- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
People have a thing for making excuses for racists that lack character change? *Shrug*
The Best Kings Wear Skirts
- Thread starter Grounders10
- Start date
People have a thing for making excuses for racists that lack character change? *Shrug*
Isiri Pudireach
Predictive text can go duck itself
Easiest way I can think of is to have Harry's arms be full of something when Molly hugs her.
- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Or being half distracted by the Twins
- Location
- Georgia
Total loathing is how Lily/James started, so the revulsion now could have been intended as a hint that that might change. I'm glad you're not going there. Draco can be redeemed, with effort, but almost everything positive we see in him is after he took the Mark and realized how much of a bad deal he had made.
She commented on Harry being smaller. Nothing else was said, so it's reasonable from the reader's perspective not to see what you intended.
The one big problem I have, and it's a common one, is the listing of his/her wealth. It's generally dull and pointless. "You now have enough that 1k galleons is chump change," or something similar, reads far better than Harry just listing how much money she had on her and in that one account to McGonagal. Pretty much anybody else would be seen as bragging with the level of detail Harry gave. "One of the vaults that are now mine has over 80,000*, and it isn't the only new vault for me," conveys the spirit without being bogged down in the minutia.
I'm fully aware that I suck at writing dialogue, but me suggesting a basic concept has helped others articulate what they're saying better.
*Or was it 800,000?
- Location
- Ylisse
Draco is rich and his actor is hot. That's really it. It can be done well, but not in a world with anything like as much canon as this one has.
- Location
- British Columbia, Canada
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I don't think Harry ever got an understanding of how much a Galleon was worth and was just the sort of person that was extremely reluctant to spend money because they grew up poor.
- Location
- Georgia
Where do you see a picture of Lily at thirteen? The youngest I can recall seeing her is sixteen, in Snape's memory.* She was remarkably pretty when she arrived at school. We know this because it gets remarked on. Rowling left a lot of details intentionally vague so readers could fill in the blanks with what they thought, including never mentioning color on Hermione except her brown eyes so she could be seen as black/African-British.
*Actually, I do remember her before Hogwarts, in another memory, but being under 11, I don't recall her having a bust line at all.
- Location
- Georgia
Harry's... correction to the scene is the kind of schadenfreude I'm susceptible to. It wasn't overdone, it wasn't actually Malfoy being hurt, so it's an acceptable indulgence, I think.
- Location
- Australia
Its more that a large part of the HP fan base loves toxic relationships for some reason… Harry/Draco, Hermione/Belatrix, Harry/Snape, Harry/Voldemort/Tom Riddle… and others I really could not be bothered to remember. These fics are alarmingly common, makes you wonder about the author demographic or HP fics.
Although, in defence of Draco he does change by the end of the series. Also, he's not racist, he's bigoted and classist - he never picked on anyone based off their race. Being a wizard is not a race.
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Gekkou_Yoko
Three-Tailed Kitsune
- Location
- In my dreams, outside my mind.
Based off of Lily's teenaged actor, whom may as well count for this, seeing as she was whom was cast for such.
- Location
- parker colorado
Yeah I'll be honest aside from one time travel fic that pulls it of well from appoapples I skip all those pairings.
TheMagister
Lord Magus
I am enoying the hell out of this story @Grounders10 . Thank you for writing this, and all your other ones. 
He starts off poor and abused, finds out he's special and magical and rich, and then the whole rich part mostly gets ignored or hand waved away except in the very rare circumstances where he has to pay for something. Also he never buys new non magical clothes so he can still be the poor orphan boy when school ends each year.
Harry having a massive family fortune sitting in a vault is almost entirely so JKR doesn't have to explain how harry can afford things when his relatives obviously weren't going to pay for anything.
My point is mostly that it could be 1000, 10,000 or 1 million, it wouldn't have that much effect on the story because Harry already had money that he didn't use.
EDIT: I realized after I wrote that that it didn't actually address what you were talking about, how Harry talking about how much money she has could have been read as rude. Sorry about that.
This lands on a common problem with Harry Potter's original story, and it's that Harry is both Rich and Poor at the same time through the entire series.
He starts off poor and abused, finds out he's special and magical and rich, and then the whole rich part mostly gets ignored or hand waved away except in the very rare circumstances where he has to pay for something. Also he never buys new non magical clothes so he can still be the poor orphan boy when school ends each year.
Harry having a massive family fortune sitting in a vault is almost entirely so JKR doesn't have to explain how harry can afford things when his relatives obviously weren't going to pay for anything.
My point is mostly that it could be 1000, 10,000 or 1 million, it wouldn't have that much effect on the story because Harry already had money that he didn't use.
EDIT: I realized after I wrote that that it didn't actually address what you were talking about, how Harry talking about how much money she has could have been read as rude. Sorry about that.
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- Pronouns
- He/him
Could be rude for sure. Could just be word vomit from a kid who is slightly overwhelmed and asked a question about something they aren't sure how to really deal with. I am just of the opinion that putting in all the effort to describe all those assets to just have them sit unused is a waste. I like the stories where the potters were an old big money family and so Harry just starts throwing money at problems. Probably my favorite move was in one story he went to the papers and said "Pettigrew is Alive. 100000 galleons whoever brings him in"
Chloe Sullivan
Subdefective
- Location
- 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale CA
- Location
- A lull in the conversation
From personal experience… yeah there was a surprisingly large gap of time from when I became obsessed with stories where the protagonist went from male to female, to me realizing I was trans.
Or so my friends tell me.
- Location
- Georgia
Being genderfluid with absolutely no chance of passing as the opposite sex means I can get intense spikes of gender dysphoria, so I like including the ability to change back and forth in RPGs when that is at all appropriate to the system. A one time-change would simply invert when I was experiencing that dysphoria, though I might still consider it in the case of a safe and complete change being available, since I expect a lifetime as one would make not being that one as a lesser dysphoria than not being the other is now.
Figuring out your own mind can be a confusing mess which led me down some very strange paths, including watching a lot of porn trying to figure out what I was interested in before learning that "asexual" was a thing.
Hmm, for authenticity's sake 'grade school' should be 'primary school', also the use of 'math' vs the UKs 'maths'. 'Tis semantics though.
I see Wyrd has already been over Harry being described as well endowed being at odds with previous the chapters descriptions.
I actually feel slightly bad for Ron right now, unfortunately for him, I'm sure he'll be awfully pigheaded and cause a falling out as per his character.
Darth Cooter
(Verified Lord of Cooters)(Dark Proprietor)(AP)
- Location
- error -loc root/users/dcooter not found
I know it was aluded to, but Harry having to deal with Aunt Flo for the first time aught to be interesting...
Hopefully the wizarding world has developed charms & potions for the young miss, or explaining to Mrs. McG that she needs to go to the pharmacist so soon after the last trip to the alley aught to be mortifying.
Poor Girl
Hopefully the wizarding world has developed charms & potions for the young miss, or explaining to Mrs. McG that she needs to go to the pharmacist so soon after the last trip to the alley aught to be mortifying.
Poor Girl
Grounders10
Nine-Tailed Kitsune
- Location
- British Columbia, Canada, Mars
This Harry has been handed money that isn't emotionally tied to 'family' and has been given an understanding that it's a *lot* of money... and at the same time still really doesn't get how much the average wizard makes or what constitutes expensive. Cause she's thirteen and her monetary education is like two months old at this point, at most. So she doesn't feel worried about spending *this* money, because it's extra. She has no connection to it compared to the money in her original vault. she gets that she has money now because she has a bit more context, and at the same time doesn't understand that she was *always* wealthy enough to do this. She still views her Gringotts vault as her fallback 'preserve this for emergencies' vault.... Rather than the several million galleon account it actually is. Because she never received context for the value of the pile that was there, only that it had to last through Hogwarts which left him with the impression that it was worth a lot less than it is.
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- Location
- Georgia
Not to mention the common fanfic trope of that vault in Gringotts just being a trust. Trust funds are there to keep an immature heir from spending all of their inheritance, and would certainly have been used by a noble house. Canon never discussed the matter, which is one of the reasons so many fanfics harp on Dumbledore manipulating Harry financially by being the one holding the key and never letting Harry actually know what he has and what it's worth.
Chapter Three: Red October
Grounders10
Nine-Tailed Kitsune
- Location
- British Columbia, Canada, Mars
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A Harry Potter Fanfic
The Best Kings Wear Skirts
By: Grounders10
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Chapter Three: Red October
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A Harry Potter Fanfic
The Best Kings Wear Skirts
By: Grounders10
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Chapter Three: Red October
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September gave way to October with a swiftness that surprised Harry. She had figured that between the time traveling, being turned into a girl, and the extra difficult classes things would drag on. Only, she instead found that she enjoyed the new classes and the time traveling, as weird as it was to have to plan where not to be constantly, made keeping up with them nearly trivial. If anything, she had more time to relax than before. At least when she wasn't searching the library for those books.
The search had consumed more hours than she figured it should have, but even when she'd broken down and asked Madam Pince she didn't seem to know where those books were. It was frustrating. Nimue wouldn't have asked her to read them if it wasn't important somehow, but so far it was proving to be frustratingly impossible. At the very least it had given her a knowledge of the layout of the massive library only Hermione could beat. She had the feeling that by the time she was done searching she'd probably have even Hermione beaten there.
Life in the girl's dorm was weird. By the third week everyone in her year's dorm had seemingly gotten used to Harry being there, Harry included, and now she only occasionally became a flustered mess. It was mostly Lavender's fault. The girl had zero idea of the concept of personal space.
That day she came down from the dormitory, chattering with Fay and Hermione as had become common about their ancient rune quiz the day before, and found one of the female prefects coming up the other way. "Ah, Potter. Professor McGonagall says that the Headmaster wishes to speak with you in his office after breakfast," she said.
"We have herbology this morning," Harry protested reflexively.
"Doesn't matter. She says the password is 'Twizzlers'. Another nonsense word again it seems," she said with a shrug.
"They are, a muggle candy," Hermione said, "From America."
"Huh." The girl looked puzzled as they walked by.
"What are Twizzlers?" Fay asked.
"Twisted red licorice candies, I think," Hermione said, "I've never actually had one." That led into a discussion of some of the differences in candies between the muggle and magical world. Somehow Harry wasn't too surprised that there existed lollipops that could and would melt a hole in your tongue. That people went back for more was just puzzling.
"I kinda wish we had a way to get muggle candies," Fay said.
"There's few things I miss," Harry admitted before tilting her head, "Hey Hermione-"
"My parents are dentists, do you really think they're going to send candies to us?" Hermione asked, exasperatedly.
"Point." She could really go for some chocolate that didn't require her to run it down first like chocolate frogs.
"She isn't the only muggleborn in our house," Fay said, "I'm sure if we asked around we could find someone willing to have some sent." They spent the rest of the walk downstairs trying to figure out who to ask. They found Ron and the rest of the third year boys already at the table.
"Morning," Harry said as she took a seat next to him.
"Hey," he said. The boy looked half dead in his seat, as did the other three boys.
"Do I want to know?" she asked.
"Seamus got these candies that let you imitate animal sounds perfectly," Ron said, yawning, "How is it we stay up late and we're still down before you?"
"Really Ron?" Hermione said, shooting him a look.
"What?"
Harry sighed and grabbed some bacon, tuning out the bickering of two of her friends in favour of food. Halfway through eating Oliver Wood stopped by. "Harry, Quidditch meeting after dinner. We'll use the same room as last time," he said, patting her on the head before hurrying off.
She scowled. "Why does everyone go for my hair these days?" she asked Hermione.
Hermione shrugged. Ron snorted. "Because you're tiny now and it amuses them?" he said.
Harry's scowl grew further. "I am not tiny. Just because I lost a few inches doesn't make me tiny," she protested.
"I think you're a little shorter than Ginny now, actually," Hermione said with a frown, "She's a bit tall for a second year, but…" She tapped her lips with the end of her fork as she stared at Harry.
"See!" Ron said, pointing with a butter knife.
"I hate you both," Harry said with complete seriousness. She felt a hand pat her on the head.
"Don't worry, you've still got me," Fay said, while patting her on the head.
"I hate you too."
"No you don't."
"Yes I do."
"Apple-cinnamon sausages?"
"... Thank you…" She spent the rest of breakfast glaring at her amused friends.
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"Twizzlers." The gargoyle at the base of the stairs in front of the Headmaster's Office stepped aside with a nod. She gave it a smile and stepped onto the steps behind it. They started moving and in a few moments she was standing outside the Headmaster's Office. She raised her hand to knock-
"Come in," Professor Dumbledore called.
She was going to find out how he did that if it was the last thing she did.
Harry opened the door and stepped inside. The Headmaster was seated at his desk in the center of the circular room. Much like prior years the walls were lined with the moving portraits of previous Headmasters. Fawkes, Professor Dumbledore's phoenix companion, was perched on his usual spot with a familiar black raven next to him. Both birds were watching her intently. "You asked for me, Professor?" she asked, wondering what Nimue's raven was doing at Hogwarts.
"That I did. Please, sit," he said, waving to the overstuffed seats before his desk.
"Thank you, sir," she said, taking a seat. She smoothed out her skirt and glanced up at where the sorting hat was. It seemed to be peering down from its perch, but said nothing as she turned back to Dumbledore.
"How are you handling things, this school year, Harry?" he asked, peering at her over his halfmoon spectacles.
"It's been… Awkward, but better than I expected?" she replied after a moment. She was somehow less ostracized by turning into a girl than she had been talking to snakes the previous year.
"I see you've made friends with your new dormmates," he said.
She nodded. "Mostly, I guess? I was already friends with Hermione. Fay's been great, and Parvati at least listens when I say no. Lavender is… Lavender. She really doesn't like how messy my hair is, sir," she said with a frown. It wasn't that bad! And she wasn't about to go drinking potions for things as minor as fashion. Especially when it would make her look more like a girl. She was already wearing a skirt, a fact that mostly bothered her in how quickly she'd gotten used to it.
Dumbledore nodded. "It is good to see you making more friends, just don't forget to make time for your older friends, like Mr. Weasley," he said.
"I- yes sir," she said. She had been, right? They were just joking at Breakfast a few minutes ago. She chewed her lip in thought. She had been making time for Ron with all of the time traveling, right? It was hard to keep track of everything she'd done over the last month, admittedly.
"Unfortunately, I'm afraid your schedule is about to become significantly more full, my girl," he said, producing a stack of parchment.
"Sir?"
"Due to the circumstances involving your transformation I have been in correspondence this last month with Madam Lakeshire," he said, brandishing the stack of papers, "During which it has become clear that your living arrangements are no longer neither necessary, nor tenable."
Hope blossomed in her heart. "Does this mean I don't have to return to the Dursleys, Professor?" she asked, practically bouncing in her seat. She didn't miss how for a moment Dumbledore seemed to get older.
"Yes, it does mean that. As the magic sustaining the protections your mother left you have moved to her, you do not need to stay with the Dursley's next summer," he said, pausing as she let out an uncontrolled 'Yes!', before continuing, "Furthermore, with your ascension to Heir of House Pendragon, her position as the official Guardian of House Pendragon has given her a claim to assume Guardianship over you."
"I- what?" She blinked, "Guardianship, sir?"
"She will be responsible for you and where you stay over the summer holidays, as well as important things like signing your permission slips. Like this one," Professor Dumbledore said as he produced a particular sheet of parchment, "Which grants permission for you to attend Hogsmeade in the future."
Harry broke out into a grin. "I get to go to Hogsmeade?"
"You can go to Hogsmeade," he confirmed with a chuckle, "However, that is not the only decision Madam Lakeshire has made for you. As I said, your schedule is about to become significantly more full."
"How sir?" she asked, her grin still nearly splitting her face. She was going to Hogsmeade! She didn't have to somehow convince the Dursleys to let her go next year!
"You will be taking three additional classes, under special tutors, come next week," Dumbledore said, "Etiquette, swordsmanship, and Politics and Law. She seems determined to help you prepare for what that sword of yours represents."
Harry's hand went to the blade with a grimace. "I- That still requires me to find Camelot, sir, and I have no idea where to start," she said. She wasn't sure she even wanted to try. And that was a lot of classes.
"Many have tried to find it, Harry. Do not be ashamed by not finding it in a month," he replied, "Your new schedule, Harry."
She accepted the sheet of paper and grimaced at the additions of Etiquette, Swordsmanship, and Politics and Law, which seemed to be sharing time with Charms, Potions, and DADA respectively. "Thank you sir," she said as she slipped it into her bag.
"Those classes will start next week," Professor Dumbledore said with a kind smile, "They will be providing any additional materials you require when you arrive, so you will not have to worry about that. Now, it's time for you to head to Herbology. I've kept you from Professor Sprout long enough."
"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir," she said, standing up.
"Take care to enjoy your week, Harry," he said, "And always make time for friends."
"... Yes, sir," she said before leaving. As she stepped onto the stairs again a grin broke out once more. She was going to Hogsmeade! Compared to a few extra classes she considered it a worthwhile trade. Especially since this probably meant she was going to be keeping the time turner.
She was still grinning when she reached the greenhouses five minutes later.
-0-0-0-0-0-
When Harry finally got a chance to tell everyone that she was able to go to Hogsmeade, Lavender and Parvati somehow managed to be more excited about that fact than Harry. Their excited chattering about 'plans' and 'places to go' made her rather worried.
The Quidditch meeting after dinner took place in a small room not far from the Gryffindor common room. It had clearly been used for the purpose by many subsequent generations of Gryffindors as it had pictures and portraits of previous winning teams hung in frames with plaques denoting which year they had won. There was a worn out desk, one of its legs had been replaced by a stack of wizarding children's letter blocks at some point that still occasionally flashed with different colours, at the front and a bunch of large overstuffed chairs. It could have been called a clubhouse, but Harry honestly couldn't say she remembered them ever using it for anything other than planning and that had only happened at the start of the previous year.
Harry arrived to find Oliver Wood, their burly seventh-year Captain and Keeper, writing something at the desk while Alicia Spinnet, Katie Belle and Angelina Johnson were standing around one of the chairs. All three looked up and grinned on seeing her.
"Harry!" Angelina said, sweeping over and grabbing her by the shoulder. With wide eyes, and a startled 'Hey!', Harry was dragged over to one of the overstuffed couches and dropped into it. Katie and Alicia sat down on either side of her.
"And now the girls officially outnumber the boys on the team," Alicia said with a laugh. Harry shot her an annoyed look that only succeeded in producing giggles.
"Don't be that way, Harry," Katie said, giving her a hug, "You're adorable." She then committed the sin of ruffling her hair.
"I'm not trying to be adorable!" Harry complained, sending her an exasperated look.
"Looking like this you really don't have to try," Alicia said, poking Harry in the cheek, "I'm officially jealous."
"Alright, enough girls," Angelina said, dragging over a chair to sit down in front of Harry. She was close enough their knees knocked as the older girl leaned forwards. "More seriously, has everything been going alright, Harry?" she asked with a concerned look
"... Fine I guess, given everything," Harry said with a shrug, "It's been more weird than anything."
"No one giving you grief in the dorms?" Angelina asked. She shook her head. Harry had expected to be practically ostracized after last year, but apparently being turned into a girl and daring to stay in the girls dorm wasn't frowned at the same way that speaking to snakes was or being found at multiple attack sites. "Are you sure?"
Harry nodded. "The girls in my dorm have been great," she said.
"What about outside of your room? Anyone causing issues?" Angelina asked.
"Other than all of Slytherin?" Harry deadpanned. Some of the Slytherin girls, along with some of Ravenclaw, had taken to fleeing the bathroom whenever she entered. There had even been a few attempts at hexing her when she wasn't looking.
"Well, yes."
"A lot of them get nervous when I show up in a bathroom," Harry admitted, "I get it, I'm not really supposed to be there cause I'm actually a guy but…" It was embarrassing more than anything, but she was used to being ostracized.
"Don't worry about that, Harry," Katie said, giving her another hug, this one was far less smothering.
"Yeah, we're here. You just let us know if anyone, even other Gryffindors, are bullying our adorable little Seeker and we'll handle it. Okay?" Alicia said, joining the hug and leaving Harry wide eyed in the middle of the two girls.
Angelina giggled. "Your expression Harry," she said, shaking her head, "We're being serious. We don't really know what happened, but you didn't do this to yourself, right?"
Harry glanced around. "Um, can I have my arms free?" she asked the two who were still hugging her. They both let go and all three stared as she pulled out her sword, still in its sheath. "I turned into a girl after drawing this. There was apparently a reaction with some old magic that was lingering in my scar thanks to Voldemort," all three shuddered at the name, and Harry just rolled her eyes, "And I woke up as a girl thanks to what Madam Lakeshire did to save me." It wasn't the whole truth, but she didn't really want to get into the whole truth.
"Is it safe?" Alicia asked, peering at it over Harry's shoulder.
"It was never dangerous, it just didn't like the dark magic that was in here," Harry said, tapping her forehead where the faded mark of her scar could still be seen.
Angelina leaned over and pulled Harry into a hug. "If anyone makes trouble about you being a girl, just tell us," she said, "We'll take care of it."
"I can take care of myself," Harry said, only to get poked in the forehead by Katie.
"We're being serious. As your older teammates it's our job to help you out," Katie said, "So tell us."
Alicia threw an arm over Harry's shoulder. "Can't let something happen to our cute little Seeker, now can we?" She repeated, pulling Harry over to her.
Harry blushed. "I'm fine, really," she said.
"And we'll help you stay fine, alright?" Angelina said, poking Harry in the cheek.
Harry hesitated for a moment, then said, "Thanks," with an honest smile.
"You girls done?" Oliver asked from across the room. The twins had arrived at some point.
"Oh, c'mon Ollie, let them have their moment," Fred said with a grin.
Oliver ignored George melodramatically 'fainting' into a nearby chair in horror. "This is our last chance -- my last chance -- to win the Quidditch cup," he told them as the girls gathered closer, a tone of desperation entering his voice, "I'll be leaving at the end of this year. I'll never get another shot at it. Gryffindor hasn't won for seven years now. OK, so we've had the worst luck in the world -- injuries -- then the tournament getting called off last year…" Wood swallowed, as though the memory still brought a lump to his throat, "But we also know we've got the best -- ruddy -- team -- in -- the -- school." He punched a fist into the other hand, the old manic glint returning to his eyes.
"We've got three superb chasers," he pointed to Alicia, Angelina, and Katie who were still clustered protectively about Harry, "Two unbeatable beaters."
"Stop it, Oliver, you're embarrassing us," said Fred and George Weasley together , both pretending to blush.
"And we've got a Seeker who has never failed to win us a match!" Oliver rumbled, glaring at Harry with a kind of furious pride, "and me," he added as an afterthought.
"We think you're pretty good, too, Oliver," said George.
"Cracking good Keeper," said Fred.
"The point is," Wood went on, beginning to pace behind the desk, "The Quidditch Cup should have had our name on it these last two years. Ever since Harry joined the team, I've thought the thing was in the bag. But we haven't gotten it, and this year's the last chance we'll get to finally see our names on the thing…"
Wood sounded so dejected that even the twins were looking at him with sympathy. "Oliver, this is our year," Fred told him.
"We'll do it, Ollie," said Angelina.
"Definitely," Harry agreed, grinning.
The schedule that Oliver laid out moments later only served to mildly dampen their spirits. But they were set for three evenings a week, no matter the weather.
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Harry spent the rest of the week fending off Lavender's attempts to tame her hair. The urge to hex the other girl was getting nearly uncontrollable. Her hair was fine, it didn't need to be tamed.
The next week she left her charms class and, thanks to a month of practice, managed to duck away from her friends. Hermione sent her an inquisitive look just before she vanished, so it wasn't a complete success, but she was soon back to before charms and hurried onto her Etiquette lesson. They had been granted one of the many empty classrooms on the second floor.
The inside of the classroom had been cleared, mostly. The blackboard was still there, but the desks were gone except for a single one by the board. Instead, two couches and a coffee table, complete with tea set, were in the center of the room while a dining table, currently empty, with chairs was by the window. A tall elegant woman with her brown hair in a bun, wearing a green lacy dress and black shawl was by the window. She turned as Harry entered.
"Ms. Potter, I hope?" she asked with a noticeable french accent.
"Yes, ma'am," she said, feeling an urge to straighten her skirt and dust off her robes, "Um, you would be," she checked her schedule, "Mrs. Auclair?" She guessed the reason it didn't list her as Professor was because she technically didn't work for Hogwarts itself.
"That I am. Welcome, please, take a seat," she said, gesturing to the couches. Harry hurried over and took a seat while Mrs. Auclair sat elegantly on the other side. "I am given to understand that your current situation is complicated. To start, you were not born a girl if I recall my English history correctly."
"That's right, ma'am."
"Hmm, tea?" she gestured to the tea set.
"Please, ma'am."
"You seem to be a bit politer than I had been told to expect," Mrs. Auclair said, a small smile forming as Harry scowled, though she quickly tried to hide it. "Don't bother hiding it for now, Ms. Potter. It's better that we understand each other. I must ask, how likely is it that you will be turned back into a boy?"
"... Not until my seventeenth birthday at least," Harry said sullenly. She hadn't bothered looking for anything on her issue since she was still looking for those books Nimue suggested. Part of her was wondering if they'd even survived the intervening years since they didn't seem to be anywhere.
"I suspected something like that. As such, I will be focusing my lessons on what might be expected of you as you are now, rather than as you were born to be. Should it become more relevant then I will, of course, teach you what you should know as a boy as well," Mrs. Auclair said. Harry nodded her understanding and accepted the offered tea with a thank you.
"My classes will generate little homework. Not that there will be none, but Etiquette is best learned through hands-on application. We will work one on one through a series of scenarios and the proper protocol. At the end of the year I will test you on everything to see what has stuck. This will not be properly graded, but anything you fail at we will cover again next year. My job is not to grade you, but to teach you."
"What sort of things are you going to teach?" Harry asked, sipping the tea.
"To start with, how to handle yourself in front of the camera as well as when presented to the Wizengamot. As I understand it your name has been put forward for an Order of Merlin, First Class, yes?" the older woman asked as she poured herself a cup of tea.
"That's right."
"Hmm," Mrs. Auclair sipped her tea, "After we prepare you for such an encounter, we will move onto things that might be expected in High Society. Dancing, greetings, letter writing, how to set a table or what might be expected when hosting a party. There are many, many other things of course, but I think we will start with some dancing."
"Dancing?" Harry's look of dislike brought a light chuckle from her teacher.
"Yes. We will incorporate dancing into the first hour of each class. Of the many skills I will teach you it is perhaps the one that requires the most practice. Someone of your importance will be expected to dance in many styles."
"So not what I signed up for," Harry muttered under her breath before taking another sip of tea. The raised eyebrow from her teacher told her that her complaining might not have been heard, but it had been recognized.
"For today, we will begin with a camera. Dory, the camera please," with a small crack a house-elf with long floppy ears that had small golden rings in them appeared with a large wizarding camera.
"Dory has it here, Mistress," the elf said.
"Thank you dear. Set it on the table," Mrs. Auclair said with a wide smile, "Then do as you wish until I call you."
"Yes Mistress," Dory said. She set the camera down then vanished with a crack.
"House elves. Always a treat to work with. I understand the Potters once had many," Mrs. Auclair said.
"I wouldn't know," Harry said, frowning down at her teacup.
Mrs. Auclair watched her for a moment with a small frown. "As I understand it, the Potters still own a number of properties that might have House Elves. I would suggest that you inquire about it at your first opportunity. House Elves often require input from their masters in order to keep up with maintenance and simple survival."
"Really?"
"Oh yes. There are many reasons that elves bind themselves to wizards and witches. Sustaining their magic is but one small part of it. To own a House Elf is a tremendous privilege, but not for the reasons many of the pureblood houses like to claim," Mrs. Auclair said, "We are placed in a position of trust. To abuse that is unconscionable, wouldn't you agree?"
Harry nodded, thinking of Dobby.
"Good," the look she received made her feel like she'd passed some kind of test, "Let us begin. Today, we will discuss how to present yourself before a camera."
-0-0-0-0-0-
Harry groaned as she pulled herself up the ladder to check the top shelf of the library stack she was searching. She had made the mistake of turning time back to have a go at the library after her potions class when she was still recovering from her first swordsmanship class. Her teacher, a dwarf by the name of Tollak Ironson, had run her through the most physically demanding exercise she'd experienced since her last gym class before Hogwarts.
She paused to lean against the ladder and let her sore muscles relax. After she was done with this bout of searching she was going to go and crash in her bed for an hour or two, possibly backstepping to do so so she could have that study session with Hermione and Ron they'd been talking about. Or, Hermione had been talking about, at them. With luck, Fay would join them as well.
Harry smiled despite the soreness. Fay was turning out to be a good friend, and definitely one of the positive points of turning into a girl.
Letting out a groan she went to start climbing again, only to pause. A fairly small book was lying atop the books in the shelf she was at head level with. Its spine was pointed the wrong way. She pulled it out, curious. It was a small, black, leatherbound book that was cracking with age, with the Hogwarts crest on the spine. The front was blank as was the back. It reminded her a bit of Riddle's diary actually.
She shivered, but cautiously flipped it open. To her relief, there was plenty of writing inside. She checked the front page. Written on it, in loopy handwriting that was barely legible, was:
The Diary of Myrtle Elizabeth Warren
Of House Ravenclaw
Circa. 1940 -
Of House Ravenclaw
Circa. 1940 -
Beneath it, in blocky printed font, were the words:
"Wit Beyond Measure Is Man's Greatest Treasure." ~ Rowena Ravenclaw
"Myrtle's… Diary?" Harry said, sliding back down the ladder. She flipped through the book. The first few pages were the usual diary entries of a young girl, but it rapidly turned into less of a diary and more of a research log. Taking a seat she started reading through the notes. It didn't take long for her to hit the limits of her knowledge in multiple subjects. There were notes on Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, Alchemy, and Warding and so much else, but her cursory glance through made it rather clear that Myrtle Warren, Moaning Myrtle of all people, had been quite the witch in the making.
Resolving to take it to Myrtle later, Harry dropped it into her bag and went back to her searching. It went as poorly as any others had and she gave up after she was done searching the rest of the shelves, though not before she pulled a copy of General Use Charms By Frederick V. Broad from the shelf. On one hand, it looked interesting, on the other, it probably didn't belong in the history section. Madam Pince would probably be happy she'd found yet another wayward book.
After checking out the book, Harry stepped back through time again and retreated to her bed. She greeted Lavender and Parvati absently as she dropped Myrtle's Diary into her trunk along with her textbooks. She left General Use Charms on her bedside table and promptly flopped into bed with a loud yawn. She fell asleep not long after despite listening to Lavender and Parvati chatter about an article from Witch Weekly. Something about nail polish was all she'd recall the next day.
She found herself shaken awake by Fay only a few hours later. She was, apparently, late for the study session.
"Thanks, Fay," she mumbled as she pulled herself out of bed, "Be down in a few."
The study session was less productive than Harry would have liked, but it took her mind off her sore body. Inadvertently it had the side effect of taking her mind off other more important things and by the time she woke up the next day, the Diary was completely out of her mind at the bottom of her trunk.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Harry stepped into the third floor room that had been set aside for her Politics and Law class showing no signs that she had spent the last two hours, temporally, running around in the pouring rain dealing with hinkypunks as part of Professor Lupin's latest DADA class. The ability to take showers in the middle of the day was one of the things she had come to love about the Time Turner she was using. At least when circumstances didn't somehow mean she had to share a shower with herself.
That had been a very awkward afternoon from both perspectives.
The room itself had clearly started out as a teacher's office, but was currently set up as a sitting room. Standing by the room's sole window, staring out at the black lake with a blank expression, was a thin willowy man in elaborately decorated purple robes. Gold thread runes and gemstones glittered across much of the fabric.
"Ms. Potter, I presume?" he asked without looking as she closed the door.
"Yes sir."
"You are five minutes early," he noted, "In the world of politics that can be both a blessing and a curse depending on who you are dealing with."
"Sir?"
He cracked a small smile. "People are finicky, they find the strangest things to complain about. Sometimes these complaints turn into laws, other times they turn into grudges which linger for decades or centuries until whatever petty feeling engendered them has long been forgotten and all the remains is the belief that there was a wrong," he said, "Pointless and petty it may be, but these beliefs can define how a witch or wizard votes centuries down the line. Learning how to play around these ancestral grudges is but one small aspect of politics."
He turned her way. "Please, take a seat, Ms. Potter," he said, gesturing to an overstuffed armchair by the room's sole fireplace. She hurried into it. "I am James Edward Fleamont Dankworth-McLeod. It is my duty to teach you Politics, Law, and Philosophy, though the latter is merely a side effect of our examination of the former two. In order to understand Politics and Law you must understand the motivations that bring them about. Our work shall be a mixture of lecture, discussion, and essays. I expect thorough notetaking and will be examining your notes after each session to ensure you've been paying attention. Any questions, Ms. Potter?"
Harry swallowed nervously as the strangely intense man raised an eyebrow in her direction. "Um… Are we just talking about current politics or…?"
"Historical, current and theoretical future. While current politics might be more important to the immediate, you should never deal with someone whom you do not understand the former. The origins of their beliefs can tell you a great deal about what someone may wish from you. Both combined can also help you theorize what future policies they might be willing to support, or stand against," her tutor said, "Anything further?"
"No sir."
"Excellent," He waved his wand and a desk, perfectly sized for Harry's chair, appeared before her, "Take out your notebook, quill and inkpot. We will get started immediately." The next two hours were one of the most intense lectures Harry had ever experienced, and despite being quite overwhelming, one of the more viscerally interesting ones.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Potions was proving to both be infuriating and odd to Harry once again. Professor Severus Snape had spent the last month refusing to so much as look at Harry if he had the choice. His eyes would sweep the room of brewing students and unless she was turning in a potion he'd just go right over her. On one hand it was nice, she hadn't lost a point all month, a record for any non-Slytherin, but on the other it was annoying. He was definitely being more vicious to the other Gryffindors as well, venting his displeasure with increased frequency, as though trying to make up for not venting at her. It had earned her a few irritated complaints from the rest of her year. Seamus in particular had managed to get hexed by Fay for suggesting that Harry had somehow struck a deal with the devil so she wouldn't lose more points.
Harry just figured that Snape was nuts.
Still, nuts or not he was just as strict a grader as before. A fact that had her taking thankful advantage to double down on her potions. Without Snape practically breathing in her ear she managed potions of… higher quality. It wasn't like she suddenly had become a potions genius, but one or two of her potions over the last month had managed to earn a very begrudging Outstanding.
Which hadn't helped to persuade Seamus she hadn't made a deal with the devil, but repeated Hexings by Fay seemed to have done that well enough.
That day they were hunkered down in the dim classroom working on an intermediate cleansing solution for use on the cauldrons. Relying on Billywig Stings and the scales of an Ashwinder, the solution had a few moments where it could get a bit dicey while brewing. Add the Ashwinder Scales too soon and it would explode. Add them too late and it would fail. Reverse the order and add Billywig Stings first and it would explode. There were a few other points of failure, but by and large they'd lead to the potion exploding.
Harry had known that from doing the homework Snape had assigned after the lecture earlier in the week. Something that Neville had seemingly missed when he mixed up adding the two primary ingredients. By some small fortunate no one was hurt when the potion… popped, but Neville had lost twenty points and taken a zero on the assignment.
Harry patted him on the shoulder once Snape was looking away and gave him a small smile. He smiled weakly as he continued cleaning up a few of the ingredients that had been scattered by his panicked response to the cauldron blowing out like a soap bubble in a windstorm. He had a lot of work to due thanks to the scorch marks left on the floor from where the potion had landed.
Hermione quietly flicked her wand and whispered, "Reparo." A handful of broken bottles repaired themselves, though without their contents, and Neville sent her a thankful nod as he hurriedly stored them away. He was probably going to have to order new potions ingredients. Again.
With that disaster nerves had fallen sharply across the classroom, including Harry. Neville was a known issue and seeing him out of the assignment had left the room feeling less like it was about to explode. Which was probably why Harry hadn't noticed the weird sparks flying off of Crabbe's potion before the big Slytherin let out a panicked shout and scrambled away as it began to fountain sparks like a Roman Candle. She'd half-turned to the spectacle when Goyle, seated at the same table as his friend, tried to… honestly, Harry wasn't sure what exactly had gone through Goyle's mind when he heaved the potion-filled cauldron off the table with both hands. All she knew is that the cauldron had briefly attained the state that all large heavy objects desired more than anything: Flight.
Despite her attempt to throw herself out of her chair it terminated this brief existential existence by soaking her head to toe in searing, exploding orange liquid. The only fortunate thing she could say about it was the fact that the cauldron, a small pewter one, succeeded in clonking her on the head hard enough to knock her out after only a brief surge of pain.
Waking in the hospital wing was remarkably painless in comparison, though there was a lingering soreness in her scalp that throbbed weakly as she sat up. In fact it felt a bit heavier than before.
Looking about there didn't appear to be anyone else, though a moment later Madam Pomfrey emerged from her office. Harry had long since begun to suspect she was using some form of alarm charm to alert her when her patients woke up.
"Awake now, I see, Ms. Potter," the Mediwitch said warmly as she came over. A flick of a wand saw a pitcher of water and a glass sail from her desk to Harry's bedside table. She presented Harry with a full glass of water that she took with wordless thanks. "How do you feel?"
"Mhmm, my head hurts," Harry replied, rubbing the side of her head.
"That tends to happen when you take a cauldron to the skull," she noted dryly, "Anything else?"
"All of my head hurts? Like all of my hair," she said, waving her hand around the back of her head, only to stop when her hand got tangled in a large mass of… hair? She pulled her hand back before her. Long silky strands of red hair that seemed to shimmer with light from within as they hung from her fingers, clinging despite her wishes. She reached back and pulled forward a lock of hair. It was long enough to reach her lap. "What the hell? What happened to my hair?" She would deny any accusations of screeching in outrage as she frantically examined her hair.
"The incomplete cleansing solution burned off your hair and I was forced to regrow it at the same time I repaired the burns it left," Madam Pomfrey said, "I'm unsure at the moment why it seems to have begun to glow. It's clearly an effect of the potion, but both Professor Snape and I are at a loss as to what exactly could have caused this sort of reaction."
Harry grimaced as she examined a lock of hair as thick around as her wrist. Her hair didn't just seem to be longer, it had more body and there just seemed to be more hair than she'd had before. There was definitely a glow to it as well. Not so bad with a single strand, but an entire lock made it rather obvious. She doubted it was bright enough to read by, far from it really, but she didn't even want to imagine what this made her look like. "Nothing?" she asked.
"Nothing that should have been in the potion," Madam Pomfrey said with a frown, "But never you worry about that." She waved her wand and a small vial of potion swept over to her. "Pain relieving potion," she said, holding it out to Harry.
The moment the vial was popped open a foul smell assaulted Harry's nose. With a grimace she drank it, gagging a bit on the taste, but the pain she was feeling faded moments later. She returned the vial to the mediwitch and flopped back onto her pillow. "Do you have to torture me with these things?" she asked, to the Mediwitch's amusement.
Madam Pomfrey flicked her wand over Harry a few times before nodding. "You appear to be fine now. You can head back to Gryffindor Tower now," she said, "But restrain yourself to light activities for the rest of the week."
Harry winced. Oliver wasn't going to be happy with that, nor was her swordsmanship tutor, Mr. Ironson. "Yes, ma'am," she said, sliding out of bed, "Um, how long was I out?"
"Only a couple of hours. You've missed dinner I'm afraid, but you're lucky, these sorts of accidents happen frequently enough that I keep the appropriate potions on hand," Madam Pomfrey said, "Now get along." Harry quickly checked for her bag, but there didn't seem to be anything. Hopefully her friends had grabbed her things from class.
It had to be her shortest stay in the hospital wing ever, Harry mused as she worked her way down to the Kitchen. Unfortunately, with her place so well known she couldn't just time travel with impunity and join her friends for dinner. So it was to the kitchens, then to the tower with snacks.
Harry ran a hand through her hair, she was annoyed. She'd been resisting Lavender's attempts to convince her to take a hair growth potion, and now she had basically gotten one forced on her thanks to… She supposed it was both Crabbe and Goyle. She would just have to get it cut later.
At the top of the steps down she encountered a familiar blonde-haired Slytherin girl. Harry paused at the same time as Daphne Greengrass. The Slytherin girl eyed her for a moment. "A bit late to be walking towards the Dungeons," Daphne said neutrally.
"I'm headed to the kitchen, actually," Harry said, starting down the stairs, matching the steps of the other girl incidentally.
"The kitchen? You know where that is?" Daphne said, a tone of disbelief in her voice.
"You don't?" Harry asked. She would have thought that if anyone knew where the kitchens were it would be the Slytherins. Then again, maybe they just didn't share the knowledge with each other? Daphne remained silent, her head half turned away from Harry. The Gryffindor rolled her eyes at the Slytherin.
Harry turned right off the steps and kept walking down the corridor. A few moments later the sound of feet began to follow her. The kitchen wasn't far and she paused by the painting of the fruit basket to glance back to Daphne. The blonde was peeking out from behind a suit of armour and ducked back as Harry watched.
"You know, if you wanted to know where the kitchen is, all you had to do was ask," Harry said, rolling her eyes at the girl.
Daphne emerged from behind the statue with a frown and a small blush that was visible in the flickering torchlight. "So it's here?" she asked.
"Tickle the pear," Harry said, waving at the fruit basket. When Daphne just stared at her with the expression of a person who refused to be tricked, Harry rolled her eyes and reached up. The pear giggled beneath her fingers and transformed into a door handle. Harry pulled the painting open and shot Daphne an exasperated look before heading in.
"Oh, Missy Potter," the first elf said as she entered. The elves had begun to recognize her on sight over the last couple months. "You is needing dinner?"
"And snacks too. Maybe you could add some of those pumpkin cookies if you have any? Hermione loves them," Harry said, and Hermione did love them, at least when she stopped thinking about who had made them. Behind her Daphne let out a strangled noise. "Hmm?"
"I had heard," Daphne said, her voice a little strangled, "That Hogwarts had house elves, but I never thought there were so many. Most wizards don't even have any at all."
"Oh," Harry said, shrugging as she allowed an elf to show her to the table where she was soon confronted with a platter of kidney pie and mashed potatoes with a very large, maybe too large, bowl of salad. She usually avoided salads.
As she dug into the late meal she heard an elf behind her ask, "Cans we be doing anything for Young Miss as well?"
"I- snacks. Something for eating in bed, I guess?" Daphne asked, sounding more unsure than Harry had ever heard her. Not that she really ever heard Daphne speak. The girl was a cold facade most of the time, only really speaking around non-Slytherins when asked by a teacher or those rare moments like this even when you encountered her by herself. Daphne wasn't Pansy or Malfoy, she didn't try to antagonize Gryffindors.
"We have just the thing, Miss," the elf declared, bouncing eagerly in a way that sent her ears flopping about like the wings of an eager bat.
A few minutes later they handed Daphne a small brown bag and the girl hurried out the door, only to pause at the door. "Potter," she said, prompting Harry to look her way. "Thank you for showing me the kitchen."
"You're welcome, just do me a favour, don't tell Malfoy or Pansy," Harry asked.
Daphne laughed and gave her a brief toothy smile. "I have no intention of telling anyone," she said, her eyes glittering as she ducked out, "See you in class, Potter."
"Later Greengrass," she called, waving with a fork. She quickly finished her food and accepted a large, quite possibly space expanded, brown bag. Carrying it up to the Gryffindor common room was a pain, but the reaction she got as she dropped it on the table between Fay and Lavender was amusing.
"Merlin, what is this, Harry?" Fay demanded as she yanked her book back. Across from her Lavender's eyes went wide as she stared at the bag of goodies before turning towards Harry.
"Snacks. The house elves basically toss-" Harry started before Lavender practically tackled her off her feet.
"Harry, your hair!" the blonde menace squealed, hanging off Harry's arm as she tugged and prodded Harry's long red hair.
"Lavender! Get off!" Harry said, trying to shake the limpet from her arm.
"It's so nice and soft. You look amazing," the other girl said, seemingly heedless of how Harry was trying to shake her off or that quite a few eyes in the common room were turning their way.
Harry met Ron's eyes across the room where the other redhead was playing chess against Seamus and mouthed, "Help me!" To her annoyance he went red, snerked, and went back to his game. The ass.
"Lavender, let her go," Fay said even as she peered into the bag of snacks, "Where did you run into house elves?"
"The kitchen. Lavender, I said get off! I'm not even going to be keeping it this long so stop it," Harry snapped, finally pulling herself free from Lavender with an annoyed hiss.
"Cut it? Well it is a bit long. Taking care of it would be a hassle, but you should keep it fairly long, Harry, it looks good and- Is it glowing?" Lavender asked, holding up a lock of her hair. It seemed to be glowing brighter than it had in the hospital wing,
"That's a side effect of the potion I got hit with," Harry replied as she pulled her hair out of Lavender's hand, "And stop playing with my hair! You keep doing this! Stop it!" She grit her teeth in frustration.
Lavender hesitated, looking nervous as Harry scowled at her. Before she could say anything Harry sighed tiredly. Despite having spent a good part of the afternoon unconscious, it wasn't sleep, and she suddenly felt just… exhausted. "I'm going to bed. Enjoy the snacks," she said, her voice clipped and short before she turned on a heel and stormed upstairs, just barely avoiding colliding with Ginny on the way. The second year girl stared at her as she practically broke into a run up the steps without even saying a word.
She wasn't sure what she'd have said anyways. Ginny had barely said a word to her before, other than squeaking and putting her elbow in the butter dish repeatedly.
Tears she wasn't entirely sure the origin of were gathering in the corners of her eyes as she slammed the door to her dorm. It was by some happenstance empty. Which was fine with her. She didn't want to talk to anyone anyways.
"Stupid Lavender," she complained as she flopped onto her bed. That girl just kept pushing, and pushing, and pushing without thinking. She didn't want long silky hair! She didn't want to look like a girl or wear skirts or- She screamed into her pillow as her frustration at everything she'd been trying to ignore boiled over. She screamed, raged, punched her pillow and probably would have done more if she hadn't realized that everything around the room was floating and quivering like they were under extreme pressure. Socks, trunks, bedside pictures, books and even the beds were floating in the air and everything was glowing a bright ominous red as her hair was blazing with light.
As though realizing it was the key everything dropped back to the ground with a crash. At the same time her hair blinked out, returning to its normal bright, but not glowing, red. An ice cold feeling of tiredness chased its way down her back as she rolled onto her back. She inhaled, her voice half sobbing as she curled up on the bed.
She wasn't sure how long later, probably no more than a few minutes, the door of the dorm creaked open. "Harry?" Hermione's nervous voice called from the crack in the door.
"Go away!" Harry said, pulling the curtains shut around her bed with a sob.
The door opened further as her friend, quite predictably, ignored her demand. "Harry- Oh Merlin, Harry- Reparo. Reparo." Harry hiccuped and wiped her eyes on the back of her sleeves as she listened to Hermione repeat the repair spell over two dozen times.
A feeling of guilt wormed its way up inside Harry. She hadn't meant to break so many things, she'd just… Lost control. Like back in the summer. She sniffled. Back when she'd been a boy, even if she'd been at the Dursley's.
Her hair fell across her eyes, and promptly flared brightly, dazzling herself with a bright red flash, as she snarled and practically ripped it out of the way as she stuffed it behind an ear. The pain that shot through her skull despite the pain relieving potion made it clear that was a bad idea. She did it anyway, tugging at her hair repeatedly, which did very little to the newly grown hair. Tears were running down her face as the curtains towards Hermione's bed were wrenched open by the girl in question.
"Harry," Hermione said, hesitating as she saw Harry.
Harry, her eyes clouded with tears, let out a sob and practically tackled her best friend with a hug. Hermione stumbled backwards and tripped, landing on her bed with Harry crying into her shoulder.
"Harry…" Hermione whispered and wrapped her arms around Harry, Harry couldn't quite make out what she was saying as she simply vented her tears and emotions onto her best friend. She thought she heard quiet assurances and she could feel a hand rubbing her back in soothing circles.
Eventually, a very long eventually, her tears ran out and she was left hiccuping into Hermione's shoulder, her head pounding with its own beat as she finally pulled back. "S-sorry," she said, her voice hitching. She felt flushed as she pulled back, embarrassed enough she felt like she was going to die from how warm her face felt. Her throat was raw.
"It's fine, Harry," Hermione said. She brushed Harry's hair back behind her ear, prompting a grimace. "Sorry."
"Don't be, I-" she coughed and rubbed her throat, "Water?"
Hermione stood up and retrieved the eternally full water pitcher from the cluster of desks in the center of the room. She grabbed her glass from the bedside table and filled it up. "Here."
"That's your glass," Harry croaked.
"Just drink," Hermione said exasperatedly.
With a slight twitch of her lips she took the glass of water. The feel of cold water down her throat brought a relieved sigh from Harry. "Thanks."
Hermione dropped onto the bed beside her and leaned over to pull her into a hug. Harry shifted awkwardly as she leaned against her best friend. She sipped the water.
"So, what happened, Harry? Everyone saw you storm out and Ginny came to me and said you were crying. Fay said I should probably be the one to come check on you," Hermione said.
Harry grimaced and finished her glass of water. Her head was hurting and her eyes were burning from the crying. She probably looked frightful enough to scare Lavender. Her lips twitched into a momentary smile.
"What?" Hermione asked.
"Just thinking about how Lavender would probably be horrified at how I look right now. Think I should walk downstairs just to frighten her?" Harry asked, hiccuping a little.
"Don't be silly. Now stop avoiding the question. What happened, Harry?" Hermione said bossily, prodding Harry in the cheek. Harry turned her head away.
"It's nothing."
"Harry James Potter, you just spent-" she glanced at her watch, "An hour crying into my shoulder. It's not nothing!"
Harry flushed. She'd spent an hour?! Merlin, everyone would think she was some kind of basket case. Would they even be wrong? She'd just gone completely to pieces because Lavender tried to compliment her hair. Her… Hair…
She reached up and pulled a lock of her hair forwards. It was glowing brighter than it had in the common room, but not quite as bright as it had been in her bed. "Lavender…" she licked her still dry lips, "Can I get more water?"
"Sure, but keep talking," Hermione said, grabbing the pitcher.
As her drink was refilled Harry scrambled for words to describe why exactly she had gone completely to pieces. "Lavender was saying my hair looked nice," Harry said, feeling very off as she said it. Like she wasn't really sitting there, in the girls dorm. Like it wasn't her body that was speaking.
"And?" Hermione prodded gently, pushing the cup of water back into Harry's hands before massaging her back.
"She suggested keeping it long. I- Hermione, I- I-" Harry blinked as more tears started to form. Her red hair started glowing brighter again. She felt arms encircle her again and a moment later she was leaning against Hermione fighting the traitorous tears that wouldn't. Stop. Flowing.
A few minutes later she pulled away and finally remembered to finish her glass of water. "S-sorry, Hermione, I-" She swallowed, her throat felt lumpy and uncooperative.
"I… I think I get it, Harry," Hermione whispered, brushing Harry's softly flickering hair out of her eyes.
Her brow furrowed. "You do?" Harry asked, wondering how Hermione could understand this when she couldn't.
"I was wondering how you were handling being a girl so well," Hermione said, putting her head on top of Harry's as she pulled her into a hug. On one hand it felt embarrassing, on the other it somehow made her feel… safe, and she was so tired she couldn't even formulate a coherent complaint. "I'm guessing, you haven't been, right?"
"I dunno…" Harry mumbled, "It's… Not as bad as I thought it would be? Does… does that make sense?"
"Maybe. What bothers you the most?" Hermione asked.
Harry took a minute to answer as she just stared at the cup of water in her hands. "I don't know. Not… being a girl, I guess. Doesn't feel any different from being a guy, not by itself," she mumbled, remembering the embarrassing first few days.
"Then what does?"
"I'm not sure. Don't really care about the clothes. They're better than Dudley's old things," she said.
"Why you kept wearing those when you had the money to get your own I have no idea," Hermione muttered, causing Harry to flush and fidget.
"That bad?"
"Harry, I'm not a fashion girl and even I can say, yes, they were," Her best friend said with a soft, if teasing, tone.
Harry plucked at her uniform's sweater. The clothes, even the skirt, honestly didn't bother her much… She frowned. They didn't bother her at all, actually. Not after the first week. She'd just… stopped thinking about it. She chewed her lip, a habit she had recently picked up from Hermione, in thought. The clothes really were better than what the Dursley's had forced her into and it honestly felt nice to not have to wear her uniform all the time just to avoid looking like she was swimming in elephant's skin.
"So what does bother you, Harry?" Hermione asked. It was a leading question, but Harry found it hard to mind.
"I don't know," she finally said.
"Hmmm, so Lavender constantly making attacks on your hair doesn't bother you? You've been rather snippish with her recently," Hermione said, sounding sympathetic.
Harry frowned. Her hair started to glow brighter as she thought about how many times Lavender had taken a brush or a potion or something to her hair to try and 'Tame the mess." She was so utterly sick of the other girl's efforts to try and… and… She drained her glass of water and let out an explosive sigh. "She makes me so mad," she said, "I just… I don't like people going at my hair constantly…. Aunt Petunia used to do that and… It's like she's trying to make me…" Something. Make her something. She tried to find the right word, but failed, eventually giving up as tears appeared and were wiped forcefully away. She felt Hermione wince as her hair grew brighter still, casting a red glow upon the walls. She should probably go back to the hospital room in the morning and get Madam Pomfrey to look at that. Having hair that broadcasted how upset you were was going to draw so much teasing from the Slytherins. Even if she didn't say anything they'd be able to tell.
She felt Hermione get up, her arms leaving Harry. "Hermione?" she asked, shivering suddenly as she watched the other girl walk over to Harry's trunk and start digging. "What are you doing, Hermione?" Her confusion grew when the bushy-haired girl pulled out Harry's album of photos of her parents that Hagrid had put together for her in her first year.
"You know, Lavender had a go at my hair at the beginning of first year," Hermione said as she sat down next to Harry again, "She seems to think that anyone not being as beautiful as possible is a crime against humanity. Like they're denying themselves something important."
"I noticed," Harry mumbled. She brushed a loose strand of her glowing hair behind an ear. Yes, visiting Madam Pomfrey in the morning was going to be a necessity.
"I got really annoyed with her for a while. Most of the year, really," Hermione continued, "She still bugs me about my hair on occasion." She fluffed it a bit and grinned awkwardly at Harry. The redhead rolled her eyes at her friend.
"Well I wish she'd just… Stop. Bugging. Me." Harry said, her voice cracking a little.
Hermione flipped the album open and flipped around, looking for something. Something she found, eventually with an "Ah" of discovery. She scooted over next to Harry. "Here," she said, pointing at a picture of Harry's parents. James and Lily were sitting at a table outside Fortescue's ice cream parlor -- had it really been open that long? -- and they were laughing.
"What's this about, Hermione?" she asked, sniffling as she stared at her happy parents. When had this photo even been taken? Who even took it? She didn't really know much about her parent's friends. They had to have some somewhere.
"I think, I know what's bothering you, Harry," Hermione said, brushing her own hair behind her ear. It promptly popped out from behind her ear earning an annoyed sigh. She pressed a finger to the picture in question, directly on the face of James Potter who dropped below it to continue making faces at Lily.
"My father isn't bothering me, Hermione," Harry said dryly, her voice cracking. She glanced at the glass of water and licked her lips. She could do with a bit more.
"Not like that, Harry," Hermione said with an exasperated tone. "... I'm explaining this badly, aren't I?"
"You're explaining?" Harry shifted away and stood up to get more water.
"Shush," Hermione huffed, "Harry, the clothes don't bother you because you've always hated your clothes. Am I right?"
Harry paused, the glass of water at her lips. "... Yes," she admitted. She had always hated what the Dursley's forced her to wear. For years they'd palmed Dudley's terribly worn old clothes off on her. Having her own things, even girl things, was… They were hers. And sure she had complained about the skirts for her uniform at first, but she found herself liking them just as much as the vests and blouses and the pants. They were all just comfortable and looked nice. Made her look nice for once.
Compared to looking like a kid being draped in cast-off elephant skin it was night and day.
"And your hair? Harry, you don't start crying because Lavender is being annoying," Hermione said. Harry sat down on her own bed across from Hermione.
"That's what it felt like today," she muttered.
Hermione sent her what she seemed to think was a comforting smile, and it was… mostly. "Harry… Your hair reminds you of your father."
"... It's hardly a reminder, Hermione," Harry replied, "I never knew him so how can I be reminded of him?"
"I've heard people say you look just like him so many times. His hair, your mother's eyes," Hermione said softly as she turned the album around and passed it over to Harry. Her finger rested above Harry's parents. "Have you looked in a mirror since this morning, Harry?" she asked kindly as Harry looked at her parents. She took the glass of water from Harry and set it aside.
"No, I haven't," she said, staring at her parents. She probably didn't look much like her father anymore, did she? Messy hair usually got more bearable when it got longer and she could feel hers against her bum. It was far too long for her taste even if… if…
Hermione laid her hands across the album, prompting Harry to look up to meet her eyes. "Go and look," She said, nodding towards the bathroom. Gently she took the album away and Harry stared at it for a long moment. Hermione prodded her. "Go, look."
Hesitant, feeling a bit like she was walking to an execution, she stood up and walked over to the large bathroom that all of the girls in the tower shared. She paused at the door. Why was she scared? She'd fought a basilisk last year and even then she hadn't felt this paralyzed. Taking a deep breath, she gathered her Gryffindor courage and pushed open the ajar door.
It was a large circular room of worn stone with alcoves running off it in between the doors to the other girl's rooms. It was an impossible layout, but magic often didn't care about little things like space. In the center of the room was a large pool, the bath in which Harry normally saw a few of the older girls relaxing in the late night. Tonight they were empty, as were the showers in the alcoves. That fit Harry just fine, as she didn't want to put on a scene as she approached one of the sinks set against the wall with a large mirror.
For ten seconds she stopped breathing as she met her own face. Though it was streaked from tears, with emerald green eyes that were red and puffy, and framed by a wild and long mass of red hair, she couldn't help it she said, "Mother?" Her voice cracked as she felt tears appear all by themselves. She stumbled forward and crashed against the sink's counter more than she leaned against it.
Harry looked like her mother, terrifyingly so. She strained, eyes watering as she searched for any search of James, of her father, in her face. Her eyes were her mothers. Her face structure was similar to her mother's, though a weak part of her pointed out it had always been somewhere between both parents. Her hair was the same vibrant shade, even if it was beginning to glow brightly from her emotions.
Her nose.
She stared.
Yes, her nose. It looked like her father's. She grinned weakly. It wasn't much, but…
Harry sagged to her knees and rested her head against the counter. She'd managed to ignore it, but she looked like a miniature Lily Potter.
Hands hugged her from behind.
"I look like my mother," Harry said to Hermione as she leaned back into the larger girl. Inside her stomach some weird mix of emotions. She felt at once sad and happy and it was making her nauseous as she tried to understand it.
"With your father's messy hair," Hermione said.
Harry frowned. "No I don't."
"Harry, I've seen pictures of your mother's long hair. Even at her worst, it wasn't this wild," Hermione said with good humour. She ran a hand through Harry's hair and the redhead pulled away with a huff.
"Maybe…" She grumbled, uncertain. Her friend sighed.
"I think I know what you're afraid of, Harry," she said, sending a shiver down Harry's spine.
"What?" She asked. That was a weird thing to say when she had been trying to calm her down for over an hour!
Hermione turned her around, leaving them seated with Harry in her lap facing her. "I've been trying to figure it out since Professor Lupin's first class. Did you know that Boggarts are terrible with abstract fears? A fear of insects or ghosts or spiders is easy, but what does it do when the person is scared of the unknown or the future or… other even more esoteric things?" she said.
That… made some sense, Harry guessed. "So what was it trying to represent, Hermione?" she asked.
"You're scared of not being you anymore," Hermione said. Harry opened her mouth to protest how ridiculous that was only to find Hermione putting a finger to her lips. "No, listen. Your Boggart turned into you and Malfoy getting married. You're so freaked out about your hair because after turning into a girl it's all you associate with your dad about yourself now. You're scared of waking up one day Harry and being someone you don't recognize anymore."
"Because I turned into a girl?" Harry said, her voice questioning.
Hermione shook her head. "But being a girl isn't what bothers you, is it? You said as much on the bed," she said.
Was she right? Harry blinked and shivered as she pictured waking up and being the sort of person that would get married to Draco Malfoy. She was already halfway there, wasn't she?
Her breathing was coming in short violent breaths and her vision was swimming before a sharp pain rang through her entire head. She grabbed her cheek and stared at Hermione. "You just slapped me," she said, her voice sounding dim to herself.
"You were panicking," Hermione said, blushing hard herself.
"I-" Harry took a shaky breath and stood up, nearly smacking her head against the corner of the counter. "I- yeah, um… Hermione, if I ever say anything like 'God he's hot' or 'I'm thinking of marrying him' about Malfoy, curse me on the spot and have me checked for a love potion. Please, Hermione?" Her smile felt fragile. She felt fragile. Like a glass ornament being used to juggle on a tightrope.
Her friend sent her a grin and stood up. "I can do that," she said before giving Harry a big hug. "Don't think you're alone here, Harry. You have friends." Harry hugged her back and mentally cursed as she felt her tears coming back. God she was a basket case, wasn't she?
"I know Hermione," she said, only to receive a doubtful look that made her blush.
"Uh huh, well I'm going to keep reminding you, Harry," Hermione said, poking her in the side, "Now, take a shower or a bath or whatever. If Lavender sees you like this she'll need a trip to the hospital wing."
Harry half-snorted, half-giggled at the thought. So what if it was a little hysterical, at least she was laughing. "Yeah, I- I'm going to have a shower," she said.
"Stay," Hermione said, leaving the room only to return a moment later with some of Harry's things. "Do you want me to let the other's know you're feeling… better?"
Harry's fragile smile dropped for a moment. "I… Well it's their dorm too, right? Just-" she took a shuddering breath, "Just, give me a few minutes head start?"
"I can do that," Hermione said before departing the bathroom. As the door clicked closed Harry turned to the showers. Somehow, this felt as daunting as it had that first day months ago. She'd thought she'd gotten used to it, but…
With a groan she dumped her things on the counter and started with the buttons on her vest. She only had a few minutes before her roommates would be swarming again.
-0-0-0-0-0-
To Harry's surprise her roommates didn't come swarming into the bathroom looking to get ready for bed. Nor did she meet any of the older or younger girls. She was thus able to finish her less-awkward-than-she'd-thought-it-would-be shower in peace. A fact that she was immensely grateful for as she toweled off and pulled on the clothes Hermione had grabbed from her trunk. Her thoughts were still circling the emotional whirlpool she'd fallen into as she pulled on her nightshirt and dumped her dirty clothes into the hamper. The House Elves would clean them and they'd invariably find their way back to Harry's trunk.
Opening the door to the dorm she stopped short on seeing the rest of her year sitting on or around Hermione's bed along with Ginny, Alicia, Angelina, and Katie. Before she could get a word out the three chasers swarmed her, making worried clucking noises and asking questions as they dragged her over to one of the desk chairs.
"What are you doing?" she asked as they deposited her in the chair. The other girl's in her year crowded around, though she noticed that Lavender was hanging back looking incredibly guilty and shy.
"Dealing with your hair," Angelina said, clucking as the nightgown clad girl browsed through what Harry recognized as
"Don't worry, we'll have it neatly trimmed in a few minutes," Katie said.
"A bit more than trimmed. You don't like it long, right?" Angelina asked as she selected a brush.
"..." Harry bit her lip and glanced over at Hermione who just smiled and nodded. She couldn't know what Harry was thinking, but the small show of support was good. Her eyes flickered to Fay, who also smiled and nodded. Had those two talked about this before?
"... maybe… something a bit longer?" Harry asked, nervous for reasons she couldn't quite place. What was it Hermione had called it? Fear of changing? That was probably it. Maybe.
Lavender and Parvati stared before excited expressions crossed their faces and they both opened their mouths only for Fay to whirl and slap her hands over both of their mouths with a firm shake of her head. She hissed something and both girls wilted a bit.
Angelina selected a big brush. "Longer?" She leaned over Harry and peered down with a raised eyebrow. "You aren't feeling pressured by any of these girls to have longer hair, are you?" she asked, shooting them a look that promised hexes if they were. Both Lavender and Parvati shook their heads furiously.
"No, no… Just, maybe something… Closer to my mother's hair… maybe?" she asked, "We can cut it shorter later, right?" Just to see what she looked like.
"It is easier to cut hair than grow it, even with potions," Alicia said, "Do you have a picture?" Hermione produced Harry's photo album and the three older girls gathered around to flip through it, leaving Harry awkwardly sitting by herself. Lavender took the opportunity to duck Fay and dash over to Harry, wrapping her in a hug as she babbled.
"Harry, I'm so sorry," she said in a rush, "I didn't mean to upset you. I just wanted to help and I didn't think you wouldn't want me to try and tame your hair or-" she kept babbling, apparently in an effort to apologize for everything that was coming to her mind at that moment.
After a few more moments Parvati and Fay pulled the babbling Lavender off of Harry. The girl shrank in their arms. "I'm sorry," she finished lamely.
"... It's fine. Just, don't do it anymore, Lavender," Harry said quietly. The blonde girl nodded and let her friends pull her over to her bed.
"While they take care of Harry, I'm going to get a shower myself," Hermione said, picking up a small pile of clothes from her bed, "We've still got class tomorrow." Harry watched with vague amusement as the other three girls scrambled to follow Hermione's example
"Here we go," Angelina said, setting the album down on the desk behind Harry. She turned to look, only for hands to turn her head forward. "Look forward, and relax, Harry." As she said that Harry felt Angelina begin to brush out her long hair. She closed her eyes and sighed, trying to do as her older teammate suggested. It turned out to be fairly easy, as the simple feeling of something going through her hair seemed to take with it much of the emotions she was feeling. It was a sensation that was as totally foreign to her as it was effective at pulling her mind away from her bothers.
She lost track of time as she sat there. At some point Angelina began to hum a song that Harry didn't recognize, though it helped make her feel sleepy as the girl switched her tools and the sound of scissors joined the chorus. A couple of times she heard Angelina ask Katie or Alicia to go grab some item or another, but by then she was so out of it it all seemed to blend together.
In time she was shaken back to proper consciousness by Katie, who held a hand mirror out to her. "Here, Harry, take a look," she said.
"I left it a little bit longer than you asked. Your mother favoured a fairly short hairstyle," Angelina said, "I figured that if you're experimenting with hairstyles, something a little bit longer will let you try a few out without needing to let it grow."
Hesitantly, Harry took the mirror and stared at her reflection. Her hair was significantly more tamed than it had been before, but despite the prolonged brushing and what had to be several hair treatments it still had a wildness that refused to disappear.
"That said, your hair is the most difficult I've ever worked with," the chaser said, "I've tried to tame it, but this is the best I could manage. Short of taking Sleekeazy's Hair Potion to it, I'm not sure anything can." She sounded nearly as annoyed as Lavender, prompting a snicker from Harry.
"Which isn't really an option, since they warn against using it on redheads," Alicia said, "And I don't really feel like finding out what their side effects are at the moment." The other chasers chorused their agreement.
Harry felt tears gather in the corners of her eyes as she turned her head one way, then the other. She wiped them away. "Thank you, Angelina, Alicia, Katie," she said, sniffling a little. God what was wrong with her? She liked it, she looked… good. Like her mother, but the wildness… Hermione was right. She still had a bit of James in her hair. That felt good.
She sniffled. Merlin, her emotions were a mess. The three Chasers pulled her into a group hug. "I'm going to get some sleep," she told them when Angelina handed her back her album.
"Not going to wait for your dormmates to see you?" Katie asked, amusement in her tone.
Harry shook her head, sending long hair flying. "Just tired," she said, yawning. Thankfully she had already done her homework for the next day so despite spending the entire evening crying, she was fine there. To her embarrassment the girls gave her another hug before leaving.
Angelina paused at the door. "If you ever need anything," she told Harry, "Hair tips, a shoulder to cry on, whatever, just let us know, alright Harry?"
Harry nodded, firmly embarrassed. "Thanks Angie," she said honestly.
Angelina grinned, then left, shutting the door behind her.
Harry climbed back into bed and shut her curtains before collapsing on her back to stare at the cloth ceiling. "So that happened," she said quietly. Unsure after everything she'd gone through she slipped beneath the covers and went to sleep.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Harry was miserable at breakfast the next day. It wasn't enough that she'd been driven to tears for the first time in forever, or been stuck with luminous hair that got brighter the more emotional she was, oh no. No, that was all rather minor. She'd been woken up practically at dawn with the feeling of her insides trying to scramble themselves with an electric whisk. That may have been an exaggeration when she'd woken up, but by the time she trudged down to breakfast it was certainly accurate.
Her head hurt, her abdomen hated her, and the looks she was getting from everyone were giving her very mixed and confusing signals as she walked down the stairs into the common room had combined to make her day utterly miserable. Neville hadn't even recognized her until she'd said, "Good Morning, Neville," at which point the boy had turned red, stammered a, "Hello Harry," of his own and ran out the door.
No, the day of her first period was turning out to be terrible, and Ron didn't seem to have a clue.
"So why do you still have long hair?" Ron asked, seemingly oblivious as he slapped apricot jam on a piece of toast.
"Because I felt like it, Ron," She replied, despite the rebellion of her own body she had quite the appetite. She'd already loaded down her plate with sausages, a stack of hotcakes, scones, eggs, more bacon than she'd ever eaten in one sitting, half the platter of hashbrowns, and a slightly overcooked lump of black pudding. Several lumps actually.
A part of her was disgusted by how much she was eating, but she couldn't help it. She felt particularly ravenous for some reason, regardless of her usually nearly dainty eating habits. Her frustration at everything, coming right as it did after a rather emotional night, and her hunger was enough to make her hair flicker ominously. A few of the other Gryffindors, including Lavender and Parvati, had taken one look at her flickering hair and promptly moved away from her when she sat down clearing a neat little space around their group.
Idiots.
"Relax, Harry," Hermione said soothingly into her right ear, "I know it's awkward."
"Awkward doesn't feel like I'm having a war with my own body," she muttered, wincing in discomfort as a cramp caused her to hiss. A surge of frustration caused her hair to flare. She really needed to see Madam Pomfrey after breakfast.
"Seriously, it's making you look even girlier than Ginny," Ron said, as he took a bite of the toast.
"I think it looks nice," Fay said, coming to Harry's defense.
"Of course, you'd say that."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You know what I'm saying."
"The hell I do!"
Harry groaned as Ron and Fay started arguing. She kept stuffing her face, glaring at the two over the top of her plate. Finally, after ten minutes of listening to the bickering of those around her, her hair steadily gaining a more rapid flickering, she stuffed the last sausage on the plate into her mouth. Finally full, she wiped her mouth with a napkin before speaking.
"Could you both, shut up?!" Harry snapped, stabbing the table with her knife. Both looked at her with wide eyes as she took a deep breath and released the steak knife. It remained standing, its tip stuck deep into the wood. "I'm going to the Hospital Wing. See you in class." Standing she turned on a heel and marched away. She didn't need to deal with Ron being an ass on top of the rest of this.
She played absently with her new long hair as she crossed the Entrance Hall. So what if it made her look girlier. She was stuck as a girl. Honestly, did Ron not get what that meant? Was she supposed to walk around spending her entire time looking like a troll just to communicate that fact? Besides, she'd done it because it reminded her of her mother.
Stupid git.
She groaned again. Okay, so she hadn't exactly explained that bit. Not that she was sure it would convince Ron that she hadn't just lost her mind or something. Maybe he thought one of the ghosts had possessed her? She giggled at the image. Could ghosts even possess people? It happened all the time in muggle stories, but did that have any truth in the magical world? She couldn't imagine it did, otherwise why would they permit so many ghosts around children.
"Morning, Potter." She looked up with a start, coming to a halt as she realized Malfoy was right in front of her. For once Crabbe and Goyle weren't flanking him… but that was because they were on her flanks, surrounding her. As the Malfoy scion took a step towards her she disconcertingly realized that he was taller than her now. Before they'd been about the same height, now she definitely had to look up to meet his eye.
Putting on her best dismissive look she replied, "Hello Malfoy. You seem to be lost. This isn't the dungeons."
"Hardly a crime to go for a walk, now is it?" he said, before reaching a hand out towards her head -- no, her hair.
She swatted his hand away. "Bugger off, Malfoy," she snapped, "And leave my hair alone."
To her consternation he grinned. "Poor little Potter," he said, "So desperate for some bit of your parents that the moment you turn into a girl you start dressing up like your mudblood mother."
Harry wasn't too sure what happened next. If anyone asked she'd have at best been able to say 'There was a flash of red light, then my fist hurt and Malfoy started screaming and holding his nose on the floor.' She wasn't sure who was more surprised, the three stooges or herself as she stood over the blond ponce who'd just insulted her mother.
It took a full moment for the two idiots to realize she'd just decked Malfoy, by which point he was screaming, "Get Potter! Get her, you idiots!"
Both scrambled for their wands. With a snarl that tore at her throat Harry punched Goyle in the face next, sending the boy through a suit of armour before she spun and grabbed Crabbe's hand as he was fighting to draw his wand from inside his robes. He joined both idiots on the ground as she felt his nose break.
"Idiots! Potter's just a girl!" Malfoy snarled, only to shut up as she whipped out her wand from up her sleeve.
"Petrificus Totalus," she snapped, repeating the spell on the other two. She stared down at the three terrified boys, her hair flaring and flashing as she tried to control her emotions. Tried and failed. "You cornered me alone, insulted my mother, then tried to curse me," she said, her tone deceptively sweet as years of resentment burbled up. She stepped over to Draco and knelt down with one foot on his chest. "Malfoy, Malfoy, Malfoy, what do I do with you today? Hmmm?" She giggled at the terrified look in his eyes. "Oh, I know."
With a cheerful hum she flicked her wand three times. "Humowasi," she said. All three boys were jerked to the side and through a secret passage behind one of the nearby wall hangings. She followed them in and spent a moment artistically arranging the three of them against the wall.
Nodding to herself she said, "This passage leads to the astronomy tower. I'm sure you recognize it," she told them, smiling prettily at Malfoy, "Which means no one is going to find you until tonight. Late, I'm sure. I'm sure I'll get in trouble, after all, you'll want everyone to know one little girl beat up you and your two big thugs with her bare hands. Right, Malfoy?"
Anger had replaced terror in Malfoy's eyes. "Going to run to daddy? Tell him all about how little Potter humiliated you again?" she asked, unable to restrain the urge to taunt him. She could see the strain in his eyes. He so wanted to curse her. Terror replaced it as she placed the tip of her wand against his forehead. "Let me make this clear, Malfoy," she said putting every bit of disdain she'd spent the last three years building up towards him into her words, "Insult my mother again and next time I'll leave you in a forgotten passageway that only the Weasley Twins know about with a hundred hexes I'm going to research just for you. Understand? Nod your eyes if you understand."
The eyes of all three went up and down frantically. She grinned. "Good, and just so you know I'm not joking, Titallatio." Malfoy's eyes twitched and went wide as the curse hit him. His eyes started twitching to either side in reflexive motions as something prodded him. "The tickling curse. I'm sure you'll be fine." Repeating it with the other two boys she left the passageway, a skip to her step all the way to the Hospital Wing.
She poked her head into the Hospital Wing, suddenly feeling far less cheerful than she had a few moments before. "Madam Pomfrey?" she called out as she entered.
A moment later the school nurse appeared from her office. "Ms. Potter? Back so soon. What is the matter this time?" she asked.
Harry flushed and her hair flashed. Wordlessly she pointed to her hair. "It's um…" It flickered, "It glows with my emotions, Madam Pomfrey." She was quickly dragged over to a bed and subjected to quite a bit of wand waving.
"It does appear to be in sync with your emotions," Madam Pomfrey said after a few minutes, "And unless I miss my guess, you appear to be undergoing your period, correct?" Harry nodded mutely, her hair giving away her mixed feelings with a series of flashes that just made it worse. "I'm afraid Professor Snape and I are still working on a solution to the state of your hair. How are you handling your period? Is this your first?"
Harry squeaked out a, "Yes" to the second question before clearing her throat and telling Madam Pomfrey everything that had happened since she'd left the hospital wing the day before… minus the encounter with Malfoy. She wasn't going to incriminate herself.
"Hmm," the mediwitch waved her wand over Harry before departing and bringing back several potions. Unlike her usual ones, these seemed to smell much nicer. Sweet, almost. "Take these," she said, "Then head back up to your bed. I'm giving you permission to skip class for the rest of the day. I'll make sure your teachers know."
"I- Thank you, Madam Pomfrey," she said, downing the potions. To her surprise they didn't taste horrible, and many of the symptoms she was feeling became muted. They were still there, they still sucked, but she didn't feel quite so terrible anymore. She twitched as a cramp ran through her strong enough to go straight through the potions
She flushed as Madam Pomfrey patted her on the arm sympathetically. "The first is widely considered the worst for a reason. You won't be able to spend your entire period up in your bed, but I think you should be used to this routine by Monday. I would suggest coming by my office each day. I can give you more potions for the symptoms."
"Thank you, Madam Pomfrey," she said, honestly relieved that she wasn't going to have to deal with people. People sucked, and the day was already a write-off.
"Now off you run," Madam Pomfrey said, shooing her out the door.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The day after, following a very wet and unpleasant Quidditch practice wherein she might have had to be restrained from cursing Oliver by the understanding trio of chasers, things were made much better by the discovery that at the end of the month they were going to get a Hogsmeade weekend! It was on Halloween, so Harry didn't quite trust that it wouldn't be marred by something. There was always something on Halloween… of course, she'd just had two years of terrible things so it was possible they'd get away with an ordinary year for once. She could really use an ordinary year.
Malfoy, as luck would have it, wasn't discovered until the morning after, following which he spent most of the day in the hospital wing as Madam Pomfrey treated what the rumour mill was calling 'phantom tickling'. He had refused to divulge the name of who did it, claiming to have been stunned from behind before waking up in the passageway. Apparently, admitting that they'd tried and failed to gang up on a single girl was too much of a blow to his pride. That Sunday morning she was amused as he flinched when their eyes met across the Great Hall. She smirked at him.
A part of her felt like she might have gone just a bit too far, but the more vindictive side that had seemingly awoken that Friday quietly whispered that he'd probably planned to do worse. Besides, he'd earned it with two years of nasty comments, academic sabotage, and just plain being a petty ponce.
"Harry, you didn't have anything to do with Malfoy's trip to the hospital wing, did you, Harry?" Hermione asked, having noticed the interplay.
"I have no idea what you mean. Can you pass the sausages, Hermione?" she asked, changing the subject.
"Harry, you could get in so much trouble," Hermione hissed.
Harry rolled her eyes. "Theoretically, it's possible that Malfoy and his friends might have tried to bully someone who didn't take kindly to it," she replied, "It's also possible that he might have called their mother a mudblood." Her hair flickered and Hermione shifted awkwardly a few inches away from her. "Really, in such a theoretical scenario is it so unbelievable that they got beaten up and left paralyzed under a tickling charm for an entire day in a secret passage?" She kept her tone light, though it was clear she wasn't fooling any of the people around her.
"Harry," Hermione sounded disapproving, "Even so that was very very reckless."
Harry rolled her eyes again. "Sausages, Hermione- Thank you Fay," she said, taking the plate from her other friend.
"You're welcome, Harry," Fay said with a grin.
"Harry! What if they come back," Hermione hissed.
"Theoretically they may have been threatened with being hexed a hundred times and left in one of the passageway only the twins remember if they repeated their stupidity," Harry said, drawing winces from Fay, Hermione, Ron, Neville and a few others, "Besides, they were cursed from behind Hermione. Didn't you hear? They totally didn't try and fail to corner me on the way to the Hospital Wing on friday." She failed to keep a vindictive and satisfied smile off her face.
Hermione looked somewhere between horrified and aghast.
"Pass the hash browns Hermione, please." Her friend automatically passed the plate. "Thank you." Her friend, and everyone else at the table, quietly dropped the topic instead shifting to talking about the pick-up game of Quidditch some of the older years had tried to host the day before. Tried, because after twenty minutes they'd given it up as a bad job when the wind and rain had literally slammed two Ravenclaws into the bleachers hard enough to join Malfoy in the Hospital Wing.
Never let it be said that Quidditch was an easy game.
The rest of the week soared by, with Harry being particularly ecstatic when her period finally ended. Enough that she let Lavender take a brush to her hair and even experiment a little with styles. She didn't really like the twintail look, or the ponytail, though the latter was probably smart in potions since she discovered that keeping long hair out of the way while doing potions was… difficult. Yeah, that was the right word. Difficult. Ultimately, however, she usually kept it loose since that was how her mother usually showed up in her pictures.
Halloween dawned early, and with it Harry. Not because she wanted to, Oliver had been threatened by four witches with being hexed if he made them do Quidditch practice on a Hogsmeade weekend. Oddly, he'd been most disturbed when Harry had joined in the threatening.
No, Oliver wasn't the cause. The cause was her hyperactive roommates who rolled out of bed like it was christmas morning and they were six. She wound up silencing her curtains and going back to sleep… for all the half an hour that Lavender allowed her to sleep before the girl threw her curtains open with a cheerful, "Good morning, Harry!"
Had she still been on her period Harry was fairly sure she wouldn't have been able to restrain the urge to hex the girl, much like she hadn't been able to with Malfoy. As it was she glared at her from under the covers. "Go away, Lavender, I want to sleep," she said flatly.
"But, Harryyy," Lavender pouted, "It's the first Hogsmeade weekend! We need to look our best!"
"You need to look your best. I'm going to be wearing my usual," Harry said, "Now let me sleep!" She ignored the aghast look on her roommate's face. "Faaay! I have a Lavender issue!"
The reply she got was muffled. "And I'm in the bath. Just Hex her," her friend called from the bathroom. An echo of other girls laughing drifted through the door.
"Rude! Both of you! Honestly," Lavender huffed, crossing her arms indignantly.
"Don't tempt me," Harry muttered as she rolled over and put her back to the other girl.
Despite her efforts, however, she didn't get back to sleep. Mostly because Lavender left her curtain open while the rest of the dorm went about their morning rituals. Finally, with much grumbling, and more than half an hour early, Harry rolled out of bed and wandered into the bathroom herself. She barely paid any attention to the other girls as she brushed her hair (still using a brush she'd borrowed from Hermione) and went about the rest of her morning rituals.
Harry was still yawning and shooting Lavender a stink eye as the Gryffindor third year girls entered the Great Hall. She was perfectly happy to split off with Hermione and Fay to their own section of the table. Ron was already at the table.
"Harry, Hermione!" He waved them over to the spots he'd saved. Fay managed to squeeze in on the other side of Harry, though Harry had to nudge Ron to budge over a little bit. "Ready for Hogsmeade?"
"No thanks to Lavender," Harry muttered, shooting an irritated glance up the table. "She insisted on waking everyone up early."
"She was hardly the only one getting up early, Harry," Hermione chided.
"But she was the one to break my silencing charm by opening my curtains," Harry grumbled, angrily spearing some smoked fish with her fork. She sighed at Ron's confused look. "Lavender is pushy and has issues taking no for an answer." Both Hermione and Fay voiced their agreement.
"Right… So, where should we go first?" he asked, trying to drag the topic back to something he was clearly more comfortable with. Harry let him, she didn't want to spend the entire day complaining about Lavender's irritating habits. "I'm thinking of Zonko's."
"You just want to pick up more dung bombs," Harry said. In contrast to past years she had barely touched the prank items and still had plenty in her trunk.
"Well, yeah. I'm nearly out," Ron said, "After that… Honeydukes, then maybe the three broomsticks for lunch?"
"I think we can see a bit more than two stores before lunch, Ronald," Hermione said, exasperatedly, "And I'd like to see the Shrieking Shack. They say it's the most haunted place in britain."
"... Hermione, we live in a castle full of ghosts. How is a shack more haunted than Hogwarts?" Harry asked, curious.
"It's not even a recent haunting either," Fay said, "It was only really active for about seven years after which its just been abandoned." She sipped a cup of black tea. "Personally, I want to stop at Scrivenshaft's Quill Shop. I still need to replace my spare quills after someone's cat," she looked pointedly at Hermione, "broke all of my spares."
"It's been driving you nuts too?" Ron asked, "Bloody thing keeps trying to get into our dorm room. It's driving Scabbers grey."
"Wasn't he already a grey rat?" Harry said. That said, without living in the dorm with Ron anymore she really didn't see much of that rat.
"Well, yes, more white I guess," Ron grumbled.
"Honestly, Ron, Crookshanks is doing what cats do," Hermione said exasperatedly, "It's not like the tower isn't full of pet cats."
"And they don't go after him," Ron replied heatedly.
"Ugh, enough arguing about this. Why don't you get Scabbers a cage or something you can keep him in that a cat can't get into, Ron? Hell, I'll pay for it," Harry said. Ron flushed and muttered something along the lines of 'it was fine'. Uh huh. She guessed she knew what to get him for Christmas then.
"Scrivenshaft's isn't a bad idea," Hermione said, "I need some more supplies. I didn't realize how much I was going to go through this year."
"Same. Ancient Runes and Arithmancy use so much ink and parchment," Harry sighed, "Is there a reason we don't use muggle stationary and pencils? It'd be so much cheaper, and then we could use erasers for arithmancy."
"Tradition I think," Hermione said. They both turned to look at the two purebloods. Fay and Ron both shrugged.
"Why look at us?" Fay asked, "Not like we know any better than you do."
"What is an eraser?" Ron asked. That resulted in them explaining the use of muggle writing utensils, which took the rest of breakfast. They might have convinced Ron of the utility of pencils by the time they were done.
A quick trip upstairs saw everyone bundled up appropriately for the wet Saturday morning. Harry hit her hair with an impervious charm, but otherwise just bundled herself up under a warm cloak with a pair of red and green knitted mittens she had gotten from Mrs. Weasley at some point. They were a little big on her hands, but they still fit well enough.
Soon their group was in the line by the front door of the school waiting to be checked off the list by Filch. The grouchy caretaker was standing in the door bundled up like it was snowing and visibly sweating because of it. He grouched his way through their names, varying between checking them off quickly and making a show out of searching for a name on the list. It seemed to depend on how much he disliked the student in front of him. He sped up considerably once Professor McGonagall came out of the Great Hall and waited by the door.
"Ms. Potter, a word," her head of house said once Harry was checked off the list.
"Yes, Professor?" she asked, stepping over to the older woman.
"This way for a moment," Professor McGonagall said, leading her around the corner of the courtyard. Her friends followed. "Go find a carriage. I'll send her along in a second," she told them. They gave Harry a look and she nodded. They quickly fled, shooting her backwards glances as they did so.
"What's this about, Professor?" she asked, curious and worried. Had something happened to her permission?
"I'm unsure if you are aware, Ms. Potter," Professor McGonagall began, "But there are some, myself included, who believe that-"
"Sirius Black is out to get me. Mr. Weasley told me, Professor," Harry said, "Before the train. He made me promise not to go after him. Not that I was particularly inclined to in the first place."
"Did he? Good," his Head of House looked relieved, "I wish to extract another promise, Ms. Potter. Sirius Black has been sighted in the region. It would be best if you do not stray while in Hogsmeade. Promise me that you will stick to the main road and only travel back to the castle via carriage."
Harry grimaced. "Hermione was thinking about visiting the shrieking shack," she said.
"Then you had best tell Ms. Granger that it is an overrated visit anyways," Professor McGonagall said with a hint of amusement, "Promise me, Ms. Potter."
"I promise, Professor," she said. She really didn't want to have to deal with another madman trying to kill her. Twice was twice too many as far as she was concerned. Well, three times really, if she included the incident when she was a baby.
"Good. Now, run along Ms. Potter. Your friends are waiting," Professor McGonagall said, shooing her out of the courtyard.
Harry found Hermione and Fay waiting by the carriages. They were joined by Lavender and Parvati. Ron was nowhere to be seen. "Where's Ron?" she asked Hermione and Fay.
Fay looked amused. "He joined Seamus, Dean and Neville in a carriage after Lavender and Parvati showed up. Too many girls for him I think," she giggled.
"He said he'd meet us at Zonkos," Hermione said, rolling her eyes to express what she felt about that.
"Harry, you've got to come with us to Gladrags," Lavender gushed, "We can get you something new."
"I've already got plenty of new things," Harry said, "I'm wearing a new blouse right now." It was one of the ones Ms. Anders had made for her. A nice dark blue made from what might have been Acromantula silk. Somehow she doubted she'd find anything as nice at a place called Gladrags.
"And sometimes you want something fun, Harry," Lavender said as they all piled into a carriage, "I'm not saying you have to buy anything. Just looking is half the fun."
Harry settled into a seat by the window. She'd done a lot of window shopping over the summer. "I know that, Lavender. I did it a lot over the summer," she said.
"Really?" Lavender seemed surprised.
"I was living out of the Leaky Cauldron for a month. Not much else to do other than window shop once you've finished your homework," she said.
"Then you should join us. I've heard Gladrags has some really wacky clothes. I'm sure there'll be something that catches your eye," Lavender said, "Maybe some cute pajamas?"
"Oooh, I heard they do some Quidditch themed stuff," Parvati said.
Harry vacillated on the idea. "I think we had plans with Ron," she said.
"That was before he ditched us to hang out with Dean, Neville and Seamus," Hermione said, rolling her eyes, "I swear he keeps doing that this year."
"Well Harry is a girl now. Maybe he's just uncomfortable?" Parvati said, "Suddenly he's outnumbered."
"And we did kind of start stealing your time," Fay said with an awkward laugh.
"He's just being an immature prat, is all," Hermione said.
Harry wasn't entirely sure what to say to that. Ron was being a bit of a prat running off on them and it had kinda started since she turned into a girl. She frowned and gazed out the window at the Hogwarts grounds they were slowly trundling through. Her mind drifted back to the conversation that Professor Dumbledore had had with her and his advice to make time for friends. It was easier said than done even with a time turner. Especially since no one was supposed to know she had it. It would be so much easier if she could just openly be in the common room twice at the same time. One doing homework and the other hanging out with Ron, but…
"Do you think it's true? The rumours that Honeydukes always gives out free fudge on the first Hogsmeade weekend of the year?" Fay asked abruptly.
"Oh I hope so," Parvati said, "I rarely get any these days."
The trip down to Hogsmeade was pleasant as they chatted about this and that and slowly Harry's mood improved again. The only difficult moment was when they passed through the gates, and passed by the Dementors by the gates. Harry kept one hand clamped on her sword as they went through the gate. The other girls shuddered and conversation took a few minutes to resume at anywhere its previous level.
They were all very happy to get out of the carriages when they reached the main street of Hogsmeade. Lavender shook herself and led the way to cover under the entrance of the Three Broomsticks. "Those things are terrible," she complained, shuddering as Parvati gave her a comforting hug.
"I know. I don't know what they think they're going to do anyways," Hermione complained, "Sirius Black got past them before, didn't he? He probably has a wand by now."
"Which is why Professor McGonagall doesn't want me leaving the main street of town unless I'm heading up to the castle in a carriage," Harry said, shaking her head, "Not like he'll be able to recognize me at this point. Unless me turning into a girl made the news at some point?"
"Oh, right. It happened about two weeks ago," Hermione said, blushing bright red, "I was going to mention it then…"
"Oh…" That would have been right when her first period was kicking off, wasn't it? "Probably a good idea that you didn't."
"Might have been funny to see if you went and hexed whoever tattled," Fay said, giggling. "Malfoy still panics whenever your hair starts flaring."
Harry blushed, her hair flashing weakly in time to her embarrassment. With a couple of weeks to look back at it, she might have gone a touch far when she cursed him and just… left him there. Then again, it was Malfoy… "Yeah, well. Anyways, we should visit Scrivenshaft's," Harry said. The other girls voiced their agreement, even Lavender who it turned out was interested in seeing if they had any bottles of pink colour ink.
Scrivenshaft's was fairly busy, though hardly packed like she imagined Honeydukes was at that moment, or Zonkos. It seemed that some students had had similar luck to Fay. Whether due to potions mishaps or the actions of a classmate's pet they were missing supplies. Of course, there were those like Lavender as well who just wanted novelty inks and other items. Harry herself eyed a dicta-quill that would take notes for you. It would completely eliminate the need to stay awake during History of Magic. She only moved on when she realized that Hermione was staring pointedly at her with a raised eyebrow.
As the other girls rang up their purchases with the overwhelmed looking shopkeeper, Harry spotted a small display of novelty inks, including one that claimed that it would 'shift through the rainbow even after it was on the page'. Feeling a bit silly she snagged two of the inkpots and ignored Fay's giggle as she added it to her own purchases, which were mostly more sensible.
After Scrivenshaft's, the coterie of girls moved onto Honeydukes. The store was packed with students and it only took moments for the girls to get split up into smaller groups. Somehow Harry wound up with Fay and Lavender as they perused the chocolate offerings.
Harry grimaced at a display of boxes. "Cockroach Cluster, Fudge Flies, and Sugared Butterfly Wings?" she read aloud, "Please tell me those aren't made from real insects."
"They are," Fay said, looking just as disgusted, "My cousin Albert loves cockroach clusters. I have no idea why, but then he's like eight and a boy so."
"I was a boy and I've never liked the idea of eating insects," Harry replied. She turned her attention to the much more appetizing display of dark chocolate beside it. A few minutes later it was Lavender who voiced her disgust.
"Blood-flavoured lollipops? Ugh," Lavender said.
"Here, have a pack of cauldron cakes instead," Harry said, passing the box of confections over to Lavender.
"Where did you…?" Lavender asked, looking confused.
"Over there, by the Chocolate Frogs," she replied, pointing out a shelf of different boxed confections. Lavender quickly disappeared into the crowd, trying to put distance between her and the blood lollipops.
By the time the five girls managed to pay and regroup Harry could admit that she'd spent a bit more than intended. A lot more, really. Being loaded down with a little over twenty galleons of candy and chocolate was rather heavy. At least she would have plenty to share.
"It's not lunch time yet," Hermione said, "We've still got plenty of time to visit more places." She adjusted the overfilled bag on her shoulder and shoved a package of Tooth Flossing Stringments down inside it.
"Gladrags then? If we take our time it should be around lunch by the time we're done," Parvati said.
"Harry? Going to come with us?" Lavender asked.
Harry hoisted the overstuffed bag of candy over the same shoulder as her book bag. "Sure, I doubt Ron is still at Zonkos anyway," she said, sighing. She felt a little guilty about not going there, but they had clearly agreed on Scrivenshaft's first when they were sitting at the Gryffindor table.
It wasn't her fault he'd run off and ditched them.
"We can swing by on the way. I think Gladrags is just passed there anyways," Fay said. Voicing their agreement the group hurried through the light rain. "And I need to grab a few things as well."
The Zonko's Joke Shop was located at the next intersection. Two stories tall with a bright red front it overshadowed the nearby buildings. Not that they were in shadows since bright lights danced in the windows and the occasional glowing display flew out the door to dance above the ground pointing towards the store.
"How are we supposed to find him in there?" Harry asked.
"Dumb luck and determination?" Fay replied. Harry groaned, then perked up as she spotted not one, but both of the Weasley twins coming out the front door.
"Fred! George!" she called, running up to them.
"If it isn't our favorite redhead," Fred said.
"At least the one who isn't family," George said.
"Finally getting around to visiting Zonko's?"
"Looks like you've been everywhere else first."
"Not that that's a bad thing."
"But your purses have to be a lot lighter."
Harry snorted. "We're fine," she said, "But Hermione and I are looking for Ron. Have you seen him?" She looked from one to the other expectantly.
"Looking for 'ittle Ronnikins?" The one she thought was George said.
"That's right."
"As luck has it, we 'ave. He left a little while ago with the rest of the boys in your year," Fred said.
"Thought it was a bit odd you weren't with him."
"But figured you were meeting up somewhere."
"Yeah, here," Harry said.
Both twins winced at the irritation in her tone. "We'll let him know if we see him," Fred said.
"See you back at the castle, Harry," George said. They both turned to the rest of the girls and sketched a dramatic bow. "Ladies." Then they turned to Harry and bowed deep enough their hoods nearly touched the ground. "Milady." They both said cheerfully before departing.
Harry watched them go with an amused shake of her head before frowning. "I'm going to hex him," she told Hermione and Fay.
"Ron probably just got caught up in things. It happened to us," Hermione said.
"Why don't you girls move onto Gladrags and I'll catch up once I've picked up what I want?" Fay said.
"Don't take too long," Harry said.
Gladrags was just a bit further down the street. Its window frames were painted a bright cheerful pink. While she couldn't say she really liked the exterior, the interior was a riot of colours. Robes, shirts, dresses, socks, and everything else a wizard or witch might think to wear hung from countless racks in a store that was larger inside than it appeared. And nearly everything had something magical about it.
Snitches danced with seekers across a set of pajamas on a nearby display which included other animated pieces of Quidditch-inspired clothing, such as socks and cloaks. Patterns swirled across eye-watering pastel robes; big hats with stuffed animals chittered back and forth from hat racks; ties shimmered with stars or sparkled sparks that seemed to be trying to leap off of the clothes. It was a riot of magic.
Harry let Lavender drag her into the racks and shelves without resistance as the other girl chattered. They explored the girl's section, and Harry had to convince Lavender that no, she didn't need a luridly bright pink skirt with bouncing polka dots. She was talked into picking out a set of blue Quidditch-themed pajamas, complete with moving snitches, by Lavender and Parvati. A pack of hair ties, both normal and Christmas-themed, joined the pajamas a few minutes later.
A flight of fancy saw Harry pluck a midnight blue cloak edged with gold and decorated with constellations that shimmered as she moved from a rack and tossed it over her shoulders. "So, how do I look?" She asked Hermione and Lavender. Fay had yet to show, probably stuck in the lines of Zonkos, and Parvati was checking out scarves.
"It looks nice," Lavender said, walking around Harry. She pulled and plucked at it, humming. "The dark blue works great with your hair and it looks fairly well made." She fussed with its collar. "Now how much is- erk." She winced as she found the price tag. "Might want to put this one back, Harry."
"What?"
"It's Forty-eight Galleons, Ten Sickles and twenty-eight knuts," Lavender said.
"Is that all?" Harry asked, moving over to a mirror to get a better look. She turned left and right in front of the mirror. It looked very nice on her, and it made her look mysterious and magical, which was a plus.
"Is that all? Harry, you could get some very nice dress robes for that price," Lavender said, "Emphasis on very… Actually, you can probably get several."
"Hmm…" Harry pulled the cloak off and fiddled with the collar. "Enchanted with self-cleaning, resizing (good for ages 13+), impervious to water, fire resistance, warming and cooling, and protective magic grade B package? What does it mean by grade B?"
"That should mean impervious to minor hexes and capable of mitigating things like stunners, etc," Hermione said, eyeing the cloak herself with a measure of surprise.
"What rack did you even grab it off of?" Lavender asked, her eyes wide.
"That one," Harry said, pointing towards the back of the shop. Lavender wandered over and came back a few minutes later while Harry was trying on wizards hats to try and match one to the cloak.
"That's their DMLE Auror-Approved line of cloaks. No wonder it's so expensive," Lavender said.
Auror approved? Harry spun in place. "I like it. I'm going to buy it," she said, unclipping it from her shoulders and adding it to the pile. A midnight blue hat with stars that sparkled joined it.
"... At that price?" Lavender sounded horrified.
"Harry, that's over six hundred pounds," Hermione said.
Harry paused and glanced at the cloak. It was a nice cloak. "I've got the money," she said after a few moments of contemplation.
"On you?" Lavender asked.
"Yes?" Harry replied. She did intend to buy it so of course she had the money on her. Sure it was more money than she'd ever spent on any one thing, except her firebolt, which she was still keeping hidden in her trunk until the game against Slytherin, but it was money well spent if it could help protect her from minor hexes. A part of her wondered if she could get her school robes enchanted that way.
"Hey, I'm here." Harry looked away from the dumbfounded Lavender to see Fay weaving towards them through the racks.
"Fay, look what I found," she said as she held up the cloak and hat.
"Oh those are nice," Fay said, sliding up to Harry as she put the hat and cloak back on.
Harry grinned. "How do I look?"
"Very stylish, like a witch," Fay said. Harry tilted her head and shrugged. It was a witch's hat after all.
"Fay, that's like a fifty galleon cloak!" Lavender said.
Fay stared. "What?"
"It's a DMLE approved cloak," Hermione said.
"They sell those here?" Fay asked, sounding just as surprised as Lavender.
Harry sighed and totally did not pout at her friends. "Well I like it, so I'm getting it," she said with a huff, "Besides, I've got more money than I have any idea what to do with."
"Sure, but on you?" Lavender asked.
"I still have over five hundred Galleons on me?" she said. Hermione facepalmed. Lavender stared and Fay groaned.
"What's going on?" Parvati asked as she came over with a new Gryffindor inspired scarf in her arms. They brought Parvati up to speed and the other girl added her two cents. "You seriously have five hundred galleons on you?"
"Well yeah. I used to have like a thousand, but I forgot to refill after the shopping trip with Professor McGonagall," Harry said, tugging at her cloak and failing to notice as her friends exchanged looks with a mixture of awe and horror, "Fay, anything catch your eye?" She paused and glanced at the row of cloaks. She peeled back the cloak's collar to look at the tag again. "... Only forty-eight galleons?"
"Harry, no!" Hermione said, crossing her arms.
"Why not? I've like millions more in coins and bars in a vault," Harry replied.
"Wait, you aren't-" Lavender began.
"She is," Hermione interrupted, "Seriously, Harry. That's like two hundred and forty-five galleons, assuming they all cost that much."
"So?" Harry asked, carrying her things towards the rack. "I'm not hearing anything I can't afford Hermione. What's the point of having this much money if I can't spend a little bit of it when I want to?"
"Because that's like… like… three thousand pounds or something," Hermione said, her voice a step below a shout as she tried to keep from informing the entire store. Harry grinned.
"Consider this thanks for comforting me a couple of weeks ago," she told her best friend. Hermione went red and her mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water.
"Um, we sort of caused that," Parvati pointed out as they followed her.
"Well consider this an 'I forgive you' thing then, because I do. Merlin, with how unstable I was that day you're lucky I didn't hex you two," Harry said, thinking back to her first period. Her hair flickered weakly with embarrassment. "Anyways, I feel like it, so pick one or I'll pick one for you." She dropped her things on a convenient stool and turned to her dormmates. She crossed her arms and stared at them.
Hermione sent her an exasperated look before walking up to the rack starting to go through it. Fay followed her a moment later. "Thank you Harry," she said, giving Harry a hug that left her blushing. Bright red, she turned her eyes on Lavender and Parvati who both echoed Fay before going to search the rack.
As they were going through the rack one of the store clerks came over to them. "Excuse me," she said, "Those are quite expensive."
"We noticed," Lavender said over her shoulder.
The store clerk, a girl who looked like she couldn't have graduated from school more than a year or two before, shuffled awkwardly. "I see, um. Look, they're expensive enough that if you aren't planning on paying for them-"
"I'm paying," Harry said, looking up under the edge of her witches hat to stare at the clerk. She held her gaze until the older girl looked away.
"Oh…" The girl said, looking surprised and mildly concerned, "Once you're done selecting your items please come by the counter then. Have a good day." She retreated back to the counter where an older woman questioned her and soon that woman was watching them from the counter as they sorted through the cloaks.
A few minutes passed by before Lavender said, "Why don't we pick from the same theme?" She pulled out a very similar cloak to Harry's. It was midnight blue with a different patch of constellations on it. "There're a few here we can pick from."
"We'll look amazing all in the theme," Parvati gushed, moving over to where Lavender was going through the cloaks. Fay hooked Hermione by the arm and pulled her away from looking at a plain green cloak with a comfortable-looking white fur lining.
"Hey! I was looking," Harry's old friend complained mildly.
"C'mon Hermione. Picture everyone's reactions when we show up wearing matching cloaks," Lavender said, "The five girls of Gryffindor Third Year in matching cloaks!"
"You realize that Hogwarts requires that we wear our uniform cloaks when it gets cold enough, right?" Hermione said with a sigh.
"So? That's when attending class or other school related activities. We can wear whatever we want on the weekends. Most people just can't be bothered to bring enough clothes to have other options and there's this whole rah rah house spirit thing," Lavender said, making a face, "Just keeps people from wearing something not boring."
"Not a fan of the House Cup?" Harry asked with a small laugh.
"Don't really mind the house cup, it's just… Its bragging points if you win? Not like we actually get anything. We don't even get to keep the cup for the next year in our common room or anything. No name on it, just a note in a ledger somewhere," Lavender said, sticking her tongue out.
"It actually gets added to the list in the trophy room," Hermione said as she started searching through the nighttime themed cloaks.
"So? No one ever goes in there. No one cares," Lavender said with a shrug, "I walked through it like once in first year and I still don't know what half the rewards actually were. The whole house pride thing just forces us to wear one colour. Even when it doesn't suit us."
"... and technically it makes it harder to make friends as well if the houses are at odds, like last year," Fay said with a frown, "The whole Chamber of Secrets thing made everyone too paranoid about anyone outside their own houses."
Harry grimaced. "I thought it was just me everyone was avoiding," she said.
"You were the focus, but half the school was looking at us like we were harboring a maniac," Parvati said, "I nearly hexed my sister when she told me some of the theories going around in Ravenclaw. Some of them were claiming that You-Know-Who had killed you as a baby and the boy we knew was just a deaged him running about claiming to be you." All four of them stared at the Indian girl.
Parvati shrugged. "That was one of the tamer ones," she said, "Of course they all shut up once rumours started flying that you'd fought and killed Slytherin's monster to save Ginny Weasley."
"... Well I did do that," Harry said, "And there technically was a young Voldemort-" the entire group shivered and Harry rolled her eyes, "Running around for maybe an hour or two? Then I killed him after I killed the basilisk."
"Basilisk?" Lavender squeaked, nearly dropping the cloak in her hands.
Harry rolled up her sleeve to show the circular scar where the Basilisk had bitten her. Despite the intervention of Fawkes it had left a scar. "I was bitten here. If Dumbledore's phoenix hadn't cried on it I'd have died then and there," she said.
"... So the stories were right then," Lavender said, awestruck.
She grimaced and pulled down her sleeve. "Depends on what you mean by stories. If you mean the ones I saw in Flourish and Blotts over the summer, then no. Those are pure fiction."
"I meant the ones going around the school," Lavender replied.
Fay sighed. She threw a midnight blue cloak -- that was decorated with a constellation that occasionally flipped into a ghostly lion that 'roared' and pawed at the stars around it -- over her shoulders and looked herself over in the mirror. "Wouldn't that depend on the rumours? I mean, the monster was right, but we spent the entirety of last year dealing with stupid rumours about Harry being the Heir of Slytherin. Harry. Seriously, you're better off just ignoring the rumour mill. That's what I've been doing."
"I guess, but sometimes there's important things in there," Lavender grumbled. She pulled a cloak off the rack that had a constellation of a woman and a man, who like Fay's Lion flickered over to being spectral and ghostly versions of people before going back to being mere constellations that were dancing beneath a moon. She swung it over her shoulders after checking the tags and went to stand in front of the mirror. "Oooh, I like this one."
"I'm sure if we look we can find some kind of exemption," Parvati said, "Most of the dress rules and other limitations have them, so why wouldn't the cloaks?"
"True, but those are usually in favour of the Noble and Ancient houses," Hermione said. She paused on a cloak where a family of barn owls were sitting on a tree branch that swayed in an unseen wind as they read from a constellation of a book in the sky. "Hmm…"
"Maybe, but we can't know if we don't look, right Lav?" Parvati asked.
"That's right. I'm not just going to ignore the possibility that we can wear these cloaks more often. Especially since the Slytherins are going to get hex-happy in a week or two," Lavender said, "Just because they're aiming for Harry isn't going to stop the rest of us from taking a curse or two by 'accident'."
"That's a good point… I'll see what I can find in the library. There might be something," Hermione said, "Does this look good on me?"
"It looks great, Hermione," Harry said, "And I'll try to help." She'd really prefer to be able to just ignore some of the hexes the Slytherins tossed around when it was approaching the Gryffindor vs. Slytherin match. Cheaters that they were, they never shied away from just hexing the other team before the match. That they hadn't lost a match to having someone hexed in the hallways was more due to luck and Gryffindor overprotectiveness than anything else. It hadn't stopped a lot of bystanders from winding up in the hospital wing in the place of the Quidditch team, however.
"Very you," Fay agreed
"And me? How does this look?" Parvati asked, spinning to show off a cloak with a constellation of birds that soared and twirled across the night sky of her cloak.
"Great," Harry said as Lavender snagged both Hermione and Parvati and pulled them over to the mirror. She plopped star-dotted witches hats like Harry's on each head and waved to Harry.
"Get over here," she said. Harry walked over and found herself dragged into the middle with Lavender on her left with Parvati and Hermione on her right with Fay. The four of them leaned together to squeeze into view of the mirror. Each of them was adorned with a sparkling witch's hat and shimmering star-decorated cloak.
Harry found herself grinning at her reflection from the middle of the group despite her earlier reservations. This was fun with friends.
"We look amazing," Lavender said with a small squeal.
"I wish we had a camera," Fay said and Harry couldn't help but agree.
"Colin has one still," Hermione said, "We could get a picture from him once we get back to the castle."
"But then it wouldn't be here."
"So?"
"You have no sense of sentimentality, Hermione," Fay sighed.
"I do! But we can just as easily get a picture up in the common room from Colin," Hermione replied, huffing.
Harry's stomach chose that moment to grumble. All four other girls turned to her as her hair lit up brilliantly. "How about we pay and then visit the Three Broomsticks?" Harry suggested, trying to ignore the feeling of burning on her cheeks.
Her giggling friends agreed once they stopped laughing.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Harry had to grin as she counted out the Galleons onto the counter to pay for the cloaks. "... Two-Hundred and Sixty-Two, Two-Hundred and Sixty-Three Galleons," Harry said as she added the last Galleon to the pile.
"... Here's your change," the woman, the manager from what she could tell, said as she handed over a small stack of Sickles and Knuts, "Fifteen Sickles, and Twenty-Two Knuts." She sounded a bit out of it as she wrote up a receipt and handed it over.
"Thank you," Harry said, slipping it into her book bag. She gathered the rest of her bags and joined her friends at the door. Each of them was wearing their cloaks.
"You really didn't have to do this, Harry," Hermione said as she fiddled with her bags.
"I felt like it. Not like I have much else to do with this much money," Harry replied. She had more money than she had any idea what to do with. Spending a few hundred Galleons on her dormmates was pocket change, though perhaps she should write Director Magni and ask him to send a few hundred more just in case?
That was probably a bit much, admittedly.
"I'll be honest, Harry, I can't imagine having so much money that I don't know what to do with it," Fay said, earning nods from the other girls.
Harry laughed nervously. "Let's just get some lunch. I'll pay," she said.
"Again," Hermione said exasperatedly.
"Shush, free lunch," Lavender said, sticking her tongue out.
The Three Broomsticks Inn was allegedly as old as Hogsmeade itself and was a fairly impressive three storey building from the outside. Located right in the middle of the small town it was a popular location and it was absolutely bustling as the five girls entered. A friendly looking older woman with red hair came over.
"Welcome to the Three Broomsticks Inn. Sit where you want and come up front when you want something to eat," she said.
"Thank you," Harry said.
"There's Ron," Hermione said, nudging her and pointing to a table where the boy was seated with the rest of the third year boys. A table next to them was open so the girls hurried over. "There you are, Ron."
He looked up and seemed to do a double take at Harry and Hermione as they dropped their bags on the table. He had just his book bag, though Harry didn't doubt that he had a few items from Zonko's hidden inside it. "There I am? Where have you two been?" He asked.
"Shopping," Harry replied as she took the seat nearest to the table.
"I'll say…" He paused as the other girls sat down. "Did you all get matching cloaks? Even you, Harry?"
"I found mine first," she said, "Then offered to pay for theirs and they decided to get matching ones." She eyed him, "If you want I can get you one later. Non-matching."
He went red about the ears and mumbled something about it not being necessary.
"You sure?" she asked.
"Yeah, it's fine…" He muttered.
She shrugged. "We went by Zonkos looking for you, but the Twins said you'd already left," she said.
"We visited Spintwitches," Dean said, nodding to her, "Looking good, Harry."
Despite herself, Harry blushed. "Thanks," she mumbled, suddenly feeling a bit awkward for reasons she couldn't explain, "Isn't that a sporting goods store?" This was Dean, why was she feeling the urge to duck and hide?
"Yeah. They've got a deal for Cleansweeps at the moment, and I got a pair of Omnioculars," Seamus said, holding up a pair of bronze binoculars.
"What are Omnioculars?" Harry asked.
"They can record what you're looking at. Slow it down, speed it up, rewind it, enhance your sight," Seamus said, gushing about them, "It'll be great for watching Quidditch. We're only like two weeks from the first game."
"Oh Merlin, don't remind me. The Slytherins are going to start trying to curse us at every turn," Harry complained
"These cloaks will help with that. Harry, want something to eat?" Fay asked.
"Hmm? Oh, uuuh…." She pulled out her coin purse and dumped a few galleons onto the table, "I'm feeling fish if possible."
"I'll see about it. C'mon Lav," Fay said, scooping the coins up and dragging Lavender with her.
"So, what did you get, Ron?" Harry asked.
Her friend perked up. "Zonkos is amazing," he said, "Couldn't get much but there was this display of Freewheeling Frisbees…." The conversation moved onto less awkward topics as Ron told her about Zonkos. A part of her wished she'd gone with him, but then she'd have missed her cloak and despite just getting it she was already liking it quite a bit. The warming charms that were part of it had shrugged off the cold so easily.
Lavender and Fay returned shortly afterwards with frothing mugs of Butterbeer, which Harry took an immediate liking to. Food followed them not long after with Madam Rosmerta, the curvy redheaded barmaid, bringing it over. Harry couldn't help but notice the way all the boys stared at the older woman as she delivered the food. She had to prod Ron in the side to get his brain focused on the important things again. Like their conversation.
The lunch was good and Harry had a second round of butterbeer before they left. The rest of the Hogsmeade trip was spent popping in and out of a handful of shops along the main street. Dervish and Bangs was full of magical gizmos and gadgets, like the sneakoscope Ron had sent her for her birthday. She'd had to pull Lavender away from a crystal ball that supposedly spouted the fortunes of whoever placed their hands on it. Seamus managed to get tossed out of Dominic's Magic Shop when he'd accidentally knocked over two rows of displayed instruments. He was soaking wet in the rain by the time the third year group left the store. They ended with another stop at Honeydukes so the boys could get some candy as well. Harry wound up picking up a pack of sugar quills.
Finally done, the group made their way back to the carriages. What had started as two carriages soon turned into three as they ran out of space due to the extra bags. Harry wound up stuffed next to Ron in the lead carriage with Hermione and Fay. Neville had gone to get in, only to realize they were out of space.
"How much did you buy?" Ron asked, sounding vaguely horrified.
"A lot. Now budge over, you're shoving me into the corner," Harry said, nudging him with her elbow.
The trip back to the castle was only spoiled by having to pass the dementors guarding the gate. Harry kept one hand on her sword as they trundled through the gate. It kept the effects down, but she could see the others shiver. She pulled out a bar of Honeydukes best chocolate and handed bits around to her friends.
"Here, take your mind off those things," she said. They mumbled thanks as they nibbled on the chocolate.
A few minutes later they were getting out of the carriages. "I hate those things," Hermione complained, "Who looks at those monsters and decides they need to place them around a school?"
"The Ministry of Magic," Fay drawled in reply as she hopped down from the carriage, "I don't know what they expect them to do. They couldn't even keep Black inside the prison." It was a sentiment shared by the rest of their groups as the other Gryffindors arrived. The group hurried upstairs immediately to put away their things.
Twenty minutes later, Harry slammed the lid of her trunk shut and growled as it popped open. "Ugh. Stupid, trunk," she pushed it down again only for it to once again pop up.
"Too much stuff?" Hermione asked as she carefully stored her things in her own trunk, though her candy had been stashed in her nightstand.
"Yeah. Way too much. I never used to own this much stuff," Harry replied as she stood there, one hand on a hip, glaring at the trunk that had committed the cardinal sin of being too small. "I can't wait for my new trunk to be done."
"You're getting a new trunk?" Fay asked.
"Eight compartments, all of them big enough to climb inside," Harry said, before sighing and dropping onto her bed. She yawned.
"Harry, that's an apartment," Hermione said, blankly.
"They aren't big rooms, and it's one of those trunks that are supposed to outlast their owners," Harry replied with another yawn. "Ugh, I'm exhausted, but sweaty. I'm going to have a shower then ta-ta-taaaake a nap until dinner."
"I'm going to work on some homework," Hermione said.
"You still have homework after last night?" Fay asked as Harry gathered a few items of clothing and wandered into the bathroom.
A few of the older girls were giggling in a corner of the bath, including Prefect Goldrose. One of them got a funny look as Harry set her things on the counter by the showers and started getting up, reaching for a towel before Goldrose grabbed her by the hand and whispered something to her. It seemed to spark a debate amongst the older girls that Harry just ignored. She was tired from all the shopping.
"Harry, tired of Hogsmeade already?" Harry jumped as arms hugged her from behind.
"Angelina," she whined as her older teammate pulled her into a tight hug.
The older girl laughed and ruffled Harry's hair. She pulled at it a moment later and sighed. "C'mon, get undressed and I'll help you wash your hair. Since you clearly have no idea how to handle long hair." She let Harry go.
"It's hair, not that hard," Harry muttered, a flaming blush appearing on her cheeks.
"Uh huh, and that's why you already have split ends. Chop-chop, get over here," Angie called across the bathroom.
Knowing her teammate well, and knowing that she wouldn't leave her alone, Harry yawned and obeyed. She was way too tired for this, however, and said as much as she joined the older girl by the showers, shivering in the cold air. You would think that a school of magic as prestigious as Hogwarts would know how to heat a room, especially as they were in Scotland, but no of course not.
Harry rolled her eyes, but listened as the older girl explained the uses of several hair products, both magical and not, and the how before she was pulled into the shower by the older girl and subjected to having her hair scrubbed. Despite her earlier annoyance having someone else do her hair was actually quite nice and relaxing.
Following her shower she let Angie prod her into climbing into the bath after wrapping herself in a towel. The older girls and Prefect Goldrose were gone, but they sat at the end closest to Harry's dorm room anyways. Harry sighed as she melted into the bath, stretching her arms with a humm before leaning against the bath's edge and closing her eyes. She let out a squeak as Angie slid over beside her and pulled her over.
"Ah, ah, no falling asleep in the bath," the older girl chided.
"But it's so warm," Harry mumbled and yawned.
"Mhmm, it is, but no sleeping."
"Fine…" she mumbled, yawning again as she leaned against the older girl, already feeling half asleep from the feeling of being clean and warm.
"Everything going alright?" Angie asked.
"Hmm?" Harry blinked up at her.
"With your dormmates. They aren't causing you any issues, right?" she asked again.
"No, not really. I mean, sometimes I feel a little bit awkward when they start talking about some things, but…" Harry shrugged, "I'm just surprised they've been so accommodating so far. I was a boy three months ago, so…"
"Hmm," Angie hummed, "What kind of things?"
"Just, like, girl talk and stuff," Harry mumbled.
"Oh?"
"Yeah. Sometimes they're talking about things in Witch Weekly or like a couple of days ago Parvati and Lavender started talking about which boys were cutest in the school in our year," Harry said with a shrug. She wasn't really interested in the conversations either way so she didn't mind being left out. "And well, Lavender and Parvati haven't really asked me about my hair since my period." God, that entire week had been a nightmare. She had been an unbearable nightmare. Bloody crazy she was sure she'd have called herself as a boy.
That thought prompted the absurd and sardonic thought of 'Well, I'd like to see him handle it.' she snorted and tried to suppress the giggles that arose from the thought. She was seeing him handle it, first hand.
"Something funny?" Angie asked, and Harry told her, earning a snort and a rub on her back that sent her sighing as she leaned against the older girl. "Yeah, I honestly can't even imagine how you're taking all of this so well."
"Neither can I. It just… doesn't feel wrong? Does that make sense? Things didn't feel wrong before and they don't now, either? It's weird," Harry mumbled through a yawn. It was strange how not wrong everything had felt. Of all the things she'd have thought would bother her, being a girl had probably been near the top of the list three months prior.
Angie nodded. "So, did they agree who was the cutest?" she asked.
Harry shook her head and laughed at the memory. The other girls had spent nearly three hours arguing. "No. Parvati insisted it was Blaise, Hermione refused to get pulled in, Fay just laughed and said that no one was since the cutest one was a girl now," she could feel her cheeks getting redder from the memory, and Angie's giggle didn't help, "Lavender insists its currently Ernie from Hufflepuff."
"And you?"
"What?" Harry blinked, "I didn't say anything, and they didn't ask." She rolled her eyes as the older girl. "I was a boy three months ago, Angie. Talking about which guy is cute?" She rolled her eyes again and huffed. "'Side's not like they ask my opinion on anything girltalk related. Even when Lavender was trying to tackle my hair for a month she never asked my opinion. Today was a bit different I guess, but that was with clothing."
"Hmm, maybe not, but what about now? Surely the great and wise Harry Potter has an opinion on boys?" Angie asked, a teasing tone as she poked Harry in the side.
She wriggled away from the older girl. "Angie!" she squealed and ducked as the other girl flicked water at her.
"C'mon, tell Angie what you're thinking of. I can see you've got an opinion," Angie said with a laugh.
"Ugh, no I really don't," Harry said, ignoring the way her brain promptly spat out the memory of Dean Thomas from the Three Broomsticks earlier in the day.
"Lies. You might not like boys, but I can see you holding back your opinion. C'mon," Angie prodded, grinning even as she pulled Harry over to her with one arm around her shoulder again.
"Fiine, just stop poking me," Harry grumbled, fighting an awkward smile that refused to go away.
"Talk," Angie said before sticking out her tongue.
"Real mature," Harry snorted before sighing, "Well… If I had to pick one…"
"You do."
"Shut up. If I had to pick one… Dean," she said, going red even as she said it. She couldn't believe she'd just said that. She shot Angie a mild glare as her hair went bright from embarrassment.
"Really? That brat in your year."
"Shut up, you made me pick. Hardly like I was going to say 'Malfoy', now was I?" Harry mumbled before yawning again despite her intense embarrassment. She should have just said nothing at all if Angie was going to be like this. How exactly had they gotten onto boys of all things? She'd been one only a few months before.
"I'd have had you checked for potions if you had."
"You and Hermioneeeeee-" She yawned again as her eyes started to close. A few moments later she was shaken awake by Angie.
"Okay, up, before you fall asleep for real in the bath. C'mon," Angie said. Grumbling Harry got up into the chilly air of the bathroom. She pulled on some new clothes and let the older girl brush her hair out before heading back to her room with a mumbled, "Goodbye". Oddly there hadn't been anyone else popping in for a bath or shower the entire time.
Harry waved to her friends she climbed properly onto her bed and pulled the curtains shut.
"Sleep well, Harry," Hermione said from where she was working through a few large books on Healing and Arithmancy.
Harry yawned, thanked her, and pulled her blanket over her head. Sleep was nearly instant.
When Harry woke up the dorm room was quiet and dark as she pulled open her blinds. She plucked her wand from her bedside table and muttered, "Lumos." She yawned and trudged over to the bathroom. A few minutes later, much refreshed, she looked around the dorm room wondering where everyone was.
Feeling suspicious she peered at her clock and inhaled sharply. "Why didn't anyone wake me up?" She shouted, her voice jumping several octaves in panic. Dinner had to have started at least ten minutes ago.
Her school cloak was thrown on to help with the cold in the halls and she jammed her wand up into its holster before dashing out of the room and down the dormitory stairs. The common room was empty as well. Mumbling curses under her breath she dashed across the room and shoved the portrait open.
"-Never get- Oh my, I thought they'd all left," the Fat Lady said as Harry rushed through and slammed her shut with one hand.
"Sorry, I'm late to the feast-" Harry came to a stop as she realized who the Fat Lady had been talking to. Harry took two steps back as she stared up at the bedraggled, tattered, knife wielding form of Sirius Black.
He stared at her as she took a breath to shout or scream for help, only for her voice to get caught in her throat as the man croaked a single word between dry cracked lips, "Lily?"
-0-0-0-0-0-
A/N: Hello once more~ *singing kitsune*
Gekkou_Yoko: Fibber Fibber! You can't sing! Chu can barely limerick!
Grounders10: …. Hush. No need to explain I suck at poetry!
Gekkou_Yoko: Still not the worst poetry I've been forced to read, or had read at me.
Grounders10: I can at least manage something vaguely like a folk song. But that's probably because of childhood over exposure.
Gekkou_Yoko: Yeah, so long as you are not the one singing it. :'3
Grounders10: ;-; it's the thought that counts? Right? *soulful kitsune eyes*
Gekkou_Yoko: That's a given.
Grounders10: Yeah! *glomps Gekkou*
Gekkou_Yoko: *fixes the typo of her own screen name mid glomp*
Grounders10: Noooo, don't tell them Dx *crying kitsune*
Gekkou_Yoko: *watches as you fix the m on them from a n thinking she wouldn't see it*
Grounders10: ;-; *sulks beneath fluffy tails*
Gekkou_Yoko: *climbs under fluffy tails to cuddle her fellow floof, having snagged her hand*
Grounder10: *sputtering and blushing floof*
Gekkou_Yoko: *smug floof*
And that is everything I've written… okay not everything I've written for this story, just everything that's complete. I've got part of the next chapter finished because I couldn't just not write the other half of a cliffhanger. I'd lose my train of thought and then we'd never get the rest.
Thanks go out to my lovely Editor once again~ *stares up at the smug floof* and of course to everyone else~
Remember, we've got a discord link in my signature if you want to come and chatter~
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Now that was a heck of a cliff hanger, honestly this barely felt like the novella of a chapter it was. Anyway, for content, having the talk with Hermione was honestly very nice, having Harry start to figure out the root of her problems was invigorating. Then seeing Harry decide to finally do something about Malfoy, and ironically enough something so Slytherin in nature, was a delight. Finally, the Hogsmeade trip was sweet, it is a shame Ron and Harry are drifting apart, though I reckon some of that may be Ron noticing Harry as a girl rather than just his friend, the matching cloaks are cute, and honestly I am just waiting to see how much Book 3 changes, since this especially hadn't happened before.
- Location
- Elsewhere
Not to mention that they all have different opinions and will hold it against you on the first meeting.
"You're early. I hate that."
"You're late. I hate that."
"You're exactly on time. I hate that."
Aliens.
It's the only logical explanation.
Non-consensual makeovers.
"You know what schools need? Soul-sucking monstrosities."
"They already have homework."
"I meant ones that would chase you."
- Location
- Ylisse
I was wondering what you were going to do with the plot of book 3, but I can say I never saw this coming.