Catechism

Chapter Four
A New Day

Harry woke to pressure in his bladder and a sense of total displacement and confusion. The floor was too hard and cold and the space just felt different. Narrower and taller. The quiet seemed much ... noisier than he used to- small, unfamiliar sounds filtering in to him rather than the absolute smothering silence he was used to. He began trembling as the memories came flooding back. He was alone in a place of magic and evil, surrounded by enemies he had to placate and fool. Forcing back the fear, he rose and hesitantly opened the closet door, then stepped out into the black void of the room beyond.

If the silence was less intense than he was used to, the darkness was far more. Only in his cupboard had there ever been so little light that shadows couldn't survive. Even the basement was lighter, its grimy windows a touch paler than the rest of the room on even the darkest nights. Nervously, he felt his way across the room, jerking back as his hand brushed something as soft as Aunt Petunia's velvet gown. The bedspread, he realized in dismay. But at least it meant he was near his trunk. Hesitantly reaching out again, he found and opened the trunk. He pulled out neatly folded clothes by feel: socks, underwear, blue jeans, and a T-shirt, and pulled them on. The socks felt odd on his feet- he had always gone barefoot before yesterday. But he was always to wear socks and shoes here, Aunt Petunia had said. His shoes he had kicked off in the night, so he returned to the closet and felt around until he found them. It took a moment to release the tangle the laces had become, but he sorted them out and pulled the shoes on, retying them carefully. He also retrieved his toothbrush, ashamed to realize that he had failed to use it the night before. One so filthy on the inside must strive to be clean at least on the outside.

Gathering up the previous day's clothes, he wondered helplessly what to do with them. He hadn't been told where to do the laundry, or even where to find supplies for any of his other chores. Perhaps they would tell him today. How could he ever find something in this incomprehensively big place if they didn't tell him? That thought led to another: in so large a place he would never be done with his chores. Surely, it could never all be clean at once? He'd never be locked away and forgotten again- there wouldn't be time! That jubilant thought was tempered by the knowledge that not finishing his chores was bad, and he could never hope to finish. But it was the kind of bad punished by beatings, not by being sealed into the dark, silent loneliness of his cupboard.

"Aren't you awake yet?" an irritated voice interrupted his musings.

"Yes, sir," he replied quickly, realizing that he had already messed up again, not correctly anticipating what was wanted of him. "Sorry, sir," he added, feeling his way to the door and opening it. The brightness beyond it was blinding after the darkness, but he forced his eyes to stay wide open. They adjusted quickly, and the pile of laundry in his arms that he was training his gaze on became blurrily visible.

"Where are your glasses? Go put them on."

He went back to the closet, picked them up, and set them carefully onto his face, a ripple of wonder running through him once more as everything shot into focus. Turning, he found sharp, black eyes staring quizzically down at him.

"What, may I ask, were they doing on the closet floor?" Before Harry answered, the professor snorted and shook his head. "Actually, I don't think I want to know. But that is no way to treat glasses. Keep them on your face or on the table beside your bed. Or, while you're showering, set them on the counter. Never on the floor. Am I understood?"

"Yes, sir. Sorry, sir."

"With reason, this time! Will wonders never case? Well? Wash up and get ready for breakfast," he snapped.

"Yes, sir," Harry acknowledged, and then hesitated.

"Well?"

"Sorry, sir, but- where, sir?"

Black eyes closed for a long moment and long white hands clenched at the wizard's sides. Finally, eyes still closed, one hand rose and Harry felt a tremor of expectation run through him. Instead of hitting him, however, one finger extended from the fist and pointed to the door beside Harry's.

"Thank you, sir." He took a deep breath and added, "Where should I do the laundry, sir?"

"Drop your clothes in the hamper in the bathroom. They shall be dealt with," the professor stated in a tone of strained patience.

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir," Harry murmured apologetically before diving through the indicated door, eager to be out of sight by the time the man opened his eyes. Only after closing the door behind him did he take a moment to consider the words. They would be dealt with? What did that mean? It almost seemed to suggest that someone else was to do the laundry? Mind whirring, he looked around the room, startling himself with the sharp lines and details granted by the glasses. It was a large room with a black marble tub filling one corner of it, a sink and counter, also of black marble, along a wall to one side. The clothes hamper seemed somewhere incongruous- a large wicker barrel of a thing with a subtle weave providing a simple pattern to it. He stared for a long moment at the complex interweaving of the slender willow rods, fascinated. Finally, shaking himself out of it, he hesitantly dropped his clothes into it, atop black garments that obviously belonged to the professor. He wasn't supposed to put his things with others', but the man had said to, so Harry did it. That task complete, if not satisfactorily so, Harry emptied his bladder with a sigh of relief.

Turning to the tub, he found the plumbing a bit different than he was used to, but after a moment's consideration he was fairly certain he could work it. He undressed, folded the clothes neatly, and placed them on the farthest corner of the floor from the tub. Remembering his recent instructions, he carefully removed his glasses and set them down on the counter beside the sink. Then, stepping into the tub, he pulled across the curtain, and turned the left knob. Cold water began streaming from a low spigot. Pulling a knob atop the spigot caused the water to stop flowing from there and, instead, to come out of the shower head, pelting him with icy water at much higher pressure than the one at home did. The water seemed colder than it did at home, but hot was too expensive to be wasted on a freak. Gritting his teeth, Harry quickly scrubbed himself clean using a bar of soap that smelled mildly of something pleasant and didn't leave his skin feeling stiff and itchy the way his usual bar did. He suspected that it was the Professor's own soap, but it was the only one there. He scrubbed a bit of it into his scalp and used it to wash his hair as well. There was a bottle of what he assumed was shampoo, as well, but he had always been instructed to use only the bar.

Harry rinsed off, turned off the water, and shook some of the excess off him before stepping out of the tub. Still wet, he pulled on his clothes without even glancing at the fluffy towels hanging beside the tub. Usually he brought a rag to dry off with, but he had no rags here. Quickly and efficiently, he brushed his teeth with a vaguely minty paste that, again, he was sure was far too good for him.

Finally, glancing around, Harry's eyes widened in dismay. He'd left a puddle on the floor and there were several smudges on the mirror and the counter near the sink. He paused a moment, eyes darting around the room in search of something to clean with. Finally, gaze settling on the laundry basket, he crossed the room and removed yesterday's shirt. Carefully he used it to polish away the smudges, then soaked up the water on the floor before putting it back, careful to let it touch only his own things.

Reluctantly satisfied that the room was as clean as he could make it without more supplies, he slipped out to stand passively before the professor, waiting.

The man's thin brows rose in distaste. "You're still soaked. Are you too good to use borrowed towels?"

Recognizing a question with no acceptable answer, Harry prepared for a blow as he answered softly, "The towels are very fine, sir." Much too fine for him to foul with his touch. But he wasn't allowed to apologize properly- they were pretending his touch was not foul, and he must play along.

Eyes down, he waited for a blow to fall and felt himself tense very slightly as he heard a whisper of wood on wood and a swish through the air. He waited for the switch to open up his cheek or lash across his shoulder, preparing for the pain, ready to accept his punishment becomingly. Instead he was shocked into a visible shudder as he was surrounded by a warm blast of steam that annihilated the chill of the shower and left him ... dry. Magic, he realized with revulsion tinged with ... pleasure. And realized that he was as bad as Uncle Vernon said. He must be, if he could feel pleasure at the unnatural sensation.

"Come," the professor snapped, turning in a swirl of black cloth and leading him out of the room.

Obediently, Harry followed, this time careful not to move so close that he would run the risk of running into the man. With his earlier thoughts about cleaning still in mind, he allowed his gaze to wander a bit. There was, as he had expected, a great deal to do, he decided with a touch of satisfaction. This corridor was quite clean, as were most of the large ones it crossed. The smaller passages, though, and many of the rooms he glanced at as they swept past showed signs of neglect. Many of them were very much in need of a good scrubbing. Enough to keep him busy for a very long time to come, if only he could find supplies. But surely they would tell him? Could they expect him to just know? Aunt Petunia expected him to just know where everything was, but he was the one who put it there. Perhaps other people knew, though, even in places they had never before been. He couldn't remember ever learning the layout of the Dursley's house, but he knew it. Maybe it was supposed to be the same here.

His train of thought was abruptly derailed as Professor Snape threw open a large wooden door and led him into a huge, well-lit room. His gaze slipped up, against his will, and then froze as he found himself staring into an endless expanse of blue and white. He could see the clouds moving more clearly now, roiling and changing shapes as they floated across the hall. His eyes widened and he began to shudder in abject terror, the stone floor feeling weak and insignificant beneath him. The sound of voices reached his ears, excited, confused, anxious. Emotions such as those could have no relevance to him, and his subconscious recognized that and ignored them, keeping his attention locked on the threat of the sky. The touch of skin to his hand combined with his complete disorientation and terror, actually shocked him into jerking his hand away.

Immediately, the realization of what he had done broke through to him, and the enormity of his transgression drove the blood from his face. His fear of the sky faded before a more immediate danger as his eyes jerked down from it to stare up at the professor as he returned his hand to its original position with a forced, "Sorry, sir."

Black eyes caught his and he managed to banish the sky altogether from his mind as he focused on this smaller, safer void. Then it occurred to him that he was meeting somebody's eyes as though he were an equal. Hurriedly, he dropped his gaze to his feet with another muffled, "Sorry, sir."

An irritated snort answered him. "If the first was for getting caught up in the sky, what was the second for?"

"Sir?" he asked, confused.

"If you're going to be apologizing with every breath, I'd at least like to know what you're apologizing for. The first, I assume, was for giving in to your agoraphobia. Fear of open spaces, or, as in this case, the sky," he added as Harry's mouth opened hesitantly to ask. "What, then, of the second?" Harry realized with a shock that he should have apologized for giving in to the fear. It hadn't even occurred to him. He swallowed, knowing it would be a special punishment. Possibly a day locked up as well, or even longer. "I'm sorry," he whispered, thoroughly ashamed of himself.

"For what?" the man all but shouted in exasperation.

"For giving in to my fear of the sky and for not apologizing for that earlier, sir."

"Then what were you apologizing for earlier?" he demanded.

"For pulling away when you touched me, sir. And-" he broke off. Meeting eyes was one of the things normal people did, and they were pretending that he was normal. So he shouldn't have apologized for that, after all. But he had been so bad. "And for staring, sir," he finished quietly. That, he thought, was rude even for people who weren't bad. And it was close enough. He waited for the punishment that always followed admission of guilt, and felt lost and confused when it failed to come. How could he hope that one day he'd defeat the wickedness in him if he was not punished when he was bad? He would have to be vigilantly aware of his actions and report them to Uncle Vernon when he went home so that he could be properly punished. He fought back a convulsive swallow at the thought of days or weeks of errors all being paid for at once. But what other hope did he have?

"Potter!"

"Yes, sir! Sorry, sir!" his gaze flicked up, horrified by his distraction- and he caught a glimpse of endless blue and felt his stomach clench and his knees weaken. He began to fall and was caught by two strong hands gripping his shoulders. The contact again broke him back out of fear of the sky, as fear of the wizard and the punishment snapped back to the front of his consciousness. Submitting to the touch, he waited for the pain that was sure to follow. At least the touch wasn't skin to skin. Even as he had the thought, his left shoulder was released and the hand took his chin instead, turning his face until there was nowhere his frightened gaze could go but into cold black eyes. How could the man bear to touch him? And how could he have been so bad as to deserve it?

"Mr. Potter. Harry."

The voice broke through his thoughts and he trembled again as he realized he had been ignoring the man, lost in his own thoughts, as though they could hold any worth. The hand on his shoulder tightened slightly and he forced himself again to passive stillness. He had no right to fear. "Sor-"

"Don't even say it. Now. Mr. Potter, you are in an indoor room. There is a ceiling above you, but it has been charmed to resemble the sky. I should have warned you of it and I apologize for not doing so," he added sourly.

Green eyes widened silently in shock and fear. What was he to do when somebody apologized to him? He was not worthy of apologies.

Fortunately, the man didn't seem to expect any response and continued without pausing. "Focus your eyes on the wall. There," he instructed, releasing the boy's chin to extend one long thin finger, pointing to a point low on the wall across the room.

Harry obeyed, not letting his eyes slip up towards the endless blue.

"Move your gaze up the wall very slowly," the professor said quietly, dropping the hand he was pointing with, the other remaining lightly on Harry's shoulder, a reminder of what could be done to him if he lost focus again. "If the wall begins looking vague or fuzzy, stop and keep focusing on that point until it seems clear again. Very slowly. This is not something you can make easier by rushing."

Again, Harry obeyed. He raised his gaze by tiny increments and paused whenever his vision blurred or faded, waiting until the wall came reluctantly back into focus. He followed it as the wall hit the ceiling and began to curve inwards. He followed it until he was staring at the center of the domed ceiling, the image of the sky thin and clear just below it, easy to ignore.

"Very good," the man beside him breathed. "Remember how it feels to focus like that, Mr. Potter. It will permit you to see the ceiling rather than the sky in this room. Or to see past any other illusion that has been created without additional magic to prevent it being seen through. If you have any trouble, start again out of the range of the magic and then, slowly, move in."

"Yes sir."

"Look at something else for a moment, then look back. Try to see straight to the ceiling."

"Yes, sir." He dropped his gaze to his feet, examining the lines of the stone floor for three long breaths before looking back up. For a terrifying moment it was the same overwhelming emptiness, but almost immediately his eyes refocused and he calmed again as he found the ceiling once more.

"Excellent!"

For an instant he was warmed by the approval in that tone. Then he remembered. This was magic- he had to be bad at it. Had to fail. He tried to back out, to be unable to see through the illusion once more, but he couldn't manage it. Uncle Vernon was going to be so angry with him.

"That out of the way, let us proceed," the tone was cold once more, but at least the hand dropped from his shoulder.

"Yes, sir," Harry acknowledged, following the professor to the long table at the front of the room. His breath caught as he saw how many people were at it. All of their eyes were locked on him, and he froze, one foot slightly in the air, under the weight of all those stares before carefully lowing it and waiting, tense.

Movement caught his eye and he saw a tall man with twinkling blue eyes and a long white beard who he realized must be the one he had met last night, rise to his feet. Now he was in bright green robes with little yellow balls darting about it almost faster than Harry's eyes could follow. A tall pointed hat rested on his head, and his face, now that Harry could see it clearly was strange- lined and wrinkled.

"I am delighted to see that you have both survived the night." Dumbledore chuckled, and then sobered. "And this excitement this morning- I apologize, my boy. I have grown so used to the Great Hall's magic, I fear I had forgotten that it would not be so pleasant a surprise to you as it is to most. You seem quite recovered, I am pleased to see," he added, eyes turning inquisitively from Harry to the potions master as he finished.

"It seemed worth delaying breakfast for a moment while he learned to see past the illusion," Professor Snape answered the unspoken question.

"Ah," the headmaster murmured, eyes flicking down the table as the statement was answered by several gasps of surprise, resting on Harry for a moment, then, twinkling, returning to the potions master. "In, er, one easy lesson?"

"So it would seem. I have always thought it was over-taught," he added with a sneer at one of the other teachers at the table. "Much easier to work out if you aren't convinced that it's practically impossible."

"It is a very complicated-" Harry turned to look at the speaker and found a woman with pale brown hair and flashing hazel eyes glaring at Professor Snape, half-rising with her hands braced on the table.

"Now, now, Professor Mungrove," the headmaster interrupted her, smiling. "You and Professor Snape can argue it out later, but, for now, let us recall that Harry is not used to being among so many people and provide him with a peaceful introduction."

The woman sniffed with irritation but sank back into her seat under Dumbledore's cheerful gaze, which turned back to Harry. "We shan't expect you to remember everyone right off, Harry, but I thought we should at least run through introductions. Okay?"

"Yes, sir."

"Very good. Your present host, you know, of course. Our potions master, Professor Snape. And you have met Madam Pomfrey, our talented medi-witch, and myself. My deputy is also the transfiguration instructor, Professor McGonagall." A tall woman with a stern face who wore square-framed glasses and her graying hair up in a tight bun, nodded to him with a thin smile.

And then another name, another face, and another. They were all so extraordinarily different. Different from one another and different from the Dursleys. There was one that was hardly taller than Harry himself, but obviously adult and wearing a beard nearly as long as the headmaster's. Another was as wide as Harry was tall and towered over everyone present. He burst into noisy tears when he was introduced. And size was only one of the things that changed from one to the next. They wore different styles, had different colored hair and eyes, differently shaped faces- there was nothing of them that was not different, that he could see. It was disconcerting.

At long last, the parade of identities came to an end and the headmaster smiled down at the child. "Well! That's accomplished! And breakfast much delayed: you must be starving! Come have a seat and we will see what we can do to remedy it," he stated, patting the chair next to him in obvious invitation.

Harry forced himself to move around the table, past all of the teachers and staff, a couple of whom actually reached out a hand as though to touch him before jerking back. Only halfway expecting a shout this time, he set himself gingerly on the indicated seat and stared down at the empty wooden table, the incredible whirls and lines of the wood grain distracting him somewhat from the stares.

"I believe breakfast may be served," Dumbledore announced.

Harry jumped in his seat as a plate appeared before him, directly over the wood he had been studying. Looking up, he found that a glass of some orange fluid and a set of silverware had also materialized. Similar settings were in front of each of the others present, and large platters and bowls and pitchers loaded with food and drink were spread across the table.

The professors began serving themselves, and the headmaster smiled down at the boy beside him, who was staring down at the bounty, unmoving. "Help yourself, my boy."

"Thank you, sir. I'm not hungry, sir."

Black eyes turned sharply from several seats away, at the end of the table, and Professor Snape, ignoring the others between, snarled, "Ridiculous. You didn't eat last night. Of course you're hungry."

"I ate at home, sir."

"Whatever farewell feast they offered must have worn off by now."

"Please, sir, I'm not hungry."

"A growing boy?" This time the voice was from the headmaster's other side and Professor Snape turned back to his own meal as Madam Pomfrey joined in the fray. "Remember what I said about lack of appetite, Mr. Potter? I'm afraid you must eat even if you are not very hungry. As your blood balances out you'll find the task less trying."

"Yes, ma'am," he conceded, reluctantly. He removed the top slice of toast from a stack before him, eyeing the melted butter atop it distrustfully. He took a tiny bite and forced himself to chew. There was a murmur beside him and he almost dropped the toast as it was abruptly covered in a thick coat of marmalade.

"Try some bacon," Dumbledore suggested cheerfully, and several pieces floated onto the boy's plate.

"I'd- I'd rather not, sir."

"Nonsense! We have the most excellent bacon here, my boy, it's one of the great benefits of living at the school."

Unwillingly, Harry picked up a slice and nibbled at it. The flavor was as indescribably wonderful as he remembered. He wasn't intended to eat food that tasted like that. It wouldn't stay down. His stomach began to roil as he finished the first bite of the first slice. The old man waved heartily to show he was to continue. Abruptly, it occurred to him what they were doing. It made a kind of sense- they couldn't punish him normally because they were pretending he was good. So instead, they gave him things that if he really were good would do him no harm, but, being as he was, would make him ill. Accepting that it was a punishment, he ate a little more willingly. A deserved punishment should never be delayed.

Glancing down, he saw that another slice of toast had been added to his plate along with a small mountain of eggs scrambled with cheese. He swallowed down nausea but wouldn't object to a punishment. Trying not to see the food, he began to eat it without looking about to see the pleased, faintly relieved expressions of the adults around him. He ate almost half of the mountain of food before he was in imminent danger of making a mess. Making a mess was always bad, but making a mess in response to a punishment was unforgivable defiance.

"Sir?" he turned to Dumbledore, as the one who had assigned the punishment.

"Yes, Harry?"

"May I please be excused to use the toilet?"

"Yes, of course, my boy."

"Thank you, sir," he rose, then hesitated. "Where is it, sir?"

"Out through the door you came in, turn right, and it's the first door on the left. Would you like someone to show you?"

"No, sir. Thank you, sir."

"Okay, then. Come back when you're finished and we'll discuss how you'll spend your days for the next little while."

"Yes, sir." Showing as little expression as he could, Harry moved around the table, out of the Great Hall, and followed the instructions to the toilet. His punishments were for his own good, so any discomfort they caused him should be kept to himself, and not inflicted upon others. Sharing it suggested that he was looking for sympathy, which would only be appropriate if it was undeserved. Otherwise, showing illness or pain was pure defiance. Defiance was bad.

He found the toilet, but it looked nothing like he expected it to. A row of sinks stood on one side with a row of doors, set very close together, opposite them, all ajar. On the far wall stood a line of porcelain things shaped vaguely like elongated, seatless toilets. Desperately, he peered through the first of the doors and found, to his relief, a normal toilet. The plumbing to the back was odd, but the bowl was perfectly familiar, and he threw himself to his knees before it. Giving up the fight to keep the food he had eaten down, he gagged. Even after there was nothing left in his stomach, his body continued to heave in rebellion.

At last, feeling weak and drained, he fell still. For a long moment, exhausted, he allowed his forehead to rest on the rim of the toilet. Clenching his eyes, he could feel tears escape the sudden pressure and roll down his cheeks. Horrified, he rubbed them off with the back of his hand. Uncle Vernon would be so mad at him. He rose smoothly to his feet, resisting the urge to steady himself against the thin wall to the side, and examined the toilet. It didn't look like the ones at home, but one piece of metal stuck out from the rest, so he pushed on it experimentally and was gratified to find that water rushed into the bowl and swirled away the mess. He took a deep breath, wiping his face of emotion, and stepped out of the tiny room, into the larger. He washed his hands, made a cup of them, and gathered water to rinse his mouth. It tasted unpleasantly of strong soap, but it replaced the acrid tang of bile. He swallowed the handful of water, rinsed off his flushed face, and dragged one arm across it to dry it. His hands he dried on the thighs of his pants. A glance in the mirror told him he bore no sign of discomfort, so he turned, left the room, and returned to the Great Hall.

For a split second he froze, panicked by the sight of the sky. Then, without any conscious decision to do so, his eyes refocused and the sky vanished leaving only a thin wisp of blue hovering below the plaster ceiling. He took a breath, furious with himself for again using magic, but not able to completely regret it since it got rid of that horrid blue void. Silently berating himself, he crossed the room and stopped before the huge table, head bowed, waiting for the headmaster's instructions. They had been talking and laughing before he entered the room, but had fallen silent when he came in. He could feel the weight of all their eyes on him as he stood, waiting to be assigned his chores.

"Are you still hungry, Harry?" Professor Dumbledore's voice seemed loud in the silence.

"No, sir," he whispered, hoping that his punishment was complete for now, that they wouldn't force him to start all over.

"Very well. For the time being, I believe it would be best if you focused on orienting yourself to the castle. It is confusing to all newcomers and given your ... unique situation, I suspect you shall have more difficulty than most becoming comfortable here. I believe the best way to go about it is to simply let you wander about. I have been considering the best way to allow this without endangering you, and have come up with several safeguards, which I believe shall do rather nicely.

"First, you shall have a map. A yellow line shall mark the easiest path from your current position to the Great Hall. Blue will lead you to your quarters, which presently means Professor Snape's quarters, of course. If one of us should want your presence for some reason, the map shall rustle to get your attention and a path leading to where you are wanted will glow purple.

"Secondly, I shall place a charm on you that will allow any of us here to track you, should the need arise.

"And lastly, Mr. Filch has agreed to send Mrs. Norris (his cat, if you recall) to check on you periodically and she shall fetch him to you if you are in any difficulty." A thin, angry-faced man glared angrily down at Harry from under long, lank, gray hair, one hand caressing the ragged fur of the cat held in his other arm.

"We spent the weekend warding any dangerous rooms and passages, so if you try to open a door and it won't open, or you attempt to move down a passageway and cannot, simply don't. The map will also warn you of such places, our wards will be marked down in red to warn you off."

The old man paused, looking expectantly at Harry, so he acknowledged, "Yes, sir."

"Good. I shall also have the ghosts keep an eye out for you. I have warned Peeves to leave you alone. He is our resident poltergeist, you know, and a bit of a mischief-maker. I fear his spirits are too high for him to take such warnings to heart for any length of time, but I believe he'll leave you be for at least a week or two. Now. Have I forgotten anything of importance?" he asked, looking up and down the table.

"Lavatories," Professor McGonagall replied succinctly.

"And food," Madam Pomfrey chimed in. "I should like Mr. Potter to be able to eat whenever he is hungry, for now, rather than only at scheduled mealtimes."

"Ah, quite so. Green, then, shall lead you to the nearest boys' toilet, and orange to the painting that opens into the kitchen. It is a bowl of fruit, and you must tickle the pear to gain entrance. The house elves will be more than happy to feed you any time at all. And since the number of paths seems to be growing, I shall also add a key to the map to keep track of what is what. All clear?"

"Yes, sir," he agreed, although he had never actually used a map. He'd seen some in his lessons with Aunt Petunia, in Dudley's textbooks for history and science, but had very little experience with them and this sounded quite different than what he had seen before.

"Very good! By the time school starts up I should like you to be able to find the Great Hall from anywhere in the castle. Also you should be able to find each of the commonly used classrooms, my office, and your room- which shall, of course, be changing next week," he added with a grin at Professor Snape, "from here. All of this you must be able to do without the map, which I shall have to take away when the students come back. In, oh, three weeks time I'll remove the lines so you have only a map, but no directions, and for the last week or two we shall give you some increasingly difficult tests to ensure that you have learned enough. You have six weeks before the students' return, which I hope will be ample. At that point, we'll have to remove all the safeguards, although some of the wards will remain in place. I feel certain that you will be ready by then. For the time being, however, I expect you to spend your time exploring and learning the lay of the school. I hope it won't be too arduous a task," he finished, eyes twinkling expectantly.

"Yes, sir," he acknowledged, mind racing as he tried to determine whether or not he had to be bad at this, since it wasn't really magic. In fact, since the map was magic, the more he learned the less he would have to depend on magic. Perhaps it would be okay to try hard? But it was all so very confusing.

For some reason, the headmaster seemed a bit taken aback by his response, but, after a moment, he smiled and took a large piece of parchment from a pocket it couldn't possibly have fit into. He drew his wand with a flourish and, cast several spells upon the map before passing it across the table to Harry. "There. The modifications have been added," he announced.

Harry accepted the magical map, trying not to touch it any more than necessary. The spells placed on him followed, and he managed to suppress a shudder of revulsion as he felt strong forces swirl around him before settling over him like a blanket.

"Breakfast and dinner you shall have in the Great Hall," Dumbledore informed him cheerfully, while rising to his feet. "I fear they are not always so peaceful as today, I requested that everyone refrain from overwhelming you, which they apparently took to mean total silence. Now that you have some idea of how many there are of us, I daresay you will become more comfortable with all of us talking at once, as we seem to do all too regularly," he added, casting a humorous glance up and down the table, pausing significantly on a couple faces. "Professor Snape shall bring you to breakfast and the map will guide you to dinner. We tend not to assemble for lunch during the summer, so for that you can raid the kitchens whenever you feel a mite peckish." He resheathed his wand, and tapped one finger thoughtfully on the table. "There was something else, I am quite sure... Ah! A warning. The map will show you only the floor of the castle you are presently on. For now, of course, the paths will lead you to the staircase necessary to reach your destination. But I did want you to be aware of it so that you wouldn't worry if, for example, you climbed a tower and the entire school appeared to vanish."

"Yes, sir," he agreed uncertainly. "Thank you, sir."

"Very good. Enjoy your explorations, my boy!"

Never having been given a remotely similar instruction before, Harry was a bit taken aback, but he managed a doubtful, "Thank you, sir."

"Off with you, now," the headmaster said with a smile, making little shooing motions with his hands.

"Yes, sir," he said, moving once more out of the hall. As he closed the door behind him, Harry heard several voices begin speaking at once.