Gold Tinted Spectacles (Hecatemus Book #1)

Chapter 1 - A Beginning (pt1)

All year he had played a role.

On the outside he had shown people a calm, sometimes cheerful face. Harry had talked with his friends and pretended that he had moved beyond Sirius' death. He had been made Quidditch captain for Gryffindor and they had happily wiped the floor with Slytherin. It had almost been like before: Harry against Malfoy, Gryffindor against Slytherin, almost back to the simplicity of school rivalries.

It had been nice, but of course Harry knew the truth; he knew he would one day end up a killer or an obituary in the Prophet. That knowledge made him separate. There was part of him he did not let out, part of him that his friends' love had not been able to reach over the whole of the school year and, suddenly, as he considered his world, this bothered him.

Harry thought that Hermione knew there was something about him, but she had not questioned him and she had not mentioned it to Ron.

The thing was, Harry knew he was no longer the same as he had been last year either. The hollow empty place he had inside him that had opened up like a chasm when Sirius had fallen through the veil had changed. He could pinpoint the exact day it had transformed; it had been towards the middle of the Summer holidays three days before his birthday. Up until that point the summer had been what he considered normal: his relatives had been being their ordinary, nasty selves, although these days they ignored him rather than anything else, and he had been doing his homework and sending owls to Ron, Hermione, Tonks and Remus as usual.

But then he had woken up knowing that the world had just shifted. It was that simple; no doubt, no second-guessing, Harry had known.

At first he had not understood what was different; he had not been able to explain exactly what he felt. Harry had suspected Voldemort's influence. At first he had thought maybe it was some trick for Voldemort to worm his way into his mind, but his scar had not been hurting and there were no signs. His Occlumency training had sharpened his mind far beyond the tricks the Dark Lord liked to play. He had discarded that idea quickly.

It had taken him until his birthday to realise he was completely unafraid of this new knowledge. It was as if something had clicked into place in the universe and become right.

Harry had been considering it ever since. He did not know what the rightness was, but he knew he had to find its root. The empty place was no longer just a hole that could never be filled; it felt like a slot inside his soul that was looking for something. Harry did not understand the feeling and it confused him, but he knew he was not afraid. He knew he had to search out the cause.

It had occurred to him to tell Dumbledore or Hermione what had happened, but something held him back. It was something that was still preventing him talking to anyone about what was happening.

It was the strangest thing as well: since the morning when everything had changed, when he thought of Sirius, he did not want to close his mind and forget. The grief was still there, but the anger had fallen away. On the first night he had realised this he had cried, sobbing his sadness into his pillow as he never had before.

Ever since Harry had felt a little better. His godfather was gone, but his memory was kindled in Harry's mind. There was still the guilt, but it had dimmed to a manageable level and he did not have to bury it anymore.

It was all such a sudden change and sometimes Harry thought that the ideas crowding his head were bound to spill out. His mind was so full, as if everything he had been hiding from for the past year was coming out at the same time, and yet he was not overwhelmed. Even as he watched Ginny tear across the garden after George, or possibly Fred, he did not feel as if he was sinking.

"What y'doing, mate?" Ron asked, as cheerful as ever as he came wandering into the room.

"Watching Ginny terrify George," Harry replied and turned to his friend with a grin. "I think when we made her lead chaser we created a monster."

"Nah," his lanky best friend said and dropped onto the bed, "she was that all by herself before we did anything."

Ron had had yet another growth spurt at sometime over the holidays, probably something to do with his mother's cooking, and Harry was sure his friend was six foot three if he was an inch. Ginny was no more than five foot six, but Harry, in his position as almost-adoptive brother, had no doubt the girl could hold her own against all her siblings.

He and Ron lapsed into silence as Harry glanced back out the window to where the only Weasley daughter had just tackled whichever twin she had been trying to catch. Harry smiled fondly.

"You're not finally going soft on our Ginny are you?" Ron asked in a dubious tone and drew Harry's attention back from his thoughts again.

"Well what with you and Hermione making doe eyes at each other all the time," Harry replied as he schooled his features into a wistful expression, "maybe I'm considering it."

His best friend looked a little anxious at that. Ginny's crush on The Boy Who Lived had been legendary, but they both knew Ginny had moved on. Harry could see all the nasty possibilities working their way through Ron's mind.

"Um, Harry," his obviously uncomfortable best friend started rather awkwardly, "you, um, well that is..."

Ron was clearly in big brother mode, but did not appear to know what to say and Harry blinked at him innocently for a few moments. He couldn't help but grin when he saw suspicion slowly begin to dawn on his friend's face.

"Don't frighten me like that!" Ron protested loudly. "God, I thought you'd gone soft in the head or something."

With a laugh Harry climbed to his feet and stretched the kinks out of his back, enjoying the moment. It felt like it had been such a long time since he had been able to tease Ron without worrying about the rest of the world, or, for that matter, do anything without worrying about the rest of the world. He knew he had many things to think about, but it felt like he was waking back up to the universe after a long sleep. Harry decided to enjoy it.

"The sun's out, it's the last day of the holidays," he announced; "what on earth are we doing inside?"

Ron's face broke into a wide grin at that.

"Couldn't have put it better myself, mate," his friend said and stood up beside him. "Shall we?"

With a flourish Ron produced his wand and Harry followed suit.

"The apple tree?" he asked, slightly more jovially than he was actually feeling, but only slightly.

"See you there," Ron replied and, pointing his wand at himself, Disapparated with a loud pop.

Shaking his head and grinning wryly Harry gritted his teeth and then did the same.