Chapter 4

Hogwarts Life

The first three months of his time at Hogwarts had been some of the happiest days of Harry's life. And considering how happy his life had been up to this point, said quite a lot. He had already created a reputation for himself among his fellow Gryffindors for an exceptionally talented wizard for a first year. He dazzled his fellow students with some of the spells he had learned, including the leg-locker curse – a spell that locked your opponent's feet together, and a spell called Patrificus-totalus – which froze the opponent in their place, making them an easy target.

Yes, Harry was impressive to his new group of friends, which included a boy named Dean Thomas, a dark-skinned muggle born boy, who loved football and was the first wizard in his family. He had found it very handy when Harry showed him the repairing charm "Reparo" which was advanced for his age. There was another boy by the name of Seamus Finnigan. Seamus was a short, freckle faced boy from Ireland, who had a talent for spells going wrong, but was quite happy to learn all the neat tricks that Harry had to show him.

Harry wasn't the only one who was showing his skill. Neville was the top in their year for Herbology, already becoming Professor Sprout's favourite. Thanks to all his time spent in Lily's Garden, even some of the older students were secretly asking Neville for tips on their homework. Draco had also come to Hogwarts equipped with subject knowledge beyond the norm, having quite a talent for Potions. A talent so natural to him, that Severus Snape had surprised the entire population of Hogwarts, by awarding Gryffindor house 5 points, when Draco produced a very good cure for boils. Professor Snape, as Harry now had to refer to his life long friend and part mentor, quickly learned that Severus was one of Hogwarts most disliked and feared teachers. He could see why with how strict Severus was. It was funny at first but even Harry wasn't immune from Severus's grim reputation.

However, the three boys were quickly earning their new reputation of being talented and were now being held in great esteem among their fellow Gryffindors. With their fame, however, they chose to employ a surprising level of modesty. They had all agreed to that they would only keep their abilities for Gryffindor, choosing not to show off in public. It was agreed by Oliver Wood, Prefect and Team Captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, that all Gryffindors keep the talents of, Harry, Neville and Draco a secret. Something that Hermione Granger disapproved of greatly.

"I agree that you are very good at spells Harry, but using your talents for popularity is a waste," Hermione had told him during their first Defence against the dark arts lesson – a class that Harry was already getting a solid reputation in, Professor Quirrell – a nervous looking man who wore a bright purple turban on his head, praised Harry's knowledge of his Flippendo Knock-back Jinx, awarding him 10 points during the first class.

"I'm not showing off to be popular," He whispered to Hermione, they were supposed to be writing a detailed description, on the exact use of the Flippendo jinx, but both had already written them out while others struggled on for the right words. "I don't walk down the corridor casting a Patronus, do I?"

"You can do that?!" Hermione asked in near shock, clearly fearing the level of Harry's talents. A Patronus, was something that Harry had only ever heard Remus talking about, it was a spell that created a powerful guardian to help defend you against dementors – cloaked creatures that could suck out your soul, the spell itself required a great deal of practice, so Harry sighed regrettably and said "No, my friend Remus told me about them, I'd love to learn it someday,"

"That's really advanced magic," Hermione told him knowingly, she seemed to see Harry's natural ability as an insult to all the extra work she put into learning magic. This meant at every turn, Hermione would do her best to try and compete with Harry, "But really, I heard you tried teaching Seamus a spell that stopped people from talking, that sounds horrid,"

"Good old Langlock," Harry said with fond affection, "I'd been wanting to try it ever since I first saw it used."

Langlock was a spell that pinned a person's tongue to the roof of their mouth to stop them casting a counter curse, it was the only spell that he'd ever seen Severus use in defence. Though calling it defence wasn't strictly true, he used it on Peter once. Peter wouldn't stop talking about a duel he'd once been in, Harry was 5 at the time and found it hilarious when Severus, after nearly a whole hour of hearing Peter recount the tale of the time he beat Marty Sneddon, flicked his wand and without even a mutter, caused Peter's tongue to be glued to the roof of his mouth. Harry chuckled when he finished the story and instantly lost any joy he felt when he saw the disapproving look on Hermione's face.

"Well, that's not funny at all." She said a haughty fashion. "Very immature of a teacher to be showing someone that. You shouldn't be teaching other students to do it either."

"I wasn't teaching Seamus how to do it," Harry said defensively, "Neville just wouldn't shut up about Devil's Snare and we wanted to sleep," He added with cheeky grin.

Hermione refused to speak to Harry for the rest of the lesson. Although he could have sworn, he saw Hermione's lips twitch towards a smile when she was trying to ignore him.

Needless to say, Harry found it difficult to like Hermione, but there was on occasion somethings he did admire. He mostly enjoyed the competition she brought to the classroom. Despite their inability to keep a conversation going without it ending in one of them being angry, together they had amassed a staggering number of points for their house. Hermione didn't seem to like the competition or the fact that Harry openly competed against her. She was always defensive against him, always trying to get to the answer first, boasted when she got the spell right before he did and fumed when he did something as if it were a very natural thing to do. Their working relationship was something of a marvel to people.

To the students it was a scary thing to see. For them it was hard enough to learn magic when it was all so new to them. Seeing Harry and Hermione battle it out for who was best was describe as intimidating and scary. Even by some of the older students. For the teachers, there was a secret buzz within the staff room that often saw Professor McGonagall rooting for Hermione – which was highly unprofessional in Professor Flitwick's opinion – an opinion which was ignore by Professor Snape, who was accused of being bias but at the same time knew full well of Harry's potential. They were quite close to a bet until Professor Dumbledore had appeared and requested that they don't try to make the students fight for supremacy and simply encourage their competition.

Hogwarts life was something of a mystery that needed to be unraveled every day. However, the Legacy of Hogwarts would be one that Harry himself would want to be part of and he was quickly leaving his mark on the school. Something that was being noticed by everyone, including a certain group of red-haired boys.