"You! Stupid, foolish boy, do you not know what you are doing?" the soft hiss carried perfectly in the silence that reigned again as Harry Potter paused, and took a closer look at the scrawny boy who had hunched even further into himself, probably thinking it would help him to melt into the stone floor. Harry nearly snorted in disgust. Of course the boy wanted to disappear. No-one in their right mind wanted to cross The Harry Potter. However, the new attitude was better than the defiance he'd seen in those strange eyes for a split second, before the boy seemed to realize how much trouble he was in and began shaking.

The only answer Harry got was an ear-splitting shriek that rent the fabric of the musty air in Hogwart's library. The book previously in the boy's hands had been dropped when the student had been startled by Harry's voice and now the boy was looking down with dismay at the shrieking book.

The boy's untidy mop of black hair obscured his face and Harry raised his voice over the unholy racket the book made, in an attempt to command the boy's attention. "This is the first night of the school year and you already have a detention, with me. It will be tomorrow night at 7:30 in my office. I can foresee you'll have carved out a great career for yourself by the time you've graduated. Can't wait to get in trouble, boy? Look at me when I'm speaking to you. It's 2 am. What are you doing in the Restricted Section of all places?" Harry reached out and forced the boy to look at him since his words clearly didn't have enough effect. The boy's face may have been forcibly tilted up by Harry but he stubbornly refused to make eye-contact.

Harry muttered a spell and directed his wand at the book without redirecting his glare from the boy, but the silence that followed predictably wasn't broken by the sullen boy. Harry decided to give him one last chance to answer.

"Stop your insolence this instant and tell me what you were doing. I'm waiting." He paused to give the boy time to answer. He looked miserable, as he should. That was very Dark Arts book that the boy was about to go delving into if Harry hadn't stopped him. Harry sighed. He would have to talk to Minerva and the boy's head of house, unless he could write a letter... but no. Minerva would insist on a good long discussion. Might as well get it over and done with in one go. If he chose the place and time well, he could even restrict how long it went for. Most of his colleagues avoided him, but Minerva more than made up for the rest, to the point of driving Harry to avoiding her.

"Very well, then. You have earned a second detention on Wednesday night, for lack of respect to a professor. You will go back to your dormitory now." Harry walked quickly after the boy, forcing him to go faster. The boy stumbled in his haste to put some distance between them, but Harry deemed the boy's discomfort appropriate punishment for interrupting his personal study. The boy was certainly very devious. Harry made a note to himself to keep a close eye on the brat for at least this year, but perhaps he wouldn't require monitoring for the rest of his education here at Hogwarts. Harry would do it if necessary, but it promised even more tedious and sleepless nights.

It was Harry's constant awareness, even when deep in study, together with his keen hearing, that allowed him to catch out the miscreant. At first, Harry had been shocked that a first-year would be disobeying the rules on the first day, and at such an hour. It was curious to find any student so quick to find trouble. Harry had only become angry when the troublemaker had headed straight for the Restricted Section and the Darkest books in there. It was odd that the usual alarms had not been set off at the presence of a student in there after curfew. Perhaps it was because Harry himself was already there. It was even odder that the book had remained silent in the hands of the boy, but Harry was only thinking ahead to his completing the rest of the research in the library after he'd finished escorting the boy.

He'd have to change the time slightly when he spoke to the Headmistress and the boy's Head of House; otherwise he would have been hard-pressed to explain what he himself was doing in the library at 2 am. A quick spell had ensured that the student wouldn't remember the exact time that he'd decided to pick up that particular book. Now that the troublemaker had been dealt with and was on his way back to bed where he belonged, Harry could luxuriate in the relief that it wasn't the Headmistress or another member of the staff who was suffering from insomnia and decided to find a book, as he had irrationally thought when he first heard the library doors swinging open. His instincts had kicked in and he'd thrown his invisibility cloak over himself at the unmistakable sound. For tonight, however, he could continue his reading and note-taking instead of cutting short his study just because of another professor conducting some early-morning research. It was just as well that it was a mere student and Harry could go back to the library to continue his research.

:-:-:-:-:-:-:

Amidst the bustle of dinnertime in the Great Hall, Harry saw the furtive glances cast at him by the same troublemaker as the night before. That morning, Harry had arrived early to breakfast so that he could pick out the dark-haired student and watch him during mealtimes. Judging by the guilty way in which the boy looked away each time Harry caught his eye, Harry knew the boy was pointing him out and talking about him. The boy bent his head toward another and cupped his hands around his mouth, carrying out his conversation in a staged whisper. It was probably a misguided attempt to make whatever he was saying sound as exclusive as he could make it.

The other Slytherin jerked away from the miscreant and quickly looked up to the High Table directly at Harry, then back again at the boy, incredulity in his eyes. Harry could see the black-haired boy feigning embarrassment at the attention he was getting from everyone close to him when the conversation was made public by the other Slytherin's loud exclamations. Harry nearly rolled his eyes; the reaction the boy got was what the troublemaker had really wanted and had been trying to get in the first place.

Harry had had enough. If the boy wanted a scene, he'd get one. He excused himself from the High Table and strode toward the end of the Slytherin table.

"If you don't want to be late, I suggest you leave now. I'm sure that even with your scrawny size, you won't starve without dessert," Harry said to the boy, making him drop his cup, spray out the pumpkin juice he'd been drinking, and choke on the juice. The students around him stood up and moved away, glaring at the boy for spitting in their food. There was no way that anyone would dare to even glance at Harry. He'd put an entire house in detention before. The sputtering boy was left alone, red-faced and gasping for air in-between wracking coughs.

"Manners, boy. Cover your mouth when you cough. And don't be late." Harry warned as he continued out of the Great Hall. Harry assumed that the first-year nitwit wasn't sure of the way to his office and didn't want to get lost and arrive late for his first detention when the boy stumbled along after him. It seemed that the boy had some intelligence after all.

Harry could have silenced the snickers at the tables with a glare but he walked faster instead, forcing the boy to run after him. It was another strange thing about this boy, Harry mused. Most of the students, regardless of house, would band together to support any student he singled out but it seemed that this boy had already managed to make enemies even within his own house. The boy certainly didn't waste time in breaking the rules or making enemies.

With Harry's long stride, they quickly reached his office. Harry set the boy to writing lines while he prepared the base potions for next month's fifth year classes, dividing his attention between the potions and the boy.

The boy seemed to be perpetual slouching. Considering his shoe size, the boy had the potential to grow very tall, but was painfully thin and small for now. Perhaps the boy thought that hunching over his work made him look studious. The boy also thought to lull him into believing that he always did what he was told, never looking up from the parchment and his messy script. Harry was not going to fall for a two-faced troublemaker's old trick.

When he'd finished the potions, Harry looked over the boy's lines. "Could you put some effort into your writing, boy?" Harry said, causing the boy to lose his clumsy grip on the quill. He narrowed his eyes and frowned at the boy. "You may stop now. As your company is tedious at best it is fortunate for me that there's no more time for you to practice penmanship. Be here tomorrow night at the same time. You do not want to make me come and get you." With that, Harry turned away to collect his own bag in a casual dismissal of the boy.

:-:-:-:

That night, Harry took the books he wanted to read with him out of the Restricted Section to an area where he could still see the small room clearly. He cast silencing and invisibility spells on himself and the books before getting down to his reading, note-taking and practicing.

As he had predicted, he heard the library doors opening and soft footsteps right at 2 am. The foolish boy obviously thought that he wouldn't be in the library at the same time tonight, even after getting caught last night. But this time, Harry waited a little longer than the last time before confronting the boy.

He seemed very sure of where he was going, despite the darkness. The boy zeroed in on the Restricted Section as he did the previous night, heading straight for the exact same spot. The alarms were still silent. The books he touched gave no resistance or warning.

Harry stood up and started walking towards the boy, canceling both spells as he got to the open door. His red-hot anger was evident in his face and voice. Those books were dangerous and no student, let alone a first-year, had any right to even touch them without supervision. They were restricted for a reason. Many people had died because of ignorance in handling these books. That the boy had done it last night was bad enough, but Harry couldn't believe that any student could have the gall to attempt the same stunt again, after he'd clearly made the dangers known to the boy during his detention. Harry had thought that the lines the boy had written in detention were sufficient, but it would obviously take more to teach the boy a lesson.

"Didn't have enough fun last night, is it boy? You had to come back for more now, didn't you?" Harry growled at the boy.

The boy gasped, and dropped the book. This time, though, his wide eyes looked up at Harry, almost pleadingly. "Again here?" he said with despair, barely above a whisper.

Harry was too furious to take note of the boy's odd behaviour. "Again. Yes that's right, boy; again I find you here and again you will be serving detention with me, on Thursday night. Tell me now: why are you here again?"

As Harry expected, the boy didn't answer. He flinched at Harry's push out the door, but at Harry's order of "dormitory. Now," he promptly turned and went back. Harry thought darkly that it was just as well for the boy that this time he went without the stalling he'd attempted the night before when Harry had had to lead him by the ear, after finally getting him to say what house he belonged to. Harry was rarely ever patient and right now he was most decidedly not in the mood to deal with a repeat offender, no matter how young and confused the boy appeared to be.

:-:-:-:-:-:-:

Harry slammed the door shut behind him when he strode into the classroom. He locked it against the stragglers still in the corridor. The fools would learn soon that he didn't tolerate tardiness. It was two minutes after class was supposed to have started and Harry was already in a fouler mood than usual because of the inane mutterings of Sybill who had uncharacteristically come out her tower with the sole purpose of detaining him with yet more dramatic but worthless warnings.

Before his entrance, Harry had already made sure that none of the nitwits who were now banging on the door were the boy. Holmes, or was it Howards? Whatever his name. On the first night the stupid boy could hardly whisper what house he belonged to, let alone his name.

The class had been silently watching him since Harry arrived and he addressed them now. "Understand that I am almost never late and tell your friends," - here he gestured to the door - "to be punctual in future." He waited with a glare till a few "yes sir" and "yes Professors" rang out from a few of the braver Gryffindors.

"Books away. Parchment out," he curtly rapped out. Harry looked over the Gryffindors and Slytherins as they scrambled to do as he said. This was their second lesson with him but he didn't recall seeing that boy in the first class, nor could he find him even when he was actively looking for him now. It seemed that despite Harry's precaution not to lock the boy out of this class so that he could observe him, he was late after all in this lesson, too. It was only on Harry's third survey of the class that, unfortunately for the boy, Harry had spotted him in the second row on the desk furthest to the right. Harry strained his memory and recalled that the boy had attended the first class, but there was nothing more that Harry could remember about the boy.

Harry glanced at the back wall, where the names of the students were charmed to appear only to his eyes. Hughes. Edward Bartholomew Hughes. 1st year Slytherin, troublemaker. That was all Harry knew about the boy for now, but he was resolved to keep a close eye on Hughes and that, together with a little digging through student records, would soon reveal more about the boy.

Harry looked around the rest of the class. Whilst slowly digging in their bags and pulling out crumpled parchment, bent quills and leaking inkpots, the dunderheads were also foolishly staring at him openly and gossiping about him. Harry hated this above all and was usually very quick to stop such idiotic behaviour from his students. He'd cure these first-years of that soon, by giving them something else to do and think about. "Are you all blind?" he barked at them, continuing with, "copy down the instructions on the board," when no-one moved.

Between copying instructions, brewing the potion and recording observations, the students had precious little time to do anything else, as Harry had planned.

Harry had either glared at or stood behind Hughes for much of the class. The boy had kept his head down and stayed silent the entire class, but he'd nervously played with his quill or the sleeves of his 2nd or 5th-hand robe. Harry could smell his sweat when he'd gone closer to look over the boy's parchment of copied instructions. The boy's script was near-illegible, but Harry assumed that Hughes could read his own handwriting as he hadn't made any major mistakes with his potion. Although he was the student in the class with the dubious of honour of being the one who'd copied down the least when Harry had erased the potion instructions from the board, Hughes had carried on making his potion two steps beyond what he'd written down. If Harry hadn't kept such a close eye on the boy he'd have accused Hughes of cheating, but it seemed the boy had a good memory. It was too bad that he was slow in copying down the instructions as the potion was actually halfway decent despite the boy's shaking hands, not that Harry would admit anything to the boy that could be misconstrued as a compliment.

"Bottle your pitiful effort if you wish," Harry told the boy, "but bear in mind that an incomplete potion is unacceptable." Harry added the last comment in case the boy took it into his head to dispute the bad mark Harry knew he would assign. Hughes was startled yet again by Harry's words, but started to clumsily pour some of the potion into the bottle.

Harry frowned at Hughes and kept his eyes trained on him as he raised his voice to address the class, "your technique will also be marked. I advise you not to waste a potion by decorating the outside of the sample bottle with it." Harry then lowered his voice and directed his comment at Hughes, "however, as this particular potion of yours is already a waste of ingredients, you need only take into consideration your already low mark." Hughes flushed red and redoubled his efforts to fill the jar with hands that shook even more than before, if that was possible.

Harry sighed and paced around the class before standing at the front. "Half of you nitwits have made the potion halfway only, which is more than the other half of you who have concocted some useless goop that doesn't even faintly resemble the potion at any stage of its brewing. I suppose I should be grateful that you have all failed to progress very far; else there would be more wasted ingredients. Even at this early point I can tell that none of your potions would have been successful in the later stages, even if some look adequate at this stage." The only exception was Hughes' potion, but Harry was not about to acknowledge that. If the boy couldn't judge the quality of his potion, then he wasn't a competent student. Harry continued to lecture the class, "you have all failed this first practical. Place the samples of your mangled potions on my desk so that I can tell you to what degree you have failed."

Harry turned and tapped the board behind him with his wand. "Homework is on the board and I suggest that you come prepared for the next lesson when you get another chance to waste the ingredients and my time. Class dismissed."

:-:-:-:

After that class Harry didn't speak to Hughes again that day until his detention that night, which involved rat dissection for the extraction and mashing up of the intestines in all of which Harry ensured that Hughes did a thoroughly proper job. Hughes lost his dinner. Harry smirked at him, safely immune to the fetid smell.

Harry was eager for the detention to be over and spent his time glaring at the boy in the vain hope that it would speed up the detention. He half-wished that he'd assigned the boy's detention with Filch. But the news had reached Harry at the same time that everyone else got it, via the Daily Prophet. Of course, no-one else paid much notice to such a small article squeezed in-between two advertisements. It was more speculation than fact, hardly worthy of being called an article. In any case, if Hughes' detention was with anyone else besides himself, Harry knew that it wouldn't help the boy as even Filch would not be able to drum the lesson into the boy's head. Harry explained to Hughes in no uncertain terms that the detentions would only get worse if he continued to flout the rules, after he went into even greater gory detail than the night before about why the restricted books were dangerous. The boy looked suitably miserable, and Harry imagined that Hughes felt as pleased as he did when the detention was over and the door closed behind the boy.

Harry quickly double-checked the potions in his pockets before he left the classroom. He walked in the direction of his living quarters, but in a dark corridor far from any prying eyes and curious ears, he whispered a spell for invisibility and made his way out of Hogwarts castle beyond the anti-apparition wards.