Exchanges

To Whom It May Concern:

On November 15th, 1981, you received a letter informing you that I had faked my own death in order to protect my daughter. Due to recent events, that is no longer effective, and I would like to go back on the books as "no longer faking." While I do not require a public notification-in fact, I would prefer to have as few people as possible know that I'm back "alive"-I have returned to England and would like to follow the proper procedures around that.

Thankfully,

Foxfire Lumiosi

Dear Arabella,

I know that this is short notice and rather inconvenient, but would it be possible to allow Harry to come to Hogwarts a day early? There are people here for the protection of the school whom I feel he should meet, and it will not be adequate to do so during the school year. If it is not possible, please let me know. If it is, have him Floo here at approximately 1:25-1:35 GMT. I promise, it will be open.

Yours,

Albus Dumbledore.

Dear Tony,

I love this place! The food is super-good (although I can't quite find it in my heart to like things made with kidneys) and the castle is... wow. I feel safe here; do you know how rare that is?

How's the house? Mom said she put as many preservation spells on it as she could, but she wasn't sure nothing else would happen that she hadn't thought of. Did it?

Are you and Peter still together? If so, happy anniversary! A year, wow! (And he never even got jealous of me, even that time he walked in on you educating me! Great guy, Peter... why are all the good ones gay?)

Missing you terribly,

Snapper

Dear Albus,

I've come up with a plausible excuse, and the Dursleys baught it, so Harry should be there at 1:30... Should I let him know that I'm a witch? I can't imagine how I could do this without letting him know. How much should I tell him?

Concerned as always,

Arabella

Dear Molly,

I would like to have Sirius here at Hogwarts for the first part of the school year, at least. I also would like a competant wizard or witch on the train defending the students in case of an attack. It seems to me that the wisest course of action would be to have Sirius simply ride the train to Hogwarts. To this end, would you please have Ron accompany him? I greatly appreciate your efforts, Molly.

Sincerely,

Albus Dumbledore

Dear Mum,

This is going to be a very long letter, so be prepared.

When I got here, I was expecting something a bit like Hogwarts, only with an accent and funny clothing. This expectation turned out to be about as wrong as it gets.

The first thing I noticed about this school in comparison to Hogwarts is that it's much more crowded. Hogwarts has twice as much area and half as many people. The class sizes at Hogwarts are about twelve people per class on average, I'd guess; here, there are about twenty per class.

The schedules here are rediculously complicated; I've sent you a chart of mine. They're based on a six-day cycle, but they only have five days of classes per week. It made my head hurt when they tried to explain it, but I thought it was pretty easy to understand when I actually tried it.

There are no boys! I don't think I really understood what that meant, before. They said that they often worked with Catskills in that packet, and they were telling the truth, but it's not the same! The Catskills boys are really nice, though; I'm working with two of them on enchanting Muggle artifacts (Dad's going to go spastic if he finds out about that, so don't tell him! It's not illegal over here), and I'm also going to work with them on figuring out why electricity doesn't work around Hogwarts. Could you possibly get Ron to find out whether magnets (whatever those are) work there?

Quidditch at this place is practically non-existant. They don't even have a field! They do have a Quodpot arena, but I'm just not as good at that; I like the feel of the Quaffle. Occasionally they have Quidditch games in the Quodpot arena, and they do have a team (we play against other schools), but we regularly get smashed. Oh, well-without Wood, Gryffindor is probably going to lose to Slytherin anyway.

One thing I never expected was the amount of freedom these girls have-as long as we take our wands and have a partner (unless we're 18, which most of us aren't) we can go anywhere in the city. I've been to two parties already, and there's this little place by the Mississippi River (that thing is almost as big as it's name!) that's got really good food (although I don't think I quite trust some of it-I swear my soup had an eyeball in it the other day.)

How are Ron, Fred, and George holding up? They should be back at school by now. And how are Harry and Hermione? What about Lee? Let me know!

Love,

Ginny

PS-I've just gotten the news-if I stay here through next year, I won't have to take the O.W.L.s!

Dear Star,

I want to thank you for coming out here-it was wonderful to see you, and better to speak face to face with you.

I need your help. Dumbledore has declared that I will speak with Sirius, and he says he's arranging to send him here with the students-I have no logical objections, but I can't quite seem to work up the nerve to face him. Help!

I would appreciate it if you would come out again to talk to Snapper. She was devastated to have missed you, and seems to be pining-not much, but enough that it's clear she's doing it.

Snapper thinks the castle is easy to navigate-all you have to do is ask for help. I suppose she gets that from my always asking for help when I need it. She's very like her father, personality-wise. She keeps her temper better, though. He told me once that the hat almost put him in Slytherin, except that he didn't have enough ambition. I think she's the same way-a Gryffindor for sure. I'm still waiting for her to find the secret passages out of the castle, though.

Your loving sister,

Foxfire Lumiosi

Dear Mother,

Thank you very much for agreeing to let me come. Although the aeroplane was horrid-cramped and uncomfortable, plus I spent the whole time riding next to Padma Patil and Virginia Weasley, and they kept going on about how wonderful Harry Potter was and how horrid somebody name Ron was-it was a whole new way to travel, and at least it was interesting.

This school is so very beautiful. It is located in caves, they have such fantastic light placements-they make the whole place surreal. There are two especially large caverns in which we eat and fly. The spelunking course is fascinating-I may go into that professionally; I know I'm not good enough to fly professionally, but spelunking... I'm getting very good grades.

They meant what they said about this being one of the best places for flying. I'm good enough to get into pretty much any flying course, but I'm certainly not the best there is. I'm going to come back a much better flyer than I went out, certainly.

I don't know how he knew, but the headmaster gave me exactly the right advice. This place is being a salve for my soul. Instead of seeing my friends and thinking "Vivian and Cedric were never very close," I'm making new friends, and I don't have the locational reminders to make me grieve. I feel a little guilty for avoiding him like this, but I feel much better otherwise-I really do think this is just what I needed.

I like it here, very much, Mother. I'd like to stay my seventh year, as well-my senior year, as they would say here.

Your daughter,

Cho Chang

Dear Arabella,

You may tell Harry however much you feel like telling him-I put no limits on how much information he gets. I hardly need to tell you, however, that you should avoid telling the Dursleys anything at all about your being a witch.

After you have dropped Harry, would you please report to Arthur Weasley? Inform him that I wish to speak with him at 4:30 in the afternoon, August 31st.

Please make sure that you inform the Dursleys that Harry has in fact made it to the station-please do not inform him that he has made it to the school.

After that, please stay a few days with Alastor Moody-he's still very twitchy, and I would like someone he knows with very strong nerves to stay with him.

Respectfully,

Albus Dumbledore

Dear Ginny,

I'm so glad you like it there-I'd be devestated if you had to spend a whole year in a place where you're miserable. Your letter practically oozed enthusiasm-it's lovely to see it. And I hope that you aren't feeling terribly crowded-you didn't seem very upset about it.

I looked at your schedule, and if you find that easy, I must say I'm very impressed. It's as complicated as a map of Hogwarts! I am sorry about the Quidditch, though; I know you trained hard to try and make the house team... I'd completely forgotten that they weren't as fond of it over there.

Ron asked Hermione, and she says that she'll find out about the magnets as soon as she can, but don't expect them to work-she thinks magnetic fields get played with by the magic. (She's spending the week before school with us.) She promises to make sure as soon as she gets there, though.

Please, please don't tell me about the lack of vigilance there-I don't really want to know that sort of thing. Just promise me you're safe and don't mention it again, okay? I don't want my daughter to get hurt.

Ron and the twins are all rushing around trying to get their things together for the year-not having prepared earlier, they must hurry to make it at all now. Why are you, Percy and Bill the only responsible ones?

Speaking of which, did you hear about the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes? Fred and George aparently found an investor to back their business. They won't tell us who, because he "swore them to secresy," but I have some suspicions. At any rate, it looks like they really are going to go through with this mad business-I do actually wish them luck, but it's so risky... They have been able to make these things just on their allowance, though, so I suppose they know how to make it float...

Harry has me dead worried. He hasn't been allowed to come visit us, and after what happened last June, he needs some sypathetic company. He did send a very nice letter thanking me for the cake and the nuts, and saying to thank you for the snake. What snake? Hermione, on the other hand, is positively blooming. She looks marvelous, she really does, and she's a prefect. (I think Harry might be, as well, but he hasn't said anything about it, the modest boy.) Hermione offered to do the finances for Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, but she was turned down on the basis of her not being a Weasley. Then Fred said "Not that it will last long" and both twins started to tease her about being Ron's Girlfriend. Don't they ever let up?

Lee Jordan is presumably fine, but I'm not really sure. He leaves today for Bulgaria-he's also in the exchange program, but he's going to Durmstrang. I hope he's all right-he says he's found a spell to teach him the language, though, so he should be alright. I hope.

Missing you terribly,

Your loving mother

Dear Fox,

Looking forward to the first day of class? I know I was! (That was sarcasm, in case you missed it.)

Good luck with the Weasley twins, and try to keep Harry from sneaking around too much. Do you remember the Marauder's Map? (Why did we make that? Why?!) I think he has it. I admit curiosity at how he got it from Filch's office, or even knew it was there in the first place. Somehow, though, he had it the year I was teaching there. I confiscated it, of course, but gave it back as soon as I stopped teaching-you didn't expect me to hold on to something like that, did you? As far as I know, he still has it, so be wary.

In response to your querry about Houses, I have a Galleon on Gryffindor. She sounds exactly like her father; clever enough for Slytherin, but not enough ambition. Also, I think that if she meets Harry, she'll want to be in whatever house he's in.

Have you met Harry? He's a darling boy, very much a mix of his mother and father. Do you remember how quiet Lily was outside of class those first few years? Well, Harry is very much like that, even in class. He tends to know most of the answers to reasonable questions, and he asks a lot of very good questions. He's an exceptional Quidditch player, better than James! And you know I think the world of James' Quidditch skills.

He looks stunningly like James. I had to work very, very hard not to call him by his father's name while I was teaching him. He has a sort of control, though, that James never did. He sees more than he says; he believes in doing what is right more than what is permitted; and his mind knows not the barriers of conventionality. He can do things long thought impossible-he mastered a patronus in his third year, Fox; most adult wizards can't do that! I didn't learn until I'd been fighting Voldemort for three years, and then only to deal with Lethifolds; Harry learned to cast a full-strength patronus against a Dementor in his third year while hearing echoes of his dead parents and nearly passing out. The boy is literally a miracle.

My goodness-I went on a bit, didn't I? Well, why not; it won't hurt you to know about him.

To change the subject-is there something you wanted to talk to me about, concerning Sirius? You've been rather conspicuously silent on that subject... I'm happy to talk, really.

Have fun with the students!

Yours,

Moony

Dear Albus,

Of course we'll take Snuffles to King's Cross. Ron was quite happy when I told him. Ginny sent me a letter; she seems to be settling in to her new school nicely, though of course there are some bumps.

Love,

Molly

Dear Former Roommates,

This place is awesome! I know, I know, you doubt it can compare with Hogwarts, but really! It's great!

The scenery is so pretty; the mountains, the forests-lovely. They had to take Muggle-deterents to a whole new level, though, just to keep the place hidden.

Unlike at Hogwarts, we live in separate cabins, about twenty boys to a cabin. (There are no girls here-send Parvati my love.) When it's time to study, eat, or do anything else, we all trudge up to the main hall. The paths to and fro are well traveled, but I'm a little worried about the winter-they say the snow can get quite deep, and that occasionally they've had people get permenantly lost. Somehow I can't quite convince myself they're lying.

The studies are fascinating-show this to Hermione when you're done. We study such incredibly cool stuff-and we aren't required to take potions! I told you the place was cool! I'm not doing horribly, either-there are plenty of what people call "legacy students" who don't have much magical talent, or even brains period, for that matter. Tell that to the Slytherins for me.

I have to go now-up to the main hall again! One thing I can say about this place, it's very good for fitness.

Sincerely,

Seamus Finnigan