Categories > Books > Harry Potter > The Power
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling owns Harry Potter. She is very rich. I am just a useless bum with no money that is trying to write fanfiction. Who ever has the rites to Harry Potter is the ones making money. Not me.
Chapter 5
Harry had long since finished all of his own books. He looked through the library, but found nothing that really interested him. What he really wanted was a book on occlumency and legilimency. He took to leaving the common room at night. He would always dress totally in black when he did this, and he would stick to the shadows the whole time with spy music running trough his head. A couple times he just missed Filch. One time he had to actually run from him. Luckily, Filch didn't see his face.
During these nighttime excursions, he would wander the restricted section of the library. He never took a book down (he could feel a faint magic on them, probably to prevent the abduction of the restricted materials), but he browsed the titles, looking for something to catch his eye.
On the third night of December, he found one that looked promising. The title was Your Magical Mind, and it also was by Power. He touched the spine of the book carefully, ready to sprint any second, but nothing happened. So, he picked it up. Now he could hear the books making a faint whispering sound. He was sure an alarm would go off if he opened the book. He thought the alarm would also go off if the book left the restricted section. 'Great.'
Finally, he made a plan. He would cast a silencing charm (over the whole section, just to be safe) and he would spell the book open from across the library, just behind the door. If the alarm went off, he would wait for Filch to come running in, then would sneak out behind him.
The silencing charm worked. He went to one of the private rooms of the library and spent the next four hours making a copy of the book. He couldn't do it magically because of the copyright spells, so he did it by hand.
He got back to the common room just in time to see Hermione come down the girls' stair case.
Hermione was happy that he finally found the book he was looking for, but she scolded him for half an hour for sneaking out, and another half an hour for finding a way around the rules. She rounded off by insisting to read the book when he was done.
That day was the first snow day. No one wanted to stay inside when the snow was outside. As soon as classes let out, everyone was on the grounds. All of Gryffindor house was involved in a snow ball fight. Harry had never been able to play in the snow at Private Drive, either because he didn't have the energy or because his relatives were pricks, so now he was really getting into it.
He, Hermione, Fred, and George were crouched behind a bunker that they made out of snow, lobbing snow balls over, when they saw Quirelle pass by the Whomping Willow. George charmed a snowball and threw it as hard as he could towards the bunker where some second years were hiding. It went around them and started bouncing off of Quirelle's turban. Hermione was freaking out, afraid that Voldemort's servant would seek retribution, but Harry just laughed right along side Fred and George.
##########
Hermione would be leaving during Christmas break to visit her parents. Harry was dismayed to find out that only one other person from their year in Gryffindor would be staying: Ron. Hermione kept insisting that Harry use this opportunity to warm up to the red head. Harry thought the opportunity would better be used to warm up to the other Weasleys, specifically, the twins. They were funny.
He did, in fact, spend most of his time with the older Gryffindors. Fred and George showed him a few secret passage ways that he hadn't found during his nighttime visits to the library, and they let him in on a few of the joke candies they had been inventing for the joke shop they were planning to open in the future.
Ron, however, seemed to genuinely want to be friends with Harry. He would start talking when Harry was trying to read, and he would follow Harry when ever he left the common room. Harry had long since learned to put up with his presence without feeling the need to hex the poor boy, but he couldn't bring himself to be nice. He really couldn't stand stupid people. They reminded him of his 'family'.
However, Ron did play a mean game of chess. Harry lost to him several times before he started to get a handle on the game. He could see that the game required an intelligence of some sort to succeed; Ron wasn't completely useless after all, just mostly.
Harry was sure to stay awake the entire week precluding Christmas so that he would be able to sleep the night before (had to make sure Santa came, right?). Christmas morning dawned bright and early. Harry woke up and was about to go down stares when he noticed a pile of packages sitting on his trunk at the foot of his bed. He noticed the one that was from his 'family' immediately (the smallest, lightest one). He threw it away. Hagrid gave him a flute that Harry was sure was hand carved. Hermione gave him a book on transfiguration (it had obvious signs of already having been read) and a box of sugar free candy. Ron's family, for some reason, gave him a sweater and some chocolate frogs. Harry supposed that Ron had written home and told them how often he hung out with Harry (without Harry's permission).
Then there was just one package left. Harry didn't have a clue who it could be from. When he opened it, a silvery, liquidy cloak flowed over his hands to the floor. 'Holy hell! Is that an invisibility cloak?' He tried it on. 'It is! Awesome!' Then, he heard Ron stirring. He stuck his cloak into the second compartment of his trunk (one of the regular sized compartments).
Ron yawned. "Morning Harry." Then, suddenly, he was wide awake. "Presents!"
"Hey, Ron, why did your mother send me a sweater?"
"She did? I guess because I told her that we have been spending a lot of time together. You should try it on, they're really warm."
"I will when I go outside later. It's too warm in the common room already."
At this point, Fred and George barged into the room. George noticed Harry's sweater. "Hey, look, Harry's got a sweater too. Why aren't you two wearing yours?"
Harry could tell that the Weasleys were going to be offended if Harry didn't try it on right now. If it was just Ron, then it would be fine, but it wasn't. He cast a cooling charm on the room and put on his sweater.
"Jeez Harry! Why do you always like it so cold?"
"I just don't like to be hot. Ron, you wouldn't be cold if you would just put on your sweater." Ha, turn it around on them.
"She always makes mine maroon. She knows I don't like maroon." 'You are a maroon.'
Just then, the last Weasley in the castle joined them. "Why are you making all this noise? Keep it down."
Identical smirks adorned Fred and George. "Percy got a sweater too! Try it on, Perce." Fred and George forced the sweater over Percy's head, pinning his arms to his sides. "You're not sitting with the prefects today either. Christmas is a time for family." And with that, Percy was drug from the room.
The rest of Christmas Day passed nicely enough. Harry, having not had a decent Christmas since his first, greatly enjoyed the feast and surrounding merriment. He even tried to get along with Ron, though he didn't think Ron ever noticed his hostility before. When it started getting late, Harry started studying his book on the mind magics again. He had been practicing with occlumency ever since he copied the book, and it wasn't what he thought it would be. He had expected occlumency to be like having walls built around your mind. The book says occlumency is the art of directive remembering. To keep a legilimencer from recovering a specific memory, one must simply (or not so simply) refuse to remember it. The legilimencer must bring that memory to the front of the victim's mind to have access to it. If the occlumense can keep it from coming forth, it is as though it does not exist. The trick is to keep oneself from thinking about the truth when lying to a legilimencer.
When Harry noticed that Ron had gone to bed, he quietly went up stairs to collect his new cloak. When he got it, a note fell out. Your father left this in my possession before he died. It is time it was returned to you. Use it wisely. It had no signature and was written in a loopy handwriting that Harry didn't recognize. 'Still, I do have permission to use it at least. And it was my father's.' That decided, he put it on, and left the tower.
He spent the night wandering around the castle. He still had a hard time finding his was sometimes, so he was taking this opportunity to learn more about it. It was almost three o'clock when he stumbled across something strange. In an unused classroom was a full sized mirror. It was wonderfully decorated and gave off a magnificent energy. In fact, the whole room seemed full of magic, yet Harry was sure the mirror wasn't the source for most of it. Nothing else seemed to be in the room, and Harry couldn't figure out where the excess energy was coming from, so he concentrated on the mirror. Carved into the top of the mirror were words, though they didn't seem to be any language he could understand. Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi. 'Hmm.'
Stepping in front of the mirror, he almost screamed. The mirror reflected not only himself (which shouldn't have happened, as he was wearing an invisibility cloak), but a whole host of other people too. Hermione was right next to him and the two of them seemed to be talking to Hagrid and a couple of other people that Harry didn't recognize but knew immediately who they were. His parents.
'That is a nice image.' Harry could tell that it was just that though. While there was, in fact, a lot of excess energy in the room, none of it was the energy Hagrid had put off that Harry had come to realize was Giant energy. It seemed that the mirror was showing his deepest wish. 'Oooh, I get it.' Smiling Harry murmured, "I reflect not your face, but your heart's desire."
From behind him, Harry heard someone clapping. Wheeling around, he saw Dumbledore standing near the door. 'Well, that explains all the magic I felt.' He took off the cloak and faced the Headmaster.
"Very good, Harry. It seems that you, like so many before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror of Erised."
'Hmm, it seems I might come away from this without a detention from being out past curfew.' "Yes sir. You wouldn't happen to have a camera would you? I have no pictures of my parents, and one with them standing next to me seems too good an opportunity to miss."
"No, I'm sorry, Harry, but cameras do not work on the mirror anyway. It would just reflect you to the camera." 'oh' "I notice you figured out the secret of the mirror more quickly than anyone I have ever encountered. How is that?"
"Well, my parents are dead, sir. There's no way they could be standing next to me. And I'm sure I would know if Hagrid was actually in this room. It was obvious that all that was just in the mirror, and the image it presents is the one that appeals to me more than any other that I can think of."
"Very good Harry. It is a very nice mirror, but I am sorry to say that after tonight, it will be moved to a new location. Please, don't go looking for it."
"Yes sir."
"Now, why don't you put that marvelous cloak on and go back to bed?" 'He doesn't seem at all surprised that I, a person raised by muggles, have an invisibility cloak.' "Sir, you wouldn't happen to know who gave me this cloak, would you?"
"As a matter of fact, your father left that cloak with me. I know you will make good use of it. I think your father valued its usefulness every time he needed a snack from the kitchens." 'I was right. The Headmaster is crazy.' Harry smiled.
Chapter 5
Harry had long since finished all of his own books. He looked through the library, but found nothing that really interested him. What he really wanted was a book on occlumency and legilimency. He took to leaving the common room at night. He would always dress totally in black when he did this, and he would stick to the shadows the whole time with spy music running trough his head. A couple times he just missed Filch. One time he had to actually run from him. Luckily, Filch didn't see his face.
During these nighttime excursions, he would wander the restricted section of the library. He never took a book down (he could feel a faint magic on them, probably to prevent the abduction of the restricted materials), but he browsed the titles, looking for something to catch his eye.
On the third night of December, he found one that looked promising. The title was Your Magical Mind, and it also was by Power. He touched the spine of the book carefully, ready to sprint any second, but nothing happened. So, he picked it up. Now he could hear the books making a faint whispering sound. He was sure an alarm would go off if he opened the book. He thought the alarm would also go off if the book left the restricted section. 'Great.'
Finally, he made a plan. He would cast a silencing charm (over the whole section, just to be safe) and he would spell the book open from across the library, just behind the door. If the alarm went off, he would wait for Filch to come running in, then would sneak out behind him.
The silencing charm worked. He went to one of the private rooms of the library and spent the next four hours making a copy of the book. He couldn't do it magically because of the copyright spells, so he did it by hand.
He got back to the common room just in time to see Hermione come down the girls' stair case.
Hermione was happy that he finally found the book he was looking for, but she scolded him for half an hour for sneaking out, and another half an hour for finding a way around the rules. She rounded off by insisting to read the book when he was done.
That day was the first snow day. No one wanted to stay inside when the snow was outside. As soon as classes let out, everyone was on the grounds. All of Gryffindor house was involved in a snow ball fight. Harry had never been able to play in the snow at Private Drive, either because he didn't have the energy or because his relatives were pricks, so now he was really getting into it.
He, Hermione, Fred, and George were crouched behind a bunker that they made out of snow, lobbing snow balls over, when they saw Quirelle pass by the Whomping Willow. George charmed a snowball and threw it as hard as he could towards the bunker where some second years were hiding. It went around them and started bouncing off of Quirelle's turban. Hermione was freaking out, afraid that Voldemort's servant would seek retribution, but Harry just laughed right along side Fred and George.
##########
Hermione would be leaving during Christmas break to visit her parents. Harry was dismayed to find out that only one other person from their year in Gryffindor would be staying: Ron. Hermione kept insisting that Harry use this opportunity to warm up to the red head. Harry thought the opportunity would better be used to warm up to the other Weasleys, specifically, the twins. They were funny.
He did, in fact, spend most of his time with the older Gryffindors. Fred and George showed him a few secret passage ways that he hadn't found during his nighttime visits to the library, and they let him in on a few of the joke candies they had been inventing for the joke shop they were planning to open in the future.
Ron, however, seemed to genuinely want to be friends with Harry. He would start talking when Harry was trying to read, and he would follow Harry when ever he left the common room. Harry had long since learned to put up with his presence without feeling the need to hex the poor boy, but he couldn't bring himself to be nice. He really couldn't stand stupid people. They reminded him of his 'family'.
However, Ron did play a mean game of chess. Harry lost to him several times before he started to get a handle on the game. He could see that the game required an intelligence of some sort to succeed; Ron wasn't completely useless after all, just mostly.
Harry was sure to stay awake the entire week precluding Christmas so that he would be able to sleep the night before (had to make sure Santa came, right?). Christmas morning dawned bright and early. Harry woke up and was about to go down stares when he noticed a pile of packages sitting on his trunk at the foot of his bed. He noticed the one that was from his 'family' immediately (the smallest, lightest one). He threw it away. Hagrid gave him a flute that Harry was sure was hand carved. Hermione gave him a book on transfiguration (it had obvious signs of already having been read) and a box of sugar free candy. Ron's family, for some reason, gave him a sweater and some chocolate frogs. Harry supposed that Ron had written home and told them how often he hung out with Harry (without Harry's permission).
Then there was just one package left. Harry didn't have a clue who it could be from. When he opened it, a silvery, liquidy cloak flowed over his hands to the floor. 'Holy hell! Is that an invisibility cloak?' He tried it on. 'It is! Awesome!' Then, he heard Ron stirring. He stuck his cloak into the second compartment of his trunk (one of the regular sized compartments).
Ron yawned. "Morning Harry." Then, suddenly, he was wide awake. "Presents!"
"Hey, Ron, why did your mother send me a sweater?"
"She did? I guess because I told her that we have been spending a lot of time together. You should try it on, they're really warm."
"I will when I go outside later. It's too warm in the common room already."
At this point, Fred and George barged into the room. George noticed Harry's sweater. "Hey, look, Harry's got a sweater too. Why aren't you two wearing yours?"
Harry could tell that the Weasleys were going to be offended if Harry didn't try it on right now. If it was just Ron, then it would be fine, but it wasn't. He cast a cooling charm on the room and put on his sweater.
"Jeez Harry! Why do you always like it so cold?"
"I just don't like to be hot. Ron, you wouldn't be cold if you would just put on your sweater." Ha, turn it around on them.
"She always makes mine maroon. She knows I don't like maroon." 'You are a maroon.'
Just then, the last Weasley in the castle joined them. "Why are you making all this noise? Keep it down."
Identical smirks adorned Fred and George. "Percy got a sweater too! Try it on, Perce." Fred and George forced the sweater over Percy's head, pinning his arms to his sides. "You're not sitting with the prefects today either. Christmas is a time for family." And with that, Percy was drug from the room.
The rest of Christmas Day passed nicely enough. Harry, having not had a decent Christmas since his first, greatly enjoyed the feast and surrounding merriment. He even tried to get along with Ron, though he didn't think Ron ever noticed his hostility before. When it started getting late, Harry started studying his book on the mind magics again. He had been practicing with occlumency ever since he copied the book, and it wasn't what he thought it would be. He had expected occlumency to be like having walls built around your mind. The book says occlumency is the art of directive remembering. To keep a legilimencer from recovering a specific memory, one must simply (or not so simply) refuse to remember it. The legilimencer must bring that memory to the front of the victim's mind to have access to it. If the occlumense can keep it from coming forth, it is as though it does not exist. The trick is to keep oneself from thinking about the truth when lying to a legilimencer.
When Harry noticed that Ron had gone to bed, he quietly went up stairs to collect his new cloak. When he got it, a note fell out. Your father left this in my possession before he died. It is time it was returned to you. Use it wisely. It had no signature and was written in a loopy handwriting that Harry didn't recognize. 'Still, I do have permission to use it at least. And it was my father's.' That decided, he put it on, and left the tower.
He spent the night wandering around the castle. He still had a hard time finding his was sometimes, so he was taking this opportunity to learn more about it. It was almost three o'clock when he stumbled across something strange. In an unused classroom was a full sized mirror. It was wonderfully decorated and gave off a magnificent energy. In fact, the whole room seemed full of magic, yet Harry was sure the mirror wasn't the source for most of it. Nothing else seemed to be in the room, and Harry couldn't figure out where the excess energy was coming from, so he concentrated on the mirror. Carved into the top of the mirror were words, though they didn't seem to be any language he could understand. Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi. 'Hmm.'
Stepping in front of the mirror, he almost screamed. The mirror reflected not only himself (which shouldn't have happened, as he was wearing an invisibility cloak), but a whole host of other people too. Hermione was right next to him and the two of them seemed to be talking to Hagrid and a couple of other people that Harry didn't recognize but knew immediately who they were. His parents.
'That is a nice image.' Harry could tell that it was just that though. While there was, in fact, a lot of excess energy in the room, none of it was the energy Hagrid had put off that Harry had come to realize was Giant energy. It seemed that the mirror was showing his deepest wish. 'Oooh, I get it.' Smiling Harry murmured, "I reflect not your face, but your heart's desire."
From behind him, Harry heard someone clapping. Wheeling around, he saw Dumbledore standing near the door. 'Well, that explains all the magic I felt.' He took off the cloak and faced the Headmaster.
"Very good, Harry. It seems that you, like so many before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror of Erised."
'Hmm, it seems I might come away from this without a detention from being out past curfew.' "Yes sir. You wouldn't happen to have a camera would you? I have no pictures of my parents, and one with them standing next to me seems too good an opportunity to miss."
"No, I'm sorry, Harry, but cameras do not work on the mirror anyway. It would just reflect you to the camera." 'oh' "I notice you figured out the secret of the mirror more quickly than anyone I have ever encountered. How is that?"
"Well, my parents are dead, sir. There's no way they could be standing next to me. And I'm sure I would know if Hagrid was actually in this room. It was obvious that all that was just in the mirror, and the image it presents is the one that appeals to me more than any other that I can think of."
"Very good Harry. It is a very nice mirror, but I am sorry to say that after tonight, it will be moved to a new location. Please, don't go looking for it."
"Yes sir."
"Now, why don't you put that marvelous cloak on and go back to bed?" 'He doesn't seem at all surprised that I, a person raised by muggles, have an invisibility cloak.' "Sir, you wouldn't happen to know who gave me this cloak, would you?"
"As a matter of fact, your father left that cloak with me. I know you will make good use of it. I think your father valued its usefulness every time he needed a snack from the kitchens." 'I was right. The Headmaster is crazy.' Harry smiled.
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