AN- Not much to say accept that I'm still having trouble writing, but I'll keeping at it!
H/H FOREVER!
Bye!
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Ron was asleep as soon as he lay down, still fully clothed, but despite how tired Harry was, he found himself unable to sleep. Something was nagging him, telling him that there was something he'd forgotten about during the day's excitement.
After half an hour of trying, and failing, to go to sleep Harry finally remembered what it was that was bugging him.
< The invisibility cloak!>
He quickly got out of bed and pulled it out from the robe he'd stuffed it in that morning.
He looked at it for a while, imagining his father sneaking around the hall of Hogwarts in it, playing tricks on the Slytherins.
He got up intending to try it out by sneaking to the library to look around. Glancing at Ron he decided not to wake him. Harry wanted to try it by himself, just for this first time. As he was about to leave the boys' dorm he thought of the other gifts he'd received that day. He went back and got the flute from Hagrid, wanting to try it out as well as the cloak.
¿ <'}}}><
Harry had never had any trouble getting to the library without being caught, even without the invisibility cloak, but having the cloak on certainly made him feel much safer. He made it to the library without seeing any other people, either staff or students, and decided that it was time to pay Lady Scrive back for sneaking up on him and startling him many other times.
"Quietus." Harry murmured, silencing the door with a charm he'd discovered before by accident (he had researched it later to be sure that he'd be able to do it properly).
He pulled open the door and slipped inside, closing the door after him. As he searched the aisles for Lady Scrive he wondered whether or not there was any point in trying to scare a ghost by sneaking up on them. After all, there is little that a ghost would fear, as it is quite difficult to hurt them and impossible to kill them - due largely to the fact that they had already been killed.
< Ahh, well.> he thought, < I still want to see how well this cloak works, whether I scare her or not - there she is!>
He'd finally spotted her a level above him floating through the aisles.
Making sure to keep the cloak wrapped around his legs, Harry slowly made his way towards her. When he'd finally reached where he had seen her last he paused, unsure which way she had gone, until he caught sight of her again. This time she was headed towards the restricted section. Harry bared his teeth in an evil grin.
< Now here's something interesting. I wonder if the cloak will hide me from the wards that keep unauthorized people out of the restricted section?>
Harry had been coming to the library at night for a while, and had access to more books than even Hermione could read in a lifetime, but despite that he'd longed for the chance to browse through the restricted section, partly because he wasn't allowed to, but also just because there was likely a lot of interesting information there.
He paused as he reached the boundary of the section. This was where all the protective charms started.
Harry had once tried, like all students do at some point, to get into the restricted section without permission. Fortunately he'd been alone at the time because the moment he had stepped past the boundary he'd been thrown back out by the wards guarding the section and had landed on his back atop a table.
He stretched forth an arm past the first rows of book cases and felt a light pressure, as if he were pushing his hand into syrup, but no alarms went off and he wasn't thrown away from the books (besides experiencing it himself, he'd once seen the same thing happen to the Weasley twins - though they hadn't known he was there), so he stepped forwards and resumed looking for Lady Scrive.
He found her near the back of the section, looking at the titles of the books and murmuring to herself.
"Hmmm, Harry would enjoy this one, I've no doubt." Harry heard her say as he came upon her.
"What one is that?" Harry asked from where he stood, not more than a foot behind her.
"Oh!" she gasped as she whirled around looking quite startled. "Who's there?"
Harry grinned and took a chance at setting off an alarm charm by removing the hood of his cloak.
The Lady quickly calmed seeing Harry - or at least his head, and put a hand over her… well over where her heart would have been if she had one, causing Harry to grin even wider.
"Payback I assume?" she asked dryly. "And how did you manage to get past the wards in here any way?"
She didn't seem at all disconcerted by the fact that she was talking to an apparently disembodied head. Perhaps it had something to do with being a ghost.
"Well, I can't be absolutely sure, but it's probably thanks to the best Christmas present I've ever had." Harry answered, still smiling.
Lady Scrive frowned for a moment, not understanding, before her eyes went wide as she finally realized that Harry wasn't all there.
"A present?" she asked. "It can only be your father's cloak!"
Harry nodded.
"It is, but - how do you know about it?" he asked.
Harry hadn't thought that anyone other than Ron, Hermione, whoever sent the cloak, and Harry himself knew about it.
Lady Scrive smiled wistfully.
"You are much like your father, and in more than just looks." She said. "He used to come here the same as you. He never asked for my help though; in fact, he probably thought I didn't even know about it since he was almost always wearing that cloak, but he slipped up a few times."
"What did you do when you found out that he was sneaking around after curfew?" Harry asked, wanting to know as much as possible about his father's school days.
"Nothing. As long as he was here to learn I saw no reason to stop him from doing so." She answered. "You know -" she went on, becoming thoughtful. " - he didn't start coming until his sixth year, but his reasons for wanting to learn more were much like your own. He wanted to know more so that he would be better able to protect his friends and loved ones. One of his best qualities in my mind and one you share with him most strongly."
She smiled sadly and Harry could see a silvery substance fall from her eye that disappeared before it hit the floor.
< She's crying.> he realized with a start.
Not for the first time Harry wondered what kind of a man his father must have been to have so many people who had known him and still mourned his passing, even years later. The Lady Scrive hadn't even known James that well and yet she had still strongly admired him.
Ever since he had been told the truth about who his parents were, and how they had been killed, Harry had hoped he would be as good a person, and as strong and well respected as both his parents had been. Now he became determined to do so.
< Wherever you are, mom and dad - I'll make you proud.>
The Lady quickly wiped away her tears.
"Well, enough reminiscing." She said. "What brings you here? I had thought you were taking a break from studying for a while in the holidays?"
"I am." Harry said. "I just wanted to try out a couple of the presents I received."
"Oh? The cloak and what else?
Harry smiled and pulled the flute out, holding it outside the folds of the cloak so the Lady could see it.
"Hagrid made a flute for me. I had a few music lessons in school, everyone did, so I wanted to try it out."
"Well go ahead then, no one will be able to hear you in here." Lady Scrive told him.
"Here goes then."
Harry put the flute to his lips and blew. The flute let out a squeal, not at all the sound Harry had been trying for.
The Lady cringed and chuckled.
"I said that I'd had some lessons, not that I was any good." Harry admitted sheepishly (of course it hadn't helped that Dudley and his friends had always been teasing him, making it hard to concentrate on what the teacher was telling them).
He brought the flute back to his lips and blew lightly this time. The sound was much better, sounding soft and clear. Harry ran his fingers over the holes producing an interesting sort of trilling sound.
The Lady and Harry smiled at each other as he paused.
"Well that sounded much better." Lady Scrive told him. "Now if you could just learn a song to practice people might not mistake the sound for a fwooper's mating call."
Harry smiled and rolled his eyes.
"Oh, give me a break! I'll get better! Besides, it's not like I'll ever be playing for people to hear."
Harry spent a while strolling around the restricted section with Lady Scrive while playing his flute. He couldn't play any songs of course so he just made up little tunes. He wasn't really especially good of course, but the sounds he made were at least not painful once he learned not to blow too hard.
Even though Harry couldn't remember any of the simple tunes that his class had been taught at school he still enjoyed just playing. The flute sounded clear and the sound seemed to calm him almost as if he was meditating.
He remembered Dumbledore saying something at the welcoming feast. Something about music having a magic of it's own, and now Harry could understand what the headmaster had meant. There was a feeling in the music aside from its calming influence. It felt a lot like the feeling that McGonagall had told them to look for during their first Transfiguration class. (Ch. 12)
After an hour or so Harry began to become tired and decided to go back to bed.
"I think I'll leave now." He told Lady Scrive when he started yawning.
"Before you go, there was a book I saw here I thought you'd like." She told him.
Harry frowned.
"Will I be able to take it off the shelf?"
"I'm not really sure." The Lady admitted, tapping her chin. "Even I don't know too much about what was used to protect this section. You may as well try though. If it sets off some sort of alarm you shouldn't have much trouble keeping from being caught. Just make sure to have your cloak on before you take it off the shelf."
She led him to where the book was ('An Objective Look At The History Of Curses') and Harry carefully covered himself with the invisibility cloak, then reached out and tentatively pulled the book from the shelf and held his breath.
Nothing happened.
Praying that he hadn't set off some kind of silent alarm, he sat down on the floor and opened the book in his lap.
Harry just about had a heart attack when the book began to scream and he nearly threw it away in his surprise. Quickly he slammed it shut, and when that didn't shut it up he stuffed it back in its spot on the shelf. It still didn't stop screaming, but the sound was mercifully muffled now.
"Oh, well." Lady Scrive said, apparently not minding the horrid noise too much, after all, she didn't have any eardrums for it to destroy. "It was worth a try, but you'd best be on your way now, Harry."
Harry nodded before he remembered that she couldn't see him.
"Alright." He told her and made his way to the entrance as quickly as he could.
¿ <'}}}><
Harry got to the library entrance as fast as he could and only just made it in time to slip past Filch as he threw the still unlocked door wide open.
< I should really get the twins to show me how to use the hidden corridors.> Harry thought. < It would have been useful tonight.>
Filch's eyes were wide and he looked so fierce and suspicious, as he whipped his head back and forth, trying to find the intruder, that Harry half expected him to start foaming at the mouth, but he didn't wait around to find out. He slunk silently away, and broke into an all out sprint once he was out of earshot.
Harry could still hear the book's shrieking, but it was fairly faint so he slowed to a walk and looked more carefully at his surroundings. He was back in the same corridor he'd run down while trying to avoid Filch and Mrs. Norris one night. He listened for any sound other than the faint scream of the book, and then walked down the corridor when he heard nothing.
A little ways down the hall he found the same room that he had used to hide in, though the door was closed now.
Curious, he tried the handle and found that the room hadn't been locked.
Harry turned the knob and carefully opened the door, then stepped inside.
The dust that had covered the room before was still there and undisturbed, but now lay equally thick on the elegant mirror in the centre of the room. When Harry had first found the room he'd thought that it was suspicious that there wasn't any dust on the mirror yet the dust on the floor leading to the mirror hadn't been disturbed, suggesting that the mirror had been put there recently and someone had covered their tracks somehow. Now he found it even more suspicious that so much dust had settled on to it in so little time. It was as if someone was going out of his or her way to keep the mirror from being noticed. Putting it in an out of the way classroom and making it look as though it had always been there.
< Someone must want this kept secret for some reason…> he realised, and then grinned. < All the more reason to check it out. After all, knowledge is power.>
Careful to disturb the dust as little as possible, Harry crept towards the mirror. It was really quite elegant looking, but Harry found it somehow disturbing, but couldn't put his finger on why it disturbed him.
He stepped in front of the mirror, wanting to not see his reflection through the invisibility cloak. What he saw instead caused him to spin around whipping out his wand and knife at the same time, as his heart raced, but there was nothing to be seen.
Harry instantly turned back to the mirror. The people he'd seen were still there, but apparently only existed in the reflection and weren't really in the room.
As he calmed down he realized two things at once. One, even though he was wearing the invisibility cloak, he could see himself in the mirror, and two, he knew one of the other people in the mirror.
In fact he didn't know how he hadn't noticed it sooner. After all, it was impossible not to recognize the softly smiling girl with her arm around his waist and her head on his shoulder. He saw her uniquely bushy brown hair and her cinnamon eyes everyday after all.
Once he recognized Hermione, he looked around at the others. There, to the left and a little behind him, was Ron, grinning as madly as ever and his hair almost seeming to be made of flames as it shone in the spotlight he was standing in. Beyond him were many others that Harry couldn't quite place right away, but they all had a familiar feel to them. Especially the closest two… a man and a woman, holding each other tightly while waving at him. The man could have been an older version of Harry himself and the woman had hair that was as red as any Weasley's and her eyes… they were the eyes hidden behind Harry's glasses…
Harry was stunned when he realised who he was looking at.
"Mom?" he whispered hoarsely. "Dad?"
Harry started shaking, though he didn't notice.
"No!" he said still whispering. "It can't be! You're dead!"
He stumbled back until he bumped into a desk and he turned and ran from the room, looking as if all the evil in the world was chasing him.
Harry couldn't remember getting there, but he somehow made his way to Gryffindor tower and into his bed.
¿ <'}}}><
That night Harry had terrible dreams about the night Voldemort had killed his parents. They started out the same as the dreams that he'd had for as long as he could remember, though he'd started having them more often ever since he had been told what really happened to his parents.
The dreams he had that night were slightly different though. At first Harry saw his parents. They were smiling, laughing and holding each other. Harry knew what was coming next, but couldn't stop himself from seeing it. A shadowed, snake like monster, would appear, looming over his parents and next would come the flash of green light then the cold, empty laughter. This time though Harry felt the dream change. Suddenly Harry found that he was there in the dream himself and when he looked back up at his parents he saw Ron and Hermione were there too.
They were smiling and waving at Harry. Harry started to smile as well and tried to move towards them, but found himself stuck. He looked down at his feet, but there was nothing holding them down. He looked up again and saw the sky that had been so blue a moment ago was now the blackest night, and behind his parents and friends he saw a part of the sky darken further and move forwards. As always, the monster seemed to be made of shadows and moved too fluidly, as if it had no bones. Somehow Harry knew that this was Voldemort, even though he couldn't see him for the darkness he wore.
Harry tried to scream a warning, but no sound came from him. He heard the laughter start and there was a flash of light. When Harry could see again his parents were lying dead and bloody on the ground, and Voldemort had turned to Ron and Hermione now, who looked horrified. Again Harry tried to move, to scream - anything, but could do nothing as there was another flash of light and his friends joined his parents.
Voldemort's laughter got louder and even emptier. It seemed as if it was suffocating Harry, pressing in against him till he couldn't draw a breath. As the dream began to fade, Voldemort turned his sunken red eyes to Harry and began to advance on him with a malicious sneer.
If Harry wasn't already used to such dreams he would have woken up screaming then, but he had experienced many such dreams before; in fact, it would have seemed odd to him if he went more than a couple weeks without a nightmare. As it was Harry's life with the Dursleys had taught him to keep from screaming from even the worst of his dreams. A fact that Harry was actually quite glad for at that moment. If he'd woken Ron up, then Ron would no doubt want to know exactly what had happened, and Harry had learned that most people didn't have such terrible dreams. At least not as often as Harry did, and Ron would be worried about him if Harry told him about the dreams and Harry definitely didn't want the people he cared about to worry about him.
It wasn't that Harry wasn't affected by the dreams. No one could dream of their parents deaths and not be affected, it was just that Harry accepted the dreams. They scared him and caused him sorrow, of course, but Harry just ignored it, or refused to let touch him. Just like he had learned to refuse to let the Dursleys' insults, or the pain from Dudley's punches affect him.
For a while Harry just sat up in bed and tried to meditate, but had a hard time clearing his mind and organizing his thoughts. After an hour or so, he gave up and simply laid back and quickly fell asleep again.
Harry looked up at his parents and saw Ron and Hermione were there too.
They were smiling and waving at Harry. Harry started to smile as well and tried to move towards them, but found himself stuck. He looked down at his feet, but there was nothing holding them down. He looked up again and saw the sky that had been so blue a moment ago was now the blackest night, and behind his parents and friends he saw a part of the sky darken further and move forwards. As always, the monster seemed to be made of shadows and moved too fluidly, as if it had no bones. Somehow Harry knew that this was Voldemort, even though he couldn't see him for the darkness he wore.
Harry tried to scream a warning, but no sound came from him. He heard the laughter start and there was a flash of light. When Harry could see again his parents were lying dead and bloody on the ground, and Voldemort had turned to Ron and Hermione now, who looked horrified.
Again Harry tried to move, to scream - and suddenly he realized there were hands holding him back. Struggling he twisted his head and saw that it was the Dursleys that were holding him back.
" Let go!" he growled at them. " You don't control me! I won't let you!"
With a surge of strength he pulled from their grip and was able to move forwards. He felt like he was moving through syrup, but he was moving forward and then he found himself between Voldemort and his friends. The shadow/Voldemort sneered and reached out a hand towards Harry, as if to grab him and crush him.
Harry found his voice again and screamed at Voldemort over the continuing cold laughter.
"Nooooo! I won't let you hurt them!"
Suddenly there was silence, as Voldemort's form seemed to be blown away by an unheard and unfelt wind. The darkness lightened a bit as well and Harry suddenly felt lighter and a great relief washed over him.
"Harry!"
…….
"Harry!"
…
"Wake up, Harry!"
Harry felt someone shaking him and opened his eyes. A blurry red shape was leaning over him.
"Ron?" Harry mumbled, feeling groggier than he could remember ever feeling before, but at the same time - something was different. He felt… more free somehow.
Judging by how bright it was Harry guessed it was still pretty early in the morning. Too early for Ron to be awake yet.
He heard Ron sigh in relief.
"Are you alright?" Ron asked him. "You were yelling something in your sleep. Something about someone not hurting you?"
"I was?" Harry asked in confusion, but then he began to remember the second dream he'd had that night.
"Yeah, you were." Ron answered. "Bad dream I guess?"
Harry thought about it for a moment. The first dream he'd had was definitely bad, but the other one…
"I'm not sure. I was dreaming, but it wasn't exactly a bad dream…" He gave Ron a crooked smirk. "You actually heard me? I had thought it would take a dozen enervate's to wake you up with all the turkey you had last night."
"Hey!" Ron cried, smacking Harry. "Here I am, being a nice guy and waking you up because I thought you were having a nightmare and you start making jokes at my expense! Some friend!"
Harry just smiled in response and watched Ron dive back into his bed, falling asleep again in moments.
Harry shook his head and wondered, not for the first time, how Ron was able to go from being fairly wide awake to being in a deep sleep at moments notice. He smiled again, thinking of how glad he was to have Ron as a friend, before laying back down to sleep himself.
¿ <'}}}><
When Harry woke up again it was already past noon and Ron had already gotten up.
As Harry got dressed he thought about what he'd seen in the mirror the night before.
< Why was I scared?> he wondered with a frown. < It was just my parents, Ron and Hermione.>
Thinking about what had caused him to run from the old classroom he realised that it hadn't exactly been fear that had made him run. It had felt more like a terrible pain in his chest.
He was still thinking about it as he walked down to the common room, where he found Ron and Hermione playing a game of chess. Ron was smirking and Hermione was scowling at the board, as if it had done something evil to her.
Seeing the look on her face Harry couldn't help but smile. She was so used to being the best at anything intellectual that she seemed to take it quite personally when Ron beat her at chess. On the other hand Ron thought it was good for her to see that she couldn't do everything perfectly. At least that was his excuse for taking such pleasure in beating her, saying that he enjoyed it because he was helping her to be a better person.
"How are you this fine afternoon, Harry?" Asked Ron, jovially.
"I could be worse." He answered. "How are you two doing?"
Hermione only grunted in response, her eyes never loosing their determined look.
"Ha!" she suddenly shouted, moving a piece on the board. "Take that!"
She smirked, obviously thinking she had made a good move to keep Ron from taking even more of her men.
Ron looked at the board for only a minute before smiling and shaking his head ruefully.
He moved his queen over two spaces.
"Check."
Harry thought that Hermione's eyes would pop out of her head if she opened them any wider.
"Darn!" she said, obviously wanting to use stronger language than that. "I surrender."
Ron just chuckled and stretched his hands over his head.
"Yep, I'm still the champ!" he crowed.
Hermione rolled her eyes at his antics and turned to Harry.
"Ron told me you had a bad dream last night." She said. "You ok?"
Harry nodded.
"Yeah, it really wasn't too bad. I've had worse before." He answered.
Now that he was more awake he realised what had made the dream different than usual. He'd seen Ron and Hermione with him and his parents in the mirror, and had them seen them all together in his dream.
"By the way, I tried out the invisibility cloak last night."
Now he had both Ron's and Hermione's full attention.
"Really?" Ron asked excitedly, while Hermione gave him a disapproving look. "Where did you go?"
"Well, I went to the library,"
Ron's face fell and he looked sick.
"Look, where I went isn't really important. I want to show you guys something I found on my way back." Harry said and stood up.
"Alright, lets go." Ron said. "but what is it that you found?"
"A mirror."
Hermione frowned.
"Why do you want to show us a mirror?" she asked.
Harry shook his head.
"Just wait and see." He told them.
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AN- This chapter is up thanks mostly to Bryan Tait, who been, as always, a tremendous help in getting everything right, and also thanks to threats of annoyance from "anon". Lol! :-)
H/H FOREVER!
Bye!
Shades of Grey