Dinner at the Crawft's was an interesting affair. After knocking on the door and being greeted by an overly-enthusiastic Lisa, I was introduced to her parents. Mrs. Crawft, an older, calmer, infinitely more mature version of her daughter, acted every bit the ideal mother. Her father, on the other hand, was a gruff businessman, a consummate professional. Where Mrs. Crawft greeted me with the loveliest of smiles, Mr. Crawft greeted me with a stiff, “hullo.”
We sat around the table, and I spoke with Mrs. Crawft who asked me a plethora of questions: how old was I. What did I like to do. Standard questions. I answered to the best of my ability.
“What are your intentions towards my daughter?” asked a gruff and, dare I say it, angry Mr. Crawft. I wasn't sure how to answer him. Thankfully, I didn't have to.
“Now dear,” Mrs. Crawft gave her husband a smile laced with poisoned sweetness. “I thought we already had this conversation. Harry and Lisa are quite young. I doubt he has any intentions toward our daughter. You promised me that you wouldn't harass him.”
Mr. Crawft Grunted, but remained silent and continued eating. I stared at the parents, confused, before leaning over to Lisa and whispering, “do you know what they're talking about?”
Lisa cupped a hand to her mouth and whispered back. “Not a clue.”
After dinner Lisa directed me to the living room, a spacious interior with a carpeted floor, a large sofa, two comfy chairs, a coffee table and a television. She bade me to sit on the couch and asked me what I wanted to watch.
I chose Star Wars.
We sat on the sofa, watching text roll down the screen as the opening theme to my favorite space opera blared in our ears.
“Hey, um, Harry?” Lisa asked, her voice soft, almost unnoticeable over the din of music.
“Yes, Lisa?”
Lisa fidgeted in her seat. “I wanted to thank you... for coming over, I mean.” Fidget. Her cheeks began burning red. “It really means a lot to me.”
I turned to look at her. Upon being caught under my gaze, Lisa flushed and looked away. How odd. Normally she's determined and vibrant to the point of being pushy, yet now she's acting shy. Weird.
I felt a smile crawl on my face, unbidden.
“You're welcome,” I said softly, then looked away and added, “thank you for inviting me over. This was... fun.”
Lisa looked surprised for a moment, before a smile broke out on her face.
“You're welcome,” she whispered, turning back to watch the movie.
XoX
As November hit the whether became incredibly cold. Frigid. Ice seemed to hang in the air and invade the lungs, causing not only mist to rise from each blown out breath, but a sharp, minty coldness to seep into ones chest with each intake of breath. Windows fogged over, not even the warming charms that kept most of the castle at a mild temperature could get rid of it. Harry wondered if perhaps they had been designed that way on purpose to give the school an authentic Scottish winter look, but disregarded the theory soon after. The ground had become covered in a thick sleet of frost. It wouldn't be long now before the snow started to fall.
The first Quidditch game was only a few days away, on a Saturday. After a little over a month of training, Harry would be playing in his first ever Quidditch match: Gryffindor vs. Slytherin. It was a much anticipated game, perhaps more so than any other due to the animosity between the two houses. It could also have something to due with him being the youngest Seeker in the past century and the Boy-Who-Lived, but that was practically a given.
There was only one problem, Harry's broom hadn't come in. He had sent the message to Andromeda the day after he had earned his place as the Gryffindor Seeker, and had received a reply that she would do as he asked. Yet a month had gone by with no word from Andromeda. He was beginning to get worried. Oliver was also getting antsy, which made everyone else on the team paranoid. It was almost like a vicious circle.
A frown crossed Harry's face as continued his training. Despite how Oliver had forced them to do extra training to prepare them for their first game, it did not mean he had slacked off in his own physical training regime. 200 push-ups with his feet planted against the wall so that he was working at a 45-degree angle, followed by 200 normal push-ups, then 200 more with his hands placed in a triangle directly in front of his face. After that he would do some core work outs, followed by stretches, then shadow sparring.
That was probably the one downfall to being at a boarding school for magic for nine months, Harry reflected ruefully. Much as he loved it here, none of the witches or wizards knew anything about hand-to-hand combat, thus he had no sparring partners to practice with. Shadow sparring only got you so far, and Harry had no doubt that when he got back home Master Wei was going to rip him apart the first chance he got.
By the time he finished, Harry had worked up a decent sweat despite no longer being able to do his daily run. Even though he knew the warming charm to keep him warm when outside, he knew no spell that cold get rid of the slippery sheet of ice that covered the ground. And he did not fancy falling on his rear end every time he tried to push himself to his limits during his runs.
Heading up to his common room, Harry took a nice, long shower, got himself dressed to start the day, then pulled out a book on dueling and began reading as he waited for his friends to wake up. He had actually advanced decently far in his spell work as far as offensive spells went. He didn't know many true, but those few spells he did know had become second nature to cast. He was currently working on silent casting, which for some reason was a lot harder for combat magic than it was for other spells.
Harry believed it had something to do with the spells effect and how you had to make non-verbal verbalized commands. Whenever Harry cast a spell for a charm or a transfiguration, he just had to picture the effect in his mind and his magic took care of the rest. Combat spells were executed much differently. Rather than picture the effect you had to make the verbal commands nonverbal and time your magic and wand motions with the command. This was because picturing the effect happening would just take too long, there was simply to much to detail; the spell as it was launched, hitting your enemy, and what effect it had on your opponent. Not even a computer capable of processing data at light speeds would be capable making that a viable means for combat.
Which was why the caster had to non-verbalize verbal spells when dueling. It sounded easy in theory, but was intensely difficult in execution, requiring not only an incredible amount of mental discipline, but also a strong will and a lot of practice. Most adult witches and wizards couldn't cast non-verbal spells. So far, Harry only had one spell he could cast silently five out of five times, and that was after two weeks of practice.
One of the many aspects of dueling Harry was interested in eventually mastering was spell-chaining. As the name of the technique stated, it was the act of chaining a set of spells together in such a way that the caster did not have to pause in between spells each time he cast. In order to chain two spells together it required the one casting the spells to cast a spell where the last wand motion of the first spell can flow into the second without the need for a pause in between. For example, one cannot chain the Expelliamus, the Disarming Charm, and the Stupify, a Stunning Charm, together, because both spells require the caster to point their wand at their target. On the other hand, the Disarming Charm can be combined with the Diffindo, the Cutting Curse, orthe Jelly-Legs Jinx, Locomotor Wibbly, because the wand movements are not only different, but can flow into each other seamlessly. A point, and then a slash.
Harry had yet to actually practice spell-chaining because he only knew six offensive spells, but he at least knew of several ways to chain the spells together, and would begin practicing later on when he got more combative spells under his belt.
The sound of footsteps let him know that someone was coming into the common room. He flipped a page of his book as he listened to the footsteps. They were light, steady and in slightly off rhythm. Harry quickly discovered who was walking towards him.
“Good morning, Hermione,” Harry greeted casually as he deliberately closed and shrunk the book before putting it away in his pocket.
The walking stopped, and Harry turned to see Hermione blinking at him.
“How did you know it was me?” she asked.
Harry smiled.
“You have a very distinctive walk.”
Hermione huffed and crossed her arms.
“That doesn't tell me anything.”
“Of course it does,” Harry stood up and stretched his arms above his head, the fabrics of his robes bunching around his shoulders. “You just haven't realized it yet.”
Hermione's lips became a thin line and her brows furrowed. No doubt she was trying to puzzle out how Harry knew it was her form her walk. He wondered how long it would take her to figure out.
A few seconds later Neville walked down the stairway.
“Morning, you two,” he gave his good morning as he walked up to them.
“Morning, Neville,” Hermione replied absently, still trying to figure out how Harry could tell who she was just from her footsteps. Harry chuckled.
“Hullo, Nev.”
The three made their way out of the Gryffindor Common Room and began walking down the many corridors towards the Great Hall, their feet making a dull thud against the stone floor. Several portraits greeted the trio, and Harry replied galely with a wave and a good morning. Neville shook his head, amused.
“Hey, Harry,” he started, “I've been wondering this for a while now, but just what do you do so early in the morning? Surely you can't be reading the whole time?”
Harry smiled. He had wondered when someone would actually asked what he did in the mornings. Honesty though, he thought Hermione would be the one to ask him.
“You're right, I don't read the whole time,” the raven haired boy admitted, “In fact, most of my time in the morning is spent exercising.”
Neville's look turned curious.
“Exercising?”
“Yes,” Harry nodded, “ever since I was six, I've been learning martial arts from my teacher, Master Wei, and in order to learn properly I need to be in peak physical condition.”
“Martial Arts?” Neville asked, blinking.
“He means hand-to-hand combat,” Hermione informed Neville, speaking up for the first time since Harry's comment about recognizing her via her footsteps. “It's a form of muggle fighting using fists and feet. Many people believe it to be the first form of fighting conceived by man as it did not require a weapon to learn.”
Neville looked strangely at Hermione's dissertation, but eventually shrugged and looked back at Harry.
“So you exercise because of your muggle hand-to-hand fighting?”
“Partially.” Harry rubbed the left side of his neck. “But I also do it because I like to keep in shape. A healthy body is essential to a healthy life. It's also a well founded theory that people who are healthier are generally happier and more self-assured. At least, that's what I've come to believe.”
There was actually an entire scientific theory that had been proposed on why healthy people who exercised and played sports were happier than others. Physical exertion released endorphins, and endorphins made people feel good, made them happy. So people who exercised and played sports on a regular basis had endorphins released more regularly and were therefore happier people. He didn't mention this, as it would likely fly over Neville's head, and he didn't want Hermione to begin discussing theory with him, interesting as that would be.
Neville was silent for a moment, his look telling Harry that the boy was pondering his words.
“Do you think...” he paused, “do you think it would be alright if I joined you while you exercise?”
“That would depend,” Harry cast a glance over at Neville, “I get up awfully early. Do you think you would be willing to wake up to join me?”
“I might need some help with that,” Neville admitted, blushing. Harry nodded. Neville was a heavy sleeper.
“Then so long as you are willing to put in the effort, I am willing to let you join me.”
Neville smiled gratefully as they entered the Great Hall. Already a number of students were sitting down for breakfast. Harry could see Lisa, Terry, Hannah, and Susan sitting down at the Hufflepuff table already.
Another thing he noticed was that Professor Dumbledore was also sitting at the head table for breakfast. An odd thing, since Dumbledore had never been seen during breakfasts before. Dinner, yes, occasionally, but never breakfast. Harry wondered why the man was here, but figured he would learn eventually, so he put it out of his mind.
He, along with Neville and a once again silent Hermione in tow, made their way to their friends.
“Did you hear how Harry killed that troll?”
“I heard he used a really powerful spell to blow it to pieces.”
“Really? I heard he through it out of one of the second story windows.”
Harry did not allow the conversations going on around him to bother him. They had been happening ever since he had killed that troll. The only thing he did do was take careful note to see which ones were continuing to look at him in fear. Thankfully, there were only a few left. Since there had been no perpetuation of violence on his part since the troll incident, most people had just decided that him killing a troll was some kind of noble act designed to protect the school. Harry had no intention of dissuading them of that illusion.
As he sat down, greeting his friends and receiving greetings in turn, Harry let his eyes drift to the Slytherin table. He immediately locked onto the form of the three individuals that he had befriended. He had been hoping to convince his Slytherin friends to sit with them at breakfast, lunch and dinner, but so far had not been able to bring the subject up.
The reason, of course, was due to how Daphne Greengrass still refused to have anything to do with him. He wasn't sure why she was so adamant on keeping her distance, but it was very unfortunate, both because it hindered his plans and because he really did want his friends to sit with him.
Looking at the trio of Slytherins, Harry saw that they were being very quiet. Even the normally talkative Tracey was silent. He frowned. It was not hard to see the worried look on Tracey's face. Blaise was harder to read, but by now Harry could claim to have gotten a decent enough grasp on how the boy worked to tell he was unnerved by something as well. And it was not hard to figure out why.
Or more specifically, who. Daphne Greengrass was not looking like her usual self. The cold indifference was still there. Her icy chips of blue were the same as always. The difference came in her posture. Her shoulders and back, normally set perfectly straight were slumped. Harry even noticed the bags under her eyes. Hardly noticeable. He guessed she was covering them with make up, but Harry could easily tell the difference between now and the first time they had met. She looked tired.
He contemplated this new change. Had something happened to her recently? Was she under some kind of duress? Perhaps a family matter? Whatever it was, it must be a grave matter. The girl had an extraordinarily well-crafted mask. For something to be capable of putting a crack in it meant it had to be a monumentally stressful matter.
With nary a sound or outward sign of his thoughts, Harry did his best to put the matter out of his mind. Until Daphne or one of her friends came to him for help, there was nothing he could do. Forcing the issue would only exacerbate the problem.
Piling on some eggs and a few bagels, Harry began to focus on his food and the conversation going on between his friends. He found himself talking to Terry about his upcoming Quidditch match.
“Are you worried?”
“Not really,” Harry shrugged and put a fork full of eggs into his mouth with a thoughtful expression. He swallowed, then looked at Terry. “Woods has been training us a lot, and we've gone over several plays. He's particularly focused on the Slytherin team, since they're well established as cheaters. A lot of what we've been focusing on recently are learning what kind of dirty tricks they'll attempt to pull. I don't think there's anything the Slytherin team can do that we haven't already covered.”
“The Slytherin team has been known to cheat a lot,” Terry allowed, “I've heard tell from some of the older years that that's the only reason they've won the Quidditch Cup several years in a row.” He shook his head. “Personally I think it's a disgrace to Quidditch to cheat your way to victory. There's no sportsmanship in that.”
“Tracey certainly agrees with that sentiment.”
The two shared a bit of a chuckle over that. Tracey Davis' disgust with her own house team was well known to the friends. Several times already she had ranted about how repulsed she was that her own house team was being ruined by a bunch of overgrown troll's. Personally, Harry just thought she was upset that the Slytherin Captain, Flint, didn't allow females on the team. She had complained many times about how sexist the Slytherin team was as well.
“Still, you're not worried at all?” asked Terry, getting his fifteen seconds of laughter under control, “you still haven't gotten a broom yet. Or have you?”
Harry grimaced.
“No, I still don't have a broom.” He ran a hand through his hair. A nervous gesture. “To be honest, I would have thought that problem would have been solved by now, but I guess there are more problems than I thought.”
“What were you trying to do?” the question came from Susan, who was sitting on his left. She looked at him curiously, her head tilted to the side.
Harry opened his mouth to answer, but didn't get the chance. A light sound, magnified by the acoustics of the hall and most likely some kind of sound amplifying spell, sounded throughout the room. Everyone turned to Professor Dumbledore, who was tapping his spoon on a goblet.
Professor Dumbledore stood up and smiled at the crowd of curious students that were obviously wondering why he was here, and why he had just interrupted breakfast.
“Good morning to you all. I hope you have been enjoying your time here at Hogwarts. I do not normally do this, but as the situation has just come up last night, I have an important announcement to make, one that I think many of you will be elated to hear.”
There was a twinkle of amusement in Dumbledore's eyes as he spoke.
“Before we begin, I would like to thank Mister Potter for his efforts on this. Without him, none of what I have to say would have been possible.”
Harry blinked as all eyes turned towards him, his friends included. He wasn't aware of having done anything that would warrant such a commendation, unless...
Harry's eyes widened in realization just as Dumbledore continued, “thanks to his efforts Nimbus Racing Broom company has decided to donate twenty-eight brand new Nimbus 2000's to our school for our four Quidditch teams to use.”
There was a moment of shocked silence. All eyes had gone wide as they stared at the raven haired boy. Harry shifted a bit under the stares, wondering if perhaps he had gone too far this time. Maybe he should have done something a bit more discreet.
Then the applause began. It started with Dumbledore clapping most enthusiastically, a large smile on his face and a twinkle in his eyes. Harry wondered if the old man knew what he was trying to do and helped him along by making the announcement himself. Soon, more and more people began to clap. Students started standing up, cheering loudly. Even the older Slytherin students were cheering. Harry saw and heard the Weasley twins whistling over at the Gryffindor table. Tracey Davis was looking at him with a kind of worshipful glance that honestly had him disturbed.
There were a few people here and there who were not cheering for him. He could see looks of jealousy from a few people at various tables. Draco and his ilk, the pug faced Pansy and other Death Eater children were giving him hateful glances, and Daphne Greengrass was frowning at him.
A small amount of tension in his shoulders faded as he realized his gamble had paid off. He now had a broom to use, and no one could say anything about him getting preferential treatment because everyone else had the same broom he did. The plan had actually gone off even better than expected thanks to Dumbledore.
He frowned again. How had Dumbledore known about this when he had not received a reply from Andromeda? That was something he wanted to know.
Perhaps Andromeda had wanted to surprise him? He knew the woman had a bit of a mischievous streak that did not show very often hidden behind that professional demeanor. It did sound like something she would do, though it wasn't quite the kind of subtle act he would have expected from her. And she did know of his plan. Maybe she had contacted Dumbledore so he could make the announcement? He decided to ask Andromeda when he went home for Christmas. For now he would simply be thankful everything had turned out for the best.
“I'VE FINALLY FIGURED IT OUT!”
Silence descended upon the hall almost as quickly as it came. Everyone stared at Hermione Granger, who had suddenly jumped to her feat, a look of triumph on her face. The girl flushed as she realized she had just shouted out loud and, after quickly mumbling out an embarrassed apology, sat back down and almost shrunk into her robes like some kind of turtle.
Hannah, Lisa, Neville, Susan, and Terry all looked at each other, confused.
“Figured... what out?” Hannah asked cautiously, looking at the bushy haired girl like she had gone insane. Hermione just blushed some more and tried to hide further in her robes.
As the others looked at the girl in confusion, Harry hid his laughter by snorting into his goblet.