Harry's Adventures in Hogwarts

It was no easy thing to pick through the gossip and find the nibble of truth. Harry spent a week listening and prodding the other students for real information. The jerks kept telling increasingly ridiculous stories. The troll had been turned into salt or a mound of stinky cheese. It had been levitated and hauled out of the castle. It had been chopped up for Trollbane Potion which they would start preparing in Potions class. It had been reverse transfigured into Professor Snape who had forgotten to take his Trollbane Potion and so had transformed one evening.

Harry did like that last one, as impossible as it was.

Harry finally waited until Charms class concluded. He asked Professor Flitwick how the troll had been handled.

Harry was expecting a fight of some type. Maybe even a lightning spell. But not a stunner or a cutting charm. Transfiguration?

"Ahh, yes. The stories have gotten out of hand. Professor Dumbledore used a sleep charm."

Harry blinked a few times. His brain was inclined to reject what the Professor had just said. "He put it to sleep?"

That didn't seem possible. A troll...just falling asleep.

"There are charms that will do that for wizards, but they don't work on creatures like trolls. The one Albus used only worked on trolls. I admit I'd never heard of it before. After all, I never joined the Troll Dueling League."

"A sleeping charm just for trolls?"

"I was also disbelieving at first, Mr. Potter. The spell was something that Professor Dumbledore learned from an obscure book."

"Thank you, Professor," Harry said. He was more than a little disappointed and fairly confused.

"I'm glad you asked, Mr. Potter. You are the first. Better to have the real stories, though I did like the one about Severus scaring the troll to death with one of his glares. Though, the one about some unnamed student levitating the troll's own club to knock it out... That was a step too far."

Harry tried to smile before he walked away. Professor Flitwick invariably said something very funny or smart when Harry asked him a question.

He was a man who had seen much. He was a man who cared. Perhaps he was also too busy to do anything unless someone asked him a question. But he cared.

Ron was arguing with Hermione. They had both waited for Harry to ask his question. The argument didn't sound heated. Harry was just glad Ron could be passionate about something, even the silly question he was quibbling over. Harry wasn't listening as they all walked back to the common room.

Harry was thinking about the professor's answer: a sleep spell tailored to trolls. He couldn't get excited about it.

In fact, Harry came down on the opposite side. He decided such a specific spell was rather useless. It was good that Professor Dumbledore knew it when confronted by a troll, but useless. How many times had the man run into a troll? How many times had he had a chance to practice it and refine it? What if it hadn't worked when he needed it decades after learning it?

That afternoon Harry excused himself from his friends in Gryffindor and went walking outside. He needed to practice. He could cast Sunfire against the bark of very old trees. The projectile was really small, but ever so hot.

The water globe was harder so he hadn't done it successfully yet, aside from some water starting to ball up. As for the third spell, Harry preferred not to be outside before trying to create lightning. It was awfully moist in the places he found to work. That was a major draw back to this spell, Harry decided. Maybe with practice it would be useful in more places.

Maybe.

He needed somewhere he could work indoors. He was going to have to find a room no one else was using, something far away from the usual corridors.

...

Yule break had arrived. Harry had stayed at Hogwarts and so had all four Weasleys and a few others.

A strange owl wearing a tag from Diagon Alley Owl Delivery interrupted Harry's conversation with Hedwig, which he had every morning at breakfast. The owl brought Harry a Christmas gift from Hermione, along with a note.

She had become a fine friend since that day Ron had been so horrible to her. Harry had become a little less Ron's friend, too, over it. Jerks weren't his favorites.

The note said, "Dear Harry, Happy Christmas. I wanted to get you something you'd appreciate. One of the used bookstores in Diagon Alley had a couple copies of the first edition Trimble book. I got one for myself, too. Your friend, Hermione."

What a gift. Harry ripped open the wrapping paper. The book was in good shape, but it had some years on it. Harry would treasure it. It was the first book Harry had intended to put into his collection. (He didn't think of his schoolbooks off a booklist as items he'd chosen.)

He needed to find a better gift for Hermione. He'd sent her some chocolate frogs, as he'd done for Ron and a few others. Some Ravenclaws had had them on offer, smart ones who'd stocked up in the summer knowing that folks would want some during the school term.

Now Harry needed to find something better. A book, of course, that he could find two copies of, one for him and one for her.

That meant Harry needed to dig around in the library again. He had mined what he could from the different editions of Trimble. He still needed to practice and keep current with his fire – water – lightning, but he was making progress. He might wait until next year to read it again. Perhaps he'd see more after sitting on it for a while.

Harry fed the delivery owl then collected Hedwig and walked back to Gryffindor Tower. He wanted to show Hedwig his other gifts. He'd gotten a sweater and sweets from Ron and the twin's mother. Letters from people Harry didn't know wishing him greetings. A cloak that made his body appear invisible. That was great fun and even Hedwig seemed to like it.

Harry had already begun thinking about how to use it to his advantage, though no one in the school knew about it. Sneaking out at night with it? Getting it pinched by someone like Filch or Snape – no.

Eventually Hedwig ruffled her feathers. She was ready to leave. Harry opened a window and Harry's good friend flew out.

Harry closed the window and walked down to the common room. Ron was sprawled on in front of the fire. How could he stand it? It was blistering in here.

"Ron, let's do something," Harry said.

"I'm napping. I had a big breakfast."

"Nap later. Let's go explore."

"Explore later," Ron said, sounding like he'd ingested a hillock of sausages and neither Ron nor the sausages had yet managed to conquer the opposing side of the battle.

Harry was whining and he didn't like that, so he stopped. Ron really had eaten a big breakfast. Fine.

"I'll be back later."

Harry's friend really didn't care about new things or adventures or exciting stories written down in books. Oh, well. Harry would take what he could – and seek out whatever was missing.

Today he decided to look into the fifth floor. Part of the third was off limits and he'd looked into other parts, aside from the upper and lower dungeons. Hmm, the dungeons. Maybe tomorrow?

The trouble with exploring was sometimes you met up with someone or something else that was also exploring. Harry felt something hit him, then something else. He looked at the floor. He had been hit three, no four, times with wire rubbish bins.

"Peeves..."

And there the poltergeist was, grinning and laughing, loaded up with another three or four bins. How did he get hold of so many?

"Potty, Potty, got a knotty, knotty on your skull!"