Harry Potter and the Tainting of the Light

Chapter 6

A/N: Thanks for the review, I understand that my explanation of magic's confusing. I can't help explain what I myself don't fully comprehend. I try, but yeah... Also PEOPLE, one vote only. No, "I would like a Harry/Fleur, Harry/Blaise, and Harry/Whatever." Please just one vote! Multiple voting will be ignored, but don't worry you can just place your votes for the next chapter or so. Note that only one LEGAL vote from each SIGNED review will be counted. Sorry to all, but Harry and Bellatrix pairing will not work in this story. I like the pairing, but it just doesn't fit with what I want to write, which truthfully I have no idea how I want to write this story, totaling bsing it with a few ideas.

Note: For the DA, Dennis Creevey will not be able to take part in it, considering that he is a 2nd year and I can't explain how he showed up at Hogsmeade. So sorry folks, but Dennis will not be in the DA.

Also about the Ron bashing, sorry if you don't like it but I'm still going to write it. I made it a Ron bashing fiction at a spur of the moment and I'm just going to have to keep writing it. I promise, that I won't make him a jealous idiot if I write another story.

(Room of Requirement, September 11, Saturday)

The ever changing room of requirement stunk of sweat and the very air was filled with tension commonly found amongst places where powerful magic had been previously used within the immediate area. Within the room were three men of average height, who were standing within a room that was no bigger than an under-funded class.

Two of three men were currently circling one another, similarly to what people saw in martial arts competitions, both giving of such poise and tension of one used to readily to spring into battle. The third man stood off to the side content to watching the other two a fair distance away.

The intelligence of such a motive was proven by the several scorch marks on the stone walls that surrounded the three men. The third man, one with salt and pepper hair where the pepper was actually brown rather then black, stood calmly yet was ready to dodge any stray spells that would come his way. His face shown with fatigue, but the man kept a decent effort to look cheery and exuberant.

His face showed concentration on the duel taking place. The man with salt and pepper hair wasn't quite sure at the intellect of the duel taking place. The favor was clearly one sided, and his concern fell for the man with the clearly underdog odds.

A stray spell from one of the two duelers hit the wall, taking a sizable chunk out of solid stone. The duel, to the man, wasn't even truly a duel. More like a sport for one dueler and a torture session for another. The first dueler hobbled to the side as he sent another powerful spell towards the second dueler.

The second dueler dodged the spell and retaliated with a rather weak stunner. The first dueler didn't even bother to dodge, favoring to block the spell rather then making use of his clunking wooden leg.

The second duelers spell wasn't particularly powerful so the shield took the spell's blow with ease, with enough power to still maintain the integrity of the shield after the hit. The second dueler glared at the first with eyes that shone like darkened emerald. The emerald eyed dueler knew the futility of the duel, but didn't want to admit his hopelessness to the first dueler.

The first dueler saw the glare and countered with a rather maniacal grin, twisting his already scarred face to something seen in cheesy under funded horror movies. The third man merely rolled his eyes at the antics of the duel stubborn and hardheaded duelers.

The first dueler with the heavily scarred face shot two closely consecutive spells to the dueler with eyes like emerald. He in turn dodged the spells by rolling to the right and tried to quickly right himself up to retaliate with a spell of his own. The scarred man's electric blue eyes stayed focused on the emerald-eyed dueler's progress.

The first dueler shot a stunner immediately to the second dueler's right, having expected the green-eyed dueler to do such a move. The bright emerald eyes widened showing his surprise and fear. The man quickly raised his right hand and wandlessly conjured a shield. The shield was weak and had been hastily cast so it wasn't surprising to second dueler when it broke upon contact with the spell. But the shield did block the stunner and that was what counted.

The second dueler dodged for 2 more minutes before a stray stunner grazed his arm putting half his body to sleep. The first dueler clanked noisily to the second dueler and stunned the second dueler, who could do nothing but glare, at point blank range.

The second dueler woke from a temporary forced sleep and protested noisily.

"What was the point of that duel? I didn't stand a chance against you Moody; not without a wand!" The second man said.

"Aye Potter; didn't really expect to win did ya'? The only point to that duel was to help get you more familiar in using wand less magic." Moody said to the second man.

"That's right Harry, it is better for you to be more at ease with using wand less magic. You never know when you'll need it." The third man said.

"It doesn't mean that I should be doing it in a duel. You could have just had me practice wand less magic on my free time." Harry grumbled.

Moody laughed. "This is your free time, and there is no better way to practice then in a fight!"

Harry grumbled something about bad luck. The whole lesson was the result of the yesterday's duel with Malfoy, Ron, and Goyle. If he wasn't so fool hardy enough to broadcast his progress in wand-less magic in the duel, he wouldn't be in the current situation.

Harry might as well had put an ad in the Daily Prophet telling to whole world of his aptitude in wand-less magic at the rate at which the whole school found out about how the duel ended against Malfoy.

Harry protested with vigor to deaf ears. Harry looked towards Moony for support, but it seemed that even now Moony was in shock at Harry's wand less magic performance the day before.

Moody stepped back to the middle of the well damaged room and told Harry to stand. Harry did and Moony handed him his wand. Harry grabbed the Holly wand and was thankful to have the familiar leverage in his hand. With the wand Harry's odd probably tripled at the very least.

"Well time for your wand training. Wand-less magic is good, but you should also train in wand magic. It goes without saying that only with a wand can you accomplish advanced spells, and it is just as important to practice advanced spells then to practice wand-less spells.

As the duel started, Harry pressed his only potent advantage in the duel. His overall mobility was Harry's best bet to winning the duel. Harry knew that he was more powerful than Moody or at least hoped, but Moody's knowledge in spells easily overrode that. Knowledge was as important as raw power.

Harry did notice that over the past few weeks the duel's difficulty rose significantly. It was almost as if Moody had levels to which he dueled at. The spells used in the duels became increasingly more complex as time progressed. Before stunners, jinxes, and simple conjuring charms were used by Moody, but recently Moody's spells were incredibly powerful. Also Harry noticed that he rarely fought duels against multiple opponents nowadays. Harry didn't know why, but it had been a while since Harry dueled against Moony.

5 minutes into the duel Harry found himself incredibly tired. His duel by wand-less magic drained him incredibly. Even though Harry could do wand-less magic, even up to stunners, Harry found that he had to put more "bang for the buck" as muggles put it. Harry figured that his channeling needed work.

A lot of the magic that he used didn't go into his spells. Harry didn't know exactly where it went, but Harry knew that he expended a lot of energy to get weak spells. Harry guessed that the tension in the air was from most of his magic leaking unused into the surroundings.

So while Harry drained his magic, Moody was conserving it by using a wand. So the duel turned ill for Harry rather quickly. Harry chose to not use his wand as often and chose to instead dodge more of the curses.

Harry was soon magically exhausted and physically tired. He couldn't even put up a good fight and went down by a stray stunner. Harry had been too exhausted to dodge the curse and just watch as it struck his stomach.

Harry woke to find Moody standing over him.

"That duel was disgusting Potter." Moody practically spat at Harry.

Harry was deeply annoyed. He hadn't been talked down by Moody in quite a while. Sure Moody didn't really praise him that often, but Moody always seemed to have a grim amusement whenever he addressed Harry. Moody's attitude told Harry enough how dissatisfied he was at him.

"It's not like I had a chance to rest." Harry muttered.

"Rest?" Moody asked outraged. "You think in a war you have a chance to rest! You may very well have to go to one fight into another in a war! Who said anything about fighting between a nice long bath and sleep. The usual break an Auror had in the First Rise was a drink of water and a 10 minutes briefing for the next battle. And that was lucky for Aurors!" Moody ranted with a gleam in him eyes as he told about the 'Good ol' days.'

Moony spoke up. "While Moody is obviously exaggerating, his story holds some truth. Aurors back then were stretched incredibly thin and usually one Auror found himself flooing all over Britain to combat Voldemort's forces. You have to know that a real battle isn't like a duel. There is no setting, no set date and location. A real battle may take place 3 in the morning and in front of you very home. You can't complain about offset surprise duels."

Harry nodded tiredly.

"Good now rest up Potter, same time tomorrow." Moody and Moony left immediately. Harry sat down on the floor of the room in deep thought. It was obvious that Moody and Moony's word held truth. Harry felt somewhat ashamed at his whining.

Moody held a world of experience against the Death Eaters compared to him. While it was true that for his age, Harry did experience a lot. More then the majority of the adults in the wizarding world can ever say. But it wasn't as if others didn't suffer. Maybe they didn't suffer as much as him, but he wasn't alone. Records gathered after the war estimated over 800 muggle orphans and around 10 magical orphans had arisen from the First Rise.

The numbers would have been greater if it weren't for the fact that Death Eaters didn't go after only certain targets, they went after their entire families also. Supposedly 3 family lines were completely erased from the record, with over 10 well known families on the brink of being erased from record. The Bones were a fine example of one of those families.

Susan and Amelia Bones were the only surviving line from the once prominent and widely influential Bones family. Before the war they were estimated to have over 150 immediate people carrying the Bones name.

The Crouches were another example, the Crouches held over 30 people under their family name, but after the war only 3 were left. However at the moment none remained, the mother having dying of illness within Azkaban, the father being murdered by the son, and the son having his soul sucked out by dementors and then having his body put to death.

Wizards of course, weren't the only ones hit hard by the war. Muggles took the brunt of the pain by the wizard's prejudice.

Muggle orphans usually arose from random attacks that killed people but not intentionally a certain family. Magical families held record of their entire immediate family so the Death Eaters could easily trace the parents and the kids. That was why there were so few magical orphans during the war.

The Death Eaters killed everyone, very few survived, and if they did survive a raid, they were immediately hunted. They were hunted to show that nobody could escape from the Death Eaters. It was only after the wars end that 9 out of the 10 magical orphans came to public, having been hidden from the world for fear of Death Eater retaliation.

The casualty during the war was high, not muggle World War high, but considering the number of magical population in the world it was incredibly high. The percentage of death of the population in the First Rise was more then the muggle world war's death percentage of Britain's population.

The death rate was why there were so few magical kids coming to Hogwarts. Harry's year barely housed around a little less then 50. Before the First Rise, the average number of students for a year was around 150. Even after Harry's 'defeat' of Voldemort the numbers dwindled because of the large amount of the magical population fleeing Britain.

Even after all these years, they still stayed at wherever they fled to. It was reported that a large number of people went to France to hide, and that the number of students for Beaubaxton escalated dramatically in recent years.

Moody recounted his tales in the Aurors often. Harry liked Moody because he didn't sugarcoat anything like the press and political figures did. He might have overexagerated in some areas, but not when it came to battles. Moody said that they held too many deaths, too much suffering and pain to be ever be dishonored by him with lies and exaggerations.

Many of the battles that Moody went into weren't even battles. They were sick and horrible massacres of families. They were raids which led to battles with Aurors. Rapes and torturing were common. Cold blooded killing were to be expected. The name Death Eaters were well suited considering that they seemed to take pleasure in the death and sufferings of others.

(Great Hall, September 11, Saturday)

Harry entered the Great Hall to hear the whole Hall quieting down. There was absolute silence for a few minutes. Harry merely rolled his eyes at such stupidity and sat down next to Neville. He scooped up food onto his plate and ignored the whispering students.

Loud screeching filled the Great Hall, indicating the morning mail. A bundled Daily Prophet dropped onto Harry's plate, rudely interrupting his breakfast. He had subscribed recently, having been fed up with having to peer over other people's shoulders to read the news. The once blood thirty reporters eager to report lies and scandals amongst the magical world's famous, feeding off the misfortune of others, now had their gruesome and sickening fill of sorrow and heartaches waiting to be written about for the world to read.

Attacks and raids were a daily occurrence now, the obituary section was never empty and usually the ages of those on it barely past the 40's. Fear and sorrow was once again etched into the students' faces. It wasn't unusual to hear at least one person crying a day. The majority of them acted as if they could never have seen this coming, even when they had been warned time and time again for over a year of what was already taking place. It sickened Harry, yet it also filled him with pity, pity at their naivety and the fact that they were living in constant fear.

"Sad isn't it?" Neville spoke up from his seat next to Harry.

"It is sad, but it isn't unexpected. It's a war, and war means casualties. You and I know that well." Harry said.

"It doesn't mean that it's any less sad. I can feel their pain, their anguish and sorrow." Neville said.

"The only thing that can be done is retribution. I don't know how long it's going to take but she'll get what's coming to her." Harry didn't have to emphasize who 'she' was. Neville understood perfectly who Harry referred to.

(Charms Classroom, September 11, Saturday)

"Today Mr. Potter we will be going over wards." Flitwick said solemnly. Even the once cheery and upbeat teacher was affected by the current misfortune that was taking place around Britain.

"The importance of wards cannot be stressed. While jinxes and curses may help you in a straight out attack, wards can turn the overall battle in your favor. Also wards can protect your lives away from the battlefield.

Many great duelers lost their lives not in a battle, but in the vicinity of their own home because of the fact that they couldn't ward off attackers. Now the range of difficulty for wards goes from hard to nearly impossible.

There is nothing less. Even the most miniscule of wards require great power and knowledge of magic. Wards require a focal point in which the strain of the wards must focus upon. Now the diversity of wards is enormous.

The most common wards are those that prevent certain people from entering. There are wards to prevent certain people access. Now the focal point is not just to anchor the enormous magic needed in wards, but to give the ward a 'brain.' The brain is in itself simple, but it does hold knowledge.

Now the purpose of the brain is to decide who can pass the wards unharmed, as all prevention wards come with a unique punishment for the trespassers. The punishment is customized by the caster, in the olden days death was a common punishment, but that is now illegal. So jinxes and subduing magic is the common punishment.

The caster gives the brain requirements for the people crossing the wards to have in order the pass. It can range from blood, looks, family name, anything the caster wants. The other thing about the focal point is that there is a constant link between the focal point and the caster, updating the focal point's requirements subconsciously.

Also the caster does not have to be alive for the wards to stand. As long as the caster 'transfers' the hold of the wards to another, then the other now holds power over the wards. Of course the wards can be held in place without a 'master' but the stability of the wards can't be managed without a master, so in the usual case the wards collapse."

Harry took all this in and looked at the only other occupant in the room. Fleur didn't show for the lessons anymore, not with her requirements to being an assistant to Madam Pomprey increasing. After all, she did have a duty to help the overworked healer in order to finish her schooling.

It was actually funny; one would think that with 2 healers instead of one, the work load for each would lessen. However the injury levels of the students increased this year. Not surprisingly the injuries were mostly male.

Madam Pomprey and Fleur weren't stupid; they knew that the males inflicted injuries upon themselves purposely. That was why Pomprey took all the male patients while Fleur attended the girls, however the male population of Hogwarts didn't seem to get the hint and more and more people went to the Hospital Wing, daily.

(Transfiguration Classroom, September 11, Saturday)

Harry sat patiently in a chair as he listened to Victor and McGonagall as they recounted their Animagus Training. McGonagall had a completely different training then Victors. It was expected considering that she had her training almost 30 years previous to Victor.

During her time, the training required a lot more reading of the theories. There weren't many instructors that could teach others so a person had to practice, practice, and practice. Rarely were people lucky enough to find apprenticeship under previous Animagi. Even those that did receive apprenticeship didn't have that much of an advantage. How was someone supposed to learn how to twitch an unused muscle merely by the words from a book or the words from another's mouth?

However a decades and a half ago, a potion was found to trigger the transformation, allowing a person to get the feel of transforming for a few seconds. After the potion was made, the transformation for animagus trainees became much easier. It was like riding a bike, after a person did it once, it became much easier after.

The problem with the potion was the price of the ingredients and the length to which the potion had to be brewed. The potion wasn't actually difficult to brew but the fact was that only people with very profitable jobs could afford the ingredients, jobs like Victor's Quidditch Profession.

Victor told Harry that to even get the bare minimum amount of ingredients, where a person had to make absolutely no mistake in wasting ingredients, the cost was about 48,000 galleons on the black market. Also the potion took about a month to brew; the good part was that there were sizable distances between the adding of different ingredients.

Another problem was that the potion only helped a person in their quest for being an Animagus; there was no guarantee that a person would be able to transform after drinking the potion. It may even take two uses of the potions.

Harry gave the question deep thought. He wasn't in any financial strain, far from it actually. But Harry didn't exactly want to be carelessly wasting money just because he had a lot. He weighed the pros and cons of the deal, 48,000 galleons for a potion that could dramatically cut down the Animagus lesson. In the end Harry agreed, he wasn't short on galleons, but he was short on time.

(Cabin in Forbidden Forest, September 11, Saturday)

"Supposedly from Moody, you're out of shape." Richard said to Harry.

Harry's mouth opened in protest. "What the hell, I run every morning!"

Richard shook his head. "Running only improves your stamina in your legs; you need to exercise for more then just your legs. From now on you will follow a strict exercise program set by me. Do you understand?" Richard said.

Harry just sighed in resignation. "Okay, but what's the point. After I learn how to control my magic level I won't need to have natural strength." Harry questioned.

"It is because then you wouldn't need to put as much magic to get the same strength outcome. If you have natural strength then you wouldn't need to divert a lot of the magic that could be used for other things into your muscles. Magic and muscle are two different sources for strength that could be combined to form a more productive outcome." Richard explained.

"You will have to do your exercise everyday; you only meet with Elizabeth and I even though I am trying to convince your Headmaster to increase the number of night lesson, but alas he says that the suspicion will be too high. So I trust that you will do what I saw without me having to watch over your back?" Richard gave Harry a scrutinizing aze.

"Alright... Let's get on with it already." Harry said impatiently.

"You seem a bit more restless today Mr. Potter." Richard said to Harry.

"It's just not a good day for me." Harry said.

"Understood, so shall we work on your muscles once again?" Richard asked. "I hope that you practiced during the weekdays."

"Yeah, a little..." Harry said.

"Good, than I hope to see improvement in your strength during this lesson." Richard said.

Harry was once again put through incredibly hilarious looking exercises. He did improve a bit but he needed a long way to go to go against Elizabeth.

(Front Lawn of Hogwarts, September 12, Sunday)

The crisp misty atmosphere found only in the early morning or right after a light rain was refreshing to Harry's hazy mind. When he exited to the lush green lawn in front of Hogwarts, Harry had been still asleep, but the weather immediately woke Harry. He went to a comfortable spot on a dewy stretch of grass and stretched his body.

He would usually stretch only his legs, but his workout was to be different then his usual morning exercise. The overall workout wasn't hard to follow; the routines were simple and mostly repetitive. The only problem being that he was severely out of shape.

Quidditch had been a good source for stretching my muscles, but as Harry quit the team he only had running to keep himself in shape. And running didn't help increase his strength at all.

He did a number of push ups until his arms gave way, which to his annoyance wasn't a lot, and then he went to do crunches. His abs weren't as weak as his arms considering that using a broom required the use of the stomach more so then the arms.

He then took out his wand and conjured what Richard said dumbbells looked like. Harry still had problems with measuring weight so he cast a charm to measure the weight of the dumbbells in pounds. (I don't know if British still use the king's system, but considering that I don't know jack about relative weight in Metric too bad.)

The dumbbell measured close to 20 pounds. It was an adequate weight to start the exercise with at least according to Richard. Harry was ashamed at the fact that he could only do 15 sets of each.

After Harry couldn't do anymore, he reduced the weight by 5 pounds and did another 15 sets on each arm. He then reduced the weight by 5 again and did another 15 sets. After Harry was satisfied and got rid of the dumbbells.

Harry couldn't exercise more because the conjuring was too complicated to bring about workout machines. Harry went for a run and after his run he stretched. He entered Hogwarts once again aching at his arms and abs.

(Room of Requirement, September 12, Sunday)

Harry stood in the middle of the ever changing room in deep thought.

Recently, Harry found out over breakfast Malfoy's punishment for Friday's spell. Harry smirked as he heard that Malfoy got his prefect's badge taken away, along with his Quidditch Captain's position, the position in the Quidditch team, and also received 3 months of detention every night. He also received a yearlong ban on Hogsmeade, future balls, and any electives and clubs. Even though the punishment was great, he didn't wanted Malfoy punished. Harry wanted Malfoy thrown into prison or at least expelled!

The bastard would have killed him if Harry didn't practice a bit of wandless magic over the summer. Harry didn't understand how the bastard was still in school; rumor had it that Dumbledore himself stepped in from expelling Malfoy. Which Harry didn't if it was true, but with the past idiocy and lenience that Dumbledore showed, it wouldn't be surprising.

He also found that his wand less magic skills turned out to be a blessing and a curse for him. After word spread of Harry's blocking of Malfoy's powerful and lethal curse without a wand, people either treated him like a god or like the next Voldemort.

Harry's last spell against Malfoy almost warranted punishment. It was only the fact that Harry did a spell that wasn't lethal, although close, that Harry got out without punishment.

Harry snorted what could they possibly do to Harry anyways? Take away his non-existent Prefect's badge and Quidditch spot, or maybe give him another yearlong detention?

Also, after the lesson's end, all Dark Arts were to be hereby banned in the duel. No matter if the two duelers agreed on the acceptance on the use. Also the rules of the duel limited to use of only one wand, Harry frowned after that. He had 2 extra wands, but now they were rendered useless in a duel.

It was actually pretty sad how unorganized the new electives were, it laid proof to how much the war was taxing Dumbledore. Dumbledore was a man that seemed to have everything seen through in advance, every problem, except where it applied to Harry, every flaw, every loophole, but even now something as simple as the MD and HA had so much problems showed that all was not well with Dumbledore. (In actuality it shows how rushed I was in making the damn electives, and they are the bane of my existence.)

The only thing that Harry looked forward to today was the DA that was to take place after breakfast in the RoR. Today's meeting would only consist of last year's member excluding the graduates. This was to be a public club, with limited membership allowed, so only on previously set dates could the club be allowed to take place. That was why Harry was situated in the RoR on a Sunday, after breakfast, with about 10 to 15 kids standing by him.

Harry turned to the group assembled before him. The group consisted of everyone from last year's DA excluding those that graduated. He even extended invitations to allow Ron and Marietta to come back, even if done with incredible reluctance. However it seemed that both of them didn't show. Harry could only guess that it was done out of shame and the other out of spite.

"Welcome to this year's DA, this meeting is now a public and LEGAL club authorized by the headmaster. The purpose of the Defense Association, as the headmaster requested I change the name, is to teach you to defend yourselves against the enemies that you may very well encounter in the real world.

Needless to say there is a war and there will be no more kidding around. The name of this club in itself is bit misleading as I will teach you offensive magic along with defensive magic. However it is said that the best defense is a strong offense, so maybe it isn't truly lying.

Anyways I will not be teaching you pathetic spells like the petrification spells and stunner. The spells I will cover will actually do damage against your opponents. The spells I will teach aren't for throwing around like you would pebbles in a pond. These spells will be damaging, painful, and are not to be taken likely or used in stupidity against your friends and enemies just because of a childish conflict.

I swear if I ever hear the use of the spells I teach you for stupidity and bullying, you will face my wrath. Not only will you face my wrath, you will also face the headmaster's punishment. What I teach you in this club should only be used against Death Eaters and the like. Spells to protect you against what could be certain death." Harry saw Zacharias roll his eyes.

"Think I'm kidding Smith? If you think what I'm saying is over dramatic or a joke, step out. I'm not paid to teach you, I don't truly care if you learn what I have to teach." Harry said.

Zacharias paled a bit but didn't budge.

"Good, now anyone that is against learning what could be borderline Dark Arts can step out now. I won't teach you "Dark" Arts seeing as how the Ministry and the headmaster will be on my arse faster then you can say Quidditch, but they are pretty harmful to you opponents."

No one left.

Harry smiled when everyone was done. "Great. Now we are told to expand the DA to include more students. I personally don't have a problem with this, but I will most likely not include 4th year students and below." Protests came up from the previous 4th years.

Quiet! Before having 4th years were fine, because we were using mediocre spells. This is year it's different, the level of difficulty far surpasses what any 4th and 5th year should normally be able to take. Last year, I was teaching you spells you should have learned from that fat toad, but this year because we have competent teachers I will teach you spells not found within your textbooks.

And these spells are not as complex as the Patronus Charm, but incredibly more difficult then stunners and redactor curses. I'm proud to say that many of you got something akin to a corporeal Patronus, but let me ask you. Can you bring up the happy thoughts in the presence of a dementor? Would you be able to even sprout a mist of your Patronus in the presence of a being that sucks the very happiness from you?" Harry asked.

Harry then shrugged at the silence. (Think Morpheus as he tells Neo about his muscles and everything in the cyberduel.) "Maybe... Now as I was saying, the spells I will teach are powerful. They are pretty well on par with the level of difficulty of the spells that you will need to know for the N.E.W.T. courses. At least that was what Dumbledore said as I told him my brief outline of the spells I will teach you."

The next 10 minutes were spent outlining what Harry would teach the DA for the year's end. Some protests came, which Harry deterred calmly, and some suggestions for the DA were brought up by the students. Harry changed some of the year's plan when needed and then the discussions came up for the new members.

"I believe that John Lawry is a good candidate to join. He's a 6th year that transferred here. He's Ravenclaw like me." Padma spoke up.

Her fellow Ravenclaws nodded their heads in agreement.

"Really, why do you support him?" Harry asked.

"He shows great knowledge of DADA and Charms." Another Ravenclaw added.

Harry nodded and added the name to a parchment carrying the potential new members.

"How about that Greengrass girl?" Susan asked.

"A Slytherin?" Seamus asked in outrage.

"Yes, she is a Slytherin." Susan said without quivering to Seamus' rage.

"Yes, that is another thing I wanted to bring up. We should add Slytherin's in this group." Harry supported Susan, who in turn beamed at him.

"What you can't be serious; they're all slimy prejudice snakes and most of all evil!" Zacharias yelled and a lot of the members nodded their heads.

"And how are we not being prejudice to label all Slytherins evil?" Hermione asked.

"Hermione is correct. I agree that not everyone from the Slytherin house is friendly, but that doesn't make everyone from the house evil. I don't plan to bring Malfoy into this group, with or without his ban, but that doesn't mean we can't ask other Slytherins to join. In all my years here I've personally never had trouble with Greengrass, from what I hear she even told her father that I wouldn't be making up the lies about Voldemort-," flinch, "-returning. Oh for heaven's sake. Stop flinching whenever the name Voldemort-," flinch, "-is said! That is so god damn annoying, I should just say Voldemort-," flinch, "-so many times that by the end of the lesson you'll either have a nerve problem or have solved your flinching problem." Harry sighed.

"Also a potential candidate to ask is Blaise Zabini. She's a good dueler from what I've seen and I heard that she's adept in Transfiguration and 5th in the year." Harry said.

"Yeah but-," Seamus tried hard to make some excuse to not let the Slytherins to join.

"Look Seamus, this isn't a secret club that needs trust to maintain it. The only thing that club needs is that the material taught here isn't abused and that the people in here will be dedicated enough to learn the material. Even in this group right now, we can't ensure that someone in here won't abuse the material taught to you. Hell I can't even know if any of you over abused the things I taught to you last year." Harry stated.

"Personally I don't want to include anyone that wasn't in last year, seeing as the people here are known to be trustful and actually believed me last year. I personally think that the only people we should recruit are the exchange students, Slytherins, and the 5th years. Seeing as they are the only ones that didn't have a chance to join last year." Harry told the group.

"Well I personally agree, we should ask people like Daphne Greengrass, she is actually pretty nice once you get to know her." Luna spoke up from the back of the group.

"Travis Davis is also someone we should consider." Padma added.

"How about the exchance student, James Cook? He's in Hufflepuff, 5th year." Hannah said.

"Yeah he seems like a good guy." Justin said.

"That McBlack girl is really good at Transfiguration." Hermione said.

"I don't think she's a good idea." Harry said uneasily.

"Why?" Hermione asked.

Harry didn't want to actually tell Hermione the truth. "I just don't feel that she'll be a good person to ask."

"Well if you can't give a good reason, we should ask her. I heard that she's great at Healing too." Hermione stated with finality in her voice.

Harry couldn't tell the truth about Dora McBlack to the group so Harry just let the subject go. Besdies, it would give him a greater time to study her.

In another 5 minutes 15 more kids were added to the potential members list.

"Good, now all we have to do is send these membership out. Colin, could go to the owlery, and send these to the given students? After the meeting of course" Harry asked.

"Sure thing Harry." Colin answered brightly.

"Good, now this year everyone should be on par with each other. Note that you will not be using spells against each other anymore. The spells are too powerful. Instead, I found a useful way to practice spells in here." Harry's face took on a look of concentration.

Behind Harry appeared 20 dummies. The dummies were brown and had no facial features; however their bodies were sculpted similarly to an actual human body.

"All of the following spells that you learn from now on will be used on these dummies. Under no circumstance are you allowed to use the spells on each other. Save the spells for the Magical Dueling elective." Harry said.

"Now today's DA won't involve any spell work. It was only to help finalize the DA for this year. The coming Sunday, meet back at the same time as today. I'll talk to you tomorrow."

The majority of the group left the room feeling unsatisfied with the lesson but opted to ignore it. They understood that the club needed to be more organized before any of the real lessons started but they had been eager to learn something from him.

(Gryffindor Common Room, September 12, Sunday)

Harry laid back into one of the many fluffy and comfortable coaches that lied scattered around the common room in exasperation. He had currently had a heated debate with Hermione about something that he couldn't even remember.

The topic was insignificant but the fact was they both were too stubborn to back down from trying to prove their point on one another. The argument wasn't like Ron and Hermione's rants; actually it wasn't even really an argument.

More like one of those political debates Harry would see on television every once in a while. Both of them weren't yelling, but they were both firm in their beliefs. Neither gave leeway to the other, and Harry guessed that was why Hermione was on the opposite side of the room chatting with Ginny, thoroughly ignoring his presence.

"Hey Harry." Harry looked up to see Dean and Seamus standing above him.

"Yeah, hey." Harry looked at them oddly. Ever since his fight with Ron, it seemed that the rest of the school's population opened up to him more. They started to talk to him more, not about Voldemort and such, but talked to him as if he was any other kid. They talked to him about girls, balls, and the like.

"I... – I mean we just wanted to have your opinion on a matter. Ya' see, Dean and I are having a difference of opinion and we wanted to have a third party's view." Harry nodded at Seamus and looked at Dean who looked confused. They wanted him to choose sides so that the other could rub it in the other's face.

"Well Dean here thinks Ginny is the prettiest girl in the upper year Gryffindors, but I think the best looking girl is Heather Jayne." Seamus explained the dilemma.

"The 7th year?" Harry asked. That was another thing, before his knowledge of classmates rarely extended past his own year. Ron's family excluded and the Gryffindor Chasers were about the only people from the other years in Gryffindor that he knew. Now he got to know more about just about everyone in Gryffindor but the 1st years.

"Yeah her, you know the red head, blue eyes, and sexy body with great assets, perky tits and nice fine arse, and a fiery temper." Seamus explained.

"Oh you mean the one that'll kick your arse if she found out that you were talking about her in such a lucrative and perverted manner?" Harry asked amused.

"Oh, yeah her." Seamus said while looking confused at Harry's smirk and Dean's frown.

"The very same person ready to hex you at this very moment?" Harry's eyes practically shined with mirth.

Seamus didn't try to hide his fear and tried to immediately hide behind Dean, who was barely holding in his laughs. He wasn't fast enough as Heather shot a jinx at Seamus causing him to grow a pig's snout and oink at odd sets of times.

Harry and Dean were cracking up by the time that Seamus ran up to his dorm trying to avoid being seen. It was a pointless cause as most of the common room saw the fiery tempered girl curse Seamus.

The rest of the common room join in the laughter and Heather went back to talking with her friends. Dean quieted down rather quickly.

"What's wrong Dean?" Harry asked.

"It's just that Seamus wasn't trying to talk about girls with you. I was trying to force him to apologize for conflicting with you at the DA." Dean confessed. "I guess he got chicken at the last moment."

"It's okay; I understand his reluctance to let Slytherins in. I too would still be reluctant if I didn't find some tolerable Slytherins recently." Harry.

"Yeah well I also wanted to-," Dean was interrupted.

"Harry?" Harry looked up to see a shy 5th year standing by his chair. "I'm sorry for interrupting, but would you go to the Christmas ball with me?"

Harry blushed. People asking him to the ball were pretty common nowadays. Ever since the papers hailed him as a hero the girls and even some boys flocked to ask him to the ball.

"I'm sorry Claire, but I'm going stag." Claire Porter looked dejected. She blushed deeply embarrassed, the color rivaling even Ginny's hair. Harry recalled that he acted the same way in his 4th year asking Cho.

Harry truly hated not accepting people's proposal, their reactions made him feel utterly guilty but he also didn't like the fact that they were probably asking him only because of his fame. He was an average height kid with slightly lanky figure and no particularly attractive attribute.

The only thing that Harry's liked about his face was his mother's eyes. Although its features were darker, more filled with pain and grief then the eyes of his mothers.

When the girl went out of sight up the stairs, with evidence of crying, Dean turned to Harry. "I don't get you Harry, you have a perfectly nice girl ask you out and you turn it down." Dean shook his overdramatically as if Harry had some sort of terminal disease.

"Well I can honestly say that the chances are that she didn't ask me because she liked me. I mean I haven't even spoken 10 words to her before and she asks me out. That kind of tells that she looks at me as the Boy-Who-Lived not Harry. I'm not even that attractive. Especially compared to you, Seamus, and that guy in 7th year with blond hair." Harry said.

"Harry, Harry, Harry..." Dean said with mock pity. "You may be able to take on 1000's of Death Eater, fly a broom rivaling pro-Quidditch players, have the power to one day rival Dumbledore, but when it comes to girls, Neville knows more."

"Oi!" Harry said in outrage. "You don't have to hit that low."

"Honestly Harry, even Neville has more self confidence then you when it comes to the other gender." Dean shook his head in a way imitating a doctor telling a family bad news. "Do you know how much I hear about Harry this and Harry that when I pass by girls. It's somewhat disgusting how much they list your 'attractive' features. They go on and on about your 'eyes that can pierce a person's soul, devil-may-care hair, build that rivals a gymnast, graceful and powerful.' Honestly I'm really jealous how they practically worship you, I even heard Ginny last year going on about you." Dean said.

Harry blushed crimson. "Aww, shut up."

Dean laughed. "Okay, okay."

(Great Hall, September 17, Friday)

As if on a regular schedule, the Daily Prophet arrived with the usual notice of deaths overnight. People's moods were at an all time low. It even got to Harry. The teachers tried to sympathize; even Snape reduced his snide comments to help the student body cope with the war.

A.M. Bones was handling the situation pretty well. At least better then Fudge by a long shot. She commanded enormous respect amongst the Aurors, having been one of the few Aurors to go through the Grindewalds reign and the First Rise without being given the boot by people like Fudge. It also helped that she had Dumbledore's full support; Harry even expressed his congratulations to Susan.

It was something that the reporters seemed to have somehow picked up on, as his open support for Madam Bones was written in the Daily Prophet. Amongst the newspapers came another mail, it was from his accountant Jewel Delaney. It seemed that she finally contacted him about him now being of legal age.

Dear Mr. Potter.

As you most likely know I am your family's accountant. While I am quite new to the business, having only been in the profession for 13 years, I can say that my family has been your family's accountant for 5 generations after having problems with the previous accountant for illegal laundering of the Potter's assets.

I understand that you have now full legal control over your financial status and thus can control who would oversee your account. While I would like to continue working for you under the same payment rate, it would ultimately be your decision. Please reply back with your wishes.

Jewel Delaney, CEO of Delaney CWA. (Instead of Certified Public Accountant it stands for Certified Wizarding Accountant. I know, I know lame but don't flame.)

Harry left the Great Hall immediately and went up to the Owlery. He whistled for Hedwig in the sea of birds. The graceful and beautiful snowy owl flew down to his shoulder. Hedwig preened herself as Harry groomed her. Harry chuckled inwardly, his owl acted just like an over exuberant female.

Harry told his owl to wait for him to finish writing a letter and told her that it'll be to France. Hedwig took it all in strides and she lavished herself in his care. Harry looked at his finished writing to check to make sure that he didn't sound over cocky or informal.

Dear Madam Delaney,

It is nice to hear from you, truth be told I had no idea of your existence or the existence of your firm until late into this summer. I put trust in your family's ability to handle the Potter Fortune, as you ancestors and mine have obviously trusted each other. I would be honored if you would continue to manage my account.

However I do have a few concerns and few questions. My top concern is the convenience of communication. It is obvious that message by owl is long and taxing for the delivery animal. I truthfully would like to have a more... immediate way of communicating with you or your workers. A way that is private and wouldn't require the frequent use of the fireplace seeing as there is no privacy within the walls of Hogwarts.

Next my questions are the Potter's full stock records. I do not know the limits of my family's fortune, business ventures, property owned, and the list of people and places where regular payments with list of payment and reasoning for payment, whether being taxes, worker's fee, etc. are made from the family vault. I wish to have complete information as soon as possible.

The form of communication would be your choice as long as it is private, though I prefer to have someone ready to explain any questions that I would need upon receiving such information.

Have a nice day, Harry James Potter, heir to the Potter Family.

Harry was satisfied with the letter and gave it to Hedwig. His owl took off and Harry watched it until her distance became so great that she was but a speck in the sky. He exited the owlery, content on leaving the loud squabbling of the owls behind. He hurried to his first lesson, seeing as he was close to being late.

A/N: Uneventful, yes I know. Sorry, but I wanted to write more on a normal day for Harry. Upcoming chapters will be better, I hope.

Seaver: 1) The reason why Harry didn't blow up in Hermione's face was because of the fact that Harry and Hermione only had a conflict of personal opinions. Opinions that Harry himself believed before, so he couldn't fault Hermione for still having the naïve beliefs. He is exasperated by her childish notions, but he isn't angry had her for having her own political type opinions. He mainly tries to explain to the best of abilities his point of view, in hopes of clearing the naive notions of Hermione and the rest of the schools, well the Gryffindor's at any rate. 2) With the physical application of the duel, Harry himself is only starting to learn the concept of strength training in terms of magic. Until then he learns nothing about fighting without magic. Of course I understand the dodging part, but the fighting part I can't bend. He is going 3 against 1, physically weaker then 2 out of 3 of his opponents for sure, and doesn't know shit how to fight hand to hand. 3) I apologize if Harry seems OC to you. However it is good to note that Harry only blasted Snape in a duel, which he brought upon himself, and when he was forced to in the hopes of a convincing act planned by the professors.

Slacker1: 1) Animagus, yeah I know it wasn't original. Hate that about the animagus not being original. This is the main part where I think I crossed the line into making Harry almost super. This is also one of the reasons I took so long to update, I was having a huge conflict whether to put the animagus's training in or not. However I don't have much knowledge on what else to teach Harry during McGonagall's lesson so I had to go with animagus training, begrudgingly. 2) What you have to understand is that even if Harry doesn't realize it, he has been given easy fights over the summer. I mean the Auror's, at least Moody, had to go easy. Most of the others went with mediocre spells, and even if it was hard being outnumbered, the spells were still way below what the trainers could do at maximum. If Moody and the others went all out at the beginning, it'll be like crash coursing Calculus to a person barely passing Geometry. As you can see after Harry got to school, and had the hang of dueling, Moody stepped up the fighting with more intricate magic and the like. That is Harry's weakness, no matter how fast, how powerful he is, he still doesn't have experience. 3) The thing with Malfoy, yeah I made Harry "play" with Malfoy more then he had to. That was in itself Harry's flaw. He, like so many before him, underestimated his opponent and got arrogant. Also the fact about Malfoy knowing how to duel, dueling in the magical world must be a somewhat popular past time. Nowhere near the publicity of Quidditch, but if dueling is so popular, Malfoy would no doubt have had tutors to teach him in the past in dueling. Even if Malfoy's spell work sucked, his past experience with dueling would make it so that he at least knew the fundamentals in a duel and not make amateur mistakes. A coward Malfoy is, but a rich ass whole with an ambitious ass kissing father he has. But remember, no matter how great a dueler is, the main fundamental flaw that can throw a duel is arrogance. Harry and Tonks, Tonk threw a spell to Harry's back and not expecting him to retaliate had a late reaction, getting taken down. Harry and Snape, there is no doubt that if Snape went all out on Harry, without playing around with "light" spells in the beginning Harry would not get out of the duel winning. Harry might believe that he could take Snape on even if Snape went all out, but Snape has had 30 years or so of experience with magic and Snape would have taken Harry down, hard if he weren't so arrogant into believing that Harry could be beaten with minimal effort. Harry and Moody, Harry over the summer beat Moody on and off, however after having a one on one with Moody, where Moody didn't hold back and did complex magic, Harry lost. Although note to the fact that Moony helped Moody, but still. Also Moony has too much emotional ties with Harry to go all out with Harry no matter how much Harry would expect him to.

Mike: About Harry playing the field... I don't think I'm going to probably write that. I like stories like that, I totally understand that, but I just don't feel that if I make Harry a sort of a player that it would fit with how I want Harry. But you never know. I seem to write one way, one chapter and the complete opposite that next. That's why I'm such a shitty writer; I have no commitment to one plot. That and my grammar sucks.

ADJ: Sorry for the Ron bashing. Truthfully I agree with you, Ron put up with a lot of shit in the 5th book. However, I'm more firmly latched onto the 4th books, as you can see with bringing all the characters from the 4th book back and all. I can't truly justify my Ron bashing, I can truly say that this story is just my way of ranting and creating a story that I wish to read from others. Honestly, I have nothing against Ron, it's just Ron bashing is so fun. I love stories where Ron and Harry are great friends, but I just can't seem to write anything pro Ron. Maybe some other story where I mature a bit, Lol. For the Veela charm, of course it the strength of the mind, and I guess your point makes sense. It truly isn't likely for a whole stadium of people to be weaker magically then Arthur Weasley, but you never know how powerful Arthur may be. Look at his off springs, they show incredible knowledge and their line of work aren't easy on their magic.