Fortinpatric : je t'en prie mon amie ( I think I spelled that right I'm ten years out of practice in my French)
Thank you midnightscar17 for the heads up I swear I update my story and each time at least 3 chapters do that.
Dramione1028: Ahh, ummm, oops! I can easily fix one of those. Looks like I have some writing to do tonight! Problem is being busy between chapters. Thank you.
With tearful farewells and well-wishes exchanged between parent and child, or aunt and nephew in Harry's case, and a few minutes remaining before the train's departure, Harry and Hermione entered and used Levitation Charms to stow their large trunks in the luggage compartment as silently as possible, so as not to disturb the strange man with whom they were riding. The two teens sat together, Harry updating Hermione on Dobby's continued improvement. When less than a minute remained before the Hogwarts Express departed, Ron sprinted onto the train. Breathing hard and loudly, he ran into their compartment as the train lurched, and with great effort, hoisted his trunk into the luggage rack as loudly as possible, causing Hermione to hiss, "Ron!" between her teeth while gesturing to the sleeping man also causing the stranger to grunt and shift before settling back down.
Looking at the man in their compartment, Harry saw something that slightly sickened and worried him. The stranger had a gaunt and starved appearance that Harry recognized all too quickly. The man had sandy-brown hair and sickly pale skin, adorned with several jagged scars. The man seemed to favor shades of brown in his clothing: he was wearing a patched and frayed sandy-brown overcoat instead of robes, an oak-colored sweater vest that had been darned in several places over a light-tan shirt, and pants that matched his vest. Oddly enough, his shoes and leather belt, while not new, were shining, well-cared for, and expertly polished.
"What's he doing here?" Ron asked quietly.
"Professor R. J. Lupin, Oh! He's the man you mentioned. In your letter that-." Said Hermione.
"Yea! But I wonder what he's doing on the train? They can't suspect Pettigrew is here
"Maybe he had business in London and decided to take the trainHarry. He looks exhausted, maybe he just wasn't up for the floo I've never seen an adult on the train aside from the old lady with the food cart" said harry. "Here, let me do something so we don't disturb him. He looks like this is the first bit of sleep he's had in a week. And Harry pulled out four ceramic coins, each with a runic array carved into them. "Silencing tokens," Harry whispered, surrounding the man as best he could. "Charge them up, and you'll create a barrier that doesn't allow sound in or out for about an hour. Ted bought them as a going-back-to-school present. Very useful for studying in the loud common rooms or having large study sessions in the library." Harry poked each coin with his wand, and the runes on the coins began to glow faintly for a few seconds before seemingly going dormant again.
"So that's how the upper years are always so quiet in the library even though they all roughhouse worse than us," asked Ron, astonished.
"It seems so. I had never heard of or even thought of how they did that. I just figured they used silencing charms, but no, apparently—" said Harry before Hermione cut him off excitedly.
"That's not how silencing charms work. I was reading about them in *Diminishing Distractions* during the summer. Silencing spells are moderately advanced spells, not normally taught or capable of being cast before fifth or sixth year. No matter what silencing spell you use, or what its strength, they all simply negate all noise within the caster's target area, making all conversations impossible." She said this very fast, in one breath.
As the train left the station and city, Hermione seemed to jump in realization. "Ron, what are you doing here? I thought your family was already at Hogwarts!"
"Well, yeah? But you wouldn't expect me to let my best mate ride the train with only you and Smara as company; the poor bloke would be outsmarted and outnumbered. Now he's only outsmarted." The three teenagers laughed, and their conversation changed topic as the hours passed. From Ron blushing and trying to come up with an excuse as to why he brought his school trunk and then hoping his chosen classes of Care of Magical Creatures and Divination would be easy, to Hermione launching into a tirade about the current state of the Muggle Studies textbook, which was well over one hundred years behind the times. She had seen Daphne's book over the summer; it stated that the last great Muggle invention was a primitive camera known as a tintype, which magicals adapted into the camera they still use to make moving pictures. As the hours passed, spotty weather alternately shrouded the train in rain or sunshine. Many friends and classmates passed by or stopped to say hello, but no one, not even Malfoy, lingered long with an adult in the compartment. Malfoy stayed just long enough to hurl his usual pathetic and ineffective insults at Harry and Hermione.
When the woman with the trolley came by, Harry made sure to grab more than enough so that the professor could have a cake or pastry if he wanted one if he woke up. He looked like he needed it. It wasn't until they passed into a thick, dark fog bank a few hours from Hogwarts that things got truly interesting.
With a grinding, groaning lurch, the train stopped suddenly and dislodged many trunks, including Harry's, which he barely managed to catch with a levitation charm before it smashed into the still-sleeping teacher's head. Suddenly, the temperature plummeted, the fog grew thicker, and the windows, wet from the day's rain, froze over in seconds.
A thick fog collected on the inside of the window. Ron wiped away the fog from the glass and peered outside the train as best he could through the thin layer of ice that had formed on the glass. "There's something moving out there. In the mist. Coming closer. I think something's getting on the train." Just then, the lights on the train flickered and died, plunging them all into an eerie darkness. The only light coming into the train now was from the sun, dimmed to near-unbelievable levels by the thick rain clouds and the fog that surrounded them. With a sudden and loud clatter, their compartment door opened, and someone crashed into and on top of Harry, their hand planted on his face. He couldn't make out who it was, just the silhouette of a student and the faint scent of something floral.
"Ow! Get off!" Harry firmly but gently pushed the person off.
"Sorry, Harry, I didn't see you there. I was trying to get into a compartment. Something is trying to open the door to the train. Are you okay?"
"Ginny? It's alright. I'm fine. Are you okay?"
"Yes, what's going o-owww!" Their compartment door opened again, and Ginny was pushed back on top of Harry when someone collided with her upon entering.
"Ow!" they said in unison.
"Who's there?"
"Neville. Who's there?"
"Ginny, you knocked me over."
"Sorry, Ginny, what's going on? Why is everything gone all dark—"
"QUIET!" The irritated voice of an adult filled the cramped compartment. "Settle down, please. Have a seat. I don't believe there is any reason to shout or panic," the man said. Once they were all seated, he gazed around at them and seemed to focus on Harry longer than the rest, something Harry was used to by this point, being the Boy Who Lived. "Good. Now, if you would, all of you, please sit and stay here. I'll be right back. Do not leave this compartment. I need to have a word with the driver," the new teacher said in a far kinder voice than before, as he quickly drew his wand and left the compartment. Harry looked down and saw that in the scuffle, the runestones had been displaced. He quickly pocketed them so they wouldn't get damaged.
"What do we do now?" Neville whined.
"I don't know. Just stay here, I suppose. No matter what he said, he drew his wand to walk down the train. Whatever is on board can't be too friendly." So they sat there, waiting nervously for a few minutes. Ginny was on his right, and Hermione was to his left, by the window, staring through the compartment door and out into the hall as best she could, as all the windows had fogged over in the cold.
"What is that?" Hermione pointed a finger at the frosted door of their compartment. A large shadow fluttered by, slowly, before stopping and filling the frosted glass with a stark black shadow.
"A k-kid, y-you think?" Ron stuttered.
Just then, the door popped open slowly, a few inches at first, and the air dropped several more degrees as their breath started to fog more noticeably. He could barely make out the invader in the dark, but he did see its hand. It was cold, gray, and slimy-looking, like something dead that had been in the water for too long. He didn't try very hard to see it more clearly as a hooded figure slowly entered the compartment. Who really cares about whatever that thing is when there is a deep, hollow pain pervading his entire being?
Harry had felt this pain before, many times.
Harry remembered the time his uncle Vernon had been reprimanded at work for making a crude joke and causing a client to stall a contract. Vernon came home and took his frustration out on Harry, beating the ten-year-old so badly that Harry tripped over a chair in the kitchen and broke it. Vernon then beat him with the broken chair after picking up the old wooden thing and smashing it over Harry's back. But it had never been the physical pain that hurt the most; it was the deep ache in his heart that called out for a love he had never known.
Harry remembered a nine-year-old boy who had spent twelve hours in the sun pruning his aunt's garden in the summer heat, only to be locked out of the house without food and with only hose water to drink for six days until it rained and Harry was clean of mud.
The time when an eight-year-old Piers Polkiss held Harry down while Dudley and the rest of his gang used hands, feet, and sticks to beat the emaciated boy into unconsciousness. All he had wanted to do was play kickball with his cousin.
The subsequent visions were no longer real, nor were they clear. Instead, they appeared as if seen through heavily tinted and fogged glasses.
Harry felt the unloving isolation that came from being locked in his small cupboard for two weeks with only two bags of crisps and a few bottles of water while the Dursleys vacationed for Dudley's seventh birthday. Then came the beating when they opened the cupboard to find that the tiny, frail Harry had soiled the ground after he could no longer hold his bladder.
The soul-shattering realization that his relatives hated him and wished him dead followed. After a six-year-old Harry had woken up, beaten and bloody, in so much pain he could not breathe, he was dropped behind the back garden shed like trash, covered in snow, after he had dared to ask why he didn't get any Christmas presents.
The feel of Uncle Vernon's belt against his three-year-old back after he'd summoned the television remote. This vision was even more dim and dark, like reading a book by moonlight.
Now, there was no vision anymore, no sight, just the horrific sound of a woman screaming. A woman screaming over distant blasts and bangs and fumbling footsteps running up wooden stairs. A woman belting out loud, bloodcurdling, pleading screams. "Not Harry, please, please, I'll do anything, please—"
A man's voice cut through the darkness, a dark hiss in the gloom.
"Stand aside, you foolish girl. You and your husband fought hard enough, but it is over. You've lost. You have neither the hand nor the wand necessary to defeat me."
"Not Harry, please, not Harry, please, I'll do anything, please—"
Then, suddenly, a blinding flash of green light, a dull thump, and mind-numbing, earth-shattering, life-ending pain.
And Mommy wouldn't wake up to make it go away.
Everything ended—no lights, no sound, no Mommy.
No Mommy ever again.
Mommy.
Harry was lying on something hard, but his head felt elevated and was lying on something very soft and warm. There was a slight weight on his chest, connected to him in a way nothing else was. Smara. Voices surrounded him, but he could not make them out yet. His mind felt sluggish, and his eyelids were too heavy to lift. He focused on the voices, willing them to make sense, but gave up quickly. His body was still asleep, even though his head was becoming more alert.
"Smara," Harry thought, cringing at the resulting headache.
"Small one! Are you hurt? Are you injured?"
"No, I believe I'm fine. What happened?"
"I am weary of the details. I'm afraid the sudden cold shocked my system. I was catatonic until a little while ago when your friends put me on your chest to share your warmth. Awaken, youngling, we shall get our answers together." After a few minutes, Harry finally managed to open his eyes. The first thing he saw was the underside of a girl's chest, clad in a green argyle sweater vest. He let out a groan, drawing the attention of the girl he was apparently using as a pillow and the people on the benches around him. The girl he was lying on looked down, revealing her identity to be Daphne.
"Hey, Daphne. You look different from down here," Harry said in a weak and drowsy voice, winning a very unladylike snort from the usually prim and proper pure-blood princess.
"Don't be a pervert, Harry. Of course I look different from that angle." But she didn't attempt to dislodge Harry. "How are you feeling?" This was echoed by Hermione, who had knelt on the ground beside him.
"I feel fine. What happened?"
"You fainted," a cool and calm voice said, drawing everyone's attention to the left of the compartment. He must have read the emotions on Harry's face accurately: worry, shame, and fear.
"Don't feel ashamed, Harry. You weren't the only one to faint. Miss Granger woke up about twenty minutes ago, and Miss Lovegood is currently eating the trolley's entire stock of chocolate frogs. I have some for you as well, Honeydukes' finest. Eat it; it will help, I promise."
Harry, taking a large bite of the chocolate and feeling a soul-refreshing warmth spread through him, asked, "What was that thing? Why did everything go dark and quiet? And why do I remember screaming?"
"That, Harry, was a dementor, one of the dementors of Azkaban prison. They boarded the train, claiming to be searching for Pettigrew. They ran off once I introduced them to a certain spell and sent them packing; however, that's not the point; they were not supposed to be near the train. The foul creatures knew that Pettigrew wasn't on the train. Children are a delicacy to them, and they could not resist the temptation, it seems. Now that they know adults are on this train and will fight them, they won't be back."
Harry, still feeling quite embarrassed by his fainting spell, did not say anything, choosing instead to stare at the roof of the compartment, partially obstructed as it was. Harry remained like this in silent contemplation until Daphne begged off and left for the lavatory. It was only two more hours until the train reached Hogsmeade station, with the now-familiar call of "First years, over here, first years!" that came from the mountain of a man and Harry's first friend, Hagrid.
"Heya Hagrid!" called Harry as he made his way to the carriages with Hermione, Ron, and Daphne.
"Heya Harry! Summer alright?" returned the groundskeeper.
Harry opened the door to the carriage and helped the girls inside before calling back, "Very busy! I'll tell you more about it later." He waved at the giant man before entering the carriage, giving a sidelong glance to the ethereal, skeletal horse that pulled their carriage. After sitting down, Smara slithered over to Daphne and filled the space with soft hisses.
"I hope you don't mind me coming with you back to the serpents' nest, youngling. I wish to return to my home, and it is fastest there," Harry translated.
"Of course you can come with me; the snake pit is always open to you, Smara. Not even Draco would dare to bar you." Smara hissed happily and burrowed under the neckline of Daphne's robes.
"I swear, sometimes she acts like a thousand-year-old reptile, and then other times she acts like an overly excited squirrel," said Harry, rolling his eyes at his partner's antics.
Hermione spoke up after laughing at Harry. "I do hope they have that delectable baked sea bass that was added to the leaving feast last year." And so sat Ron, Hermione, and Daphne, talking about the merits and demerits of Hogwarts cooking, which left Harry out of the conversation. Harry, having grown up starved and malnourished, had grown to eat and love all food and couldn't contribute much of a critical palate to the conversation, which suited him just fine as he enjoyed the back-and-forth between the three of his friends.
As the group entered the hall with a stream of other students, they heard the familiar, thick Scottish brogue of an irritated Professor McGonagall.
"Mr. Potter! Excuse me, but I would like you and everyone who was in your compartment to come to the hospital wing for a quick examination. We must make sure there are no lingering effects from those foul monsters' attack."
"But, Headmistress, I wanted to watch my sister get sorted," said Daphne hesitantly.
"Not to worry, we will be examining a number of first years as well. No, your sister is not one of them. The Sorting has been postponed." The Headmistress smiled and, after gathering Neville, Ginny, and Luna, led them to the hospital wing. It was another twenty minutes before all the students were given a clean bill of health, but Harry and Luna were both ordered to load their dessert plates with as much chocolate as possible.
It was close to ten o'clock when the school was finally gathered, settled, and leaning forward with bated breath for the Sorting Hat's new song. With a slow tear, a wide hole opened above the brim of the hat to form a mouth, and out rang the sorting Hat's new song:
"Step right up, and don't you fret,
The Sorting Hat's on stage, all set.
At Hogwarts School, your journey starts,
With houses waiting, and open hearts.
Gryffindors brave, they'll never yield,
Their courage shines in every field.
If ambition is your guiding light,
In Slytherin, you'll find your might.
Ravenclaws wise, with minds so keen,
For seekers of knowledge, it's a dream.
And Hufflepuff, where love's embraced,
With patience and kindness, perfectly placed.
So, place me on, and close your eyes,
I'll find your house without disguise.
Each house holds wonders and magic untold,
Welcome to Hogwarts, where stories unfold."
Harry then tuned out the rest of the Sorting, only clapping when he heard Astoria Greengrass be sorted into Ravenclaw. A glance at Daphne revealed that she was pleased with the sorting. The headmistress, breaking from tradition, instead just held her hands above her head and clapped to signal the start of the feast. After dinner was consumed and every last morsel of chocolate devoured by the student body, the headmistress stood up to address the school. As Harry waited, he finally turned his attention to the head table. There was Hagrid, the massive gamekeeper, always the first one he saw, and he was having a whispered conversation with Professor Snape. Vector, Sinistra, and Molly Weasley were all chattering, looking backward occasionally at Professor Lupin, who waved at Harry when their eyes met. Next to Lupin was a man Harry didn't recognize, with thin, pale skin, thick, long, windswept dark hair, and a rugged beard. He was talking to Flitwick and Pomona Sprout.
"There, I can see we are all nice and happy, finally able to enjoy another wonderful feast together, especially after such a harrowing and unacceptable episode you experienced on the train.
Before we proceed with further school announcements, there is something I must cover while I have your attention.
For those of you unaware of the creatures that visited the school train, let me tell you and give you a fair warning: those creatures were Dementors—some of the darkest and most foul creatures inhabiting this world. They are here at the Minister's request and are searching for a known dangerous criminal believed to be in the area. They are tasked with patrolling the border and school grounds but will not enter the school unless given permission. Please understand that it is not in the nature of a Dementor to respond to pleas or screams for mercy, and they cannot be fooled by potions, disguises, or even Invisibility Cloaks. So I beg each and every student here not to give them any cause to harm you.
Now, on to more uplifting announcements. The list of banned items has been expanded again by Mr Filch, the caretaker, to include fanged frisbees and even bashing boomerangs. He has also asked me to remind you that bubotubers and mimbulus mimbletonia are banned from all interior corridors.
As stated last year, Professor Kettleburn has retired, and Professor Hagrid has taken over the class. His expertise should aid your mastery of the subject and understanding of the subtle differences between violent monsters and misunderstood magical creatures. An auditor from the Department of Education will be here for the first month to ensure a smooth start to the class.
Next, Professor Snape has started an extracurricular Potions class for fourth-years and above that will meet every Saturday. Sign-up sheets will be on the notice boards in your common rooms. Harry looked at Snape, who seemed to be waiting for his response. The man simply nodded and swung his gaze to Hermione, nodding again.
"Finally, we have our last new staffing change as we welcome Professor Remus Lupin as the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor. However, due to an ongoing medical condition, we have hired an assistant for him; please welcome both Mister Remus Lupin and lord Sirius Black!"