Dancing was such a simple thing, at first Harry had no idea what to do but Tonks had patiently taught him. Then something just clicked and he found himself lost in the rhythm, his mithrilium even gave him hints on how to improve his dancing.

After a few days practice, he was able to keep up with Tonks, even if it was obvious she had more experience. Harry found he could relax, he only had to think of the music and could let his worries wash away, it was extremely therapeutic.

Soon Christmas day arrived and they gathered round the tree. It was the third time Harry had celebrated Christmas and his first surrounded entirely by friends, it made the day feel important and Harry felt he finally understood why the other children cherished the day.

At the head of the table was Dumbledore, Harry was sitting to his right and then Tonks was to the right of him. Beside her was Bathsheda then Moody at the end of the table, who could then keep an eye on the only door into the dinning room. Finally Nicolas and his wife, Perenelle Flamel, sat on the opposite side of the table.

When Harry had first met Nicolas it had been hard to judge his age, he could've been anywhere from 70 to 100. But as his store of the elixir of life had started to deplete he and his wife had started aging again, what elixir remained ensured they would age slowly.

But the pair had refused point blank when Harry had offered them back the Stone. "I plan to live long enough to see you flourish… Then me and Perenelle shall take on the great next adventure."

It was the first time Harry had most of his friends gathered around him. It was nice to see Tonks and Nicolas discuss the abilities of a metamorphmagus, or Bathsheda asking Moody about the runes on his eye. The lunch had been prepared by a Hogwarts house elf, so nobody had to wash up.

Once lunch was finished they gathered around the tree and started handing out presents, Harry enjoyed seeing everyone's faces as they opened his presents. His only issue was that Luna wasn't around, but with Xenophilius out of the country she had to stay at Hogwarts.

Nicolas had helped him with most of his presents that year, like his gift to Tonks which was a mithril bracelet with an alchemical stone embedded. An alchemical stone was simply an object which had been enchanted to help an alchemical process, the Philosopher's Stone being the most powerful alchemical stone to date.

Tonks' alchemical stone would convert the magical energy of the mithril into solid matter, which she could then use to drastically increase her powers. She had then given Harry dragon skin gloves, which she hoped would stop him damaging his hand.

Moody had given Harry a book on Auror grade spells, such as advanced protection spells and basic situation awareness. In turn, Harry had given him one of his flasks. But he had modified it so that it would produce whatever had last been poured into it, it was also impossible for anyone other than Moody to open the cap and would nullify any poisons.

By the time all the presents were opened everyone seemed content and truly happy, it was a moment Harry wouldn't forget in a hurry.

"He's the perfect mix between his mother and father Sirius, his curiosity definitely comes from Lily but his creativity is pure James. For instance the other day we were talking about how to deal with a grindylow, and he suggested blasting them with a fire spell. His reasoning was that as grindylows prefer cold water, the heat from the spell would keep them away!" Remus said excitedly, he and Sirius were hidden in the Shrieking Shack, drinking fire whiskey and reminiscing about old times.

Together they had decided to approach Dumbledore at the end of the year and explain Sirius' story, they hoped the fact he hadn't done anything the whole year despite his proximity to the castle would help.

Remus doubted the Sirius he used to know would never have been able to wait so long, it seemed twelve years in Azkaban had changed more than just his looks. But even with his new-found patience, with barely two weeks left till the end of the year Sirius was starting to become antsy cooped up in the shack.

To try and keep him occupied Remus had gotten Sirius to mark some of his class work, then he helped prepare classes. He got a kick anytime Harry's name came up, which Remus hoped kept him focused on why he needed to wait in the shack.

With the full moon set to rise that night Remus was nervous, Snape's potions helped immensely but that didn't stop his fear that he might lose control. He was also worried for his friend Hagrid, who's hippogriff was set to be executed on the same night. Never mind his fear of a high ranking member of the disposal of dangerous creatures being near him when he transformed.

But there was an issue, after he had caught the Weasley twins studying an apparently blank piece of parchment he had recovered the marauders map. It made catching students much easier, but one night he saw a name that shouldn't have been anywhere near Hogwarts 'Peter Pettigrew'.

He had kept the knowledge from Sirius, the man had nearly ruined his life chasing after Pettigrew, Remus wouldn't let him do it again. When they had made the map they had used their blood to hide their names from anyone who wasn't a marauder, so he couldn't show the Headmaster.

Which was why he was carefully scanning the map before Snape arrived, the rat had been staying in Hagrid's hut for the last few days and he wanted to trap him before sunset. "Evening Professor Lupin, Professor Snape had to deal with some Slytherins so he sent me instead."

Harry put the potion on the desk and casually leaned over to look at the map, Remus wondered why he was so interested in something that should appear blank. "Nice map, did you make it?"

With a start, Remus remembered that James' blood would recognise Harry as a marauder. "Yes… We, that is the marauders, finished this map at the end of our sixth year. Regrettably we never got much use out of it as we spent most of seventh year studying… or at least me and Peter did, James and Sirius spent most of the year relaxing and still got top marks."

Remus wanted to fold up the map and stop Harry seeing Peter's name right in the center, but he couldn't think of a way to do it without drawing undue attention. As such he was helpless as Harry's finger drifted across the page, he could only hope that the boy was too busy studying the map to bother reading the names.

"This is great, I assume it links into the wards? So it should be able to easily detect people through privacy enchantments… I wonder if it can see through invisibility cloaks too. Although if it works based on magic then it wouldn't detect muggles, which means anyone that can hide their aura would also drop off the map…"

Harry's finger then came to a stop, but he wasn't looking at Hagrid's hut. It seemed Sirius had gotten bored of waiting within the shack and had stepped outside the willow.

"Black's broken in, we need to tell Dumbledore!" Harry said hurriedly, running to the door. Moving quickly Remus flicked his wand towards the door and sealed it, he had no idea how he was going to explain it but he couldn't let Harry get to Dumbledore.

But before he could even begin to explain himself, Harry had whirled around with his wand raised in his right hand. His left hand seemed to be in a bright silver gauntlet, which was covered in bright red veins that were glowing ominously.

Remus raised his hands calmly, he wasn't scared of losing to a thirteen year old student, even if that student was the best in his year. But if Harry attacked he would need to defend himself, which would make everything much harder.

"Listen to me Harry, Sirius Black is innocent. He never betrayed your parents and he didn't kill those muggles."

"If he didn't betray my parents, who did?" Harry asked bitterly, normally the boy kept his emotions tightly reined in. Even on their semi-regular walks through the lighter parts of the forest he had kept control, having been fascinated when learning of his parents' lives in Hogwarts.

"It was Peter Pettigrew, from what I can understand he framed Sirius… To be completely honest I don't know the full story, but I trust in Sirius."

"If you trust him so much, why not go to Dumbledore?" Harry asked suspiciously, he still hadn't lowered his wand although his gauntlet had stopped glowing.

"And what evidence could we provide, it would be Sirius' word against the eyewitnesses. We were going to approach the Headmaster after the students had gone home, where we could talk without being in danger."

Harry slowly lowered his wand and Remus relaxed, but there was still a hard glint in the boy's eyes.

"I want to talk to him then." Harry said stubbornly

"Dumbledore can't know Harry, I'm sorry"

"Oh I wasn't talking about Dumbledore, I want to talk to Black!"

Sirius sat just beyond the reach of the Willow. He had grown tired of waiting for Remus to show up, so he had decided to stretch his legs as Padfoot. There was no risk of discovery because the only man alive who knew of his animagus form was Remus.

After a while he saw Remus walking down from the castle, he eagerly ran up to his friend only to stop short when he caught the scent of another human. Instinctively he stopped and started sniffing around until he bumped into an invisible leg.

He jumped back and was ready to strike when Remus deliberately moved between them, Sirius instantly settled down but couldn't help wondering why Remus had brought someone with him.

"Sirius, this is Harry… Harry, Sirius. We'll talk more when we're somewhere more private" He then marched purposely past Sirius and towards the Willow, Sirius trotted after him and hoped this 'Harry' was his Harry.

Distantly he heard voices arguing and his ears flicked so he could hear better. "There's nothing we can do Ron, even my Gran couldn't get the committee to change their mind… Look can we get a move on, I don't want to see it."

"I would but Scabbers isn't making it easy, Merlin knows why he ran away in the first place. Will you be still, Scabbers!"

Just then the wind changed and he was able to catch three scents, two he didn't know but one he knew extremely well. His entire body tensed and he turned towards the two boys, there madly struggling in the one of the boys hands was a very familiar rat.

Without a second thought he charged towards the boys, he deliberately over shot and sailed over the boys so that the rat had nowhere to run. The blonde boy had dived out of the way leaving the ginger one holding the rat free, Sirius dived for the rat only for it to run away.

Harry was stunned as the dog set off after Ron's rat, he didn't know why the two were out there to begin with as it was coming up to curfew. Lupin had set off after the dog, which left the three of them alone on the path. Neville had thrown a stunning spell at the dog and Harry was proud to see it struck him between the shoulders, the spell did nothing to the dog but the accuracy was impressive.

Neville had continued coming to his study group even after they had covered the few lessons he'd missed, he seemed to enjoy the way Harry taught. Draco and the older student had only attended a few sessions before they stopped showing up, which had left Justin, Colin and Neville, as the four were all friendly people Harry had started enjoying teaching them.

But for now the two were in his way, he hurriedly unfastened his Cloak and dropped the hood to drop the invisibility so that they could see him. "Guys, it's fine. Just go back to the castle before you get in trouble for being out after curfew."

"Sod that, I'm not going back without Scabbers!" Ron said firmly, the two then looked at Neville who stepped back fretfully. "C'mon mate, you aren't gonna leave without me are you? We'll be fine, we won't get in trouble cause we're with professor Lupin, and Harry won't let us get hurt!"

Harry rolled his eyes while summoning his spear, since the chamber he had keyed it into his arm's mithrilium.

With Snape's and Bathsheda's help he had figured out how to group ideologies together, so when he triggered the metaphysical line connecting the spear with his arm plate it would in turn trigger a specific ideology cluster.

When called, the spear would go metaphysical and shoot itself towards Harry, but it would also make itself go twice the speed of sound until it got within a few feet of him where it would slow to a stop. This meant it appeared in his hand nearly instantly, he then tossed it to Ron who had already proved to be capable of wielding it.

He then triggered his shield and together the three of them ran off after the distant form of Lupin, with the sun just starting to set behind them. The three were able to keep up a fast pace but Lupin was much faster, so once they got deep enough into the forest they got well and truly lost.

Or at least they would've been lost if Harry wasn't able to see the glowing beacon of Hogwarts through the tree, but he wasn't looking for Hogwarts. He kneeled in the ground and looked intently at the ground, he could see Lupin's track marks but they disappeared in the grass.

He then managed to find what he was looking for, rose red paw prints. It was the same signature as the signature he had found in Black's cell in Azkaban nearly a year ago, now that he knew what to look for it was easy to make them out against the other signatures.

With that they set off again, the other two had to trust that Harry knew where he was leading them as the footprints were invisible to them. But for Harry the footprints glowed brightly, easily guiding him to wherever the dog had gone. None of them noticed the slight chill in the air, which had been building the further they got into the forest.

Eventually they were led to a clearing, which contained Lupin and a familiar looking man who was looking around angrily. Harry quickly saw how the paw prints turned into footprints which led to the man. He stepped forward cautiously, he trusted Lupin and so if the professor said Black was innocent he would be willing to listen.

"Mr. Black, it's nice to meet you in person." He said wryly, stepping forward into the clearing. His gauntlet remained inactive and he had moved his shield to his left arm to leave his wand free, even if he knew for a fact Black wouldn't attack him he wouldn't leave himself defenceless this deep into the forest.

"Harry?" Black asked slowly, Harry decided he looked better than his wanted posters but he was still dirty and dressed in a robe that had been poorly resized.

Black set off towards Harry only to stop when the point of a very sharp spear appeared from beside his godson and pointed at his chest. "Professor call the aurors! This is Sirius Black!" Ron said fearfully, his spear shaking slightly.

"Ron give him a minute to explain himself first, I have it on good authority he was framed." Harry was glad Ron was defending him, but didn't want the boy to kill one of his last connections to his parents, at least not while there was a possibility he was innocent.

At his words Ron dutifully lowered the spear, although it was clear he could raise it should he need to. Black looked between Harry and Ron and grinned sadly.

"Now that you aren't about to be killed Black, talk." Harry commanded forcefully.

"There isn't time, you don't understand the Rat's getting away!"

"What did you do to Scabbers!" Ron said suddenly, having remembered he had a reason for following Harry.

"Scabbers? No boy, his name's Peter Pettigrew, he's an animagus! If we move quickly -" Black said desperately only to be interrupted by Neville of all people.

"Peter Pettigrew's dead, you… you killed him thirteen years ago! He was my parent's secret keeper, because of you the death eaters were able to learn of the secret!" There was a deep anger in Neville's voice and when Harry looked at him there was a steadiness that had been previously missing.

"No! I didn't kill him, though I wanted to! I thought he had gotten himself blown up, but it was definitely him who ran away."

"So who betrayed my parents then Black?" Harry demanded

"Peter did! Look, I was meant to be the secret keeper but at the last minute I convinced your parents to switch to Peter, he had kept the Longbottom's secret so we thought we could trust him! But then when I felt the Fidelius fall I knew something was wrong, I tracked him down but when I got to him he blamed me!"

"And Pettigrew somehow escaped and lived as a rat for thirteen years?" Harry asked in disbelief.

"Yes! And he's getting away!"

Now that Harry knew what was going on he understood why Black was so impatient, he scanned the floor and tried to find Pettigrew's signature but as he had no idea what colour to look for it was impossible to find.

Just then the moon appeared over the horizon and illuminated the clearing, for a second Harry hoped the moonlight would make it easier to find the footprint but then he remembered the undrunk potion on the professor's desk.

When Harry next awoke it was to a pounding headache and weak muscles, his memory felt splintered and he couldn't remember why he was in the hospital wing yet again. Distantly he could feel his mithrilium working to heal whatever was affecting his memories, but it was slow going.

While his memories trickled in he took stock of his belongings, running his thumb across his fingers assured him he still had all three of his rings. His trench coat was neatly folded at the foot of his bed, with his wand and shield sitting on top.

His invisibility Cloak was hopefully still inside the pocket of his coat, as a seam of mithril at the mouth of the pocket stopped anyone else reaching inside. He didn't see his spear but he could feel the line running from his arm to what he assumed was the forbidden forest, considering it would barely take him half an hour to make a new one he wasn't too worried about it.

Finally he felt his mithril greaves on his shins, which contained his personal mithril battery. With his belongings accounted for he tried to remember what had happened.

The full moon had risen and Professor Lupin had gone rigid, staring at the moon and panting deeply.

"Harry, get back to the castle! Run and don't stop running!" Sirius had said desperately, rushing towards Lupin and attempting to talk him out of transforming, as if it was something controllable.

"Guys do as he says!" Harry commanded, he was glad to hear the sound of footsteps as the boys started running away which meant he could focus entirely on stopping the wolf.

It hadn't been hard to figure out the professor was a werewolf. Especially when his monthly attempts at brewing Wolfsbane alongside Professor Snape corresponded with the Defence teachers absences.

He couldn't find it in him to be worried about sharing a castle with a werewolf because of how docile the professor normally acted. That and once you started down the king of all snakes, a lone werewolf didn't seem that bad.

But thinking about a werewolf in the light of day didn't prepare him from the transformation in the outskirts of the forest in near darkness. Harry wasn't a fool, he knew that if he wanted to kill the man he simply had to summon his spear from Ron and throw it at Lupin.

The spear was made to accelerate quickly and the distance between him and Lupin was big enough to allow his spear to reach top speed. Then after the spear had failed to penetrate the basilisks hide he had modified it to emit a powerful severing charm.

This meant his spear would easily cut through and kill the werewolf. Unfortunately he didn't want to kill the man, he was both the best defence teacher and had known his parents.

Which significantly lowered his chances of getting out alive, a werewolf could shrug off most versatile curses and anything more powerful ran the risk of accidentally killing the wolf.

Spells which focused on disabling an opponent, such as petrificus totalus, only worked on humans, while creature focused spells were too weak to affect a werewolf. There was a reason they were so wildly feared after all.

When a werewolf transformed from a human into wolf, their magic changed with them. While a werewolf couldn't cast spells, it gained an incredible magical resistance equal to that of a dragon.

In fact the only person who had second hand knowledge of fighting a werewolf was ironically the last defence teacher, Professor Lockhart. Incidentally, the man was still hiding in St Mungos, ever since Tom Riddle had cast a dark fire charm against Lockhart when he had defended his student.

When Harry had asked about the wizard that had actually fought the werewolf, Lockhart had revealed the man had giant blood. A werewolf's greatest power was their physical strength, so long as you stayed out of range a werewolf couldn't hurt you.

Unless you happened to be born with the strength of a giant, which meant you could match that strength. While Harry didn't have a way to raise his strength to that of a giant, he could form a layer of magic over his skin, which would hopefully save him should he be hit.

The list of spells Lockhart had originally given Harry had started with the spell 'Solis', Harry had even told Lockhart "It has been theorised that it would also weaken werewolves… but as nobody has been stupid enough to try it against a transformed werewolf we may never know."

Now was as good as time as any, moving quickly Harry drew a circle with his wand before jabbing straight through the centre. A beam of sunlight illuminated the clearing, blinding all of them. He heard the wolf cry out but from the sounds of it, he had only annoyed him.

With his eyes blinded he was relying solely on his magesight to see, the wolf was easy to see as Lupin's auburn signature stood out against the pale white of the trees. Beside the wolf he could see Black shuffling away clutching his eyes, Lupin's wand lying between the two.

When the wolf turned towards Black, Harry reached out with his magic and pulled the man towards him, just as the wolf dived past. Luckily for Black, magic didn't care about the difference in weight between the target and caster, otherwise it would've been Harry flying towards Black.

Black landed in an untidy heap just behind him, which meant as long as the wolf stayed in front of Harry everyone should be safe. Cautiously Harry opened his eyes and blinked back the remaining spots, the moon was bright enough to dimly illuminate the clearing but the woods around them were pitch black.

Flicking his wand towards the trees, Harry let a few dozen tiny lights leave his wand to settle around the clearing. If it wasn't for the werewolf charging at him it would've been very atmospheric.

Just as the wolf descended on him he confidently raised his shield. As the arm got into range, the shield started absorbing its momentum. If it weren't for the sound of the claws hitting the shield Harry wouldn't have known his shield had been hit.

But while the wolf's strike had been absorbed, that didn't stop it letting out a cry of pain and throwing the shield away, a shield Harry was still strapped to. Harry flew across the clearing and hit a tree painfully, with his shield arm falling limply at his side.

Harry wanted to just collapse there and try to escape the pain but the wolf had started walking towards him again. Black had bravely turned into his dog form and had jumped onto the wolf's back, but that only stopped him for a moment before he punched the dog off him.

He willed the shield to disconnect from his left arm and awkwardly strapped it to his right. It would stop him from using his wand properly, but as his wand was useless against the wolf he didn't care.

It was fortunate that his magic could flow down his broken arm, with a prod from his magic he was able to activate his gauntlet which swiftly grew to cover his entire arm. As soon as the mithril stopped spreading he lost all feeling in his arm, but as this stopped the pain he welcomed the numbness.

Ideally he would've slowly experimented to see what he could do with his gauntlet, but with a werewolf almost on top of him he had to hope it would work. For the first time since the chamber of secrets, Harry was extremely glad he had learned how to split his magic.

Using one tendril of magic to raise his gauntlet, he used another tendril to shoot as many offensive spells as possible. The spells seemed to annoy the wolf but he kept charging through them, but it bought him enough time to use his gauntlet.

He channelled his magic through the Philosopher's Stone and transfigured the ground in front of him into chains, which he then sent at the wolf. To his left Black had turned back into a man and, after picking up Lupin's wand, sent his own wave of chains.

Together they buried Lupin in chains, he struggled violently but the numerous chains held. With the threat temporarily dealt with, Harry stumbled over to Black. As he moved he tapped into his greaves and drew some power into himself, unfortunately that didn't help the various pains throughout his body.

By then Black had sat down on the ground and was leaning against a tree heavily, Harry decided resting was a good idea and soon joined him on the ground. Black kept massaging his side, but he seemed to be in a better condition than Harry. He didn't dare deactivate his gauntlet as he feared the pain would knock him out.

After several minutes of resting Black finally broke the silence "Good idea with using chains, I'm surprised a Third year was able to transfigure chains capable of stopping a werewolf though! I think it'll be best if you go back to the school and bring a teacher down here, so we can get Moony somewhere safe." Black stared at Harry as if expecting him to follow him blindly.

"I'm not going to just let you get away, I'm definitely not going to let you have a free shot at my back. Professor Lupin may have trusted you but that doesn't mean I do." Harry said stubbornly.

"Merlin you don't trust easily do you? Did nobody ever tell you? I'm your godfather, I can't attack you without my magic killing me." Black said gently.

"What…" It was as if the ground had dropped out from beneath him. For the first time in a very long time, Harry lost control of his emotions. He was so deeply entrenched within his mind he didn't realise he had started shaking and hyperventilating.

For his part, Sirius was extremely worried about Harry's reaction, he tried shaking Harry to get his attention but that did nothing. He was so focused on Harry he didn't notice the fog rolling in or the frost that started spreading across the clearing.

Sirius did notice when Moony started whining, which drew his attention away from Harry. Now that he was focused again he recognised the aura of the dementors, he clutched Remus' wand desperately and tried to think of happy thoughts.

Any memory from his school years was tainted with the knowledge that his best friend would die only a few years later, while he had barely any happy memories from fighting in the war and definitely none from Azkaban.

But he had one thought that kept him steady, the same thought that had given him the strength to escape prison. 'I am going to be with Harry, I'm going to look after him and James will forgive me!' With a hoarse "Expecto Patronum" he released Padfoot who bounded around the clearing.

Slowly the dementors started appearing amongst the trees, every time one got too close Padfoot would charge them but there were over a hundred dementors against one weak Patronus. Every time Padfoot hit a dementor it would fly away, but Padfoot would lose some of his light, which meant that after only a few hits Padfoot was barely giving off any light at all.

As his patronus grew weaker the dementors grew braver, soon it was hard to see beyond the trees. Padfoot gave one final charge and banished a dementor that was leaning over Harry, before keeling over and fading completely.

With his patronus gone the dementors charged into the clearing and swarmed. Sirius desperately tried to summon a new patronus, but with the dementors so close he was unable to focus on his lone happy thought. As such he was powerless as the dementors glided up to him and pushed him to his knees and lowered his hood.

Black spots began appearing in Sirius' eyes, but just before he lost consciousness a blinding light spread across the clearing. The dementor over Sirius was dragged away, revealing Harry. He had a fire in his eyes and a bright, white light was being emitted from his metal arm, which had pushed away most of the dementors.

Harry was roused from his mind by the cold, he became aware of his gauntlet giving off a soft pure white light. With some alarm, he then realised the reason for the cold was the dementors that were hovering all around him, if he was brave enough he could've reached out and touched their cloaks.

Instantly he panicked and jumped to his feet, leaving his wand forgotten on the ground. Just like on the train his mithril was growing painfully cold at the proximity to such a large number of dementors, however now the cold spread much deeper within.

Worst of all was he could feel his heart beating slowly and painfully, which led Harry to assume that even if the dementors didn't seem inclined to suck out his soul he would still die if he didn't escape soon.

It was then that Sirius gave off a pained moan, drawing Harry's attention to the man. Before he could even register what was going on he had willed his magic to push the dementors away and had shot forward and grabbed the dementor around its bony neck, easily pulling it away from his godfather.

The dementor thrashed desperately against his gauntlet as if the glowing light hurt it, unfortunately when he had grabbed the dementor the frost which had been held at bay by the light rushed up his arm. Distantly he could feel his Cloak hugging him tightly, unbeknown to Harry his Cloak was acting rather strangely.

Despite the fact the Cloak was completely closed around him it hadn't become invisible, instead it was giving off the same white light which stopped the dementors getting close.

By now the cold had gone past painful and Harry wondered if his arm would ever recover, but still he held onto the dementor, he could feel the Stone growing stronger and Harry eagerly fed it more of his own magic.

He was glad when Sirius rose and shakily held out his wand, the two stood back to back with his Cloak's aura barely protecting his godfather. Unfortunately whatever his magic had done to push away the dementors had stopped working, Harry could distantly feel them poking his defences.

Luckily, the Stone chose that moment to release its power, Harry had already depleted his grieves and was running dangerously low on his personal magic. He had resorted to draining his shield, which made the magical shields visibly flicker.

The Stone channelled all this magic through the gauntlet and injected it into the dementor that was still clutched in his hand. Red fire seemed to rush through the dementor's bones until the entire skeleton glowed red, the creature obviously didn't like this as it let out a demonic scream and tried to attack Harry with new-found vengeance.

But it's attacks were hampered when the fire started compressing the bones, first it's rotten hands started compacting with a sickening crunch then the arms, chest and finally head. As the bones burned the fire started turning a dark grey until all that was left was the dementor's cloak on the ground and a floating ball of angry grey fire and bones.

Even then the ball kept compressing until it was the size of a large marble, which slowly lowered itself into his outstretched hand, surprisingly the gem wasn't that cold and he absent-mindedly slipped it into his coat pocket.

He then realised the dementors had frozen at the death of their comrade. Harry turned to them and raised his gauntlet threateningly, which made them float back hesitantly. Things would've gone better if the gauntlet hadn't chosen that moment to lose its light and shroud them all in darkness.

Sirius desperately summoned his patronus back, just in time to reveal the dementors had moved considerably closer in the short time it had taken to summon the patronus. The light from the patronus helped Harry see what had happened to his gauntlet.

It seemed when the magic had surged through the red veins of the philosopher's stone it had affected the mithril around it. The mithril was speckled with pale green scorch marks, which caught the light when he moved his hand to inspect it.

"Harry, you need to do that light thing again! I can't hold them off by myself." Sirius said urgently.

"I can't! It did it by itself. I can't control it!" Panic was starting to show itself in his voice now, his magic was near useless against the dementors. Even against the basilisk he had some plan, but now he was entirely dependent on Sirius to defend him.

"Well can you cast a patronus?" Sirius asked desperately.

"No!" Harry snapped "And if you tell me to 'think happy thoughts' I'm going to hit you."

Sirius never got a chance to reply, as a glowing bear charged into the clearing. It helped Sirius' patronus clear an area around the pair, which allowed Neville and Ron charge into the clearing and join them.

"I thought I sent you two back to the castle?" Harry asked, somewhat annoyed they didn't follow his command and got help, but also relieved they arrived and provided help. The four of them stood facing away from Moony, who had fallen unconscious when the dementors had attacked.

"Well, you see we were going back to the castle, then we ran into the acromantula. Well… you know what I'm like with spiders. Anyway when we got free of them we left the forest and kinda ran into the dementors." Ron said, pointing his frost covered spear at the dementors. "Oh, by the way, your spear works great on spiders… Not so great on dementors."

"So where did the patronus come from?" Sirius asked

"That was Neville, he's been getting lessons from Professor Lupin all year. Then after being chased by the dementors for a while, Neville just turns around and makes his patronus."

The two patroni kept the dementors from getting near them, it seemed that despite their numbers they were unwilling to attack. Harry decided to use the time to form a mithril sword, he imbued it with the ideology of 'kill dementors'. But for the first time, he felt the mithril reject him.

He tried several different combinations, but it seemed either the instruction was too imprecise or his mithril couldn't do it. Faced with no other option, he tried to summon as many happy thoughts as he could and imbue them into the sword.

His problem was, he struggled to think of any strong happy memories. It was why he had been unable to cast patronus charm, when Dumbledore had attempted to teach him. He often found himself neutral or content, which was fine for him, but apparently that wasn't enough for the patronus.

Hopefully by combining multiple memories into the sword, it would become strong enough to take on the dementors.

With a whoop of joy, his sword finally started glowing the blue light of a patronus. At the sound of his joy the dementors shivered in sync, as if they had never had someone laugh in their presence before. Regrettably the light was still pathetically dim, so to make it appear more impressive he made the blade emit white flames.

He raised the sword high and pointed it at the dementors with the patroni taking positions equal distances away, then with a yell all three charged forwards.

I do want to make it clear, Harry has happy memories, it's just none of them are strong enough to maintain the patronus charm. Which is the same problem canon Harry had during Prisoner, since his strongest memory was thinking of his parents before they died. This Harry doesn't have that memory because his Cloak and mithrilium keep the dementors out of his head.

My plan is to finish year three then take a short break, during that break I will be finishing Time Heist and planning goblet of fire.

Due warning for goblet, the year will be a mix of characterisation, setting up future plot threads and more magical learning. As I have said a few times now, Harry is almost entirely motivated by what makes him look "cool", but if you take away his mithril the magic he knows isn't that useful.