CHAPTER 8

Of Classes and Headaches

"Good morning boys!"

Neville resisted the urge to scream as Blaire's clear voice made its way through his brain. He sat up straight on his four poster bed, his heart pounding wildly.

"It's past seven already!"

Neville was sure he was mad now. How exactly could he hear her voice?

Maybe if he answered and got no reply his imagination would die down.

"Blaire," he thought fiercely. "Is that you?"

"Neville!" said Blaire's voice and Neville's heart sank. He was going mental.

"Neville?" came either Harry's or Ethan's voice, Neville wasn't too sure.

"W-what are you three doing in my head?" Neville said as calmly as he could.

"Oh no!" said either Harry or Ethan again, "I think we've done some accidental magic and got Neville connected too!"

"Are you sure it's accidental magic?" Blaire said.

"Of course." said the first voice. "That's how I got the three of us connected, I was worried that evening."

"What do you mean 'got me connected'?" Neville said, now even more afraid. "Are you even real, or is my mind playing tricks?"

"No, no. It's real Neville!" Blaire said. "It's a very long story, actually."

Harry sighed and began telling Neville about his little adventure with those apples and what happened from then on and when he was done, there was silence.

"So you haven't told anyone about this?" Neville said after a while.

"No," Ethan said. "It was kind of our secret, but now that you're connected, it's yours too!"

"Professor Snape doesn't know?"

"No."

"So what do we do? Is it a good thing to be mindchatting?"

"We don't know." Blaire said. "We've just used it as a good thing. But maybe we could all gather in the library today and find out?"

"Sure." Harry, Ethan and Neville said.

With that Ethan got out of bed and got ready for his first day at school. When he left the dungeons to head to the Great Hall, he found Blaire and Neville waiting for him. He rushed to meet them.

But once he opened his mouth, he had to shut it for a group of Slytherins made its way out of the dungeons and crossed the entrance Hall before heading to the Great Hall. Ethan noticed Harry coming up with that eerie expressionless mask he knew Harry to wear when the Dursleys or anyone else wronged him and to Ethan's utter shock he realised that the Slytherins were giving their fellow housemate a wide berth.

Harry caught their gaze and gave them a bright smile and after a few acknowledgements and claps on the back, Ethan, Blaire, Harry and Neville made their way to their respective tables only to notice a space of two seats on either side of Harry that no one wished to fill. A little later though it was filled by two tall burly boys who simply nodded at Harry when he looked up at them with wonder.

"You must be Harry Potter?" one of the boys with blue eyes and brown hair said.

Harry nodded.

"I'm Adrian Pucey." Harry shook hands with him.

Then the other fellow with the grey eyes and black hair said, "I'm Marcus Flint."

Harry shook his hand too and they began to have breakfast.

Blaire could only just resist screaming as a flock of owls made it's way into the Hall and Hedwig was amongst them. She moved first to the Gryffindor table and dropped a letter to Neville, then she flew to Ethan, then came to her, and finally went to Harry.

Blaire hurriedly opened her letter and recognised the handwriting of her Grandma.

'Darling Blaire,' it read.

'Congratulations on your sorting to Ravenclaw. Your Grandpa and I are so proud of you. Your favorite professor, the one responsible for telling us about your sorting in the first place, has asked us to congratulate you on their behalf as well. Said professor doesn't want to risk losing their reputation and asked me to remind you, much to my displeasure, that said professor will need to act their part.

Don't mind the grouch. Look after Harry for us. I've already written to the poor boy, but he may need your reassurance and maybe even Ethan and Neville.

Do take care. Look after yourselves. Do write to me and your Grandpa regularly.

I hope you settle in well.

Lots and lots of love,

Grandma.'

Blaire put the letter down with a smile. She looked across to the Slytherin table and saw Harry smiling too.

She put the letter just in time for Professor Flitwick, the Head of her house, charmed her timetable to fly to her. Blaire caught it and gave the little professor a big smile and he beamed back.

Blaire went through her timetable the same time as Ethan said, "Oh look! I've got Herbology with Neville first thing today!"

Blaire looked up just in time to see Neville jump in his seat. She smiled and shook her head as Ethan continued, "And I've got all my Potions and Astronomy classes with Blaire and Charms with Harry!"

Neville piped in, "And I've got Charms with Blaire and Potions and Astronomy with Harry!"

Harry said happily, "And I've got both Herbology and Transfiguration with Blaire!"

"What have you got, Blaire?" Neville said.

Blaire rolled her eyes, "I don't think I have anything else with you. You've said it all."

Ethan laughed, "I've got Transfiguration with only the Hufflepuffs."

Blaire smiled, "So I'll meet you all at the library after class then. Let's get going now before we get late."

Neville said, "I think I'm beginning to like this mode of communication."

Ethan laughed and the four of them left the Hall and headed to their respective classrooms in higher spirits.

Their classes went well. Blaire succeeded in transfiguring her matchstick into a needle by the end of Professor McGonagall's Transfiguration class. Then she had a bit of a competition with a Gryffindor girl called Hermione Granger in answering Professor Flitwick's questions and he was thoroughly amused... by the end of her double Charms class, so was Tilly and Liza Turpin, Blaire's housemate.

The rest of her classes went well and at the end of the day, she went to the library and waited for the others to return.

Harry had had very pleasant classes but not a very pleasant day. His own classmates were giving him very ugly looks let alone the hostile looks of most of the other students of the school. It was terrible actually, but Harry remained stoic and defiant. It bothered him in a big way. He was used to such treatment, but he had never been through it alone before. It was very disconcerting. But it used to be even more disconcerting when Blaire or Ethan got punished because of him.

That was why he decided to act as though the other students behavior didn't affect him at all. He didn't want to worry them more that they already were. And Blaire, Ethan and Neville actually seemed proud of his acceptance of the students behavior, if not very upset, but what could be done? The school had a strong impression that all Slytherins were evil, because Voldemort and most of his followers were sorted into Slytherin.

Bosh and nonsense.

He silently made his way to the library and headed to where Blaire, Ethan and Neville sat, theirs noses burried in various books. They were doing their homework. He smiled at the sight and joined them. The only other occupants were Madam Pince the librarian and a girl with bushy hair sitting at another table and working feverishly whom Blaire referred to as Hermione Granger from Gryffindor.

When they were done, Blaire wondered around the shelves and came back with an armload of books. Blaire silently passed them a book each and Harry got a book called, The Workings and Uses of Mind Arts. He got himself engrossed in the book full of different kinds of magic. It didn't go into details, but it gave the reader a gist of everything.

The four of them decided not to mention anything about their mindchat to anyone if they could help it - Not Professor Snape or their grandparents or even the portraits of their parents. This was their secret, their little mystery that they would solve, no matter if it remained a mystery forever.

And as he went through the book, Harry got himself engrossed in something called Occlumency, an art that allowed one to hide his thoughts from those who could perform Legilimency, another art that allowed people to penetrate other people's minds. It seemed interesting and Harry suddenly had the desire to learn it, but this wasn't of any use to him at the moment. Harry sighed and turned the page.

His eyes fell on the bold title on the next page, 'MENTAL COMMUNICATIONS'.

There Harry read about the kind of skill where wizards and witches could pass on messages to one another. And there were many methods of doing that. There was a one way, where a person could put the message in another's mind, if he was in sight of the former. There was another where the same could be done if the persons were far away from each other. There was also the third one - and Harry found himself getting excited as he read it - that allowed people to have long conversations that didn't need to be heard by anyone else... This type could range between one to five people and it didn't come in the way of Occlumency, while the previous two methods needed that skill.

"I think I found something!" he said excitedly.

"What?" Ethan said.

He pushed his book towards the rest and they read the page.

"What's Occlumency?" Neville said.

Harry turned to the previous page.

"Interesting." Blaire said. "But back to the point. So this proves that our ability to mindchat was really caused by a bout of accidental magic."

"Looks like it." Harry said. "Does it have any side effects?"

They immersed themselves into their books for some more time until Neville indicated to the page of his book he'd just read. "It says here that there are no repercussions, if that is what side-effects mean. I'm not sure about headaches or anything minor...and I'm really not an expert in huge words..."

But at that they were interrupted by an annoyed Madam Pince who chased them out of the Library claiming that it was time for them to get to dinner. And they obediently replaced the books back on the shelves and left a little after Hermione Granger. She was still annoyed with Blaire who had managed to outsmart her marginally in Professor Flitwick's class and now she walked with her nose in the air.

Ethan grinned but said nothing.

Once they reached the Great Hall and took their places, he noticed the Slytherins still sitting as far away from Harry as possible. He studied Harry's face and was surprised. Harry had so calmly taken their behaviour in his stride. He, Ethan, for sure would have been upset if he was in Harry's position. Ethan felt terrible for Harry and the feeling was worsened by his helplessness. Harry was all alone there and he could do nothing to improve the situation.

Then the same boys who sat with Harry during breakfast and lunch, who Harry said were called Adrian Pucey and Marcus Flint sat by his side again and got him in a conversation that seemed quite entertaining for Harry gave them a bright grin.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Severus was going to have his first class with two of his wards today - Blaire and Ethan. And he wasn't looking forward to it for he knew he would have to put up a hateful attitude towards them alongside his signature intimidating front. He could only hope they would understand.

He waited for the right moment and opened the door to his classroom and got the students to come in and settle down and then he started calling their names very coldly from the register.

He didn't immediately call out Blaire or Ethan's names but said instead, "Ah yes, the Potters... Hogwarts' new celebrities."

With the exception of a couple of pureblood kids, no other students laughed and Blaire, who at the beginning looked very hurt - making Severus hate himself for doing it - suddenly looked on with comprehension and her face then on was neutral. Ethan however found it difficult to take off that small smile that formed on his lips but by the time Severus had called them all by name he looked as expressionless as Blaire.

Severus was relieved.

He began giving the students his speech, the one he would repeat year after year to each new batch of eleven year olds he received. The students, even Blaire and Ethan looked impressed.

"Potter!" he barked. And both of them, who happened to be sitting on the same bench looked startled. "The Hufflepuff Potter. What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Ethan's eyes brightened slightly, "Er, er, you get a sleeping potion Professor, er it called, um, the drought of the living death!"

The boy practically rushed the last few words as though he was prompted. Severus almost sighed, he was imagining things again. He never understood how the triplets seemed to communicate without having to talk out loud. Maybe it was just a triplet thing, or maybe they simply knew each other very well.

Severus said nastily, "I suppose you have brains then, what about the Ravenclaw Potter, what is the difference between Monkshood and Wolfsbane?"

"It's one and the same, Professor, and the plant is also called Aconite."

Severus looked down at them coldly and then turned to the snickering boy at the back of the class.

"Smith! Where would I find a bezoar?"

The boy stopped smiling and gave Severus a sullen look, "I don't know sir."

Severus sneered at him disdainfully and turned to Blaire and Ethan who had their hands in the air and scowled at them and then turned to Suzan Bones and nodded at her.

She looked terrified, "I-In the s-s-stomach of a g-goat, sir."

Severus nodded and then snarled, "Well, why aren't you writing this down?"

The statement was followed by the scratching of quills on paper and Severus had a chance to catch the Potters' eyes and give them a swift wink while no one else was looking. They smiled at him in understanding and he turned away.

And thus passed on an hour of slow torture and Severus began wondering how he was going teach Harry and Neville the next day. Harry found it difficult to trust an adult and Severus feared the worst, but hopefully the message Mrs. Evans sent them would be enough.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

At the same time Blaire and Ethan were having their first Potions class, Harry was having his first DADA class and he began to have a headache, a very queer one, just around the place of his scar. The pain seemed to intensify every time Professor Quirrel turned his back to the class and every time Harry looked at that purple turban.

It was quite hard to concentrate with that, coupled with Malfoy and Zabini, who were sitting right behind him, throwing parchment balls on his back. Harry suddenly found himself getting irritated, but he wasn't stupid. He cleverly sent a whispered tickling hex at both boys after he purposely dropped his quill and ducked to the floor after it.

He wasn't caught, thanks to no one wanting to sit next to him, but both, Malfoy and Zabini were given a detention with Filch for laughing out loud. Quirrel had taken offense, probably thinking they were laughing at him...it wasn't as if his classes were not a joke with him stuttering all the time while the students kept trying to understand what he was saying.

But Harry soon realised he wasn't getting headaches if he didn't look at the Professor at all, be it his face or turban and soon he learnt to cope with the class. But normally, you couldn't get headaches everytime you entered a very boring class and he didn't feel pain in the History of Magic class (practically forcing himself to stay awake during the class was his only problem there - their teacher, Professor Binns was a ghost who dronned on and on about ancient goblin wars).

That meant there was something wrong either with him or with Quirrel. Harry was worried, very worried, what was he going to do? And he didn't want to bother Blaire, Ethan or Neville about it.

Then Harry remembered the words, 'When in doubt speak to your siblings' from his mother's letter to them and he groaned. He would have to speak to them then. He would do so in the evening.

But...maybe his parents' portraits would know something.

Just before lunch, Harry rushed to his cubicle and opened his trunk to find his mother baking a cake!

"Mum!" he exclaimed and she turned around.

"Harry! It's good to see you!"

Harry rushed straight to the point framing his question carefully, "Mum, a thought just struck me today, you know this scar which I got on my forehead... It isn't magical or anything, is it?"

"What? No! Of course not dear!" his mother said surprised. "Why do you ask?"

Harry replied nonchalantly, "Oh, everyone keeps staring at it as though it is something great, that's all. It's getting really annoying too."

It was the truth, but it wasn't the answer to his mother's question and to his relief his mother sympathized with him.

He rushed for lunch later and found Blaire missing. Neville who was exiting the hall later said, "She's had an early lunch today. She's in a bit of a hurry."

"What ever for?"

"Didn't you know? She and Hermione Granger are trying to get the better of each other! It's a very entertaining competition really."

Harry laughed. He knew how seriously Blaire took a challenge. He heard a soft sniff behind him and saw Hermione Granger walking away from them with her nose in the air.

Harry couldn't help it he laughed harder and the bushy haired girl simply turned her head and glared at him and increased her speed.

Finally the day was over and Ethan walked up to the library and found Neville and Blaire sitting there. Harry hadn't yet come and it was his idea to meet there. Blaire was engrossed in a book that grazed through just the surface of Occlumency.

"The others are in the restricted section." she told Ethan before he could ask. "You can go there only if you have the permission of a teacher. And a teacher will get suspicious if we simply ask for that book."

"Why're you reading it?"

"I found it interesting."

Ethan sat down next to Neville and waited to Harry to come. Harry arrived not a minute later and he sat down besides Blaire.

Harry began to tell them about his headaches during his DADA class and he was telling them about asking their mother about it when Blaire gasped out loud making Madam Pince scowl and Hermione Granger on the next table glare.

"Maybe he's trying to get into your mind!" she exclaimed.

"What do you mean?" Harry said.

Blaire indicated the book she had just closed, "It says here when someone does Legilimency on another, it causes the victim pain."

"But, that someone needs eye contact with the victim! And Quirrel's back was turned away from me!"

"Maybe he's got eyes on his back?" Neville suggested.

The triplets turned towards him.

"What makes you think so?" Ethan said.

Neville shrugged slightly embarrassed at his silly declaration, "Why is he wearing a turban?"

"I dunno." Harry admitted. "And again, he wasn't wearing one that day in Diagon Alley."

"We met him at Leaky Cauldron on July thirty-first."

Neville nodded in understanding. It was the same day he lost his Gran. He wasn't that fond of her and he really didn't miss her, but he couldn't help but feel guilty about it. But that day led him to live with the Potter triplets and Neville, inspite of being awed about it, had a certain fear that he would be left out.

Which was not the case. The triplets simply involved him in everything they did and Neville began to worry he was coming in between them. He tried to decline doing certain things with them, but they wouldn't hear of it. They practically considered Neville to be their brother and Neville didn't complain.

He felt terrible for them though, being seperated into different houses and all that. And he felt terrible when both Malfoy and Weasley targeted Harry, though Harry didn't seem bothered about it. Mrs. Evans who insisted on being called Grandma by Neville was swell. She even wrote to him and Neville couldn't feel more honored.

But now Neville needed to focus on the topic at hand.

"Okay." Blaire drew out slowly. "Let's consider that Quirrel has eyes on his back. Why would he only target Harry?"

Neville shook his head, "Come on! How many people are there who want to target Harry? See this school itself! See the Slytherin house, Harry's own house!"

Blaire nodded thoughtfully and then she said, "You know what? I think we should start learning Occlumency."

"What?!" Harry, Ethan and Neville said as one.

"It is a very difficult skill to master." Harry said. "Come on! You didn't skip that line on the book I showed you yesterday, did you?"

"Of course not." Blaire said slightly irritated. "And how will we know it's difficult if we don't try? Books aren't everything, you know. They're written by people like you and me, maybe the author of yesterday's book found it difficult to learn that art and put it down as a difficult skill to master...there could be others who find it easy."

"That's different, coming from you, Blaire." Ethan said quietly. "Anyway, how are you going to get the books? They're in the restricted section, aren't they?"

Blaire looked up brightly, "So we're doing it then?"

"There's no harm in trying." Neville said and Harry nodded.

"Yeah," he said. "We really don't know what is causing this thing and if we don't try, we won't get anywhere. Besides, I'm not telling anyone else about this and I don't want you telling anyone else about my DADA headaches."

"Great!" Blaire said. "Do you remember that card Professor Snape gave me, the one that allowed me to read books from the library of Flourish and Blotts?"

Comprehension dawned on the boys faces, but before they could say anything Hermione Granger approached them and said in a bossy voice, "How exactly do you have time to study and complete you homework when you spend half of the while simply staring at each other and making faces? Don't you realize you distract the others who come here for serious learning?"

She stalked off before they could say anything. The four of them looked at each other and giggled and took out their respective homeworks and began working on it and helping each other out.

...

The next day, Blaire got a letter from Hagrid asking them to visit him in the afternoon that day. Hedwig had returned just the other afternoon with another letter from their grandparents, in response to the ones the triplets and Neville sent after the congratulatory one they'd received

Today was a Friday and the whole of the first year had the Friday afternoons off. Blaire quickly wrote a reply to Hagrid saying yes, after informing the three boys and then she instructed Hedwig to come back to her later so she could send another letter.

Hedwig returned in no time and Blaire pulled out the parchment on which she had written a message to Flourish and Blotts asking for a catalogue of the books on Occlumency. She just hoped they wouldn't find it too suspicious.

Visiting Hagrid was something Harry was looking forward to but he had to endure a class with Professor Snape first and neither the Professor nor his Grandma were joking when they said they needed to act their parts well. Harry didn't mind the taunts, and Snape asked him the question that had the same answer as the one that Blaire had prompted Ethan in his mind. And that was exactly why Harry remembered it -The draught of the living death.

Harry hated the sniggers he got from Weasley and Malfoy and the other Slytherins and he hated it. But the Professor turned on Weasley and humiliated him too making Harry feel better. Tilly looked at Harry with apologetic eyes, and Harry found himself feeling sorry for her. She was Weasley's friend and she didn't like the way he behaved, but maybe, there was a possibility that she would be able to change him. It was a pity she was so shy.

It turned out that Malfoy and Weasley didn't get along, and Harry had actually believed that they would follow the principle, 'one's enemy's enemy is one's friend' when it came to Harry. But apparently it turned out to be the three sides of a triangle - a triangle that Harry found rather amusing inspite of him being one of it's corners.

The class went well and Harry worked with Neville. The two of them prepared their very first potion flawlessly and the Professor simply scowled, but as he passed, Harry could have sworn the Professor whispered as quietly as a breeze, "Five points to Slytherin and Gryffindor."

The boys tried their best not to beam happily and they left the classroom in good spirits.

After lunch, they along with Blaire and Ethan headed down to Hagrid's hut at the edge of the forbidden forest. They were immediately greeted by a boarhound who Hagrid shooed off before he let them in smiling his big broad, warm smile and offered them tea and a plate of rock-cakes that seemed to be made more from rock than cake.

Blaire liked Hagrid's kind eyes.

"This is Neville." she said.

"Ay," Hagrid said kindly. "Yeh parents, Frank and Alice, the best o' their year, just like James and Lily... Both Headboy and Girl o' their own time... They would be proud of yeh, I'm sure o' tha'!"

Neville flushed, but couldn't help the smile that flitted across his face. "Thanks Hagrid." he said quietly.

Then Harry's voice made it's way into Neville's mind, "Don't look, but there's a newspaper clipping on Hagrid's desk that says that there was a bank robbery in Gringotts on the thirty-first of July!"

"What!"

"We must have missed that bit of news on the Daily Prophet. Anyway they say nothing was taken."

"Do you think the attack outside the bank was a distraction?" Neville said.

"I dunno Nev."

"Maybe we shouldn't bother about this." Ethan said, "We better not get involved in things that don't concern us. I know it concerns you, Neville, but we could get into trouble for interfering. Let's leave it to the grown ups, eh? Anyway Hagrid is looking at us rather strangely."

"Er, Hagrid?" Ethan said allowed.

Hagrid looked confused, "Eh, I asked yeh, 'ow yeh classes were."

"Oh, they were brilliant!" Blaire broke into speech.

"It's quite different from what we used to study at our school." Harry said. "And I like this better."

And that was how they were able to spend the afternoon with Hagrid and conveniently forget about the rock-cakes that seemed to threaten to break their teeth if eaten.

tbc...