peb 3

by Lazydaily

hp

8. Chapter 8

The first Saturday in November dawns bright, cold, and clear: a perfect day for Quidditch. Of course, there is no Quidditch, because Umbridge banned it, but… the thought is nice.

Harry finds himself standing in the Entrance Hall thinking about it, feeling a bit forlorn. He could go outside, go flying—Theo would probably come along, or Higgs or Warrington. It just feels a bit pointless, is all—but then, he doesn't really want to go back to the Slytherin common room, either, and sit around and do yet more hopeless reading about the history of Hogwarts, or try to get some homework done, or… whatever. He sighs, looks out through the large main doors, propped open at the moment to let the fresh air in. He can see, distantly, some students sitting out on the lawn, chatting or maybe working.

"Potter?" someone says from behind him, and he turns to look.

It's Cedric Diggory. He's got his broom with him, and he's dressed in Quidditch practice clothes, including a flying robe, still unbuttoned, worn over a skintight athletic top that displays the muscle in his chest and the breadth of his shoulders. Harry blinks, startled, and looks up to meet Diggory's rich brown eyes. Diggory smiles, warm and charming, and says, "This is perfect!"

"Er," says Harry, feeling awkward. "What? I mean, sorry—can I help you, Diggory?"

"Yes, actually," Diggory says. "I was hoping for another Seeker. Would you like to come play some Quidditch?"

Harry blinks. "I thought we weren't allowed?"

"Umbridge only said that the teams were banned," Diggory replies, still cheerful, though his smile shifts from mild and enthusiastic to something a bit more… mischievous. It's not entirely unlike one of Sirius's grins. "Nothing in the rules about a group of students just happening to meet up on a nice day and do a bit of flying together."

Harry snorts, unable to help himself. Clever—almost Slytherin, really. "Alright," he says. "I'll fetch my broom."

"I'll wait for you," Diggory says. "We're not supposed to, ah, happen to get together for another half-hour."

Harry smiles, nods, and then darts off toward the common room. It's a quick sprint down into the dungeons and through the halls; he knows the route better than he knows the back of his own hand, these days, and he still gets up to run in the mornings a few days a week, keeping in shape even without Padfoot to run with. The common room is partially occupied, a number of Slytherins hiding from the dungeon chill near the fire, or ensconced at a chessboard or with their books, but he slips past them all to get to his dorm and fetch his Quidditch gear.

Theo and Blaise are lounging on Blaise's bed playing cards when he comes into the dorm, and he greets them quickly before changing into his Quidditch gear.

"Going flying, Harry?" Theo asks from the other side of the room.

"Yeah," Harry says. "Diggory's got a pickup game going, so I'm headed out to join."

Theo makes an interested noise. "Maybe I'll come watch."

"If you want." Harry shrugs, snags his broom, and turns to go. "I'm heading out now—it's cold, so bundle up if you're coming." He's got layers on himself, bracing for the icy wind at Quidditch altitude.

Theo is clambering off Blaise's bed, ignoring Blaise's irritated protests that they had been in the middle of a game, as Harry darts back out of the dorm. He's determined to get back to the entrance hall and not keep Diggory waiting; he doesn't know the handsome Hufflepuff all that well, but Harry doesn't want to make him irritated or disappoint him.

"Going flying, Harry?" Warrington calls, as he makes his way back across the common room.

"Quidditch pickup game with Diggory and a few others!" he tosses over his shoulder, and then he's gone, back out into the halls and on his way, picking up his feet and running. He's a little out of breath by the time he emerges back out into the Entrance Hall, but Diggory is still there, looking out the door and up at the clear blue sky outside with a calm, patient air.

He turns when he hears Harry's footsteps against the stones, and smiles widely once more, his cheeks a little flushed in the brisk air. "You didn't need to run," he says as Harry comes to his side.

Harry shrugs. "Didn't want to make you wait. Shall we?"

"We shall," Diggory says, and makes a gesture toward the door. "Onward, Heir Black."

"Ugh," Harry says, then grimaces. "I mean—sorry. Just Harry, please."

Diggory laughs, the sound carrying as they emerge out into the open air of the grounds and begin to make their way to the Quidditch pitch. "Don't apologize! I shouldn't have joked. You're a bit known for your dislike of politics, for all you're quite good at them."

Harry blushes at the compliment. "I get by, I suppose."

Diggory glances at him, smiles, and says, "More than that. Anyway, you should really call me Cedric, if I'm going to call you Harry—I can practically see you calling me 'Diggory' in your head."

Harry ducks his head, a bit embarrassed. "Slytherin is big on formality."

"Oh, I know—I've spent some time with Farley and her crowd lately. Interesting group, really." Cedric shifts his broom to his other hand, a gesture that reads faux-casual to Harry, and shoots him another sideways glance. "You're friends with her, aren't you?"

"Yes," Harry says, more cautious. Spending some time with Farley—Cedric is probably talking about Neville and Hermione's defence club. A few weeks ago, Harry had told Farley about it as casually as he could, and he's seen her and Hussain sneaking off with a group of others a few times, presumably for meetings. They've been subtle; he's only noticed because he's watching for it, and because he knows who else is involved and therefore whose simultaneous absences to mark. He's done what he can to cover for them with those of their Housemates who would surely tell Umbridge: Malfoy and his cronies, Flint, even Warrington.

"You know—" Cedric looks down at Harry again and cuts himself off. "I… well. She seems like a good sort."

"She is," Harry says. That much he's sure of. "Farley's got her head on straight."

"Glad to know it's not just me," Cedric says, shifts his broom again, and falls silent.

It's not an entirely comfortable silence, and Harry doesn't have the social grace needed to broach it, so he stews in the awkwardness and his own feeling of regret. Cedric is warm and friendly and charming, charismatic in a way that makes him stand out not only among Hufflepuffs but among the students in general, and Harry wishes that he could be friends with him. He wants to be on the same side, to be among Cedric and Neville and Hermione and their club, with Gemma and the rest… but he can't. He swallows down hard on the bitterness that the thought provokes, lets out a short breath, and then points ahead of them. "Look," he says, because the Quidditch pitch is in view now and there are a few people up on their brooms already. "Looks like they've started without us."

"Can't blame them," Cedric says with a laugh. "I'd like to be up there too!"

"You didn't need to wait for me," Harry points out.

"I wanted to." Cedric glances down at him again. "Neville's got nothing but good things to say about you, you know. Says you're a good friend, and very talented."

Harry looks down, away. "He would say that. He's a nice person."

"And he has good judgement, I think," Cedric says. Then he sighs. "I was curious about you, Harry. Still am, I think, but… well. I'm not Farley, I don't have her cutting instinct for people, not in the same way. Still, I think Neville isn't wrong about you."

"Maybe," Harry says, and looks up to meet Cedric's eyes. He wishes for a moment that he was capable of Dumbledore's silent, wandless Legilimency, because he wants to know what Cedric sees when he looks at him. What he thinks he knows, just from their brief talk.

Cedric just nods, and they walk the rest of the way to the pitch quietly, though this time at least there's no tension strung between them, awkwardness born of things unsaid.

It's a fairly diverse group that they join in the enclosure of the Quidditch pitch: students from third right up through seventh year. About half the group is Hufflepuff, with the remainder split fairly evenly between Ravenclaw and Gryffindor, including the Ravenclaw Quidditch captain, seventh year Ash Chadha. Harry is the only Slytherin present, and receives a few narrow looks from some of those gathered as he approaches, but his place by Cedric's side saves him from any harsh words or errant hexes.

"Right!" Cedric says as they get close. "Gather up, everyone, and call the rest down, will you?"

Immediately another Hufflepuff turns and waves down the three who are flying idle laps around the pitch; they turn the noses of their brooms and dart downward. As soon as they're on the ground—two more Hufflepuffs and a Ravenclaw, Harry notes—Cedric gathers everyone close. There's a little more than a dozen of them in total, more than enough for a quick game.

"Listen up," Cedric says, speaking quickly and quietly. He reaches into one of the pockets of his robe and pulls out a handful of galleons, to Harry's surprise. "Everyone take one of these."

Harry obeys, confused, and listens intently as Cedric continues, "Don't lose it, everyone. This is how we'll keep in touch and organize new games—I have a master coin and I'll set times for when we can get together, so that it doesn't look like we're organizing against Umbridge's rules."

Harry peers at the coin more closely and realized that, indeed: the markings on it aren't quite right. The characters around the rim are numbers forming a time and date, rather than the usual runes and year of mint.

"Nice," says one of the other Hufflepuffs—one of their team's beaters, Harry recognizes. "Got Granger—"

"Yeah," Cedric says, cutting him off sharply. The other boy blinks, then blushes. "Anyways, let's get going, we're probably going to get cut off by Umbridge and her cronies."

Cedric goes about deftly organizing teams while they all tuck away their false galleons. Granger, Harry thinks, can only be Hermione; he remembers asking her last year to try to find a way for them to communicate without tipping anyone off, just in case. Clearly she'd succeeded, and if he had it right, they were probably using these coins for their Defence club too—though maybe a separate set. Clever, really. He wishes he could tell her how impressed he is. Maybe Cedric would be willing to pass a message.

For now, Harry decides to focus on Quidditch. He and Cedric are the only Seekers present, so that's decided easily; the others divide up the positions among themselves with Cedric playing mediator, and soon enough they're all launching up into the air. Chadha had pulled out the chest with the Quidditch balls earlier, though they're playing with only one Bludger to reduce the risk, given their lack of any staff present in case of accident; they also have one more player than the fourteen necessary, so Cedric's talkative beater friend is playing fifth free-agent beater for whichever team seems convenient at the time. Cedric and Harry had made an agreement to play joint referee, given that they wouldn't have much to do until the Snitch appeared.

The game goes on for a while, Cedric using his more carrying voice to shout the score when the the Chasers managed, Harry keeping an eye out for fouls and the Snitch both. A few times he nearly darts after a glint of gold before realizing that the glint he'd seen was merely the cool winter sun catching Cedric's honey-brown hair and highlighting it. After the second time, he gives himself a good shake and refocuses on the game, scolding himself for getting distracted. He's not even sure why it's happening—it hadn't last year. But maybe something about the quality of the clean November sun…

At some point, Theo and Millicent appear in the stands, and Harry sweeps past on his broom to wave and them. Theo whoops, waving his arms and grinning; Millicent gives a more restrained wave. Then he turns his attention fully back to the game, knowing that he'll have to keep on his toes—he's a better Seeker than Cedric, but not by so much that he can just ignore what's going on. Plus, though none of the other Houses are so willing to risk a penalty to foul other players as Slytherin, there are a few Ravenclaws on Cedric's team and they can be sneaky.

They're playing for fun, not for any real competition, so the game goes on at a leisurely pace, people pausing from gameplay now and then to play games of chase around the pitch, and players show off their tricks; Harry makes a few dives just because he can. He and Cedric are both watching for the Snitch, and the Chasers pass the Quaffle around, and goals count steadily up, but it's enjoyable rather than tense. After about an hour, Cedric drifts over toward Harry on his broom and says, "I haven't been watching very closely for the Snitch, but I think we'd better start in earnest—if you haven't already, anyway."

"Alright," Harry says, aware of the same distant possibility that Umbridge and her lackeys could turn up any time to spoil their fun. "We'll try to wrap in the next half-hour, then?"

"Sounds good."

With that in mind, Harry sets himself more firmly to the task, paying less attention to refereeing and settling instead into his usual searching flight pattern, looping in an even figure eight high above the action of the other players. It's another ten minutes or so, and then he sees Cedric make an abrupt move leftward—at first he thinks to avoid the Bludger, but then he realizes that Cedric is still moving, darting further toward the goalposts and chasing a far-distant glinting spark of gold: the Snitch. Cedric is much closer than Harry and will probably get there first, but anything can happen, so Harry flattens himself to his broom and dives a dozen feet to collect as much speed as he can, racing toward Cedric. Around him, he can see and sense the other players going still, their play pausing as they wait for the outcome of the Seekers' duel; but Harry suspects he already knows.

Somewhat to his surprise, he does catch up with Cedric, who's had to dodge around several other players as well as the goal post, and has bled speed as the Snitch drew closer to the far wall of the pitch. Harry has no more interest than Cedric does in slamming into the wall face-first when there are no professors nearby to administer first aid, so he slows a little too as he gets close, but not as much. He's close enough to touch Cedric's back and can see the Snitch just in front of them when it suddenly darts upwards. Both of them go after it, and Harry tries to lay on more speed—but Cedric reaches out, and his few inches of extra reach are plenty to allow him to make a catch that Harry would have missed at the same distance.

"Got it!" Cedric crows, and shoots a shining triumphant grin over his shoulder that makes Harry's gut clench.

"Congrats!" Harry shouts back over the sound of the wind, and peels off, unable to stop his own grin. Across the pitch, Theo is waving his arms in their air; Harry suspects he's hollering, though he can't hear it from this distance.

The players all come together in the middle of the field and exchange handshakes somewhat at random, everyone smiling and patting one another on the back. Even Harry receives a few shoulder-pats from commiserating teammates, and Chadha tells him that he'd done well, better than Cho Chang, the Ravenclaw Seeker, would have done with such a gap between Seekers when the Snitch was spotted, and that she'd be happy to have him on her team the next time they played one of these games.

Cedric winks at everyone before they disperse, and grinning says, "Well, we'll play again when next we happen to have a nice day, I suppose! Don't forget your pocket change, lads and ladies. Thanks for the game!"

"You too, Cedric," Harry adds to the chorus of returned thanks and agreements, and then goes to meet Theo and Millicent, who've descended from the stands. The other players disperse too, though Chadha and Cedric stay to try to round up the Bludger and get the chest of balls put away.

"Good game, mate," Theo says, and pats Harry's back once he's within reach. "Some nice flying, as always. You really are a natural."

"Well, I try," Harry says. "Thanks for coming!"

"Of course," Millicent says. "No other Quidditch to watch this year, is there? Boring."

"Yeah, it's a shame," Harry agrees. "Honestly, I wonder what Cedric could have done to make Umbridge so angry—he's so nice."

"Cedric, huh," Millicent says.

Harry shrugs, suddenly a little awkward. "He offered. Like I said, he's nice."

"He's a Hufflepuff," Theo says with a dismissive shrug of his own. "Well, it was good luck you bumping into him. Who knows when this'll happen again?"

"Yeah," Harry says, and consciously does not put his hand in his pocket to touch the enchanted Galleon. "Fingers crossed."

November draws on, and Harry tries to focus on homework—his research into the Chamber of Secrets has dried up, and Umbridge's increasingly strict rules about who's allowed to be where, when, and for what reason make it nigh impossible for Harry to spend any sort of leisure time anywhere. Even worse, he's reluctant even to spend time outside, where he could relax somewhere hidden away from the eyes of Umbridge and her minions—who now include Malfoy, of course—because after the Quidditch game with Cedric the weather takes a turn for the worse. It's not snowing yet, but it rains constantly for most of a week, and even after that it's cold and overcast and miserable outside. He'll endure it for the freedom of Hogsmeade weekends, but other than that, he'd much rather stay inside. It leaves him little to do but write slightly grumpy letters to Remus and talk on the mirror with Sirius, play chess with Warrington or Gemma, talk professional Quidditch scores with Theo, and study.

At least his grades reflect his increased focus. McGonagall even delivers a bit of praise to his effort to transform a pincushion into a hedgehog. Still, it's more than a little frustrating to be so stymied, especially after his conversation with Dumbledore. He knows that right now he's less than useless—in fact, he's a liability to his own safety and to his side of the war. He feels like he's just drifting along, not doing anything actually helpful, and he doesn't have anywhere to go for help but the inside of his own head.

It's with these thoughts in his mind that he finds himself contemplating the diary itself when his hand brushes it at the bottom of his satchel while he's packing his bag before class one day, a week and change after the Quidditch game with Cedric. It's surely dangerous, or else Voldemort wouldn't have suggested he write in it; Harry suspects it's cursed in some way. And he could always get a blank, totally Muggle journal if he just wanted to get his own circling thoughts out on the page, but... something in him wants to write in the diary. He's taken to carrying it around constantly, concerned that Theo or Blaise might discover it somehow in his things or Umbridge might find and confiscate it, and then where would he be? And with each day that passes, he wonders more and more whether the item itself might hold the secrets to unlocking Voldemort's quest.

It's not impossible, at least. So he waits until Wednesday night after Astronomy, when Blaise and Theo are both certain to fall asleep quickly and deeply, and then sneaks out of the dorm under his Invisibility Cloak, the diary and a quill and ink bottle tucked into the pockets of his dressing-robe. He doesn't want to do this in the dorm where he could be discovered... or where his writing in the diary might unleash some harm on his unsuspecting roommates. So he sneaks up to the room that he and Neville and Hermione had used for study and strategizing last year, somewhere familiar and already set up with a dust-free table and chairs. In the thin pale light of a moon barely breaking through the clouds and shining through the room's tall windows, bolstered by the white glow of a Lumos cast from the tip of his wand, he slides off his Cloak and sits down with the diary.

He opens it to the first page, cracks his ink bottle and dips his quill, and then sits staring at the blank pale expanse for several long minutes, wondering what he's doing. It's foolish, he knows. He could be killed, or bewitched in some way, and no one would even know it had happened. If he is harmed, who knows whose possession the diary will end up in—probably Umbridge, and that would be a disaster. She'd recently put rules in place about what sorts of artifacts were permitted in the possession of students, banning all joke products from Zonko's as well as Rememberalls, Self-Inking Quills, and enchanted journals, daybooks, and notebooks of all kinds, because she claimed they helped students to cheat. Really, Harry thinks, she's just taking out some frustration on the Ravenclaws, who are the school's most frequent users of such things and deeply outraged. Luna had come to sit with Harry in the library just yesterday (very much without his asking her, but she couldn't be discouraged) and even she had complained about it, in her roundabout way.

So, really, if Umbridge were to find this diary... well, Harry would be done for good, he suspects. He's not sure she has the power to expel him yet, but she's certainly getting there; moreover, as High Inquisitor she has the power to impose any punishment she wants on him. Her detentions are already torturous—even the thought makes his hand, still carved open and wrapped in a bandage, twinge—and he's not sure he wants to test the limits of her imagination.

But... he needs the information. He needs to find the Chamber of Secrets, and if he can do it before the winter hols, all the better; it'll be easier to get away then to meet with the Dark Lord, as he suspects he'll be called to do if he manages to complete his task. Once term resumes, it'll be much harder.

So he taps the gathering drip of ink off the end of his quill and puts it to the page of the diary. It feels a little girly and stupid, but for lack of any other ideas, he begins with Dear diary, and then pauses, hesitant.

To his surprise, the letters, stark black on white even in the darkness, don't stay. Instead the ink seems almost to sink into the page and vanish—and then, a moment later, other letters appear in an unfamiliar handwriting.

Hello, the writing says. It lingers long enough for him to read, and then that message too vanishes.

Harry swallows hard and writes back, for lack of anything else to do. Who's there?

My name is Tom, the diary says. What's yours?

"Oh, shite," Harry says out loud, because he can and because he doesn't know what else to do. He'd known that this was Tom Riddle's diary, but he hadn't realized that it was his in the way the Marauder's Map belonged to Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs. Their essences, or a version of them, were preserved on that folded scrap of parchment in the way that it seems Tom Riddle has survived in the pages of his diary, impressed by magic, will, and dedicated attention. Which means that Harry now has access to Voldemort himself at age... whatever. Probably sixteen or seventeen, if the creation of the impression on this diary had taken the same length of time as the impressions on the Map.

My name's Harry, he writes. It's nice to meet you, Tom.

You're very polite, Tom replies. Are you a Hufflepuff, Harry?

No. I'm a Slytherin.

Wonderful. There's a pause. I am as well. It's a wonderful House, isn't it?

It certainly has its perks, Harry writes, debates with himself, and then decides to be honest. Or at least a version of honest. But it's very political.

Oh, yes, Tom writes. His handwriting is a tidy and deliberate cursive, quite beautiful and clearly practiced, letters formed with wide loops and clean slanting straights; every i is dotted and every t is crossed promptly. But there can be advantages in that, if you know how to take them.

I've been pretty successful, Harry writes. Though I'm only in my third year. The older students are still much more influential.

Your time will come, Harry. I've only known you very briefly, but you seem like you have potential.

Others have said that, too, Harry replies. It's interesting, he thinks, to see the way Voldemort works. The charisma he has now had clearly come from somewhere, been built upon the foundation of this smooth and complimentary teenager. He continues to write back and forth, allowing himself to speak openly about his place in the House and some of his frustrations with the older students, including Marcus Flint, and with those his own age like Malfoy—the way he feels like an outsider to the politics despite his so-called potential, the way others can close ranks when he exposes his foreign viewpoint to the light. Almost without meaning to, he admits that he's a halfblood raised in the muggle world, and that he finds the magical world still strange and confusing at times, despite having been integrated swiftly and deeply into pureblood society.

To his shock, Tom replies, I know a thing or two about that, Harry. I have a noble magical lineage—you probably wouldn't believe me if I told you—but I was raised in the muggle world, too. Discovering my magic was a revelation beyond compare; suddenly many things made sense. You must have felt that way, too.

Yes, Harry writes, trying to process past his surprise. He'd known Voldemort had been raised in the muggle world from Dumbledore's comments, but he's startled to hear him admit it—didn't he hate muggles, and muggleborns? And really, how had that even come to be, since Tom seemed aware of his heritage. Had he somehow been lost by his pureblood family? Or... was one of his own parents a muggle or a muggleborn, like Harry himself? And if the latter, did Tom know that, or think he was a pureblood, somehow? Maybe he can find out, if he asks carefully. Very much. Things are really different here.

And they expect you already to know how the world works, don't they.

Exactly. No one explains things because they think you should already know, and when you don't they treat you like an idiot. I got lucky—I made friends quickly who could explain some of the things I didn't get. And I read a lot.

You were luckier than I, then, Tom writes. It wasn't until my third year at Hogwarts that I began to make friends. Before that, I did as you did—I read everything I could get my hands on. But I've become respected, especially once I discovered my heritage and began to share it with those worthy of the knowledge.

The second hint about his heritage makes Harry narrow his eyes. So, Tom hadn't known right away that he was a descendent of Slytherin, and Riddle isn't a magical name that Harry knows. Maybe he is a halfblood. He wants to ask more, try to press and see if Tom will admit what his heritage is, and how he learned of it, but he thinks that this might be a test. He follows his instincts and doesn't ask, glad that he doesn't need to; he already knows that Tom Riddle is Slytherin's Heir.

The conversation continues, Harry letting Tom lead a little, and the spirit in the diary plays up their similarities, digs for other connections. He doesn't write in much detail about his own past, avoiding deftly the topic of his muggle upbringing beyond its existence, and he doesn't mention any of the names of his friends, but he talks about building what he refers to as his 'faction' and complements Harry on the connections he's made, gives advice, and generally presents himself as a font of wisdom about school politics and how to influence them.

Truthfully, it is interesting and even somewhat helpful, though of course things have changed a bit since the '40s when Tom was in school. And the similarities between Tom and Harry himself are as genuine as they are disconcerting—if the diary is telling the truth, that is, which Harry has no real guarantee of. He promises himself to try to dig up a little more on Tom Riddle's history, because he doubts he'll get any sort of answer or do anything other than make the magical impression angry if he accuses him of lying just to sway Harry to his side and seem more friendly.

Eventually, he finds himself yawning and nodding over the book as he reads through a story Tom is telling about his own days in third year Transfiguration, when none other than Albus Dumbledore had been the professor of that class, not yet risen to status as Headmaster. When he's finished reading and Tom's words have again faded to nothing, he writes, That's amazing, Tom. I'm not sure I'll ever see Dumbledore the same way. Which is true, though maybe not in the way that Tom might want. But, listen, it's late and I need to sleep. I'll write to you more tomorrow night, okay?

That sounds good, Harry. Enjoy your rest, and I'll talk to you soon.

Good night, Tom.

Good night.

Harry closes the diary and puts it and his writing materials away, contemplative, and swings his Cloak back over himself. He makes his silent way back down through the hallways and hidden passages of Hogwarts, thinking over what he's learned—that the diary might just be a useful source of information, if he can get the magical impression to trust him, if it's truthful, and if it's even able to speak about the things he wants to know. There are a lot of ifs there, but it's something, at least; there's a possibility there that seems more fruitful than his continued dive through the dusty and dull school archives, which he suspects he's plumbed for anything useful already anyway.

He puts the diary and his things back into his satchel and his Cloak back into his trunk when he returns to his dorm and crawls into bed, so tired that he almost decides not to bother Occluding before he sleeps. But he knows what sort of thing both Sirius and Snape would have to say about that kind of laziness, so he takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and delves deep into his own mental landscape.

To his surprise, he finds some disorder in the halls of his mental Hogwarts: doors flung open to bare rooms filled with memory and emotion, especially the memories that he'd been sharing with Tom, most of which live in his mental version of the Slytherin common room. The entryway to the common room is open, not requiring a password as it usually does to access his thoughts and memories of Slytherin House's complex politics. Here and there, also, the windows are open in the upper halls, letting fresh air and joy and light shine into the spaces in his mind and shift the shades of all of his thoughts, all his ideals hung in paintings on the walls. He leaves the curtains open most times, when he knows he won't need to hide his true inner heart, his joy and his love, from anyone else, but he never leaves the windows themselves open. Doing that weakens his control over his emotions and his reactions, causes his passions to weigh more heavily on the way he responds to things, and with Umbridge around he's had to be twice as controlled. Something strange is happening—something had disturbed his defences without his realizing.

Disconcerted, Harry sets his Hogwarts to rights, closing the windows and the doors, replacing his memory-books back on their shelves and replacing the furniture of his thoughts and opinions into its usual arrangement, and then setting locks and passwords where he can to double his defences and make sure that nothing could open them again without his noticing. Then he retreats back out of his construct and doubles the layer of his primary shielding as well, like placing a ward around the grounds of his Hogwarts like those that actually exist to prevent Apparition and make the castle Unplottable and protect against other things, hoping that that will give him warning in case something like this were to happen again.

The effort of so much Occlumency after his long and draining conversation with Tom knocks Harry out quite thoroughly, and his exhaustion causes him to sleep in uncharacteristically late, and he's woken by Theo shaking him to let him know that breakfast is starting.

"Ugh," Harry says, and turns his face into his pillow.

Blaise, somewhere across the room, snorts loudly.

"Shut up," Harry mumbles, still, muffled, but rolls over and begins the process of getting ready for his day, ignoring his roommates' amusement at his uncharacteristic morning grumpiness. Next time, he tells himself, he'll chat with Tom at a more sane hour, risk of being discovered or no.

Reservations about the effect on his mindscape aside, Harry does continue to write in the diary, almost every day in fact. He takes to shoring up his Occlumency shields before sitting down to write to Tom, and that seems enough to prevent the diary's incursion into his mind, though he still can't feel the attempts to penetrate his shields, if there are any. Maybe it's a matter of it being a different kind of magic, or maybe he's only being paranoid and the diary had nothing to do with the disorder he'd discovered in his Occlumency construct. It's impossible to know, because after the first time it doesn't happen again.

The larger problem is that as Harry gets to know Tom better, it's hard not to want to spend more time talking with him. It's only the fact that Umbridge is still watching him like a hawk and assigning her vicious detentions at the drop of a hat that keeps him from writing for more than an hour each day; he's simply not got the time some days. But if he did, he would be writing as often as he could. Tom is an interesting conversationalist and full of fascinating anecdotes about Hogwarts in the 1940s, and when his guard comes down a little, even about what it was like to live in muggle London during World War II—Tom had fortunately been at Hogwarts during the Blitz, but remembered clearly the devastation he'd returned to the summer after.

Those little slips into personal detail tell Harry that the impression, however he came to be, has detailed knowledge of his own life up until his creation at least, as well as a fair share of personality; he also remembers the details of previous conversations with Harry, unlike the impressions of the Marauders in the Map. So he's something more, something greater than them—whether that owes to the fact that he's a single concentrated personality, or the manner of his creation, or some other thing, Harry doesn't know.

But he knows, or at least thinks, that he'll be able to earn the impression's trust. Tom doesn't seem to know much about current events or people at Hogwarts; Harry tests the waters by carefully mentioning Neville, but Tom doesn't react much—and not in the manner of a conspicuous non-reaction. Maybe he's just a better liar than Harry thinks, but he feels, after several weeks of writing regularly, that he can read Tom pretty well even just through writing. The impression is sly and charming, continues to be slick and evasive of providing any real information about himself, but he tends not to lie outright, so far as Harry can tell. He draws in all the information Harry can provide about modern events and relies on that when he relates his own stories to Harry's experiences, which serves Harry's own efforts not to give too much away perfectly well. It's interesting and good practice for political conversation with other Slytherins without being quite as high-stakes as some of what Harry's having to juggle in real life, and though in the back of his mind he's always aware that he's talking to a young version of Voldemort, he finds that he actually sort of likes Tom, finds him engaging and interesting.

Of course, they stay well clear of topics of blood and any real discussion of their personal politics; Harry implies that he agrees with the pureblood side of things and that's enough for Tom not to start any debates. Harry suspects that he'd find the diary less engaging company if they were to start in on any of that; at least it would be harder to ignore who exactly it is that he's talking to. As it is, he tries to think of Tom a little like Warrington or Flint: someone whose personality he doesn't dislike, but whose politics he can't abide. Someone to be wary of.

It makes for a tenuous balance within his own mind, because he can't give up talking to the diary in hopes that Tom will decide to tell him about being Heir of Slytherin, and he also can't ever, ever forget that the real Tom would very much like to see Neville, Hermione, and most everyone else Harry loves and cares about in the world very much dead, and probably painfully and violently dead as well. Silently, he resolves that if he hasn't gotten anything out of the diary before Christmas, he'll give up and hide it at the bottom of his trunk again—better not to tempt fate.

So he writes to the diary and writes his essays for classes and every once in a while Umbridge gives him a detention for 'disrespectful looks' or 'disrespectful tone' or just plain 'disrespect' and he goes to her office and he writes lines; she's stuck with I must not tell lies even though after the beginning of November he gives up on arguing when she mentions loudly in her class how of course Voldemort is certainly not back despite what certain people would have anyone believe. He'd hoped keeping mum might make her lay off, but it quickly becomes obvious that she's decided to hold a grudge.

Then, in the last week of November, Umbridge gives a lecture on household wards as a passive defence. She talks at length about how one should always make sure to hire a properly Ministry-certified Warder, who will be able to construct proper wards in accordance with the law, and that therefore one will never need to fear assault in their own homes from any sort of thief or other common criminal, children!

Ugh, Harry thinks, listening to her. He can see the bored expressions of his classmates all around the room—as usual, one of Umbridge's lectures had seemed like maybe for once she would say something useful, but it had turned into an advertisement for some Ministry service or other.

"And don't forget," Umbridge continues in her usual shrill tone, up at the front of the classroom, "only wards properly established by a witch or wizard of Light inclination will be thoroughly impregnable! But those, indeed, cannot be conquered whatsoever by—"

"That's not true," Harry says loudly. He curses himself internally, hesitates a moment while Umbridge slowly turns her bulging eyes on him, and then decides that if she's going to hold a grudge and make him write I will not tell lies over and over in his own blood anyway, he might as well tell the truth. "It's not true."

"Mister Potter—" she begins, but he shakes his head and cuts her off.

"First of all," he says, "the House of Black hasn't had a wix of Light inclination in its line for generations, but the ancestral home of my House has some of the most extensive and powerful wards of any magical home in England."

"Those were surely established by a Light wix," Umbridge insists, "as your esteemed House of course has the funds to hire one!"

"No," Harry insists. "A lot of them are cast with the family magic—they have to have been cast by a member of the Black family. And a lot of them are Dark wards, which are perfectly good and really strong, and could only have been cast by Dark wixen."

"Dark magic is illegal, Mr. Potter!" Umbridge shrieks.

"You're either stupid or a liar," Harry replies bluntly. "You can't make all Dark magic illegal, because that would include basically all of Care of Magical Creatures, Divination, and half of the spells Aurors use every day—including the Disarming Charm. And anyway, even if it were, a Dark wix of sufficient ability can cast Light spells anyway, so even if only Light wards were useful, a Warder with a Dark inclination would still be able to put them up if they were strong enough."

"Detention," Umbridge says, her voice nearly a hiss. "Every night this week, Mr. Potter, for your lies and disrespect for both my authority and the law."

"Fine," Harry says with a shrug. "Anyway, you were wrong about something else, too—no wards are impregnable. There's just no such thing."

"There are plenty of Light wards that cannot be breached by outside force," Umbridge says.

Harry rolls his eyes, giving up on any pretence of respect. There's really no point. "No, there aren't," he says. He glances at Neville, hoping his apology is clear in his face; Neville seems to catch something in his expression and nods a little from across the room. "Look, it's clear if you just look at history that there aren't. The Ancient and Noble House of Longbottom is Light all the way through and their wards were too, and Lord Voldemort showed up and smashed right through, and look where they are now. With enough power and enough cunning, any ward can be broken."

Umbridge sputters, and then she rounds on Neville, which isn't at all what Harry wanted. "Mr. Longbottom," she says, "please correct Mr. Potter at once!"

Neville's face is nearly white, but he shakes his head. "Harry's right, Professor Umbridge. There're reasons for why it was possible—one of them is that our family hasn't had a Runemaster of any skill in a few generations to do upkeep on the wards for ourselves, which would have helped a lot. But my gran says that we'd had a Ministry warder in to check up on them, and he'd said they were fine enough; only blood wards would have been better but those are harder for Light wixen. Dumbledore himself couldn't have done better."

Umbridge seems briefly stymied by this. Then she rallies and says, "Well, well then it clearly wasn't done properly—"

"It was," Neville says, as stiffly dignified as Harry has ever heard him. "As proper as it could have been."

Umbridge is scowling. "You are only a child and certainly cannot know better than I do, a Ministry employee and an expert in methods of defence! I'm uncertain where you got your ideas, Mr. Longbottom, but they are incorrect."

"They're not," Neville insists. "You're the one who's wrong, and… and Harry's right to stand up to you. Relying only on wards… I mean, my parents were taken by surprise. They thought our wards were going to be enough to protect them, and now they're dead. If you tell people to do the same, more are going to die—whether you believe Voldemort is back or not, those Death Eaters are at large now, and they're going to hurt people."

"The same happened to my parents," Harry adds, though it grates in his throat to talk about them to her. "They believed that the Fidelius—a Light charm, in case you didn't know, Professor—would be enough to protect them. It's probably the closest to impregnable that you can get—but even the Fidelius has a weakness, and that's treachery. Lies, Professor, are what killed my parents." Purposefully, he splays his bandaged hand on the desk in front of him. "Say what you want. I am telling the truth."

She glares, her whole expression transformed into something even more ugly than her usual simpering insincerity; the rage she feels is plain. Then she hides it away, forcing a shade of mere sour displeasure over the raw hate that she seems to hold in her heart toward Harry, for who knows what reason. It doesn't matter, ultimately; if the Dursleys had taught Harry anything, it's that people don't need a reason to hate you and no amount of reason can make them stop. "Be that as it may," she says, with more composure than Harry had expected her to be able to summon, "you will still be serving detention this week, Mr. Potter. And you may join him, Mr. Longbottom."

Harry grits his teeth. "Fine."

He manages to keep his mouth shut for the remainder of class, where Umbridge continues to lecture even more pointedly about the virtues of Light wards and when pauses to list Dark wards and other rituals that are classed as illegal. The bias is obvious, but it seems foolish; some of the most powerful Houses in the Wizengamot are the Dark Houses, and even if they weren't, about 40% of the magical population has a Dark inclination, even if it's rarely tested for. The Ministry seems to be trying to redefine 'Light' and 'Dark' away from the magical theory that Harry has learned, and he's not sure why, or if there's any real reason at all other than wanting more control over the way people think.

Then again, it's not like bias against muggleborns is any more logical; they make up about a third of the population, or would if half of them weren't driven back out of the magical world as soon as they completed their educations. It was that sort of thing that Sirius had been trying to fight against in the Wizengamot's legislative sessions over the past few years, with limited success. Just one more stupid frustration about the magical world to store away and deal with later, after the war was won.

Finally, class lets out, and Harry packs up his bag and then hesitates for a moment, indecisive, as he watches Neville and Hermione and Ron get ready to leave as well, chatting among themselves. Maybe it's foolish, but he misses his friends; he's tired of spending all his time arguing with a teacher who hates him or talking to paintings of snakes and the echo of a sixteen year old future Dark Lord.

So he catches up with them as they head out of the classroom and says, "Neville, hey."

The trio of Gryffindors all pause, and Neville turns with a hesitant smile. "Harry. Um… how are you?"

Harry shrugs and adjusts the strap of his satchel. "Fine, I s'pose. Listen—I'm sorry for getting you in trouble with Umbridge."

"You didn't," Neville says immediately. "I should have said something ages ago, really. It was just… easier to keep my head down, you know?"

"Yeah," Harry says, then sighs. "Well, I did try that."

"She really wouldn't give you a break," Hermione says sympathetically. "I kept wanting to say something, but…"

"No, better not," Harry says immediately. "I mean, I know you hate getting in trouble with teachers."

Hermione shakes her head. "It's not because of that—I mean, she's not much of a teacher, is she?"

Harry laughs, joined by Neville and Ron, Ron a bit awkwardly. Ron seems uncomfortable just in general, and Harry wonders if their already-tenuous friendship has deteriorated entirely under the weight of Harry's own recent distance from the Gryffindors. "No, she's not," he agrees, ignoring the issue of Ron for the time being. That'll resolve or it won't—truthfully, he's got bigger problems. "Listen, I've got a spare next and I know you do too—d'you want to come with me to the library? I was going to go work on my essay for Arithmancy."

"Oh, yes!" Hermione says immediately, and Neville agrees as well, but Ron begs off in a sullen tone and vanishes down the hall toward Gryffindor tower. Absent his grumpy company, the three of them wander up toward the library, chatting, and Harry feels a little bit like he's gotten his balance back. He'll have to be careful, because he can't let word get back to Voldemort that he's too friendly with the Boy-Who-Lived and a muggleborn, but he had sold his value to the Dark Lord as partly being Neville's trust in him. So… maybe he can keep his friends—in the effort to thwart Umbridge and still pass all their classes, if nothing else.