Harry Potter and the Students of the School of the Sphinx

Harry Potter and the Students of the School of the Sphinx (1/?)

By Angelina Johnson

Chapter 1
Dreams of the Department

All throughout number 4, Privet Drive, the sounds of very loud snores could be heard. In fact, the only bedroom that did not contain the sounds of snoring was the bedroom that contained a small, skinny sixteen year old boy. This boy had black hair and bright green eyes, and across his forehead was a scar in the shape of a lightning bolt. It was because of this scar that the boy was not sound asleep and snoring like the rest of the residents of the house. It was because of this scar, or rather, because of the person who had caused it, that the boy called Harry Potter had no father, no mother, and now, to top off the list, no godfather. It was because of this man that Harry was haunted nightly by visions of murder-the murder of his mum, the murder of a boy named Cedric Diggory, the murder of his godfather, and the murder of so many more.

Tonight Harry had been haunted again by a nightmare from the Department of Mysteries. It had been a little over a month ago, but still the image was in his mind as if it had been just yesterday. Harry could see himself and his friends enter the Department of Mysteries because Harry had seen a vision of Lord Voldemort there, torturing his, Harry's, godfather, Sirius Black. Harry, thinking that the vision was real, had gone to the Department of Mysteries with Neville Longbottom, Hermione Granger, Ron and Ginny Weasley, and Luna Lovegood. They had gone to the spot where Harry had seen visions of Sirius, but instead of finding Sirius, they had instead found a large group of Voldemort's Death Eaters. Harry and his friends had narrowly escaped death that night, but unfortunately, not everyone had escaped safe. Harry still remembered vividly when Sirius, Remus Lupin, Tonks, Kingsley and Mad-eye Moody had arrived to help Harry and the others. Harry remembered the battle that had ensued between the members of the Order of the Phoenix and the Death Eaters. He remembered Sirius dueling with his cousin Bellatrix Lestrange. He remembered her first spell missing him. He had taunted her, but then the second spell had hit him dead on......... Harry remembered watching Sirius fall backwards into the black veil........... It had all happened so fast, but Harry saw it as though it were in slow motion.

Harry tried to rub the sleep from his eyes-he didn't want to go back to sleep, didn't want to have any more haunting visions, any more nightmares-and he found that tears had formed in his eyes. This was not unusual, he often found that his eyes welled up when he thought of Sirius. There were so many emotions inside of Harry-he was angry and hurt and upset and bitter all at once. He was in such a rage-he wanted to destroy everything around him. All Harry ever wanted anymore was to be alone-and this was not hard for him, as the Dursleys would prefer to pretend that he didn't exist. Thick as they were, though, Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon, and Dudley had all noticed that there was something that had been upsetting Harry all during the summer holidays. Aunt Petunia, much to Harry's horror, had actually attempted to talk to Harry about what was bothering him. Harry had angrily told her that she would not understand and that she should just leave him alone the same way that she had since he had been left on her doorstep fifteen years ago. Aunt Petunia appeared to have expected this sort of reaction, because she had told him that if he changed his mind and decided that he did want to talk, she would be there. Harry did not understand what had happened to make his aunt actually seem to be human, but he was reluctant to find out.

Harry had received owls from his friends. Hermione, Ron, and even Ginny had written to him, but all of them had tried to discuss Sirius, and his feelings. Harry had been infuriated by this, because none of them seemed to understand what he was going through. After all, none of them had lost their parents to Voldemort as a baby. None of them had lost the closest thing to apparent that they had ever really had to him. None of them had witnessed Sirius's death, or Cedric Diggory's. None of them had witnessed Voldemort's return. And none of them had it hanging over their head that all of this was their fault. It was Harry's fault that Sirius had died. If he had just taken the Occlumency classes from Snape, then Voldemort never would have been able to send him the false image from inside of the Department of Mysteries. Harry and the others would have never gone there, and Sirius would have never had to come and save them from Voldemort and the Death Eaters. It was Harry's fault that Sirius had died, and he hated himself for it.

Upon getting the letters from his friends, he had burned them all. He also refused to write any of them back. For once in his life, Harry was not looking forward to going back to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry on September 1st. Harry actually had no interest in returning to the wizarding world at all. He didn't want to lead any more people that he cared about into danger, and danger seemed to follow Harry everywhere. In fact, the night of Sirius's death, Harry had learned that he was the one who ultimately had the power to destroy Voldemort altogether, and only he had that power. There was a prophecy that said that only one of the two could live-and Harry's greatest fear was that the one to survive would be Voldemort. He had already let so much damage happen already-if he didn't succeed in destroying Voldemort, then he would leave the wizarding world in total peril.

Harry shook his head. More emotion was building up inside of him-he had tried to keep himself empty and blank. He didn't want any of this anymore-he was sick of all the pain, sick of all the fear, sick of life. He didn't understand anything anymore-and the thing he understood the least was himself. Sometimes he was sad and miserable, other times he was angry and bitter. Sometimes he felt like he couldn't wait to go back to Hogwarts and the wizarding world, other times he wished to never go back. Sometimes he wanted to talk about what he was going through, and sometimes he wanted nothing more than to be alone. Right now, however, he wanted to talk to someone. Too bad there was no one here to talk to. He lay back down, not intending to go back to sleep, and he tossed and turned, still wanting to talk to someone face to face. Somehow, he drifted back to sleep..........

He was back inside the Department of Mysteries, back inside the Chamber of Death. There was the black veil-and there was Sirius. Harry watched as a jet of red light hit him, and Sirius fell slowly toward the veil. Harry heard a scream-his own. He woke, panting. He sat up just as the door to his room was flung open.

"What on earth are you screaming about! You'll wake the whole house! How Vernon and Dudley sleep through this I can't understand!" Aunt Petunia shrieked. Harry looked up at the figure of his aunt in the doorway. He had never been happier to see her in his entire life. She had wanted to talk about it-maybe she could understand, or at least try to. Maybe she would understand what he was going through. She was, after all, his family, no matter how much she fought it at times.

"Aunt Petunia? I want to talk to you about........ Well, about these nightmares that I've been having." Aunt Petunia's angry expression softened when she saw the look on her nephew's face. He looked haunted and frightened, and she felt the thing that she had rarely felt-the bond between herself and this boy, the son of her sister. She didn't say anything to this, she merely nodded. She closed the door behind her, and then she sat on Harry's bed.

"Well, then, what's wrong?" she said, turning to him, "What's been happening?"

Harry sat, and he explained to his aunt the events of the past five years. She didn't say anything, she only listened to what Harry had to say, starting from the Sorting Hat wanting to put him in the house that turned out all of the dark wizards and witches, Slytherin House, and ending with the prophecy and Dumbledore's speech to him. Though she never voiced what she thought of these things, it was apparent that when Harry told her about Sirius's death, she was shocked. Harry didn't leave out any of the details-he told her everything that there was to know, about how it was his own fault, about how Harry now had no one left. Finally, once Harry was done speaking, an hour later, Aunt Petunia had tears in her eyes.

"Listen, Harry........." she began.

"Yes?" Harry said, looking at his aunt.

"Look, I know that I've never exactly been very nice to you, and I haven't given you any reason to believe that I care about you these last fifteen years, but you are my family, and I do care, whether you know it or not. I never realized what you have been going through, and though I can't take away any of your pain and grief, you need to realize that it is not your fault. You did what you thought was best, and........... Well, Harry, people make mistakes. You seem to make less than most people do, judging by all of the things that you've done, so it was bound to happen sometime. I think that your godfather would rather have gone out fighting than to have to sit around and wait. I can tell by what you said that he was unhappy inside of the hiding place, and now he's in a better one. He's where he belongs-he's where your parents are. He's back with his best friends, and you still have so many people left that care about you. He would want you to let go and move on. It was his time to go, and you need to understand that. All things happen for a reason, Harry," Aunt Petunia said. Harry stared at her in shock.

"How can you know all of that just by what I've told you?" he asked incredulously.

"Well, to be honest, I met Sirius Black- a long time ago. He was always eager to be out there, doing something, helping someone, fighting evil. He was............" she said. But what he was Harry would not find out, at least not tonight, because there was a loud popping noise, and suddenly there were four wizards and witches in his bedroom.

"What are you doing here?" Aunt Petunia and Harry asked at the same time. Aunt Petunia sounded angry, but Harry was more in shock. Inside of his bedroom were Remus Lupin, Nymphadora Tonks, Minerva McGonagall, and Alastor "Mad-eye" Moody.

"Harry, what are these people doing in my house?" she asked, sounding enraged.

"I..... I don't know," he stuttered stupidly.

"We're here to take you away," Lupin said.

"Take me away? But Dumbledore said that I needed to be here-that I would be protected, and that................" Harry began.

"Things have changed," McGonagall said, looking at Harry. Her face was set in a straight line as it always was, but he could have sworn that there was a twinkle in her eyes, as if there was good news that she wasn't going to tell him. Harry shook off this feeling-there was never any good news anymore, because there was nothing good left in the world now that Sirius was gone.

"But.......... Where are you taking me?" he asked.

"Headquarters," Tonks replied cheerily. Harry stared at her in horror. How could she be cheery when just a month ago her cousin Sirius had died?

"No! I won't go back, I can't be there, I can't be around those.......... I can't! I won't! You can't take me back to Grimmauld Place," he said, completely set. He would not go back to Sirius's house. There were too many memories.

"Things have changed. You need to come," Moody said.

"You keep saying that. Things have changed, things have changed, but nothing can bring Sirius back from the dead and I won't go back to the house where he lived. There's too many things to remind me of him, and I'm sick of all the pain! I'm sick of having nightmares about his death, I'm sick of knowing that it's my fault that he's gone, I'm sick of feeling! I WON'T GO!" Harry said.

"You will go, and things have changed. I can't explain it here-not around Muggles. You are safe from harm here, but that doesn't mean that you can't be watched and overheard. You have to know what is happened- I dare say you will want to know what is going on. You must come, Harry! You can't understand yet, but once you are there you will know everything and you will be glad that you are there," McGonagall said.

"HOW CAN I BE GLAD ABOUT ANYTHING WHEN MY GODFATHER IS DEAD?" Harry roared, and he swore that Lupin smiled.

"Please, Harry, just come," Lupin said persuasively. He looked at Harry pleadingly. Harry was horrified. Why were they all smiling, why were they all happy? He doubted that he would ever be happy again, but if they said that what they had to tell him at Grimmauld Place would make him happy.......... Well, maybe it was worth as try.

"All right, but if I want to come back after you tell me what is going on, you have to let me. I won't stay locked up there," he said. To his shock, none of the four argued with him.

"Of course. That will be arranged. If you wish to leave once you understand, then you may," said Tonks, and under her breath she muttered, "But I doubt you'll want to." Harry glared at her, but then he turned to his aunt.

"I guess I'm leaving, then," he said.

"G'bye, then. I suppose we should keep in touch this time," she said, looking downward.

"Sounds good, then. I may be back," he said, and then he scooped up his things. He handed them to Lupin and Moody, and then they led him downstairs.

"Traveling by Floo Powder- I had them hook up your house to the network. Weasley suggested it," Mad-eye said, and he took out a bag that contained a powdery substance that could only be Floo Powder. Moody lit a fire, and then he took a pinch of the powder and said "12 Grimmauld Place." Tonks followed suite, and then Lupin motioned for Harry to go. Harry was about to step into the fire when McGonagall spoke.

"Before you go, Potter, I want you to be prepared. What is on the other side will come as quite a shock to you," she said. Harry stared up at her.

"Why are you taking me back to Grimmauld Place? And what in the world am I supposed to be prepared for?" he asked.

"I've already told you that we can't explain here, Harry. Just know that nothing is as it seemed," she replied.

"I know that you don't want to go back, but you need to, and you need to just be open-minded. I am sure that all of this is very strange, and you will be just as shocked as any of it. Something has happened that we never could have predicted, and, well............" Lupin's voice trailed off.

"What is it? What's changed? I have a right to know what on earth is going on," Harry said, "I don't want to go back to Grimmauld Place not understanding." He was starting to get angry again. None of this was making any sense.

"I'm sorry, Harry. I know you're confused. You don't have to wait much longer. Just step into the fire, now. It's time to go," Lupin said.

Harry did as he was told and stepped into the fire. He shouted, "Number 12, Grimmauld Place," and there was a feeling of dread mixed with anticipation as he twirled around in the fire. It seemed as though the journey lasted for a long time, but then, suddenly, he was on the cold hard floor at 12 Grimmauld Place. He looked up-and what he saw he couldn't believe. It wasn't possible-it couldn't be.......... He was seeing things, he had to be seeing things............ There was no way.....

At the table in the kitchen sat two people. One was a woman that Harry had never seen before, with long brown hair and bright blue eyes. She was very pretty, and there was a friendly smile on her face. And the second..............