Harry Potter gets smart and takes control - The Goblet

Chapter 79 Skeeter Strikes Again

This has been proof read and updated.

Side note, slight amendment to the scene with snape and flitwick. I removed the bit about harry being in the dungeon, as neither of them have any idea where harry is staying at this time (its important later and I forgot about it)

Sorry it was ruff last week, been burnt out this month and I'm behind schedule but I didn't want to have to stick it on hiatus.

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Harry had planned on giving himself the week off from doing anything stressful or tournament related. He had every intention of not doing anything except his regular daily routine of going into the forest, class, hanging with his friends, tutoring his first years, O.W.L. studies and mirror calls with Bill and Charlie. He hadn't even planned on starting any new language potions until next week to give his brain a rest.

Life, however, as always, had other plans.

Harry had been mainly detached from the Hogwarts rumour mill since his un-housing. He avoided the great hall, the common room. He rarely loitered in the hallways, meaning he had little contact outside of class with his peers. And in class, he always paired up with his friends and rarely had to actually interact with anyone else. He was more than okay with hardly ever seeing the rest of his peers. Antisocial of him, but he'd had enough of the lot of them.

Not being around his peers, or not getting caught by them meant less whispering, pointing and staring. Best of all, it meant less hexing and bullying.

It did, however, mean he was somewhat out of touch with the rumour mill and the mood of the school. Fred and George found the various rumours terribly entertaining. When they weren't helping the stories along, they were regaling Harry and the others of the better ones during meals. The better ones being the most outlandish and ridiculous ones, which knowing Hogwarts was most of them.

Since the last edition of the Quibbler, the un-housed had apparently been a hot topic. Everyone had been trying to figure out who had been un-housed. For once, Gryffindor had been keeping it quiet. Something which had astounded Harry.

Fred and George had been equally surprised by the loud house's silence. They had sworn to get to the bottom of their uncharacteristically successful secrecy, when they weren't busy losing the house points, of course. Having Hagrid (a Gryffindor) as their stand-in Head, was very advantageous in their collective plot to ruin the red house.

Harry just hadn't taken too much notice of the gossiping about the un-housing in the lead up to the second task. But now it was over, he couldn't help but notice the whispering, the staring, pointing and sneering as Professor Binn's droned on in History on Friday morning.

Something had fired up the rumour mill.

It was quiet, a few Gryffindor girls at the back, but he thought he caught a few words, "Prophet...Harry...disgrace....un-housed... deserved it... is a delinquent... muggles... scars."

It sent a cold shiver of dread through him. He knew that somehow his un-housing was now common knowledge. Especially if the stares, the smirks, and smug looks the Gryffindors were giving him were anything to go by. He'd already had to dodge a few hexs behind teachers backs.

While he'd become an expert at never being caught, that didn't stop the really determined Gryffindors when the teacher's backs were turned. It really was lucky he had become terrific at shield charms.

But it wasn't all bad, which was the oddest thing, not that it really cheered Harry up any. Ernie McMillan tentatively asked him what had really happened in the lake and with Gryffindor, wanting to hear Harry's side of it. But it was a little too late for Harry really. Even if someone not automatically doubting and judging him was a nice change.