The World Beyond

Chapter Five: 'The Invisibility Cloak'

Harry squinted down at the copy of 'Standard Book of Spells: Grade Five' lying on the common room table in front of him. He had been delighted to learn that, upon attending Professor Flitwick's class, they would be studying the Summoning Charm to start off the year. The classes at this Hogwarts moved at such a fast pace that the fifth years here were far beyond what the fifth year curriculum at the other Hogwarts had been . It had been a nice treat for Harry to find himself up to speed in Charms. Of course, he thought to himself, had it not been for the Triwizard Tournament, he most likely would not have mastered it at all.

"Funny," he muttered to himself, "never would've thought anything good..." but then he stopped short and glanced across the table at Hermione, who was no longer bent over her own textbook, but now watching him.

"Never would have thought what?" she asked.

Harry shook his head. "Oh, nothing." She wasn't buying it, so he continued. "I just had to learn this charm under... stressful... circumstances, and I never thought anything good would've come of the whole thing."

"Oh." She nodded. "Well, I've been having trouble with it. Maybe you could help me?"

Harry smiled to himself at the irony of the situation. His memories were only too clear of the year before when Hermione had spent much of her free time teaching him the charm. "Of course," he answered. "I'd be glad to help."

"Thanks." She smiled. A thoughtful look came over her face as she watched Harry. After a moment, she spoke, "Can I say something... and I mean it in the nicest way possible, though it might not sound good..."

"Sure," Harry agreed, bewildered as to what she might have to say.

"Well," she began slowly. "I was kind of glad when, you know, in classes, when you were sort of behind everyone else. You know, when you didn't know all the spells or potions or whatever." She shrugged. "I mean, it was nice, for once, not to be the only one who couldn't do it. I'm sorry," she muttered, "I know that's horrible."

Harry burst out laughing. A few students in the common room glanced over at the two of them and Hermione looked horrified that she had truly offended him. "Hermione," Harry began, trying to stop himself from laughing, "that's not horrible. I mean, maybe it's not so nice to tell someone you hope they're always a failure, but, really, I know how you feel. It's pretty horrible to be singled out, whether it's because you're particularly good or particularly bad."

A tentative smile came over Hermione's face. "So you're not upset with me?"

"Of course not!" Harry exclaimed. "Hermione, you're probably my best friend here. I couldn't be mad at you. Well," he clarified, "I probably could, but not over something silly like that!"

"Okay, then." Hermione smiled more brightly than she had before. "I was just so afraid I was going to offend you..." she trailed off.

Harry shook his head. "Not at all. And I will help you with the Summoning Charm, whenever you want, but right now I think we should take a break." He shoved his spell book across the table and away from him and snapped his parchment notebook closed.

"What?"

"A break." Harry grinned. "A noun meaning a short, or not-so-short, as the case may be, bit of time off from work."

"I know what a break is, Harry." She scowled at him. "I've just..."

"Never taken one before?" he interrupted with a laugh.

She flushed bright red. "I have, too! I just don't think now is the time for a break. We do have to get this work done, you know, Harry. And, more than that, it would be helpful if I actually learned how to do this Summoning Charm."

"All right," Harry began. "I'll make you a deal. We take a break, just an hour or so, and I'll spend the rest of the evening teaching you the Summoning Charm. Deal?"

Harry watched as Hermione thought it over for a few minutes. He could almost see the wheels in her head turning as she weighed her options. Finally, she nodded. "All right. Fine. We take a break. What is it you had in mind that we do on this break? Nothing to get us in trouble, I hope."

Harry leaned back in thought. He had decided he needed a break but didn't take the time to think of what they would do with the break. He glanced around the room and saw Neville Longbottom sitting with a group of younger girls around him. The prefect's feet were propped up on the table in front of him, and a pair of socks with dancing golden snitches peeked out from the gap left between his robes and his shoes. An idea dawned on Harry, and he muttered "Dobby" under his breath.

"What?" Hermione asked. He smiled at her, a plan forming in his head.

"There's a kitchen here, right?" he asked. She nodded, a confused expression on her face. "Well, house elves work in it, right?" Hermione nodded, looking quite confused by this point. "Well, then, why don't we go and, you know, find it!"

"Harry!" she hissed. "We're meant to be staying in the common room, you know. Or up in our dormitories, not wandering about the castle."

"Oh, come on." Harry couldn't resist teasing her just a little bit. "You don't want to be a stick in the mud, do you? I bet you've never snuck out of here." The expression on her face made it clear that his assumption was correct. "Well, come on then, it'll be fun."

She wrinkled her nose. "To see house elves?"

"Why not?"

She looked suspiciously at him. He decided at that moment that this Hermione had clearly never thought once about house-elf liberation. She didn't respond, so finally he elaborated, "I knew a house elf at my old school. We were friends, of a sort. I just... I like the little guys. Come on, Hermione. Let's just go see them, all right? And then we come back here and start on the summoning charms. Or... we could practice there. I could teach you to summon house elves."

"Harry!" she exclaimed. "That's horrible!" He could see a bit of the Hermione he knew sparkle in her eyes at this exclamation, but he could also see that she was beginning to give in. "How do you know we won't get caught?"

Harry jumped immediately from his seat. "I'll be right back!" he called to her and dashed up the stairs towards his dormitory. Hermione sat, stunned, watching the path he had disappeared up. Moments later, he was back, a shimmering cloak clutched in his hands.

"What's that?" she asked.

"Not here," he shushed her. "Come with me. Leave the books, we'll be back." With that, he grabbed hold of her hand, pulled her from her seat, and dragged her behind him and out the portrait hole, into the hallway.

"Harry!" she hissed once they were safely outside. "Tell me what is going on. What is that?"

Harry grinned and shook the cloak out in front of him. "This is an invisibility cloak."

Hermione's eyes widened. She glanced from the cloak to Harry and back again. Tentatively, she stuck a hand out and fingered the material. "But... I thought these were just legend. I've read about them somewhere, I'm sure of it."

"Well, they're not common," Harry conceded, realizing he knew nothing about the availability of invisibility cloaks in this world. For all he knew, they might not exist here. Shrugging that off as he had already told her about it, he swung it over the two of them and pulled it closed. "Inherited it from my dad. This is how I know we won't get caught."

Harry realized happily that Hermione seemed to trust him, so they started walking. After passing a few moments in silence, he turned to her. "We can talk still, you know."

"It's soundproof?" she asked.

"Well, no," Harry answered. "But I don't see anyone around to hear us. Just keep quiet and if you see or hear someone coming, shut up."

Hermione nodded. "All right." She paused and glanced over at Harry as they made their way down the empty hallway. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"Well," she whispered, "it just seems that you have a lot of... weird... things. I mean, this, first of all. I don't know of anyone else who has ever had an invisibility cloak. Honestly, I thought they were just legend. And then your broom. What model did you say it was?"

"Firebolt."

"Right," she continued. "Well, I don't know too much about broomsticks, but if Neville Longbottom says he hasn't heard of it, then..." she trailed off.

Harry gulped. He had been hoping Neville wouldn't have gone spreading rumors about the broomstick after they had flown together the other day. "Well, it's a, a, um, prototype, you know. I have... connections, and all that."

Hermione eyed him. He could tell she wasn't sure if she should believe him or not. They passed a few wary moments in silence, standing still in front of a painting that looked a good deal like Salazar Slytherin. Luckily, the founder appeared to be asleep. Finally, Hermione said, "Yeah, I suppose that makes sense. Anyways, Neville was probably just upset that you had a better broom than him. You flew circles around him, or so I heard."

"Yeah." Harry had to smile at the memory of watching Neville's smug smile disappear. Harry's Firebolt had been several times faster than Neville's Nimbus 2002, a state-of-the-art model in this world. Harry had been even happier to learn, though, that he was more adept on a broomstick than the boastful prefect was. He got the feeling he could have gotten Neville's inferior broomstick to perform better than the other boy could. Shaking the smile from his face, Harry turned back to Hermione. "You could have come and watched, you know."

Hermione shrugged her shoulders. "Oh, you know, Quidditch isn't really my thing."

"You went back to the library and studied, didn't you?"

Hermione blushed, but before she could say anything, a male voice appeared out of nowhere. "Who's there?" it demanded. "Identify yourself!"

Hermione and Harry both froze and Harry glanced in front of them. The man in the portrait, who was definitely Slytherin, was now very much awake. His eyes were darting around the hallway in an urgent search for the voices he had just heard.

"Oh no!" Hermione gasped, her voice barely more than a whisper.

Harry was panicking a bit himself. McGonagall had trusted him when she had no good reason to, but if he was caught out in the hallways, she might rethink that. "Run!" he whispered back to Hermione. For a moment, they both stared in shock at the portrait, and then, in unison, they set off down the hallway at a run.

Unfortunately, they set off in opposite directions.

After only a few steps, Harry fell to the floor with a thud. He heard a grunt from Hermione's direction and looked back to see her sprawled in a similar position to his. The invisibility cloak lay abandoned between them. Harry glanced towards the portrait of Slytherin, a feeling of dread growing in his stomach, and was surprised to see that the founder was laughing at them. He didn't seem upset to see the two students out of their dorm, though Harry thought he could hear the portrait muttering something that sounded an awful lot like "Stupid Gryffindors."

Harry's relief was short-lived, however. Slytherin may not have decided to rat them out, but a portrait down the hall didn't seem to share these sentiments. A shrill woman's voice was bellowing, "Students out of bed! Students out of bed!"

Harry was barely thinking rationally. He could just imagine McGonagall telling him she had been wrong to trust him and kicking him out on the street. He crawled towards Hermione and was just reaching for the invisibility cloak, intending to recover the two of them, when his hand froze. He could hear footsteps echoing ever closer.

"Oh no, oh no, oh no," he could hear Hermione whispering as he stood up and pulled her to her feet as well.

"I'd run if I were you." Slytherin chuckled at the two students. "He may be a Squib, but that man sure gets here fast. Oops." The portrait chuckled again, a broad smile on his face. "Too late."

In a moment of fear, Harry stuffed the cloak into his robe pocket. He was still struggling to fit it all in when the footsteps came close enough that he knew the person making them was now in the same hallway.

Hermione huddled behind Harry as he turned with dread in the direction of the footsteps. Hearing the word Squib, he fully expected to see Filch at the end of the hallway, but was in almost equal proportions horrified and thrilled at who he did see.

A grown man, shorter than Harry and even Hermione, stood in the shadows at the end of the hallway. He glared at the two students for a moment and then strode forward and Harry knew for certain that this was who he thought it was. A thin rat with mangy hair clung to the man's shoulder and Harry was certain he could see what looked like claw marks across the man's baldhead. It was all Harry could do not to laugh as he turned back to Slytherin. "Squib, you said?" The portrait nodded with an evil smile, but said nothing as the man had just stepped into hearing range.

Harry turned back to him and suppressed a laugh as he questioned, "Pettigrew?"

"What of it?" Peter Pettigrew, whom Harry assumed was the caretaker, as Filch had been, growled back at him. Hermione whimpered from behind Harry. "Well, well, well," he snarled at them, though his diminutive stature made him a wholly unimposing figure, in Harry's view. "If it isn't the new boy. In trouble already. The first transfer student ever, and Professor McGonagall was so certain you were a good idea. My, my, how disappointed she will be."

Harry didn't know quite what to say to this. In many ways, Pettigrew's words echoed his own feelings. But Harry was still concentrating on not laughing at this man. It seemed, to him, almost poetic justice that the man who was responsible for so much evil in another world, was condemned in this one to what was considered the biggest disgrace among wizards.

Pettigrew cackled nastily to himself as Harry stood silently in front of him. The man's unfriendly nature was making Harry feel less and less amused by this situation. His first reaction had been to laugh, but as the Squib stood cackling in front of him, he began to feel hatred building towards this man. He was beginning to worry that, if left alone with him too long, he might feel the need to take revenge on this man for what the other Pettigrew had done.

Luckily, Harry was saved from having to say anything to the caretaker by the sound of someone whistling happily and walking ever nearer to the two students and one caretaker. Just as Pettigrew's footsteps had come quickly closer, so too did this whistling. Harry held his breath in the hope that it would turn out to be someone who would be on his side. The group waited in silence a moment, and then the person appeared.

Professor Riddle came up the hallway behind Pettigrew, and stopped his whistling at the sight of the group. "Oh, hello," he greeted the crowd of them. Then his eyes narrowed at Harry and Hermione. "Shouldn't you two be in your common room?"

"They were wandering the hallways, Professor," Pettigrew growled. Riddle glanced over at the smaller man and Harry was amused to see that he looked disgusted at the caretaker. Harry's initial shock at seeing Pettigrew was fading, and he was beginning to feel disgusted toward the man, as well.

"Right, then." Riddle nodded. "Well, thank you, Mr. Pettigrew, for collecting them. But I think I will deal with these students now, if you don't mind."

Pettigrew glanced over at the two students and, after a second, nodded his head. "Fine by me," he muttered. "I have better things to do, anyway." With that, he turned off and headed back the way he came, stroking the rat on his shoulder as he went.

Harry for a moment let himself feel relief at the retreating form of the Squib caretaker, but that feeling came to an abrupt end when he realized that he and Hermione had been left alone with Tom Riddle. No matter what anyone had told him about the Potions professor, he couldn't bring himself to trust the man.

Hermione, on the other hand, looked positively delighted to see Pettigrew go and was no longer cowering behind Harry.

"Right, then, come along." Riddle signaled to the two students and started off in the opposite direction from Pettigrew. Harry stood stock still, but Hermione started to follow him. After a moment, she glanced back at Harry and saw that he was not moving. She stopped walking and went back over to Harry as the professor continued down the hallway.

"Well, come on, Harry, don't just stand there," she whispered to him.

"What?" Harry looked shocked, "You expect me to go with him?" he motioned towards Riddle's back.

Hermione huffed with impatience, "You need to get over whatever this is you have against him. I mean, I don't want to get into trouble anymore than the next person, but, honestly, this is about as lucky as we can get. I mean, to get caught by Riddle! He's a Hufflepuff, for God's sake, they don't do evil things."

Harry snorted his disbelief at this and Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Are you two coming?" They heard Riddle's voice and looked up to see him waiting at the end of the hallway.

"Yes, Professor," Hermione called and seized hold of Harry's arm. Just as he had dragged her out of the Gryffindor common room, he now felt himself being pulled by her after the professor. He thought for a moment about digging his heels in and refusing to go, but, deciding that was a bit immature, finally allowed himself to be pulled along.

It was a surprisingly short walk to Professor Riddle's office. Harry fully expected it to be down in the dungeons, as Professor Snape's was, but Riddle led the two students down to the first floor and into a room not far from the Great Hall.

If the location was different, the contents hardly were. Riddle's office was chock-full of bottles of odd-looking liquids, creatures, and bits of creatures. Every surface not being used for something else seemed to house a bottle or two, and a couple of cauldrons were sitting off to the side. One appeared to be in use; it was simmering softly and a light aroma wafted from it over to the trio.

"Oh, my!" Riddle exclaimed, hurrying over to the cauldron. "I completely forgot I had started this off. My, my," he peered into the cauldron, "completely ruined now." With a shrug of his shoulders, Riddle cast a cooling spell on the cauldron and dumped its contents down a nearby sink. This task completed, he motioned for Harry and Hermione to sit down at the two chairs facing his desk.

"Now." Riddle dusted off his hands and sat down on the side of the desk opposite the students. "I'm really most surprised at you Hermione. Wandering in the corridors at night!"

Hermione looked down at her hands, but Harry got the feeling she actually wasn't as ashamed as she pretended to be. "I'm sorry, Professor," she said.

"I believe you are," he responded and then turned to Harry, who shrank back in his chair. "Mr. Potter." He looked curiously at him. "You do try to avoid me, don't you? Quite like I was a Dark wizard. I don't know quite what I have done to get on your bad side, but I do hope we can reconcile it. However," he said, "today does not look to be the day for that, as I must be the disciplinarian. And I must know, what were the two of you doing out in the hallways?"

Harry and Hermione glanced at each other. Neither of them spoke as Riddle continued to look imploringly at them. Multitudes of possible explanation flew through Harry's mind, but none of them seemed right. He had no idea what Hermione was thinking until she spoke. "We were going to the kitchens, professor."

"Oh?" Riddle raised an eyebrow.

"Yes. To see the house elves," Hermione continued. It was brilliant, Harry thought, to use the truth as their excuse. Hermione was still talking, as Harry silently thanked her for seeing the obvious answer to their problems, and one that didn't blow his cover story. "You see, Harry was friends with some of the house elves at his old school, and he wanted to meet the ones that work here."

Riddle smiled at the two students and leaned back in his chair. Though the professor looked friendly, Harry felt the need to scoot his chair back from the desk. What Riddle said next surprised him. "I always have been a bit fond of house elves myself. It's horrid, really, the way they are treated by most of wizard kind."

"I agree!" Hermione exclaimed, and then quieted quickly, as she realized that she had spoken without prompting to a professor. Harry figured it was probably the first time she had ever done so. After a moment she seemed to regain her confidence, and spoke again, "It's really a pity nobody sticks up for them, you know."

Harry couldn't help but laugh at that statement. He decided he would have to be careful never to mention S.P.E.W. to her, lest she got the idea to take it up as her own cause. He stopped laughing quickly, however, when he saw that Riddle and Hermione were staring at him. "Oh, sorry." He waved them off. "Just thinking of... something... else..."

"Right." Riddle nodded. He watched Harry suspiciously, but said nothing more about it. "Well, then, down to business. Mr. Potter, I know you are new to this school, but surely you have ascertained that wandering in the corridors after hours is against the rules?"

"Yes, sir."

Riddle nodded again. "And I know you are aware of that, Ms. Granger. House elves or no house elves, the two of you should not have been in the hallways. You should have been in the Gryffindor common room studying. Or in your dormitories getting your beauty sleep." He winked at them with a smile.

"Of course, professor," Hermione answered while Harry nodded vigorously.

"Well, then." Riddle stood up and looked down at them, "I will send you on your way. You are to go directly back to Gryffindor tower, making no stops along the way. And ten points will be taken from your house."

Harry's jaw dropped. Hermione nodded quickly and jumped up, but Harry stayed rooted to his seat in shock. He had been fully expecting to lose many more points and get a detention, on top of that. "Is something wrong, Mr. Potter?" Professor Riddle asked.

"He's fine," Hermione said, grabbing Harry's arm. "Come on, Harry, Summoning Charms, remember?"

Harry looked up at her and seemed to spring back to life. "Right. Okay." He stood up and followed Hermione to the office door. He stopped and glanced back at the Potions professor. "Thank you sir," he said and the two students hurried out the door.

They walked a good ways down the hallway in silence, Harry drifting behind Hermione, lost in thought. As they reached the staircase and began to climb, he finally said, "Only ten points?"

"I told you he wasn't a bad guy," she said, stopping and turning to face Harry. "What did you expect, really?"

Harry shook his head as if trying to clear his thoughts. "I don't know. More than ten points. And a few detentions, at least."

"What was your old school, a prison?" Hermione asked seriously. "No one takes off points like that here."

"No one?"

"Well," Hermione conceded, "Slytherin prefects do. But generally only off of Gryffindors. Especially first-year Gryffindors, just to be vindictive."

Harry laughed. "Yeah, we have that, too." Hermione looked questioningly at him, and he corrected himself, "I mean, house rivalries, and all. Back at my old school."

The two friends started walking again in the direction of the Fat Lady's portrait in silence. Just as they were about to reach the common room entrance, Harry asked, "Why is there such a rivalry here, do you think?"

"I don't know," Hermione answered. "But there always has been, as far as I know. Now, come on, you promised me help with Summoning Charms after our break. And I think our break is over."

Harry laughed. "Enough excitement for you in one night?"

"I think so. What, don't tell me you do stuff like that all the time?"

"Well, my invisibility cloak doesn't fall of all the time," he answered her with a laugh. "I don't get caught all the time. But come on," he turned to the Fat Lady and said, "Chudley Cannons." The portrait swung open and he glanced back at Hermione as he stepped through. "Summoning Charms await."

Hermione shook her head and laughed as she followed him back into the Gryffindor common room for the evening.

To be continued...

Scenes from Chapter Six: 'Transfiguration Class'

- "Honestly," Hermione shook her head, "you've been here how long and you already hate them?"

"You have no idea," Harry said. "I have to admit, though, I may have to hear that story eventually," he nodded his head towards Neville. "Anything that starts out 'Slytherin keeper's head' and finishes with 'slams into pole' sounds pretty good to me."

- "Okay," Harry took a breath, "so we just..." he paused and consulted his notes, then aimed his wand at the worm. If he didn't know better, he would have said the worm looked frightened. He counted silently to three, and then muttered the incantation.

A spark bounced from his wand and collided with the worm. The worm bounced a few inches into the air, twisted, and fell back to the desk. Nothing else happened.

"That has got to be inhumane," Hermione said.

- The students all stood up and began to cram their supplies back into their book bags. As Harry and Hermione were about to leave, Professor Black called out to Harry and stopped them.

"I was wondering, Mr. Potter, if I might have a word with you before you go?" Harry nodded and turned to walk back to the front of the room. Hermione hung back by the doorway, but Black spoke to her, too, "You may go on to lunch, Ms. Granger. Don't worry, I won't be keeping him long."