Harry Potter and the School of Change

Chapter 3:Not at Hogwarts Yet

...the Weasleys. They were all sitting nervously around a large ornate fireplace, except for Ron, who was currently pacing, stopping, looking at his watch, and pacing again. Why are they here? Hmm...

Looking at the fireplace, he finally figured it out. They thought I'd be coming by Floo! Dumbledore must have forgot to tell them. Might as well "show up".

Harry silently padded toward Ron and positioned himself behind him, taking off the invisibility cloak and stuffing it in his pocket..

"Boo."

Ron and everyone jumped and looked around for the source of the sound. Harry smirked and waved his hand in front of Ron's face. Ron, finally snapping out of his shock, turned around and fainted. Harry looked at Ron's form quizzically, but before he began to bend down to wake Ron up, he was, well, tackled, by the rest of the Weasley's, who were asking a rampage of questions, How'd you get here being the major one. Harry loved the Weasleys, but not enough to die from strangulation.

"Stop! Cough I need to breathe!!" Harry tried to wiggle out of the Weasley's grasp, trying not to step on the still unconscious Ron. Just then, Hermione came out the fireplace, dusting herself off then looking up, shock written over her face as she saw a sea of red with a tiny tuft of black sticking out the top.

Dropping her trunk she ran to the mob and started trying to dig Harry out. She first pried off Fred, but before she could peel off George, she stepped on something soft. Looking down, she saw that the soft thing was actually Ron! Frantically grabbing his limp arm, she pulled him out and as soon as she did so, she saw a foot sticking out of the hole Ron had just emptied. Pulling on the foot, she began seeing the rest of a leg, then a rumpled shirt, and finally a tuft of black hair. She helped him stand up, Harry looking very ruffled, and looked amusingly at the mob Harry left a moment ago.

"Um, excuse me? Missing someone?" Harry tapped Charlie's shoulder and waved sheepishly.

The Weasleys, finally realizing that someone was missing, turned around, all with equal expressions of shock and relief on their faces.

Mrs.Weasley came up to Harry and hugged him tightly. Harry smiled, one he could take. She looked at him closely and asked, "How'd you get here?"

"I'll say how I got here if you tell me why you're here." Harry replied, waving his hands around to indicate this room.

"Ron didn't tell you!! Ohh, I'm going to get him, I'll make him maroon sweaters for the rest of his life!" Just as she said this, Ron woke up, still dizzy.

"I was hoping it would be a surprise! How was I supposed to know he wouldn't use the Floo?" Ron retorted.

"I used a portkey, actually. I couldn't Floo, the Dursleys boarded their fireplace up again. I showed up in a really weird room and didn't know where I was, so I wandered around until I found this room and you all tackled me. Now, again, where are we?"

This time, George spoke up. "Well, you see, Dad over there, the old chap, he was tinkling around with some Muggle things, called Compoosers or something like that, and he finally made up this thing we like to call the Diabooth. He needed some funding, so we gave some of the money from our "private investor" and it took off. We now have plenty of money and we bought this here manor. Grand, isn't it? I reckon you came out in the Portkey room."

"Why is it so dark in there? It's sort of dreary down there."

At this, Ron spoke up. "We don't really have enough stuff to fill the place. We're filling it, but it's going slow." Ron now turned to Mrs. Weasley.

"Can I show Harry and Herm their rooms now?"

"Yes, yes, of course! I'll get the house-elves to bring your trunks. Umm, Harry dear, where is your trunk?"

Harry looked through his pockets and pulled out a tiny trunk.

" I-er... Dumbledore shrunk my trunk for me. He said one of you could unshrink it."

"Of course! Here, Redureverso!" With a sky blue light coming out of Mrs. Weasley's wand, hitting the trunk, the trunk popped and reverted to its original size.

"There. Done! Now, off you go. I'm sure Ron will catch you up."

The houseelves grabbed the trunks and popped off, while Ron led Harry and Hermione down the many corridors an stairs, finally stopping at a large door, labelled Hermione's room.

"This is your room Herm, Harry's is in the tower, it's just down there." He pointed to another door down the corridor.

"I'm a bit over there", he said, pointing to another door, slightly in the opposite direction from Harry's. "And we have a common room in between the three. Harry, we should first unpack and then we can go down to the Quidditch pitch. Is that ok? The houseelves should have all your stuff in your rooms by now, and don't worry Herm, we're paying the ones that want it."

Ron led Hermione and Harry into a large room, covered completely in a deep red and gold, from floor to ceiling. Hermione's trunk was already on the table beside the large bed and the big windows were wide open, letting fresh air in.

"This is wonderful! It's so big! Is there a library?" Hermione said, taking it all in.

Harry chuckled and Ron just looked at her strangely. "Of course there's a library, but why? We're on vacation! Books are for school, not for vacation. I have to show Harry his room, if you need anything, just ring the little bell."

Ron led Harry out of Hermione's room and Harry followed Ron to another door, this time with Harry's name on it.

They walked up a set of spiralling stairs into a circular room, surrounded completely by windows. It was decorated in the same way as Hermione's room and the windows here were open too. There was a small balcony off one of the two floor-to-ceiling windows opposite each other.

When Harry saw this, he walked out and looked down, finally seeing the scenery. In the far distance, he could see the lights of a small village, and a large forest between here and the village. To the left, he could see a full-size Quidditch pitch and a large swimming pool was beside it. On the right, he could see what looked like a burnt-out ring in the grass. Wondering what it was, he pointed it out to Ron.

"Oh, that's the duelling ring. Of course, we can't use it now for magic, but we can use it for anything else that needs shields to keep spectators safe. By the way, did you see the school list this year? Focus stones, swords, what type of nutter teachers do we have now? We still have to go shopping for everything, since we can't use the Diabooth for swords or focus stones. We'll probably be going in a couple of days, you still have to get everything, right?"

"Actually, no, I got everything from Whinging Way, which is the little alley Whinging has, and the Diabooth, which it really great, by the way."

"Really? Can you bring your sword and stuff down to the common room? I bet Herm'll want to see it too." Ron looked very excited and raced down before Harry could say a word.

* * *

When Harry came down to the common room 30 minutes later, he could see Ron and Hermione waiting on the couch.

"Hi Ron! Hi Hermione! Ron, I brought the sword and my focus stone with me. Want to see them?" Harry walked over to where Ron and Hermione were sitting and sat down beside Ron. He passed Gryffindor's sword to Ron and placed the focus stone on the table.

"Is this-it can't be-can it?" Ron looked up at Harry,an expectant look on his face. Hermione in front of them, looked at him, quizzically.

"Yes, Ron, it's the same sword from second year. Dumbledore told me it would be the only one that worked perfectly with me. Something about it choosing me. Not bad, eh?"

"Not bad?? NOT BAD??!!? This is GRYFFINDOR's sword, not just any old thing. Not bad...the git..." Ron mumbled off, occasionally mumbling something along similar lines.

Meanwhile, Hermione was looking intently at the swirling light of the focus stone. She started reaching for it, but before her hand could get close enough, the stone let off a small tendril of light that struck Hermione's hand, which she quickly pulled back, rubbing the spot with her other hand.

"Ow...I guess I should have known it would have done that, it is a life-stone, after all. Even normal stones give off a small shock when touched by someone other than their chosen. I should have remembered that. Stupid, Stupid me."

"Herm, you aren't stupid, you should know that by now. Anyways, what's a life stone and what does it have to do with me?" Harry picked up the stone and started tossing it from hand to hand.

Hermione looked at Ron for a second and grinned. He was still looking wondrously at Gryffindor's sword. Shaking it off, she looked at Harry and replied.

"Your stone is a life-stone, Harry. The stonecarvers, who only come around once or twice a generation, and not even that often sometimes, put a bit of their essence into the stone. They can only make one of these in a lifetime, and many don't choose to make one, as it takes away most of their magical power. Stonecarvers who don't put their essence in a stone always have a special skill, and have an extreme amount of magical talent.

"The stones choose their master, and since they are only matched to one person on the entire world, it's extremely rare for someone to be chosen. When one gets chosen, they start going through some sort of transformation and if there is one, another life-stone holder goes to train them. That's all I know about focus stones, but then again, I've only done some light reading on them."

Ron looked up at this. "Light reading? How is all that 'light reading'?"

"Well Ron, some people actually enjoy reading, unlike you. All you care about is Quidditch, Quidditch, and more Quidditch!"

Harry could sense that this could become a full-blown fight, unless he intervened right now.

"Ron, can we go outside now? I need to warm-up for the season this year, I haven't flown for a year."

Ron nodded and gave the sword back. Harry ran upstairs and put the sword and the stone away. He got dressed in his school Quidditch robes and grabbed his Firebolt. He went out to his balcony and mounted the broom. He jumped off and flew down to the balcony in the common room. He knocked on the window and waved, signalling that he would meet them down at the Quidditch pitch.

Harry started his warm-up by doing some shallow dives towards the walls of the manor, looping around his tower and the two smaller ones. Flying up to get a good look of the manor, he saw a very small resemblance to the old Burrow, except mostly made of red sandstone and on a much larger scale.

Flying around the building one last time, he flew to the Quidditch pitch in a series of dives and loops. By now, his Firebolt was already back to its former state, not showing the year of non-use at all.

When he got to the pitch, he was several hundred feet in the air, so he went into a steep dive, pulling out only a couple metres from the ground.

All the Weasley children were there, even Charlie and Bill. They had decided to take a vacation over the summer, due to the family's success. They all wore new Quidditch robes, except for Fred and George, who were wearing their Gryffindor robes.

Hermione of course, was standing to the side with a large book in her hands, waving at Harry. Harry wove back and turned to the group of Weasleys.

"So, who's on which team?" Harry asked, sinking slowly to the ground and dismounting.

"Um, let's see...You'll be Seeker for the red team, Ron'll be Keeper, Fred'll be Beater and Gin'll be Chaser. The gold team'll have me as Seeker, Bill as Keeper, George as Beater, and...who's going to be Chaser??" Charlie looked about, and spotted Hermione. Grinning evilly, he climbed up on his Starbolt (an older broom by the makers of the Firebolt, it was specially made with Seekers in mind) and flew towards her in a blur, turning back around with Hermione in his left arm.

Hermione was kicking and screaming, but when Charlie dropped her in the circle of players, Bill shoving a broom in her hands, she sighed and asked, "So, how do you fly this thing?".

They all quickly gave her a crash course in flying and the basics of Quidditch. She was actually quite good at flying once she was taught, and even she decided that flying was enjoyable.

So they were soon in the air, playing with a regulation set of Quidditch balls, Harry finally catching the elusive Snitch almost 2 hours later, after several near misses. Hermione wasn't bad as cChaser at all, even though she didn't get anything past Ron, who had a good shot at getting the Keeper position that was vacated by Oliver Wood two years ago.

They flew around for the next hour, doing some acrobatics from Charlie's brief stint as an Aeronautic Acrobat, the official stunt team of the NQL, the National Quidditch League, before Mrs. Weasley called them in.

They all had lunch, where Harry got stuffed as a very large turkey would, on the account that Mrs. Weasley thought he was too thin. Hermione made Ron lead her to the library once they were finished, with Harry waddling behind, not feeling very well.

When they got to the library, Ron dramatically started humming and opened the door. When Hermione looked in, she gasped. The large library was airy and spacious, with small modified Muggle conveniences stuck in various corners, like a computer-like catalogue or an auto-sorting machine. There were several large wooden tables and large puffy armchairs. Light was shining through the many clandestine windows, so the library had an airy look to it,dust motes floating in the air. Hidden between two stocky bookcases full of very old books, there was a small door, looking at least as old as the books.

"I found this when I was looking around for information on how to make your trunk, Harry. I don't think anyone else knows about it, not even Fred and George, I think they're afraid of books or something. Anyways, do you guys have your wands?"

Both Harry and Hermione nodded, wondering what Ron was getting at. Ron pressed in a knot on the wooden door and rubbed another. The door creaked open and revealed a dark room. Ron shoved them in and lit his wand.

"How... How is that possible? We'll get caught by the ministry!" Hermione looked very shocked.

"Nah, there's shielding here like you'd never believe. No one can track it. It was sort of messy, so I shoved everything into that corner." He said, pointing toward a corner with several odd-looking boxes. "I tried opening them, but I couldn't. Anyways, what do we want to do next?"

"Harry, do you have that book I gave you? Maybe we could start some of it. " Hermione asked Harry excitedly. "Oooh! This going to be so much fun!"

Harry, who had been looking through many spells over the summer, used a form of the summoning charm that used principles similar to apparition. The book appeared in his hand and he handed it to Hermione, who accepted it dumbly.

"Harry! That sort of spell takes tons of practice! How'd you do it on your first try?"

Harry decided to tell them about the necklace, it had been glowing through his shirt slightly anyways. "Well, you see, Dumbledore gave me this necklace on my birthday. It masks any magical activity coming from me, therefore, presto! Magic over the holidays! I've been practicing a bunch of duelling spells and counters. Dumbledore told me they're restarting the duelling club."

"Dumbledore basically let you use magic over the holidays? Wow. Well, now we all can, but still, wow." Ron shook his head and walked over to Hermione, who was sitting on one of the boxes. Harry followed, sitting on one of the other boxes.

"Well, let's get started then, shall we?"

* * *