Great Hall and looking at the options of food available. That wouldn't do. Too much fried food for his current taste. He walked back some steps and called for Dobby.
"Good morning, Great Harry! What can Dobby do for you?" saluted the elf.
"The food. Too much grease. Can we have something more appropriate?" he asked.
"Would all Great Harry's girls also want some lighter?" the elf asked, and all the girls answered affirmatively.
"Then go take a seat, Great Harry and girls. Dobby will be serving youses soon!" said Dobby before popping away.
.o0o.
The already packed Gryffindor's table simply overflowed with the number of visitants from other tables that wish to partake of their differentiated menu. It was really luck that Snape wasn't there or Gryffindor's points would be in negative and Harry would have to serve detentions for the whole year. Notwithstanding, in Snape's absence McGonagall came to them.
"Mr Potter, what is the reason your group is being served different food from the usual?" she asked of him.
"Well, the usual isn't much healthy, is it? Too much grease. And look, we have nothing more expensive than the usual. It didn't make much difference if our eggs are boiled instead of fried, right? And I doubt the fruits and fish are much more expensive than bacon and sausages" he answered.
"Well, I don't know the prices to confirm" McGonagall conceded, but criticized two other points: "Anyway, you are breaking tradition and overloading the elves with more work."
"Well, I don't know about traditions, as Hogwarts doesn't offer a class about them" answered the boy with some cinicism, "but tell me how much more work this change will cause to the elves and how much is their wages and I'll glad refund Hogwarts for the extra expense."
McGonagall could clearly see the deep sarcasm behind the superficially polite words and was ready to chastise the boy when a newcomer decided to interfere.
"I approve of this change, if my opinion matter to you, Minerva" said Madam Promfrey, after just entering the Great Hall in time to hear the confrontation. "With a healthier alimentation, I'm sure I'll have less problems to keep them in good shape."
Disarmed, Minerva just said "I'll think about it" and left.
.o0o.
After breakfast Harry had a free period so he went out to the grounds, still followed by some girls also with free time. Outside, he realize how difficult would it be to keep secrets with him always being followed everywhere by a group of girls. He loved their attention and company, and didn't want to be rude asking them to leave. What to do?
As was his intention since he decided to create The New Harry, he thought a little about the problem instead of jumping into some ill-devised action. He soon had an ideia that he put on try. He decided for sincerity and explained the problem to the girls. For his surprise, they quickly decided that a vow of secrecy was the better solution and promptly gave theirs. He was surprised by the solution and how quickly they decided and executed it. He wouldn't ever consider in asking so much of them. He was expecting in only obtain an agreement that provide him some alone time. Instead he had now a team of partners to help him in his endeavours.
He called for Milly and Willy and received from them a map of the castle, which he immediately started to exam. He told the girls what he was looking for and they divide in groups, each group with a parchment containing the layout of one of the floors. They soon selected several interesting places to exam personally.
"Did any of you know Hogwarts has a kind of theatre? It is called here a 'Conference Room' but it has an elevated stage and many rows of chairs in ascending levels and even some boxes at the sides for VIP guests!" said Susan, examining the sixth floor with some friends.
"Wow! If we could make a movie projector works here!" said Glenda, a muggleborn from Hufflepuff, and she had to take some time to explain to the others what a movie was.
"There is a Music Hall on the third floor!" said the excited Ravenclaw Mandy. "Maybe there are some instruments in there we could try to learn how to play!"
"There is a most extraordinary room on the seventh floor, but here it only appears with a question mark on it. I'm sure you will love this room, Harry. I hid there sometimes last year from some nasty people" said Luna, the newest addition to the group. Harry was curious so Luna then led the group to the seventh floor, where they went to investigated that special room.
.o0o.
A room able to realize most of your wishes! How cool was that! And Padma thought of asking for a manual about how to use the room and what were its limitations, and the room was able to provide them with that! It was amazing. All day until curfew there were students in the room trying different things. They only found three limitations: 1) nothing created by the room could be transported outside; 2) there was a limit to the size of the internal space the room could create; 3) it was impossible to connect the room to any place outside the castle.
Otherwise, it seems that everything else was possible. Susan had requested a pensieve, and it works fine. She wanted to show the girls her conversation with Harry last night, so they also knew about the dangers he had faced in his first year. Harry did better, putting his memories of the events in the pensieve to all them see the real thing, and let Susan collect the memories and send them to her auntie.
They were so entertained by this that they follow first year with second year, the last summer and the highlights of the journey on the Express. For his dismay, some girl, making use of the anonymity of being covered by the others, asked him to add the memory of his shower that morning, making all the girls laugh and the sole boy want to hide in some place very far away from them.
To go to dinner, instead of walk down seven floors, they tried, and succeeded, to create a passage to an usused room on the first floor. They returned to the room after the meal and, nearing curfew, all the girls, including those which hadn't accompanied them from the beginning, have made their vows and were now aware of the capacities of the room. They decided it was the perfect place for their lessons with Harry and their exercising, as some boys had made some rude remarks seeing the girls in their sport shorts that morning.
.o0o.
Next morning they had the privilege to exercise in a complete gym, the few muggle-raised explaining to the others the function of each machine and how to use them. They decided to take breakfast in the Great Hall, both to not arouse suspicion as well as to see if McGonagall had accepted the change on the menu.
Fortunately, it seems that Promfrey had succeeded to persuade the deputy-headmistress and a healthier variety of food was available in every table. Harry's luck was still active and neither Dumbledore nor Snape tried to interfere with his breakfast. Hermione and Ronald were also keeping distance, but while Hermione's looks at him were sour and disdainful, the ones from Ron were longing and suffering. Harry felt the necessity to try to exchange some words with him when they met at the doors, but the guy just murmured "Traitor!" and walked away. Well, he had tried and didn't feel as he had done anything wrong, so he just forgot the matter and went at a slower pace to his first class of the day.
.o0o.
The rest of the week went easy. Most of his time out of classes he expend in the Come-And-Go Room, as Willy has said the other elves called that room. She had discovered that the elves had been using a special configuration of the room to store any lost object found in the castle as well as any unnecessary items. Willy and Milly were doing a search on this configuration of the room, and were finding some interesting things. The old Music Hall contained only a piano and an older keyboard instrument (harpsichord), but the two elves had found several others in the Room of Lost Things, as they called that particular configuration.
The deal with Lord Greengrass was settled: all the costs would be deduced from the revenues and the net would then been divided in the proportion of 9:1 in Harry's favour. As the Chamber was out of Hogwarts' wards, Lord Greengrass would provide Harry with some portkeys to attach to the carcass to be voice-activated to deliver it at some warehouse. The only difficult was the will of the girls to see the beast, but the room could open a passage direct to Myrtle's bathroom so nobody else would know about their trip to the Chamber.
.o0o.
Harry was happy with the progress of the girls. He divided them in two groups, those who already were able to keep part of their magic spread through their bodies and those still trying to do it. The second group had roughly the double of girls than the first when Harry made the division on Wednesday (Sept. 4th), but he expected to invert the proportion until Monday.
At Thursday he made an important discovery about magic that shocked him. He was working with Hannah Abbott, a pretty blonde Hufflepuff in his year, when their magic started to interact in a strange way, similar to what had occurred with Patricia and him on the train. They were able to avoid an embarrassing moment only because other girls near them started to ask them about what was happening, breaking the entanglement of magic and allowing them to recompose themselves. But all the signs were already there: their foreheads were touching, they were panting and sweating, their eyes locked in each other's and their lips were mere millimetres apart. The sexual tension was heavy in the air, and every one nearby was somewhat affected by it.
Old Harry would probably stutter some lame excuse and fly from the room ashamed. New Harry decided to share his insight with the girls and hear what they think was a viable solution for the situation.
"It seems that my magic has had an effect over you all that I only realized now that yours is also affecting me..."
"Isn't it wonderful?" asked Patricia smiling. "I'm hoping for the opportunity to feel it again since you healed me on the train."
"Well, it is amazing... but it is safe?" pondered Harry. "It is addictive... euphoric... I'm afraid it could also be misleading, like... we can do things we really don't want or were not prepared... I fear it is too similar to the Imperius curse to my liking..."
Harry alternatively looked at Hannah and Patricia, silently asking for their opinions. Was he still on the effect of the magical bond or were just his hormones leading him to think how cute the girls were while thinking? Hannah had her head a little bent sideways, and the tip of her tongue was visible between her lips at the side of her mouth. Patricia had her eyes almost close, and had her teeth pressing the side of her index finger. But it was Astoria the first to talk: "I can't wait to feel it myself!", which was followed by a chorus of "Me too!" from several others.
Harry had turned to look at Astoria when she said her comment, and was now staring at her with open mouth, in awe, suddenly making the usually bold girl quite shy.
"Harry?"
"Astoria, there is some wrong with your magic. Do you know what it is?"
The girl lost all her colour and almost faint.
"Can you see it? Can you see it on me?" she asked so softly it was barely audible.
Immediately perceiving the importance of whatever that taint in her aura was Harry started to get up opening his arms to confort the girl just to be sent back to his seat with the force the little girl throw herself at him. He adjust their positions putting the girl sideways on his lap, her head supported by his shoulder, and asked softly: "Would you tell us what is it?"
The little girl was sobbing and from time to time a shiver run through her body. She needed some time until she could answer his question: "It... I... is a curse. It has affected my family for centuries... I don't know the whole story... Some old dispute between the Greengrasses and the Mulcibers..." Harry started to gently run his hand over her soft hair, trying to calm her down. It seemed to help as she soon revealed some more: "What I know is that it attacked me, meaning I'll hardly reach fifty... Probably less, a decade less for each child I bear."
"We'll find a way to free you from this fate, Astoria." The girl looked at him with such hope in her eyes that he felt he could easily give away his life in exchange for her health. "We have time and we have magic at our side. With determination, I'm sure we'll find a way!"
"Harry?" someone called from behind the group of girls around them. The boy tried to look at whoever had called and the girls between them part away revealing a Slytherin he knew was in his year but didn't know her name. But her appearance was so fragile, she was so pale... Harry used his magic to enhance his vision and clearly saw she was also afflicted by some kind of curse like Astoria.
"You too? What happened? I can see the similarities, but there are some differences too."
The girl came to him, drop to her knees and seat on her heels, her head down and her hands united on her lap.
"I'm Lilith Moon, Harry, and I'm also victim of a curse. Some querrel between my family and the Lestranges. Unlike Astoria, who have the curse on hold, I'm suffering its sequels since birth. Would you help me too, please?"
.o0o.
Harry asked the girls if they knew how these kind of curses were possible. He didn't expected an answer, but he received a very detailed one.
He was doubly gobsmacked. The first reason was seeing that some Slytherin girls had been added to the large group of girls that now follow him everywhere without him noting. 'They are just girls like the others' was his conclusion. 'They are here by the same reasons of the others. They are not planning my death'.
The second reason of his astonishment was to discover the extension of the evil behind those curses. The Carrow twins knew a lot about Dark Magic, and they explained that such curses could only be raised between families engaged in a blood feud, and required a willing human sacrifice of someone of one side of the conflict to inflict the curse over the other side of the blood feud. A hate so intense that one lost their own soul to extract revenge not only from their enemies, but also from innocent children yet unborn centuries after the feud started!
This revelation affect him deeply. He stood up and walked away from the girls. The room, reading his needs from his mind, expanded in one direction where a 2 metre high block of basalt representing the skull of Tom Riddle as he saw in the back of Quirrel's head appeared some 10 metres from him. Harry pointed his wand at the block and screamed in fury against the unfairness and violence in the world. A kind of voltaic arc connected his wand to the rock for some seconds. When it was over, the rock was steaming, reduced to a pile of chips no bigger than his hand.
Author's Note: My special thanks to all of you who favourited and/or reviewed this story. The feedback is a great incentive to continue and to improve.