Thank you, Sagotan and Miyugi! You two gave me the impetus I needed to post this today. : )
Sagotan: While I can't answer some of your questions because it would be spoilers for the rest of the series, I can say that I agree with your points about the developing relationship (for lack of a better word) between Harry and Snape. Only the future - well and me, I suppose lol - know just how that will turn out. As for Draco and Lucius in regards to Harry. How that works out is already written into the story line. : ) I hope you enjoy where it goes.
Kiri
xxxxxxxxxx
Chapter Four
xxxxxxxxxx
Harry woke bright and early the morning they were all to leave for King's Cross, fully ready to head back to school. Though he did have a few reservations about his control, he hadn't had any bouts with accidental magic since the second week of August, a week after Snape's one and only visit. The surges themselves had almost disappeared, happening less than two to three times a week now. Remus told him he was fairly certain he'd mastered his own growth and was now dealing with the extra from his mother.
"Alright, you lazy lumps!" Mrs. Weasley shouted from the hall. "Time to get up! Breakfast will be ready in ten minutes!"
Harry laughed when Ron hollered back. "We're up already!" He vaguely heard it echoed by Ginny from across the hall. He didn't hear Hermione's response, as it was obviously far more quiet and, he assumed, far more polite.
Ron and Ginny had come to stay at Grimauld for the last three weeks of summer and the four of them'd had a wonderful time; though Ron had been a bit disgusted with Harry when he'd insisted on maintaining not only his summer exercise routine, practicing his bio-feedback, continuing his meditation and occlumency, but also actually finishing his summer school work before the end of summer. He didn't want to do it on the train this year. He actually had the luxury of finishing it properly this year, of showing what he was truly capable of.
Harry snorted. That disgust held nothing on Ron's reaction to his and Hermione's idea of a summer school. He'd looked at them as if they'd been completely out of their minds.
"What are you up to?" Ron asked as he walked into the library.
"Working on a summer school idea."
"What?"
Harry laughed, but beside him, Hermione bristled.
"It's a good idea, Ronald, even if you don't think so."
"It's completely barmy, that's what it is!" Ron exclaimed, dropping down beside them. "We already go to school most of the year; why would anyone want to go in the summer as well?"
Hermione huffed, but Harry lay his hand on her arm, cutting off her rant, as she turned to frown at him.
"Haven't you ever wanted to cast magic during the summers?" he asked quietly, hoping to bring Ron on board. It would be so much more fun if all three of them worked on it together. It'd be like all their adventures before . . . only this one wouldn't be dangerous.
"Well, of course, I have, Harry. Who hasn't?" Ron retorted, rolling his eyes. "Doesn't mean I want to spend summer in school, just to do it."
"Well, it wouldn't be a real school, Ron," Hermione huffed.
Ron's eyes narrowed. "It wouldn't?"
Harry shook his head at the same time as Hermione. "No. We have to have a Professor there 'supervising' in order to make it all legal, but it wouldn't be. . . ."
"Structured like school," Hermione finished after Harry trailed off, unable to find the right word.
"You mean there'd be no homework?"
Harry laughed. "No, Ron, no homework. There wouldn't even be assignments as such."
Ron's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, 'as such'?"
"It'd be kinda like the DA," Hermione replied.
"Oh!" Ron exclaimed. "Well, that's alright, then."
The next hour was spent ironing out what the three of them wanted out of the day school.
"I still say we should have quidditch there, too," Ron insisted.
Hermione growled, and Harry was certain it was because she was getting tired of Ron's obsession. Not that he was any less for it, but he'd been smart enough to keep it to himself after the first time the idea was raised. He didn't like conflict. "This is about evening things up between the pureblood elite who can pretty much do magic any bloody time they want to, and the muggleborn and raised that can't."
Ron scowled, crossing his arms across his chest as he glared at her. "I know that, Hermione," he bit out angrily. "But have you noticed there are almost never any muggleborns on any of the teams at school? Harry's the only muggle raised."
Hermione opened her mouth for what looked to be an automatic retort of some sort, but, frowning, she snapped it closed. "No, I hadn't noticed that," she replied quietly. "But, that doesn't make any sense," she continued, speaking almost to herself. "It's not as if brooms are all that difficult."
Harry snorted, gaining Hermione's instant, irate attention. "So says the girl who refuses to ever get on one."
"Just because I don't like them," she snapped back, "doesn't mean I couldn't if I wanted to, Harry James Potter."
"He knows that, Hermione," Ron replied before Harry could recover from his surprise at the strength of her comeback. "But, you're not comfortable on a broom, are you?" he asked.
Hermione's frown deepened. "A lot of people aren't comfortable on a broom," she replied defensively.
Ron nodded, but surprisingly seemed to change the subject . . . slightly. "Do you know how old I was my first time on a broom?"
Hermione shook her head.
Harry couldn't figure out what that had to do with anything.
"I was two."
Hermione stiffened, sitting straight up, outrage written in every line of her body. "Somebody let you get on a broom at TWO?"
"Not by myself, obviously," Ron retorted, rolling his eyes.
"Oh, well then," Hermione replied, trailing off uncomfortably. "Sorry."
"No worries," Ron replied, shrugging. "The first time I was on one by myself was on my 6th birthday." He grinned sheepishly. "It was just a kid's model. It wouldn't go more than two feet off the floor and its best speed was about as fast as I could walk."
Harry snickered, suddenly picturing a tiny version of Ron on a broom that inched across the room.
Ron threw him a quick glare, but his heart obviously wasn't in it, because a canary eating grin quickly replaced it. "It was the best broom ever as far as I was concerned."
Hermione's mouth twitched and Harry could almost hear the 'awwwww, that's so cute,' that wanted to tumble out of her mouth. She resisted admirably, Harry thought. "Your point being?" she asked.
"Isn't it obvious?"
"No," Hermione snapped back. "If it was, I wouldn't have asked."
"When was the first time you got on a broom?"
Hermione rolled her eyes. "I was almost 12, Ron, you know that as well as I do."
"Which of us should be more comfortable on one then?" he asked.
"Well, you, obviously," Hermione replied, obviously not seeing his point.
"No muggleborn even knows about flying brooms until they're ready for Hogwarts. Given that they can't fly at home, even after they come to Hogwarts, and the only time we fly at school is in first year flying class and for quidditch, how are muggleborns supposed to get comfortable on one?"
Harry was absolutely, positively not laughing - not even mentally - at Hermione's sudden impression of an out of water fish. He wasn't! Okay, maybe he was. It wasn't often he got the chance to see his very brainy friend completely flumuxed.
"Okay, you're right," Hermione said tentatively, visibly pulling herself together, "I just don't see what's so important about it."
Harry winced as Ron's expression darkened. Wrong answer, he thought, scrambling for a way to head off the coming storm and coming up completely blank.
"Not everyone is as good at school as you are, Hermione!" Ron snapped, leaping to his feet.
"I know that!" Hermione snapped back, also standing.
"For some of us, quidditch is the only chance we have of actually making something of ourselves! I'm sorry if that insults your brainpower, but if you're really intending on helping the muggleborn, then help all of them, not just the ones that are like you, otherwise, you're just as bad as the people like Malfoy!" Ron snarled, spun around and all but ran from the room.
Hermione gasped, tears filling her eyes. She turned to look at Harry. "I suppose you're angry at me too?" she half snapped, half asked.
Harry shook his head. "No, but I do see his point," he replied carefully.
At that, Hermione's tears overflowed and spilled down her face.
Harry felt like a heel. He hadn't meant to make her feel worse. But, he knew this was going to fester if it didn't get out in the open. "You're my best friend - female version - Hermione, and I don't want to make you feel bad, ever. But, I have to admit that sometimes, you make me feel that you don't think we're good enough because we're not as good at school as you are, that we're not as smart as you are."
"No, Harry!" Hermione protested instantly, looking faintly horrified. "I just want you two to be the best you can be."
"I know," Harry replied, sighing. "How would you feel if Ron and I kept telling you that you had to come play quidditch, that your studies weren't important at all, were, in fact, a waste of time?"
"I wouldn't like it," Hermione replied almost as quickly as before. "It- It would make me think you didn't know me at all," she continued slowly.
Harry didn't say anything in response. He knew he didn't have to. He just let her think it through. A few moments later, he was proven right. She gasped.
"I'm sorry, Harry!" she exclaimed. "I never realized."
Ron hadn't been as quick to forgive as Harry had been, not that it had come as a surprise to either of them, but eventually things had smoothed over between the three of them. Of course, Hermione's last second admonishment had helped that along.
"That doesn't mean that I'm not going to harass you into doing your homework, Ronald Weasley," Hermione said tartly. Ron grinned widely at her, throwing an arm over her shoulder. "Of course not," he agreed amiably. "You wouldn't be you, if you didn't." "But I will try to be less. . . ." "Obnoxious?" Ron offered, grinning. Hermione glared. "forceful, about it." "I can live with that," Ron replied easily.
Almost every other spare minute - not that there were many left - was spent simply hanging out together, playing chess and exploding snap - their ideas about the school slipping into all aspects at least a few times as each of them thought up new ideas. Unfortunately, he didn't manage the last three nearly as much as he - or Ron - would have liked. There were only so many hours in the day, and with Ron staunchly refusing to join him in his 'insane running' from the bottom of the house to the top and back again multiple times a day, it didn't leave a whole lot of free time to just goof around.
He'd thought it before, and he'd think it again, 'being mature sucked!' It was awfully boring, too.
Of course, with Ron and Ginny, came Mrs. Weasley's near constant presence as well, which made it all the more difficult to actually find time to practice his wandless magic. He and Hermione had to avoid all three Weasleys to do so - since they'd sworn not to tell anyone that they knew about the loophole in the underage magic restriction. Harry managed it a bit more often than Hermione, simply because she'd been a saint about the whole thing and had distracted the Weasleys a couple times a week to allow him to expend his excess magical energy. That had been particularly helpful once his mother's magic started to affect his fluxes and outbursts - something he hadn't really expected to even notice after Remus' apple description.
While Remus had been right that it hadn't been as hard as what he'd gotten from Yilmez and Rutherford, it still hadn't been the walk in the park Harry had been hoping for, either.
Hermione was the only one who joined him for any of his exercises, but even she refused point blank to run the stairs with him. She was, instead, doing what he'd been doing at the beginning of the summer - running in place and dodging obstacles - and doing what she called aerobics. Harry called it dancing, something he refused to do. He knew what he looked like when he tried and he had absolutely no intention of making himself look like an idiot. He did that often enough without trying. Hermione had agreed to run with him when they got back to school, 'on flat, solid ground' as she put it.
He was already ready to go, so he was in no hurry to climb off his bed. He'd just end up getting in Ron's way, since he was running around the room like a half crazed chicken trying to find his missing 'lucky' socks - the bright orange ones. He was having fun watching his friend go nutters with his last minute packing anyway. He smirked to himself. He'd finally found a real, honest to goodness benefit to being mature. He got to sit back and watch the chaos instead of participating in it. It was a chaos that Harry could hear echoed outside their room as Ginny was pretty much doing the same thing as Ron.
How it could be that way every year, though, Harry didn't understand. The family had been doing this for years, surely they should have it down to an art form by now. But no, Mrs Weasley had already shouted up the stairs at them four times to get a move on or they were going to have to skip breakfast in order to make the train in time. That's what had finally lit a fire under Ron. Food was his friend's holy grail - not that Mrs. Weasley would ever make good on that particular threat.
"I can't find them anywhere, Harry," Ron whined. "Are you sure you haven't seen them?"
Shaking his head, Harry finally climbed out of bed and immediately dropped to his knees to look under Ron's bed. When Ron lost something, it could usually be found there. Sure enough, that was where they were, along with many other things - some of which Harry had no clue what were. Frankly, he didn't want to know what some of them were, he thought with a shudder as he stood and handed his find to Ron.
"Thanks, Mate!"
He dressed quickly in his new clothes that - to his completely embarrassed pride - Mrs. Weasley'd, had to alter less than a month after he'd bought them.
Harry stared down at his bare ankles in dismay. He'd just bought these! Why-? He darted out of his room, hoping Mrs. Weasley had already arrived for the day.
"Mrs. Weasley!" he called out as he reached the ground floor landing.
"In the kitchen, dear," she called back.
He dashed down to the kitchen, skidding to a halt just before crashing into the table that dominated the room.
Mrs. Weasley's eyes widened. "Something wrong, Dear?"
He nodded. "Yes!" Stepping away from the table, he cast a look down and held his arms out to the side.
Mrs. Weasley chuckled. "Looks like you gained about an inch."
"But my clothes fit yesterday!"
"Sometimes, during magical growth, your body gets a bit of a jolt, too. Nothing wrong with that."
"But an inch," Harry exclaimed in disbelief, "overnight?" Who'd heard of such a thing?
"Yes, dear," she replied, still smiling. "Sometimes more; though, that doesn't happen often. You'll probably put on a couple more before you're done."
"But I just bought these!" he protested. He'd been so happy to finally have clothes that actually fit, and now they wouldn't. The only difference would be that now they'd be too small, instead of too big. He wasn't altogether certain he didn't prefer it the other way round. At least that was more comfortable.
"I'm sure there's at least a little seam allowance for growth, Harry. Madam Malkim usually adds that in automatically for youngsters. You do have a tendency to outgrow your clothing, after all. Once we're reasonably sure you're done with your surprise growth spurts, I'll let them out for you, and if necessary, magically enlarge them a bit. That's best done not more than once, since any more than that starts to weaken the material. Clothing doesn't take real well to sizing charms."
"But what'll I do in the meantime?" he asked. He'd thrown out all of his old things the moment he'd got home from his shopping trip. He didn't have anything left.
"Borrow something of Ron's, Dear. It'll likely be too long, but that's better than too tight."
Harry sighed, nodding. "Thanks, Mrs. Weasley," he said, turning and heading back upstairs. He tried telling himself it wasn't such a bad thing to happen - all things considered. He really was rather tired of being so very short. At five feet, five and a half inches, he was the shortest boy in his year, but worse than that, he was shorter than almost all the girls too! Only two of them were shorter than him, and those two were tiny! Maybe, if he grew enough, Madam Pomfrey would stop referring to him as 'delicate'. He hated that.
By the time he reached his room, he'd almost convinced himself and was wondering just how much he'd grow. Picturing himself at a respectable 6 foot one or two, was rather pleasing actually. At least then he'd be taller than Malfoy. Harry frowned. Unless the prat was having the same growth spurts he was.
Harry shook his head. In the end, Mrs. Weasley had, had to let out the seam the full inch of the built in allowance and magically stretch the material two and a half inches more, so he hadn't met his 'wish height'. But then, five foot nine wasn't such a bad height. It certainly beat what he'd been before hands down.
Hurrying from the room, lugging his trunk, he discovered that Ginny was still not doing much better than Ron; though, she appeared to missing a necklace and her favorite pair of earrings, rather than a pair of 'lucky' socks. Rolling his eyes, he headed down the hall. Hermione was already there, waiting in the hall with her trunk beside her. They made their way downstairs together, both laughing at the increasingly frantic shouts that always seemed to start with 'where is my. . . .' Only the endings varied the slightest.
They pulled their trunks to the side of the entry hall against the wall, making sure they were out of the way of anyone passing through. Both shaking their heads at the continuing chaos, Harry feeling rather smug that this time he was ready ahead of time, they headed for the kitchen.
"Hello, Dears," Mrs. Weasley greeted them brightly as she hurried past them. "Food's on the table, keeping warm. Help yourselves." Huffing, Mrs. Weasley stepped just outside the room. "Ron! Ginny! Hurry it up! You've got two minutes!"
He and Hermione laughed, both shaking their heads. They'd only just managed to dish themselves up and begin eating when Mrs. Weasley hurried back into the room.
She sighed heavily, never slowing as she bustled around the kitchen. "As usual," she muttered, gathering up a couple bowls and dishing the various breakfast foods into them, "they're going to be eating on the way."
Hermione huffed. "Maybe they might learn if you made them miss it once."
Harry laughed at Mrs. Weasley's horrified look. "I couldn't do that!" she exclaimed.
Both he and Hermione chuckled at her horrified outrage, and Harry couldn't resist teasing her just a little. "Oh, I don't know; it might just sink into Ron's head if he had to walk out of room filled with food without eating any of it."
"Oh, you!" Mrs Weasley huffed, chuckling, suddenly realizing they were teasing her.
Minutes later, their dishes were cleaned up, courtesy of Mrs. Weasley's wand and they were making themselves comfortable on top of their trunks. Hermione immediately crossed her legs, pulling herself into the stereotypical meditation pose - pinched fingers and all - and Harry shrugged, following suit; though, he chose his normal cross legged position, palms resting lightly on his knees, rather than the one Hermione had chosen. It felt too uncomfortable to him and made the whole process more difficult for him. Breathing deeply and slowly, he sank into a light trance state. It didn't take him long, anymore, the ease with which he successfully meditated improving almost every time he did it - something he was becoming proud of. The sounds around them were slowly relegated to insignificance as he found peace within the trance, leaving only a small portion of his attention spared for anything out of the ordinary.
x-x-x
"What are you doing now, Potter?"
Hermione groaned mentally. Not now, she whined silently, not daring to do so out loud. She waited, not moving. She hadn't been addressed, after all.
"Potter!"
Isn't he going to answer? She opened her eyes in time to see Harry turning his head to face the professor.
"Hello, Sir," Harry replied, sounding remarkably polite and respectful. She was impressed. She knew damned well that Harry wasn't feeling the way he was acting.
Professor Snape sneered. "I asked you a question, Potter!"
"We were meditating, Sir" Harry replied, his voice still quite calm, almost as though he were still in trance.
"Meditating?" the professor scoffed, still sneering. "Looked more like sleeping to me."
Before Harry could respond to the accusation, however, the professor continued, his tone growing even more scathing.
"Still not thinking through your actions, Potter? What would have happened if someone who sided with the dark lord managed to get in? Hmmm?" he snarled, moving well inside Harry's personal space. "They would have taken you by surprise, just as I did, Potter. Then, where would you be?"
"I heard you come in, Professor," Harry said softly, his gaze not dropping from the professor's.
"Typical! Which means, either you're lying again to save your hide, or you ignored me when I questioned you. If we were at school, you would be serving-"
"I'm not lying, Professor," Harry inserted quietly. "Nor did I ignore you. I simply knew you weren't a threat, so-"
"Don't interrupt!" the professor snapped.
"-I took my time coming out of trance instead of wrenching myself out of it."
Hermione winced at the second interruption, wanting nothing more than to jump up and intercede, before the encounter escalated terribly. She had learned a lot this summer too, however, and knew that Harry had to deal with this on his own to truly move passed it. She remained silent by only the thinnest of margins, however. It simply wasn't in her nature to stand aside while someone else was falsely accused - something that had cost her more house points than she cared to recall at the moment.
"You insolent little-"
Again, Harry didn't let him finish, smoothly continuing his explanation as if the professor hadn't said anything at all
"It's healthier that way," he said
Professor Snape stiffened, glaring angrily, but surprisingly didn't push the issue. She wondered if that had anything to do with what had happened the last time the two had tangled. "Next time you choose to goof around, Potter, make sure you do it out of everyone else's way!" he snapped.
"We did, Sir," Harry replied quietly.
Hermione was beyond surprised that Harry didn't add anything refuting the 'goofing around' comment, but was proud of him for it. It wouldn't have made a bit of difference in the professor's attitude, except perhaps to make him angrier, so it would have only served to frustrate Harry even more than he had to already be. It was all she could do to restrain the wide smile that wanted to spill across her face - despite how angry she was at the professor.
"Dont contradict me, Potter!" Professor Snape snapped.
It was then that Hermione saw the twitch. Harry was fast losing the battle to hold on to his temper, and she sincerely hoped the professor would leave off soon, or Harry's triumph would become failure instead. Harry needed a success.
"Did you, at least, make sure you were ready to leave first?" Professor Snape demanded.
Harry nodded. "Yes, Sir," he replied; though, this time, Hermione could hear the tightness with which he spoke.
Professor Snape snarled and spun away, striding toward the sound of Molly Weasley's voice, once again raised to be heard two stories up.
The moment Professor Snape was out of sight - and hearing range - Harry turned toward her, the smile on his face bright. "I did it!" he exclaimed in a loud whisper.
Hermione frowned, confused. "Did what, Harry?"
"Kept my temper, of course," he replied. "What else would I have meant?"
"I'm proud of you, Harry," she said carefully, knowing he needed the encouragement, but was not able to let it rest at that alone. "But it seemed like you were getting pretty angry there at the end."
Harry snorted. "Oh, I didn't say I wasn't angry," he replied wryly, "and frustrated, for that matter, but I didn't lose control like I usually do with him." He stood slowly, his grin widening even more. "I didn't even have to grit my teeth!"
"Good point," Hermione admitted. "Being angry and losing your temper are two different things entirely."
Harry beamed. "Maybe I can do this after all," he admitted. "I wasn't sure until now." He frowned then, biting his lip indecisively. "Do I need to admit that just coming up from meditation helped . . . a lot?" he asked. "I just felt too . . . peaceful to let anything get to me at first - even him."
Hermione laughed. "No, Harry, you don't. That's what meditation is for, after all, to help you find and maintain your center of calm. Just remember, his opinion of you doesn't matter in the least. He is how he is, and nothing you can do will change that," she said with a small shrug. "Just don't carry that too far and stop listening to the other things he says," she warned. "Just because his opinion of you is very skewed, doesn't mean he doesn't know what he's talking about in other areas."
Harry snorted then. "I do know that, Hermione."
"Good," she said firmly. Harry had a tendency to go to exremes sometimes - though, not as often nor as deeply as Ron did - and she wanted to nip that in the bud if she could.
It wasn't long before a double, repeated, thud, thud, thud, caught their attention and both of them turned toward the staircase where Ron and Ginny were dragging their trunks down the stairs.
Hermione sighed, standing, feeling the last of her meditative calm slipping away with the irritating noise. She could only imagine just what it was going to do to the professor's temper.
x-x-x
Harry frowned, heading immediately toward the siblings. "Why didn't you just carry it, Ron?" he asked as he met them a third of the way up the stairs. He took Ginny's trunk in hand and carried it for her, reducing the noise by half. "It certainly would have been quieter."
Ron shrugged. "Too much bother," he replied with a shrug, continuing to let the trunk thud down the stairs behind him, completely oblivious to Harry's growing irritation.
He frowned at the uncaring response. "You really should-" His words cut off as an odd thought hit him. -think about other people, Ron, the sentence completed silently. Harry's frown deepened as he reached the main floor landing and set Ginny's trunk next to his and Hermione's. That is what everyone keeps accusing me of; what Professor Snape says I do? he thought incredulously. Sure, there had been times he'd been wrong about what he was thinking. He'd made mistakes, wrong assumptions, hadn't always thought all the way through to every single consequence of his actions, but he had never been so thoughtlessly unaware of the effect of his actions on other people. He really didn't like it that anyone saw him that way. He certainly didn't want to be that way. That was the way his cousin acted.
"I really should what, Harry?" Ron asked, looking at him oddly.
Harry shook his head, knowing all too well, just how Ron would react if he completed that sentence. "Nothing important, Ron," he replied, smiling at his friend. "You finally all ready?" he asked instead of doing so.
Ron nodded. "Yep," he replied, then shook his head. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm glad to be getting back to school."
Laughing, Harry shook his head. "Hermione must be rubbing off on you."
Hermione's indignant, 'hey'; Ginny's laugh; and Ron's instant blush, washed away the final taste of anger toward Snape. A new year had begun, and Harry was determined that this one, was going to be the best yet. Not that, that would exactly be difficult, considering his other years at Hogwarts. He just really hoped it was less . . . exciting than his summer had started out.
"It's about time you got ready!" Mrs Weasley snapped as they reached the foyer. "It's time to go."
"But, Mum!" Ron instantly protested, "we haven't eaten yet. I'm hungry!"
"Tough!" she snapped back at him. "You'll have to eat in the car again. If you want to eat a full breakfast, you should be ready on time."
Harry's 'Hermione and I were ready last night,' was kept behind his teeth only barely. He so wanted to gloat!
He sighed, heading for the door, instead. Several someones would be upset with him if he did gloat - including himself - which made it not worth the effort. Besides, he sneered to himself, it isn't mature. Unfortunately, he wasn't exactly feeling very mature right now.
Once out the door - with Mrs. Weasley herding them like an English sheepdog herded sheep - it didn't take them all long to load their things, and themselves, into the ministry supplied cars and they were finally on their way to Kings Cross, off to begin a new year at school.
The end of episode Two
Episode Three is "Shifting Perceptions" Be on the lookout for it soon.
Kiristeen ke Alaya
Feedback: is the ink with which I write! Please review.