Chapter 6
The next morning found the students of Hogwarts blearily eating breakfast as their Heads of House handed out class schedules.
Harry smiled at Minerva as she handed him his, and he looked it over, seeing what books he would need that day.
Schedule for Harry James Potter
Monday:
0900-1150: Transfiguration
1300-1450: Charms
1500-1650: Potions
Tuesday:
0900-1150: Arithmancy
1300-1450: Ancient Runes
1500-1650: Defense Against the Dark Arts
Wednesday:
0900-1150: Potions
1300-1450: Transfiguration
1500-1650: Arithmancy
Thursday:
0900-1150: Defense Against the Dark Arts
1300-1450: Charms
Friday:
0900-1150: Ancient Runes
Today was a Monday, so they would be starting out with Transfiguration right off.
Hermione's schedule was exactly like his, except she was also continuing with Herbology.
All of them had dropped History, Astronomy, Care of Magical Creatures, and for those taking it, Divination. They were taking most classes together, except Ron wasn't in Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, Neville hadn't taken Ancient Runes, and Susan had dropped the subject.
They all finished their breakfast quickly and left to get their books before heading to the Transfiguration classroom.
Harry knew that this year would be challenging, but that fact was only driven home more by the end of the day.
Minerva informed them right off of what she would be expecting of them as NEWT students. As an upper level class, it was comprised of students from all four houses. It was slightly larger than previous years, but there was only one class for the sixth years.
Charms passed much the same way, but it was Potions that Harry was really waiting for.
Slughorn proved himself to be a jolly man, in good spirits, but Harry felt like part of it was an act. Sirius had told him the man had been in Slytherin, so he had to be cunning.
Slughorn started them off by identifying different potions – Hermione was able to successfully identify Amortentia, a powerful love potion, while Harry correctly identified the Drought of Living Death, and Neville recognized the Dreamless Sleep potion.
Slughorn seemed very happy with their success, and clapped his hands jovially. "Well done indeed," he chortled. "That will be five points each, to Gryffindor. Now, the potion we will be brewing today is –"
"Sir," Terry Boot interrupted, "you haven't told us about that one yet."
He pointed at the fourth and smallest cauldron set up. Slughorn looked down, and chuckled. "Dear me, so I haven't." Harry rolled his eyes slightly, and caught Hermione's equally exasperated gaze. Neither of them believed for a second that Slughorn had forgotten the potion. More likely, he had been waiting for someone to ask, to make a scene out of it. "This," he waved at the cauldron, "is none other than Felix Felicis!"
Hermione gasped. "Liquid luck!" she breathed, her eyes trained on the small cauldron.
Slughorn chuckled again. "Take five points for Griffindor Miss Granger. Can you tell us what this potion does?"
Hermione looked up at the professor. "It gives the drinker good luck for a set amount of time. But it's extremely regulated."
Slughorn nodded. "Indeed. It must be taken sparingly, as excessive amounts can cause extreme overconfidence, giddiness, and recklessness. It is banned in any organized event, and as Miss Granger said, it is extremely regulated." He sighed reminiscently. "I've taken Felix twice before, both times resulting in perfect days." He looked around at the class. "This potion will be the prize for today. We will be brewing the Draught of Living Death." He gestured to the potion sitting on the desk. "As you can see, this is it in its finished stage. I highly doubt any of you will get to this point today, but to the person who gets the furthest, you will win one small bottle of Felix Felicis. Enough for two doses, or twelve hours of luck." He clapped his hands. "Let's begin!"
What followed was actually a good lesson, but Harry couldn't forget his misgivings over the professor. Still, it was better than Snape, even if the Slytherin Head of House had mellowed out slightly in the last year.
At the end of the lesson, Slughorn called for them to step away from their cauldrons, as he walked around and observed the students' work.
The finished product was supposed to turn from a pale lilac color to clear. The colors in the class ranged from dark blue to purple, and Slughorn would peek in each cauldron and either nod or shake his head. He seemed to approve greatly of Daphne's potion, if the smile on his face was anything to go by.
When he got to the last couple of tables, he smiled widely at Hermione's potion, which was a light purple color, clearly the furthest along he had seen. He gave Ron a nod at seeing his darker purple potion, before moving along to Harry and Neville. Neville's potion was about the same as Ron's, but Slughorn stopped immediately when he saw Harry's cauldron.
"Ho, ho, what do we have here?" he grinned proudly. "By far the furthest along, Mr. Potter, it is clear we have a winner!"
Harry grinned, feeling proud, as Slughorn handed him the bottle of Felix Felicis. His finished potion still had a slight purple sheen to it, but it was barely there. All in all, he figured he had been about three minutes ahead of Hermione. If they had had just a little more time, their potions probably would have looked the same.
"Take fifteen points to Gryffindor, Mr. Potter, and for next week, everyone, a foot of parchment on the Draught of Living Death."
Harry and his friends left the dungeons and headed up to the common room, talking about the lesson. They said goodbye to Blaise and Daphne as they left the dungeon, and then Susan as she headed off to the Hufflepuff common room, before they went up to Gryffindor tower.
Harry waited until they were sitting in the sofas around the fireplace before they got into the more deep conversations about their new professor.
"It was a good class," Hermione commented. "I wish I could have won, but your potion was very good Harry."
Harry smiled and nodded his thanks. He had worked very hard to understand the process of brewing, and Potions had become a class he was quite talented in, now that he knew what he was doing. He bit his lip. "Slughorn seems to know what he's doing, but I still get this… feeling about him."
Neville nodded. "Like he's always looking for an angle?"
Harry glanced over at the Longbottom heir and nodded again. "He was a Slytherin, so I would expect him to be at least a little bit cunning, but everything Sirius told us, coupled with my own observations, tells me that Slughorn could be dangerous. I don't think he's evil, or in league with Voldemort, but I think he'd help out the wrong person for the right price."
Hermione gasped slightly, and Ginny, who had arrived from Care of Magical Creatures shortly after they had returned to the common room, raised an eyebrow. "That sounds a little harsh," the redhead commented.
Harry looked at her and shrugged. "It's just an assessment," he muttered. "Something about him just doesn't endear me to trust him. He reminds me a bit of Lockhart, riding on the coattails of other people's achievements. I think he's probably a better professor than that fraud, he did teach our parents after all, but I'm going to withhold judgment until he gives me a reason to get off the fence."
"That sounds like a good idea," Neville commented. "Let's give him a chance, but haven't we all learned by now not to trust blindly?"
Hermione flinched slightly at the small dig to her previous faith in authority figures.
They all put their books away and headed down for dinner.
XXX
Harry spoke with Minerva after supper, and they set up a DA meeting for that weekend.
In the meantime, Harry also had to plan on setting up Quidditch tryouts. He wasn't quite as nervous as he would have been, had they not had a full reserve team the year before, but as Captain, he had to reserve the Pitch, and it would come down to him to decide on the new team.
Over the course of the week, Harry spoke to all the other Captains, and they decided to split their tryouts over two weekends. Slytherin would need to do the most rebuilding by far. With Malfoy gone, Crabbe and Goyle were the only members left of the previous team. Snape had given Theodore Nott the position of Captain, as the sixth year had played as a reserve a few times over the years. That, and Blaise had said that he wasn't interested in playing.
They decided that Hufflepuff and Slytherin would have their tryouts the second weekend of the month, and Ravenclaw and Gryffindor would have their tryouts the third weekend.
It was so much easier to get things done when all four Houses got along, Harry mused, as he made his way to the DA lounge that Saturday afternoon.
It was a large group gathered for that meeting, once more with everyone returning but the graduated seventh years. They had also added the majority of the first years. A few holdouts were normal, Harry knew from the previous year; it was mostly kids who had been taught at home to remain aloof and not associate with other houses. From experience, Harry knew they would join within the next few months, after acclimating to school and the newly developed Inter-House friendships.
With so many people in the group, Minerva and Flitwick had done some major reconstruction and sectioned off that wing of the castle, turning it into a much larger lounge. There were multiple interconnected rooms, so that people could form smaller groups to study different subjects.
It was a very successful evening, with a little studying, and a little catch up with friends that they hadn't seen since the previous term. One of the topics a lot of people were talking about were Snape's Defense lessons. The old Potions professor had proved to be adept at his new subject, and people were talking about how much they enjoyed the lessons.
Harry was smiling as he dropped into his bed that night.
XXX
Harry received an invitation to a 'small get together' in Professor Slughorn's quarters the next week. The 'get together' was for Saturday evening, and Harry really didn't want to be a part of Slughorn's little club.
As it turned out, all of Harry's friends had gotten invitations as well, but they felt the same way, and all decided not to go.
Instead, they spent most of the weekend in the Room of Requirement, practicing their animagus transformation, working on homework, and various other pursuits. Harry and Hermione spent part of an afternoon discussing the werewolf transformation and cure possibilities, along with the Wolfsbane potion and whether or not more improvements could be made. It made little sense to the others, though Daphne joined them after practicing her transformation for a while, and seemed to be keeping up, even putting in a few of her own ideas. It would make sense for her to understand, though, seeing as how she was planning on studying for a Potions Mastery after Hogwarts.
Harry also continued testing Blaise, Daphne, and Luna on their Occlumency shields; though they were a little hesitant, they all agreed that with Harry using Legilimancy, they were more likely to achieve full shields quicker. And they trusted him not to go digging for anything.
Harry was learning quickly, and hoped that he would be able to master the art within the next year. He really hoped his idea would work. He wanted to give Neville his parents back.
XXX
Slughorn caught up to Harry on Monday and expressed his disappointment that Harry couldn't make it to his get together. Harry apologized, but when the professor tried to invite him to another one in two weeks, he politely declined, saying he wanted to focus on his studies, before making his escape.
Even just over two weeks into the new year, Harry knew it would be a challenge. Classes, Prefect duties, the DA, and his new role as Quidditch Captain. Not to mention a few other side projects he was working on, or wanted to start working on. He was pretty advanced for his age, but he knew he would need to work hard to keep up with everything.
Still, organizing his time and not allowing himself to slip, kept him on top of the homework, and he was even able to help Ginny a little, as the fifth years never really got the chance to ease into the new year – the professors immediately started them off on OWL work. Plus Ginny also had Prefect duties to attend to.
XXX
Hermione's seventeenth birthday fell on that Tuesday, and Harry and Ron plotted together to pull off a spectacular surprise party for her.
The bookish young woman was very emotional as she saw the entire Gryffindor House there in the common room. She had grown up with very few friends, and to see so many people wishing her a happy birthday was such an amazing experience.
Harry had talked to the House Elves and gotten them to provide enough food to feed all four Houses, which was very much appreciated, especially the fantastic cake they whipped up, after Harry told them that the party was for one of his best friends. They wanted to make the evening great for 'Mr. Harry Potter sir'.
After they all got a plate of food, Harry and his friends drifted off to a corner so that they could give Hermione her presents. Harry and Ginny teamed up to get her a boxed set of Shakespeare plays.
When Hermione looked up, surprise written clearly on her face, Ginny shrugged while Harry smiled. "Harry's the one who came up with the idea," she admitted. "I knew your name comes from one of his plays, and even the wizarding world knows that Shakespeare was one of the greatest writers of all time." Ron's guilty shifting suggested that perhaps he hadn't known that, but Ginny didn't comment. "I hope you don't already have these books. I thought you might enjoy reading them."
Hermione looked at Harry. The teen just shrugged. "You love to read. I know you probably read some Shakespeare at muggle school, but I thought you might enjoy having a collection of his works."
Hermione beamed brightly. "Thank you so much, both of you. I love them. I have read a few before, but I don't own any of these. This is a brilliant present."
Ginny flushed happily, and Harry smiled, as Hermione opened Neville's present next. He got her an in-depth guide to the NEWTs, which she thanked him for ecstatically.
Ron's gift was a simple silver necklace, with a small pendant shaped like a book. Hermione put it on immediately, and gave her boyfriend a kiss. She was so happy with the man he was growing into, and she loved the necklace.
XXX
George groaned as he sat up. Why had he decided to take a nap on the hard cement floor of his and Fred's Potions laboratory?
Nearby, Fred also stirred, and looked over at his twin.
Oh yeah, George remembered ruefully, they had been working on their listening device. So far, they kept running into trouble when it came to getting the device to work on passive magic. They just couldn't make something like the muggle batteries, and like most of their experiments, trying seemed to be detrimental to their health, as was evident by their current situation.
Fred sighed as he stood up. "Now what?"
George shrugged, and moved over to the now blackened device, sitting innocently on the table. "Back to the beginning," he grimaced.
Fred nodded, and they got back to work.
XXX
Gryffindor Quidditch tryouts were held that Saturday. When Harry went down to the Pitch that morning after breakfast, what seemed like half the House was waiting for him.
Last year's starters and reserves stood off to one side, while all the other hopefuls crowded in the center of the Pitch.
Harry arrived with Ron and Ginny after breakfast, and the two Weasleys went to join the group of previous team members, after wishing Harry good luck. Harry smiled thankfully as he looked at the crowd in front of him. Ron had helped him a lot in coming up with some good plays that they would certainly implement this year. The youngest male Weasley was truly gifted when it came to strategy.
Harry cleared his throat. "Good morning, everyone, thanks for coming." He bit his lip, and mentally prepared himself for what was going to be a long day. Why did so many people show up? "Let's start by separating by position. Chasers, go group by Katie; beaters, form a group next to the chasers; keepers to Ron; and seekers, to me."
He waited for a coupe of minutes as the flurry of movement died down, before he spoke again. "OK, chaser group, two laps around the Pitch. Go."
The group immediately took off, and Harry watched them carefully. He had decided this year that everyone would need to try out again. He didn't expect anyone other than Katie and Ron to win their chaser and keeper spots back, but it would be best to give everyone a fair shot.
When the group of chaser hopefuls returned, Harry politely dismissed three of them, all first and second years who clearly didn't possess the skill set to handle the position, and sent the beaters up in the air next.
After two laps around the Pitch, Harry dismissed four beaters, leaving seven hopefuls left.
Of the seven keeper candidates, none of them were horrible on a broom, so after their two laps, Harry called the chasers back, and had each of them take five shots against each keeper hopeful.
Harry dismissed three chasers and two keepers in the first round, before he called the beaters back up. He let the bludgers loose, and paired up beaters, having them try to hit the chaser hopefuls as they each went up against the keepers one more time.
He eliminated four more chasers who couldn't get past the bludgers to make more than one of their five shots, and three more keepers, leaving him with six chasers and two keepers. He was pleased to see that third year Evan was one of the keeper candidates, along with Ron. He had suspected the year before that the kid would be good in that position, and he was glad that he was going for it.
Of the beaters, he excused three of them who had worse aim than the others, leaving him with four.
Sending all his remaining candidates back to the ground, he called the seekers up next. He released two snitches, and told the three students – Dennis and two second years – that the first two to catch the snitches would advance. He had been a little surprised to see that Sheila had joined the chaser group that year, though he was happy that she was still in the running, having some talent at aiming, and a strong arm that really did not match her tiny frame.
He wasn't surprised when nearly twenty minutes later, Dennis found the first elusive gold ball, just like the year before. Five minutes later, one of the second years – a short girl with a near uncontrollable mane of hair named Katrina – found the second snitch.
Now that he had two full teams, Harry had them all go back up for a mock scrimmage.
In the last couple of hours, the stands had filled up a bit with Gryffindor students, coming down to watch after a leisurely breakfast. They were joined by all those who had been cut already, as fourteen brooms rose into the air. Harry re-released the two bludgers and a snitch, threw up the quaffle, and then joined them.
He watched the scrimmage carefully, keeping an eye on all the players. The game lasted almost an hour and a half, in which Harry mixed up the chaser and beater teams several times, before Dennis caught the snitch.
As they all touched the ground, he raised his voice to make himself heard over the noise. "Really great job everyone, thanks for coming out. I'll post the list by tomorrow morning."
The stands slowly emptied out as the player hopefuls all headed up to the castle to get some lunch.
Harry didn't join them, instead heading to the kitchen to get something quick before he planned on spending the rest of the afternoon going over the tryouts and making his final decisions.
After making a quick stop in his dorm room to collect a few things, he sequestered himself in the Room of Requirement for the afternoon, and went over the different candidates. There was no question, after seeing everyone, that Katie and Ron deserved their spots back. But that still left him with two chaser spots, two beaters, and an entire reserve team to choose.
Using the pensieve that Minerva had given him for Christmas several years previously, which he had picked up from its spot in one of the compartments in his trunk – one that was keyed solely to him so that no one else could get in – Harry reviewed the tryouts and compared the players.
By the time he joined his friends for dinner, he thought he had a pretty good team worked out. However, he waited until late that night to post the list on the board in the common room. He couldn't hide it from Ginny, of course, since she was in his head, but he wanted to keep it a surprise for everyone else.
Harry and his friends were up early the next morning, and Ron checked the list first thing before they headed out for their morning run. He grinned happily at seeing his name on the list as starting keeper, and Harry shook his head. "You know you were the best one out there, mate," he clapped the redhead on the shoulder. "I don't know why you worry so much."
Ron glared halfheartedly at him, and they headed down to the Entrance Hall to meet up with Susan, Blaise, Daphne, and Luna.
When the Gryffindors returned an hour and a half later, they were met with several people crowding around the bulletin board, some of them beaming happily, others with disappointment on their faces.
Katie made her way over to him and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "Nice to see you know your place, Potter," she said haughtily, though there was a twinkle in her eyes that clearly said she was kidding.
Harry nodded contritely. "Of course," he replied, playing along. He raised his voice. "Practice starts tomorrow, starters and reserves, I expect you all there ready to train."
Those who had made the team nodded, excited.
Harry glanced over at the board, and smiled. It was going to be a good team this year.
Gryffindor Quidditch Team
Starters:
Chaser – Katie Bell
Chaser – Ginny Weasley
Chaser – Demelza Robbins
Beater – Colin Creevey
Beater – Dean Thomas
Keeper – Ron Weasley
Seeker – Harry Potter (C)
Reserves:
Chaser – Natalie McDonald
Chaser – Vicky Frobisher
Chaser – Sheila Walters
Beater – Seamus Finnegan
Beater – Geoffrey Hooper
Keeper – Evan Harrison
Seeker – Dennis Creevey
Sheila and Evan both made their way over to Harry and thanked him, to which Harry just shook his head. "Hey, you guys are the ones who earned it. Don't thank me, I just picked the best ones for the team."
The two third years beamed and went to find their friends.
Ron raised an eyebrow. "Didn't they both try out for seeker last year?"
Harry looked over and nodded. "I think Evan prefers keeping, maybe you could give him some pointers?" Ron shrugged noncommittally, and Harry sighed. "As for Sheila, I think deduced that she might get more playing time as chaser, at least until I graduate. And Dennis is just better at the position than her. She makes a good chaser, who knows? Maybe she decided she likes that position better. Come on, we should shower and get changed."
They all agreed and headed up to their dorms.
After breakfast, Hermione settled herself at a table in the corner of the common room, doing some sort of work – not that anyone felt brave enough to ask. It couldn't be homework, since Hermione would never leave her work to Sunday.
Ron joined her shortly, because he would leave his homework until the last day of the weekend.
Neville left soon after that, and if Harry had to hazard a guess, the Longbottom heir was off to find a certain Hufflepuff. He and Hannah Abbott seemed to get on quite well after their date in Hogsmeade last term. Harry knew that Susan was a little jealous, but she was trying to be supportive of her two friends.
With all their friends busy, Harry and Ginny disappeared to the Room of Requirement for the day, where they spent some time talking about a good point Harry had brought up at the end of the last term. Namely, what had happened to Voldemort in 1981.
Harry sighed. "I don't know why, but I feel like this could be the key to defeating him, once and for all," he admitted as the two cuddled on a sofa in a passable representation of the common room.
Ginny nodded. "He must have done something to stop himself from dying that day. The question is, what?"
Harry shrugged. "We should look into ways to cheat death. But somehow, I doubt we'll find any answers in the Hogwarts library."
"Maybe we should check your library at Potter Manor?" Ginny suggested.
Harry bit his lip. "Perhaps," he agreed. "Though I think the Black library might bear more fruit. That family is more likely to have books on the darker side of magic, and unfortunately, I think that's probably where we'll find our answer."
Ginny growled. "Why couldn't this be easy?" she huffed. "What are the chances that we'll be able to sneak off to Grimmauld Place?"
Harry's eyes sparkled mischeviously. "That sounds like a challenge," he grinned. "We'll come up with something. Maybe we'll get a chance over Christmas. In the mean time, we'll do some research here, and see what we come up with."
Ginny nodded. "We should tell the others though," she suggested. "We're going to need help."
Harry inclined his head. "As soon as Blaise, Daphne, and Luna master Occlumency, we'll tell everyone. And if we find anything important, we might need to tell Aunt Minerva. You're right, we need help. More than just our friends. We're going to need adult help at some point."
With that agreed, the two left the Room to go find dinner.
XXX
Late into the next week, Harry had some time in between classes, so he decided to spend it in the Room of Requirement. He had checked out a few books from the library that he thought might prove useful in their research on Voldemort, and as he paced the hall three times, he thought of a place he could use to study.
Opening the door, he considered that maybe he hadn't been quite as specific as he thought he was. Clearly, he had still been thinking of places they could find useful information.
The Room had provided him an impressive library.
"Harry?"
Harry turned quickly, and smiled as Ginny joined him; the two had the same free period, and while she should probably have been doing homework, they both agreed that defeating Voldemort was pretty important. She had brought her bookbag though, so that she could do some school work while Harry looked for information on the Dark Lord.
Together, they walked into the library, and Ginny gasped at the sight. "Wow," she breathed, looking at the floor to ceiling shelves filled with books. "Where did it all come from?"
Harry shrugged. "This Room has been here probably since the castle was built. It's probably been collecting books that long as well. Books that get lost, books that are hidden… these could have come from anywhere. I didn't mean to call this room up, but I guess I was thinking partly of a place to study, and partly of where we could find more information. Maybe what we're looking for is here."
Ginny looked around for a moment longer, before she turned back to Harry. "Don't show Hermione this room," she suggested, smirking. "She'll never leave."
Harry chuckled, and headed to check out the shelves after depositing the books he had been holding on a nearby table. Ginny sat down and began writing an essay while Harry searched.
It was perhaps an hour later when Harry's voice drew her out of her homework. "Hey, Gin? Check this out."
Ginny looked up to see Harry standing beside her. In his hands was a very worn looking book.