Harry nervously followed the big man, Hagrid, up to the banking counter, trying not to stare at the long-fingered, warped creatures that were rushing back and fourth, cashing Wizarding checks and testing pearls to ensure that they were not transfigured from pebbles.

At last, they were in front of a goblin teller. Hagrid didn't mince words."I've cum to take 'Arry Potter 'ere to 'is vault, and then I need the you-know-what in vault 713. 'Ogwarts business."

A nod, then the goblin held out his? hand. Goblins were evidently neither cordial nor effusive beings. "His key?"

Hagrid fished around in his deep pockets, pulling out moldy dog biscuits, Wizarding change, scraps of paper, and so on, and pouring them out onto the counter. The goblin wrinkled his? nose, but Hagrid only rummaged around a little longer before finally coming up with a tiny golden key. The goblin took it with a grunt.

"Griphook!" he called. A smaller goblin ran over.

"Chabring sokk nirae," the teller told him. Harry had no idea what that meant, but whatever it was, Griphook seemed to understand, because he nodded and motioned them to follow.

After leaving the main lobby, they went down several progressively narrower and lower corridors, lit by torchlight, before piling into a little cart and rattling at a nauseating speed on a track that seemed to lead into the very heart of Gringotts, ducking stalactites along the way. Harry swore he saw dragons breathing fire through the iron grates that shielded some of the more strongly-protected vaults, but when he tried to lean out and look, Hagrid dragged him back in the cart by the scruff of his neck.

At last, the cart screeched to a stop that was, if anything, more sickening than the previous speed, and Harry and a sick-looking Hagrid staggered out of the cart while Griphook gave a toothy grin at their discomfort. After the two of them had somewhat caught their breath, Griphook opened the vault and Harry stared in pure shock at the piles and piles of Wizarding money. The Dursleys would have been green with envy...provided Harry would be stupid enough to let them know about his inheritance, which he was not. No doubt the Dursleys' hatred of all things magical would not extend to money. Speaking of, why was he at the Dursleys if he was rich and famous? Harry might have stood there all day, but Griphook gruffly told him to hurry up then, so Harry pushed the worrying thought to the back of his mind to ponder later.

Hesitantly Harry walked in and gathered some of the gold into his pockets while Hagrid was still catching his breath outside, still staring in awe with wide green eyes. After he'd gotten what he hoped was a large enough amount for his school supplies, he was about to leave his vault when he saw it.

It was a yellowing, blotchy envelope, which looked as if it was older than him, and when he curiously picked it up, he saw that it had his name on it written in beautiful green ink. Harry stared at it, turning it over and over in his hands. Could it be from his parents?

"'Arry! Y'all right there?"

Harry hastily stuffed the envelope in his pocket, somehow not wanting anyone else to see it. He wasn't even sure he was supposed to be taking it, but it was in his vault, and he couldn't just pass up the chance to read anything his parents might have written. Without another word, he obediently left the vault, taking both letter and gold with him. And then they were rocketing deeper still into the bowels of the underground levels, before stopping at another, obviously high security vault.

Here Griphook stroked the door with one long finger, letting the door melt away, ("Now't but a Gringotts goblin can do that," Hagrid commented) and, that said, he slipped into the vault. Harry peeked in after him, but unlike his own vault, this was entirely empty...well...except for a small package wrapped in brown paper, which Hagrid said was "'Ogwarts business" and refused to elaborate. Harry might have been more curious if he had not been obsessing over what his envelope might contain.

After the long, precarious journey back to the land of the living, Harry and his escort stumbled out, blinking, into the mid-afternoon sunlight, Harry staring around at all the beautiful shops and such. He might have stood there forever, looking at the wizards walking to and fro, when a still rather pale-looking Hagrid asked if he wouldn't mind going into Madame Malkin's Robes alone, as he needed a drink. Harry obliged.

Madame Malkin was a plump, no-nonsense witch, who thankfully did not make a fuss over him because of his scar, and he got done relatively quickly, except that one of the other boys being fitted, a white-blond with elegant everyday robes and an arrogant demeanor, nearly bowled him over with his casual comments about things Harry hadn't even heard of, much less formed opinions about.

Hagrid came back shortly with two ice cream cones (raspberry and covered with nuts, which Harry had never had before), and waited outside for Harry to finish. No one had ever done that for him before. Then they collected the rest of the supplies, dragonskin gloves and a telescope and all sorts of herbs and seeds and pickled things from the apothecary, as well as a cauldron (Harry wanted a golden one, but Hagrid wouldn't let him buy it- "It says pewter on yer list"-) And then they finally got his wand.

Harry had been looking forward to getting a magic wand from the moment he learned that he was a wizard, but his mood fell considerably when he and Hagrid actually went to buy his wand. Mr. Ollivander, the wand-maker, had protruberant silver eyes and a creepy, omniscient sense about him that made Harry shiver. He didn't particularly cheer up when Ollivander told him his wand was 'twinned' with the wand of the evil wizard who killed his parents, as well as many others. Even going to the pet shop afterward (where Hagrid bought him a beautiful white owl and Harry managed to buy a little black snake with eyes like black diamonds, because it made cute. snarky remarks in his general vicinity- not that he told him that, considering how the shopkeeper reacted when he mentioned that it talked) did not completely cheer him up.

The end of the trip was still too soon. Hagrid dropped him off at #4 Privet Drive, where Aunt Petunia dragged Harry inside ("Don't let the neighbors see!") and sent him straight to his room after letting him drink out of the tap. Harry sighed as the locks clicked, but he was not as depressed as he would ordinarily be, because he knew there was an end in sight. Soon he would be going to Hogwarts!

An hour passed. Harry tensed as he heard his uncle's heavy tread clomping up the stairs like a pigmy elephant, but after his uncle went by without halting by Harry's door to bang on it and yell for "the freak" to come make (and maybe, if he was lucky, eat) dinner, Harry relaxed. He dug in his bags to give the owl (newly christened Hedwig) and the snake (Jewel) their mice, and got out some leftovers from lunch with Hagrid.

But as he sank down on his thin bed to eat, he heard a papery-thin crunch. And remembered the letter.

Hardly daring to breathe, Harry drew out the now rumpled letter, bearing his name, and drew it out of it's envelope with trembling fingers. A loopy script, inked in dark, forest green ink covered every inch of the yellowed paper, and he could faintly smell the scent of water lily perfume. Harry stared down at the letter, hardly daring to touch it for fear of smudging it. Finally, when he couldn't bear it any longer, he adjusted his glasses and bent over the letter. And slowly, as if savoring a chocolate that was steadily melting in the sun, he began to read.

My dearest baby, (the letter read)

I hope this letter finds you well, wherever you are. If I could have my way, you would be sitting with me and your father as I tell you these things, but in case I do not survive, I want you to know the things that I've written here. I would like to think that this is foolish, and that this letter will just crumble to dust in your trust vault, or become a curiosity to your grandchildren, but something tells me that I will not survive, and these things should not be forgotten.

The first thing you need to know is that I am not a muggleborn, whatever my husband leads you to believe. I was not able to take an inheritance test before my marriage, and James didn't allow me to take an official, documented test afterwards- probably because I could have contested the marriage if I'd known- but I had my friend brew me an illegal Heritance Tincture, and discovered that I, and by extension you, are descended from Salazar Slytherin- you might even be a parselmouth, or speaker of snakes. ('Was that what it was called?' Harry thought) Do not tell James if this is the case; parselmouths are not well liked in the Wizarding world, and James in particular will not be pleased. I don't want you to be hurt.

The second thing you need to know is that James Potter is not your father.

Harry had to stop and re-read that line several times. It wasn't as if he knew his father, so he wasn't grief-stricken or in denial, but he was still somewhat surprised. If James Potter wasn't his father, then who was, and why had they never come to rescue him? Unless whoever it was was dead too? He went on.

This will probably come as a big surprise, especially if James raised you, and before you go any further I want you to know that I love you no matter what, and nothing I'm about to say will change this.

Harry frowned. From what it sounded like, his mum expected that he had been raised by his father- by James, actually. Harry was far from stupid, and something told him that he would not like everything that he was going to learn today. Why had his mum married James- she didn't actually seem to like him, and if he was not even his dad, then what was going on?

You might as well know that I never wanted to marry James. I did have a crush on his best friend Sirius, but James himself was always too big-headed and inclined to bullying. (Harry winced, thinking of Dudley) James, however, wanted to marry me, so he used an old pureblood marriage law to make me marry him. As for your real father...it's complicated. I was always friends with him, since when we were nine, but I never thought of him as more than a friend, and when we went to Hogwarts together we got sorted into different houses, straining our friendship still further. He was smart, funny, and very competent...but I didn't like the boys he was hanging out with, and he always had a vicious, dark streak that made me nervous. In my- our- fifth year, our friendship died a painful end after I defended him when James and his friends were bullying him, and he called me a mudblood.

I started fancying him in seventh year, but by that point he had friends in a terrorist group called the Death Eaters who targeted muggleborns, and when I learned that he had actually joined, I had to let him go. That and James did not like me to associate with him.

I thought, when he came back after the first revel that I could save him. He wanted out, and I couldn't blame him; he told me that he joined because his housemates had given him an ultimatum- either he join the Death Eaters or he would be made to "commit suicide" or meet with "an unfortunate accident". Not only that, but he had been offered patronage for his Potions and Defense masteries, and he couldn't afford not to take the opportunity. I was worried for him, even if there was a little part of me that worried that he was lying to me, and that he really did join the Death Eaters by choice. But we couldn't associate as long as long as he was a Death Eater, and there's no way out once you are branded. We met in secret a few more times after the meetings. Then James forced me to marry him, and I was no longer allowed to talk to your father.

It was one day in late September when I met Severus Snape for the last time. It was a farewell, of sorts. Alice Longbottom- a school friend of mine- and I were out shopping together since James was away overnight at a Quidditch game in Peru; the first time I had left the manor in months. I met him in The Leaky Cauldron, and, in a moment of rebellion, stopped to talk to him. Long story short, we had far to much firewhiskey to return by floo, so I ended up staying the night at the Leaky.

I was so happy when I learned I was pregnant. You were so beautiful when you were born, but I knew immediately who your father was, and only then was I afraid. In the end, I cast a full body glamour, making you look almost like a twin of James, except with my eyes, and I don't think James ever knew, or he probably would have hurt both of us. The glamour is an old Hungarian disguise spell called "Teljes alruhaban" and there is no British counter; the only counter I've heard of is in the same language, (vege a varazskatnak), which will break the spell. To replace the glamour, since you won't have any of James's blood to complete it, you will probably need to use more ordinary glamour spells.

Harry stopped dead. He had a sneaking suspicion of what a glamour was- did that mean that the pale face that always stared back at him out of every mirror was not actually his own? The thought was definitely frightening, and he had to stop for a few moments before he could recover himself enough to go on.

I hope, now, that you will forgive me for my deception. If by this point James has gotten rid of me in favor of a pureblood, I hope you at least find it in your heart to still think of me as mum. But if, as is also likely, you are an orphan- there is, after all, a war going on between the Death Eaters and Magical Britain as a whole- I want you to know that you are loved, and that you might possibly still have living family.

'Got rid of me in favor of a pureblood?' Harry definitely didn't like the sound of that.

You don't have to tell Sev who you really are, if he's even still alive, but I know that he would want to get to know you. He is a good man, if not an easy man to get along with, and he is loyal to a fault, if not always kind- he would never betray you, although it will likely be difficult to break through the shell he has built around himself. I implore you to find him, if he is still alive, but in the end that is at your discretion. Enclosed here also are my notes for a spell to remove his Death Eater brand, also- I was never able to test it.

Also, if Dumbledore is alive and at Hogwarts when you go there for your first year, I want you to be on your guard. He is very manipulative, and he uses compulsion and coercion spells on the students that he doesn't trust, to keep him loyal to him; try to make sure you get into Gryffindor or Hufflepuff, so you're under the radar, and don't ever meet his eye until you've learned rudimentary occlumensy, or he'll read your mind. Also don't eat any candies or tea he offers you in his office; it's usually laced with something- Sev palmed some on various occasions and tested them, and they contain things as diverse as loyalty potions to truth serum.

Harry paused to digest that bit. Dumbledore as in Albus Dumbledore? Headmaster of Hogwarts? What on earth was he getting into?

Actually, if Dumbledore is alive at all, be careful. He's good with words, and he likes to act like a sweet old grandfather, but he'll let you rot in Azkaban (What's that?) if it's part of his plan for the "Greater Good". He'll also guilt trip you, and he dispenses unequal justice; Sirius Black tricked an enemy of his into going into the Forbidden Forest when there's a transformed werewolf out, and got lines for his "prank", whereas the boy who was almost killed lost a hundred points for being out after curfew, to offer one example.

He is actually the reason James and I are in hiding at the moment- one of his Death Eater spies heard that there was a prophecy (James never told me the full text) about a child born at the end of July, like yourself and Neville Longbottom, who would have the power to defeat Voldemort, the head of the terrorist organization, and that Voldie was going to hunt all of them down, so he told James to put the cottage at Godric's Hollow under the Fidelius Charm, which means only those who know the secret can find it, and the only one who can tell anyone else the secret is the Secret Keeper. Dumbledore told us that Sirius, the one we were going to use, was to obvious, and to pick a man named Peter Pettigrew, one of James's friends. James agreed. I am afraid. Peter is weak- they could make him tell them the location with only a little firewhiskey or a few threats, and besides, I think he's a Death Eater. James says I'm paranoid. But I know I'm right, and I'm suspicious that neither James nor Dumbledore is even listening to me.

After he had finished the letter, Harry simply sat there, mulling it over for a long time, heedless of the purple and gold twilight outside his window. Then he picked it up, rereading bits until it was too dark to see, even with his glasses. He was not even close to understanding it all, but what he did understand petrified him. The great, magical world he had been introduced to that morning suddenly seemed a whole lot darker, and a whole lot more dangerous. But as frightened as he now was, he was also excited. Soon he would be entering a world that was his birth-right, to learn magic, escape the Dursleys, and possibly, just possibly, find a father. Now if he could only figure out just what all those magical words meant!

The rest of the summer nearly flew by for Harry Potter. His relatives pretty much left him alone, except for giving him food and chores; obviously Uncle Vernon knew better than to push his boundaries or knock him around now that he thought that the "freaks" were watching. So the rest of the time, Harry stayed in his room, keeping very quiet and spending most of his time reading and talking to Jewel, who had a wicked sense of humor and and an interesting worldview.

At last, September first arrived, and Harry managed to get Uncle Vernon to drive him to King's Cross ("Only because we need to take Dudders to the Clinic") and he wandered about the station, looking for Platform 9 3/4.

It was only once he had been dropped off that he realized that Hagrid had not told him where to board the the train. He was afraid to ask any of the muggle security guards where said platform 9 3/4 was, and none of them knew of a train that departed at eleven O'clock. At last, when he was starting to wonder whether he had been given the wrong date, or the wrong place, or something, when he felt Jewel readjust herself on his arm.

^Thossse no-ssscaless ssmell like magic,^ she commented. ^Isss that what you're looking for?^

Harry started, looking up to see a group of red-heads by the barrier between platforms 9 and 10. It was obvious from their mismatched muggle clothes and the owl that one of them was carrying that they were Wizarding, and Harry smiled. ^Yess,^ he said, slowly approaching them. ^Thanksss, Jewel^

Jewel's sensitive tongue flickered out to caress his hand as he carefully adjusted his cuff to conceal her- after the letter he had read and the reaction of the shopkeeper when he'd asked Jewel what kind of carrier she wanted, he sensed that it would probably not be a good thing for others to know he had her...even more so because she was a magical karait and her bite was highly toxic.

Harry hesitated.

^Well, go on,^ Jewel told him. ^They do not look venomousss.^

Harry snickered and then approached. "Excuse me?"

One of the wizards, a motherly-looking witch with frizzy red hair and a kindly expression turned around, allowing one of her children to wiggle away before her hankerchief could expunge the smudge on his nose. "Hello, dear. Hogwarts, then?"

"Yes," Harry responded politely. "Um...how do you get to the platform?"

"Oh, the wall between nine and ten is an illusion; all you have to do is walk through- best to do it at a bit of a run if you're nervous."

Harry smiled. "Thank you."

"No problem, dear- Fred! get back here!"

"It's George, mum!" the boy addressed protested, coming back nevertheless, accompanied by what looked to be his twin."I- who's this?"

"I'm Harry," Harry told him politely, already liking them.

"Harry, as in Harry Potter?" they both chorused.

Harry blushed and then face-palmed. "Um. Yes. Don't get all weird, will you?"

"But we are weird, my dear Potter!"

"Weirdness is our business, my dear Potter!"

Even their mother laughed.

Then one of the boys called "Scabbers!" evidently looking around for a pet, and Harry took the opportunity to slip through the barrier, a little overwhelmed. Jewel gave a series of giggly little hisses at his discomfort. Behind him, he could still hear the Wizarding mother talking to her children- "Now, you two – this year, you behave yourselves. If I get one more owl telling me you've – you've blown up a toilet or –"

And said children's responses: "Blown up a toilet? We've never blown up a toilet."

"Great idea though, thanks, Mum."

Harry laughed as he lugged his trunk on board.

In no time at all, he had found an empty compartment, where he put his trunk under the seat and sat back with his potions book, relaxing and making the occasional comment to Jewel, figuring that he'd rather see if anyone would like to join him than try to find a compartment of people who would let him join them. Not that he really expected anyone to come; after all, he had seen plenty of compartments on his way, and most of them were empty or nearly so.

It was not long, however, before he was proven wrong, as the door creaked open and a round-faced, rather shy-looking boy already in Hogwarts uniform stepped in the compartment. He looked as though he was about to put his bag down when he saw Harry.

"S-sorry, I didn't see you," he said, looking mortified. "I- can I sit here?"

Harry smiled disarmingly. "Sure, if you want to. I was looking forward to having some company."

The relief on the boy's face was palpable. He stood there another moment then heaved his trunk into the compartment, and Harry helped him stow it under another seat. After that, the two of them sat down again and Harry pulled his potions book out again, although he was more interested at looking at the other boy than at the book. Harry spoke first.

"So, what's your name?"

The boy glanced up at him, as if in surprise that he was being addressed. "Neville," he said finally. "My name's Neville Longbottom."

Harry blinked- where had he heard that name before? He might have spent more time thinking about it, but he knew this wasn't the time, so he shoved it to the back of his mind to ponder later. "Mine's Harry," he replied at last.

The other boy's eyes flicked to his scar- then he blushed and lowered his gaze. A silence fell; Harry was tempted to go back to his book, but he forced himself not to. He could read a book anytime, after all. "So what house are you hoping to get into?" he asked finally, genuinely wondering what the reply would be. He sort of wanted to be in Slytherin, himself, considering he could talk to snakes, but he knew that was considered 'the bad house' so he had resolved to try to get into Gryffindor or Hufflepuff so he could be under the radar for as long as possible. That is if he had a choice.

"Gryffindor," Neville said immediately. "My parents were in Gryffindor." A pause. "I'll probably be in Hufflepuff though."

Harry wondered how much to say. Would Nevile judge him for wanting to be in Slytherin? "There's nothing wrong with being in Hufflepuff," Harry found himself saying. "I mean, I would rather be in Hufflepuff than Gryffindor- I'd probably make more friends. But if you want to be in Gryffindor you probably will be; I think you can at least have a say."

"I hope so."

They lapsed into silence again.

"So which class are you looking forward to the most?" Harry asked, when the silence was threatening to become awkward.

"Herbology," Neville said without missing a beat. "I love plants. Astronomy sounds good, too, but I have a horrible memory. What about you?"

"Potions," Harry responded. "Potions sounds amazing. I mean, I'm looking forward to everything, though."

"P-Potions?" Neville sounded almost alarmed.

"Yeah, why?"

"I...you've heard about the Potions teacher?"

"What about the Potions teacher?"

"He's...really strict. I mean really. I've heard that he hates everyone who isn't a Slytherin." Neville shivered involuntarily. "I don't know if it's true, though..."

Harry didn't like the sound of that. He couldn't be a Slytherin, not unless he wanted to have more trouble than just Voldemort. But how could he learn potions if the teacher hated anyone who wasn't Slytherin? A shiver he couldn't quite understand ran down his spine as he fumbled in his bag for a bookmark, (as it was likely that he wasn't going to go on reading). Harry didn't know what to say, but luckily he was saved from having to respond by the trolley witch, who took that moment to knock on the compartment door.

"Anything off the trolley, dears?"

Harry glanced at Neville. "What do you think is good?"

Nevile blushed. "Uh, chocolate frogs are good. So are licorice wands. Uh, don't get Bertie Bott's Every-Flavor Beans, though; when they say every flavor, they mean it."

Harry grinned at him and bought a few of everything- except Every-Flavor Beans. "You want some?"

Neville shyly took a frog and tore it open. Harry did too, and was promptly surprised by the card that the package contained, especially since it moved. Neville wasn't quite so excited when he asked him about them. "They're collectible cards; Gran never liked me collecting them; said they were a waste of time. I did for a while though..."

Harry, who had been inspecting a picture of the enchanteress Morgana LeFay, looked up. It was a fascinating card, but he had to agree with Neville's Gran...although it would be nice to have nothing more important to worry about than which chocolate frog cards were missing from his collection.

They ate sweets and talked about ordinary things for some time; Harry discovered that Neville was very clumsy, had a pet frog which he called Trevor around his gran and Augustus in private, and really hated Pepper Imps. Neville discovered that Harry had been raised muggle and that he was really looking forward to flying.

And that was when the door flew open. It was the boy he had met at Madame Malkins, accompanied by two other boys who reminded him of the pictures of trolls in storybooks. Harry had a brief, painful flashback of "Harry Hunting".

"They've been saying Harry Potter's on the train," he said without preamble. "Are you him?"

Harry didn't like the way he said that, nor did he like the look of his thugs. "And what if I am?"

"Why are you over here sitting with a squib when you have an in with the right sort?"

Harry didn't know what a squib was, but he could guess it was not complementary, given the look on Neville's crimson face. And he was angry.

"I Think I can tell the right sort for myself, thank you." Harry told him angrily. "And please go back to your compartment."

The blond boy paled until his already admittedly pale face was as white as his hair. "And what if we don't? We ran out of candy in our compartment, and you seem to have some..."He nodded at his thugs, who each took a handful of the remaining confections.

Harry's eyes narrowed and Neville spluttered angrily, drawing his wand, which emitted a crimson spark. The boy smirked. "Ooo, the little squib is angry," he said, sounding (if he'd only known it) very much like his aunt Bellatrix.

It was at that moment that Jewel poked her tongue out of Harry's sleeve, smelling. ^Harry, whatsss going on?^ she asked. ^Who are these no-sscalesss?^

^I don't know, but they sstole my and Neville'sss prey.^ Harry told her quietly, masking the parceltongue with a sneeze and making sure Jewel was concealed.

Jewel hissed furiously. ^They dare to sssteal your prey?^ she spat, venom dribbling out of the corner of her mouth. ^Tell them to get out or I will bite them! Miserable no-sscalesss trying to take what they haven't hunted!^

^I have to keep you sssecret, you know,^ Harry told her under his breath. Then to the boy and his thugs: "Get out. Now. Just because I can't use magic on the train doesn't mean I can't call a prefect or punch you in the nose."

"Are you threatening me?"

"If you would just let us alone I wouldn't have to," Harry said practically. "Seriously, guys, what is your problem?"

The boy didn't seem to know how to respond to that. After a minute, he beckoned to his thugs. "C'mon, they're not worth our time." And then they were gone.

As soon as they were gone, Jewel poked her head all the way out of his sleeve. ^Oh, good, Chunky, Ugly, and Ssslippery are gone! Did they take any more prey?^

Harry burst out laughing. ^No. Nicess namess, by the way.^

^It sssuitss them,^ was Jewel's response. And it was only then that Harry realized that Neville was staring at him, wide-eyed and open-mouthed.

Harry didn't know what to do. Neville had seen him talking to Jewel, and now it was out. Maybe it wasn't! Maybe Neville didn't know it was supposed to be evil and he was just surprised! But somehow, Harry doubted that. This was stupid. There was no way he could keep his ability quiet any longer, and now everyone would probably think he had gone evil. And Dumbledore would probably take Jewel away.

"Y-you're a parselmouth?" asked Neville, looking terrified at the very thought.

Harry didn't know what to say- that seemed to happen frequently to him. "Um...yeah."

Neville continued staring at him.

"Please don't tell anyone," Harry continued when Neville still said nothing. "I mean, Jewel's really nice- she won't hurt anyone unless they hurt her..."

"Jewel?" said Neville cautiously.

Harry was encouraged. "Yeah, her name is Jewel."

Jewel waved her tail. ^Hi no-sscale,^ she said ^Pleasssed to meet you.^

Harry grinned. "She says pleased to meet you," he translated, choosing to leave out the no-scale part. Neville might not think it was nice, even if it was just the parseltongue for "human", or more broadly, "anything that wasn't a bird or reptile".

"Uh, pleased to meet you too," Neville said, watching Jewel as she crawled out of Harry's sleeve and into his lap, hissing contentedly. Harry translated, although it was probably not necessary, as he had been attempting to teach the snake to understand English all summer.

"So, uh, why do you have a snake?" Neville asked, after his shock seemed to have worn off.

"I went to the pet store in Diagon Alley, and she begged me to 'get me out of this miserable enclosed space' so I did. Uh, please tell me you don't think being a parselmouth means I'm gonna go dark?"

"I- it's just...odd, you know, you just hiss and it's a little creepy. But I don't think you're evil- I really don't."

Harry absentmindedly began to stroke Jewel's head. "Sorry, it sounds like English to me."

"Actual English? As in, it sounds like they're really talking?"

^Of course we really talk, no-ssscale; what did you think we did- babble?^ Jewel said scathingly. Harry covered his laugh with a cough.

"I wish more people were parselmouths," Harry said contemplatively, not really looking for an answer. "I mean, it's not like I'm evil or even that I'm headed for Slytherin- I'm just bilingual. But the Wizarding world doesn't see it that way." He paused. He'd managed to owl-order a book on the history of parselmouths earlier that summer, and what he'd learned had been frankly astonishing. "You know that it's only Voldie and a few other British parselmouths are bad, right?"

"W-what?"

"Yeah, in Ancient Egypt and India and Sumeria they were honored because there are whole branches of Healing and Curse-breaking that are only available if you're a parselmouth- same with Alchemy."

Neville looked a little impressed, and Harry was confident that he hadn't lost him. It would be nice to have a friend.

The train rattled on for another few hours, and Harry and Neville truly got to know each other over Wizarding candies, trading knowledge of their separate worlds, while Jewel made the occational comment when she felt there was something she needed to say, and Harry translated. It was during the final hour before the train would pull up (and after they had changed into his school uniforms) when Harry finally decided to ask Neville something that had really been bothering him.

"I...will you...do you want to be friends?"

For a painful moment, Neville said nothing, and Harry nearly panicked. Then he grinned. "Y-yes," he said, smiling shyly. "If you want."

Harry had never grinned wider.

But now the train was slowing down, and Harry and Neville were pulling on their student robes and adjusting each others' ties, while Jewel sat on the seat and looked on with black eyes like onyx beads and hissed. At last, after they had dressed in their uniforms and stuffed the last few Wizarding candies into their pockets, the train ground to a halt in Hogsmeade, and the wizards and witches clambered out, and were led by Hagrid to the shore of the Black Lake, where they piled into the little boats, three and four to a boat. Harry was with Neville, the red-haired boy from the King's Cross, and a pretty Indian girl with a shy smile; Harry learned that the other boy was Ron, and the girl was Parvati.

Then they were approaching Hogwarts, and Harry got his first glimpse of the school.

It was beautiful. With illuminated windows, soaring towers, and flapping pennants, it seemed like a castle out of a fairy tale, and Harry dared to dream that there would be a happy ever after. That Dumbledore would not interfere. That Voldemort would die. That Severus Snape was still alive out there somewhere, and that the man would want his son. That he could have seven long years at Hogwarts, playing Quiddich, doing homework, and having fun. Then the boat he was in passed through the veil of ivy that hid the boathouse, and Jewel squeezed his arm almost painfully under his robes.

And they were clambering up the slippery, narrow pathway, and from thence to the great doors of Hogwarts. Hagrid banged on the heavy oak until the great portals swung open, revealing the figure of a tall, stern older woman, with black hair tucked into a tight bun and a constraining green silk dress.

"I'll take it from here, Hagrid," she said, conducting the children inside, where she led them through the halls to an anti-chamber just outside what a frizzy haired, talkative girl was saying was the Great Hall. Then she left them, and the children stood in a hushed and tense silence, broken at intervals with quiet chattering, waiting for her to return.

Then the ghosts appeared. Harry was actually rather fascinated by the shimmering entities, although some of the girls seemed scared. But then they were sliding through the wall again, and the Professor, who now introduced herself as Mcgonagall, had returned, so Harry turned his attention quickly to her, as she explained what Harry had already learned from Hogwarts, a History, just a little bit about the houses of Hogwarts.

Then she led the chattering group into the Great Hall, and they fell silent again as they were faced with all the other years, who had evidently already been there for some time. (Well, mostly silent; several of the first-year students were speculating intensely about what the sorting might include).

Everyone stared at them, and Harry shrunk within himself, tense with all the eyes fixed on them, and specifically him. Professor Mcgonagall then brought out a battered, dirty olive green hat, and laid it on a stool. Harry frowned, studying it intently, as everyone else seemed to be doing. What was that?

Then the hat twitched, a rip in its brim opened, it seemed to clear its throat, and it began to sing.

"Oh you may not think I'm pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat than me.

You can keep your bowlers black,
Your top hats sleek and tall,
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat
And I can cap them all.

There's nothing hidden in your head
The Sorting Hat can't see,
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to be.

You might belong in Gryffindor,
Where dwell the brave at heart,
Their daring, nerve, and chivalry
Set Gryffindors apart;

You might belong in Hufflepuff,
Where they are just and loyal,
Those patient Hufflepuffs are true
And unafraid of toil;

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,
if you've a ready mind,
Where those of wit and learning,
Will always find their kind;

Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folks use any means
To achieve their ends.

So put me on! Don't be afraid!
And don't get in a flap!
You're in safe hands (though I have none)
For I'm a Thinking Cap!"*

Everyone started clapping, and Harry blinked a few times before rolling his eyes, looking, had anyone been watching him at the moment, nearly exactly like his father. Of course. It was a magical school- it would have an eccentric talking hat to sort the students into houses. Quickly, however, he schooled his face back to awe, like most of the rest of the first years, and he listened politely, if a little absently, as Mcgonagall told the herd of firsties that they would all put on the hat to be sorted. (As if Harry had not figured that one out by that time.) Then all the first years were going up, one by one, to try on the hat and see which house fit them. Harry hoped that the hat, if, as it seemed, it was somehow sentient, would listen to entreaties. He slowly watched as each student walked up to the stool and put on the hat, trying to distract himself from his nervousness by looking at each student as they walked up and trying to figure out which house they were going to be in.

"Goyle, Gregory...Granger, Hermione...Greengrass, Daphne...Hopkins, Wayne..."

Harry was beginning to grow nervous. What if he was put in Slytherin? Not that he didn't want to, but he didn't want to deal with more backlash when he'd only discovered he was a wizard this year. But if his father was alive...would he be proud of him if he got into any house besides Slytherin? Or was it already settled; was he going to have to be in Slytherin because he was a parselmouth?

"Li, Su...Longbottom, Neville...MacDougal, Morag...MacMillen, Ernie...Malfoy, Draco...Moon, Lilian...Nott, Theodore...Parkinson, Pansy,"

He knew he would not want to go to Ravenclaw...should he try for Hufflepuff, or just suck it up and go to Gryffindor? The Gryffindors looked far to rowdy, on the whole...

"Padma, Patil...Parvati Patil..."

It would not be long.

"...Perkins, Sally Anne..."

And then, at long last, "Harry Potter!"

Harry hesitantly approached the stool, heart thumping so loud that he thought that the entire hall must be able to hear it. At last he reached it and sat on it, hastily pulling the Sorting Hat over his eyes so that he wouldn't have to see all the other students staring at him, glaring at him, appraising him, trying to memorize his features. All of a sudden, he felt an odd...pressure, for lack of a better word, bearing down on his brain.

"Oh, my, well this is interesting," a little voice commented. Harry blinked rapidly a few times. A hat was reading his mind. And commenting. Surely this counted as some kind of breach of privacy?

"Well hello to you too, I guess," he responded mentally. "So how does this work? Do you just rummage around in my brain, or..."

The hat seemed to chuckle, if such a thing were possible. "Yes, although that is a rather crude way of putting it. You know, you sound very much like your father was when he was your age."

Harry gasped, letting out a quiet but unmistakable huff of air. "You knew my father? My real one?"

"Child," was the hat's response, "I know every student whom I ever sorted."

"What was he like?" Harry asked, forgetting the other students, and the staff, and everyone else in the hall. He could distinctly feel the hat's amusement.

"I expect that you'll find out for yourself; he's the head of Slytherin house here at Hogwarts."

'What?!"

"Yes, now let me sort you, you don't want everyone thinking you're a hatstall..."

"A hatstall?

"Hmm," the hat said without replying. "You're brave enough to be in Gryffindor, but I don't think you'd be the best fit. Not a bad mind, either- you'd make a good Ravenclaw, but I don't think that's where you want to go. Loyal enough for Hufflepuff- now that's an idea...and Slytherin...you'd fit perfectly into Slytherin...you're a parselmouth, and you have the ambition needed...you would do very well in Slytherin."

"Please not Slytherin," Harry responded, eyes wide. "I want to be in Slytherin really bad, but I'm new to the Wizarding world, and I'm worried about everyone's reactions."

"Child, you shouldn't have to worry about people's reactions to your sorting. Do you truly want to be in Slytherin? You'd do well there..."

"Yes, but-"

"No buts. If you truly want to be in Slytherin, I can put you there."

"I..."

"Or I can do something I haven't done since Halcyon Gryffindor came to Hogwarts."

"What's that?"

The hat raised his? voice, speaking out loud now. "Better be Slytherpuff!"

Complete and total silence fell over the whispering hall. One of the teachers, a tall man with a large nose and long black hair, turned very pale, black eyes widening. A wizard with long white hair and garishly bright robes choked, looking momentarily horrified before a twinkling-eyed and grandfatherly facade dropped over his face again. A short little wizard slid three galleons down to table to a cheerful-looking witch, and the students stared at each other down the long tables, evidently shocked speechless. Finally the witch who had introduced herself as Professor Mcgonagall walked over and took the hat off his head.

"Mr Potter, you may sit at either the Hufflepuff or the Slytherin table- you will meet your heads of house after the feast and they can explain more about your dorm arrangements."

Harry blinked at the her and then at the two tables mentioned, still reeling from the shock of his sorting; whatever had happened was obviously unusual- yet another thing that they would stare at him for. Then he looked back at the tables. Hufflepuff table looked much more cheerful- it was draped with black and butter yellow pennants, and the students looked more welcoming. But the hat had said that his father was the head of Slytherin house, and Harry longed to make the illusive man proud, to prove to him that he was good enough, to make him come back. And so, in the whispering silence, he cautiously walked over to the Slytherin table and sat next to a pretty, if a little aloof, Slytherin girl, making sure that he was as far from the boy from the train (Malfoy, Drace) and his two bodyguards.

Everyone seemed very shocked by his decision, but the sneering Slytherins were starting to smile, as if they had just realized the political advantage of having the Boy-Who-Lived in their house (well, partially in their house). The rest of the hall was just staring and whispering as Harry tried to ignore them- he felt so much like an animal at the British menangeries.

Just then Professor Mcgonagall cleared her throat. "We will now be moving on normally," she said in what was obviously a magically amplified voice, and then called out the next name as if nothing had happened.

Harry simply sat stiffly at the Slytherin table in silence, while the rest of the names were called. After Blaise, Zabini, went into Slytherin, the grandfatherly man at the head table- Harry assumed he was Professer Dumbledore- got up, tapping his glass with a fork to make a chime that rang through the hall.

"Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!" he said, before sitting down again. The girl sitting next to him (Greengrass, Daphne) gave a little snort.

"Definitely mad," she muttered, glancing at the head table. "Father was right."

"Who is?" Harry asked, digging for more information.

"Dumbledore, of course," was her answer, she said after a moment, nodding at the eccentric man. Harry might have asked something else, but at that moment the food popped up on the tables, and Harry cast a critical eye over it before carefully collecting some, trying to remember what Aunt Petunia had always told Dudley about manners and watching the other Slytherins to pick up the rest, very self-conscious.

The food was very good, however. Harry spent most of the time watching the other Slytherins and making simple replies to the questions leveled at him- yes, he was looking forward to flying class, no he had not flown before, yes, he had been raised under a rock (that last answer garnered giggles from a few of the others). All and all, it was one of the best days Harry had ever had, even though he had to endure the constant whispers about his sorting, and his looks, and everything about him, and though he had a very nasty headache by the end of the night.

At last, however, the feast ended, and Harry was left staring at the backs of the other Slytherins as they left to their common room. And then two of the teachers- a plump, motherly woman in warm brown robes and the rather sinister-looking teacher he had noted at his sorting. "Mr. Potter," the witch said, when the other looked as though he wasn't going to say anything, "We will be your house heads from now on. I am Professor Sprout, head of Hufflepuff, and this is Severus Snape, head of Slytherin. We will be your..."

But Harry didn't hear any more. Severus Snape, head of Slytherin. His new head of house. His father. His father was Severus Snape. The man who was currently sneering at him as if he would rather be anywhere but there. He was never, ever going to tell him, Harry resolved grimly, making an effort to refocus.

"Because you have been sorted into two houses," Professor Sprout went on, "you may sleep in either the Hufflepuff or the Slytherin dormitories, and sit at either table. You may also go back and forth between tables, if you wish, although I suggest sticking with one or the other. You will only be permitted to switch dormitories between semesters, or if you feel threatened. Any points taken from you will be divided between the two houses, and any points you win will likewise be divided. You may come to either me or Professor Snape if you need help or advice or anything..."

Professor Snape sneered coldly at this, as if he hoped that he would never be the one approached. Harry felt this heart clench just a little more.

"For now, you will have to choose a dormitory to begin with."

Harry blinked a few times. Choose a dormitory. He knew which one he wanted to choose, but he also knew that he'd never get a chance to even be near Professor Snape if he did not sleep with the Slytherins. And yet he also knew that the headmaster would probably keep more of an eye on him if he slept with the Slythers, and he also didn't like the way some of them were looking at him. And Professor Sprout looked so much more welcoming...but what would his father- no, Professor Snape, he reminded himself- think of him moving in with the Hufflepuffs?

"Well, get on with it," Snape said in a harsh voice. Harry couldn't help but flinch at this.

"Slytherin," he whispered finally. "I want to sleep in Slytherin."

Both of the teachers stared at him, Sprout looking more worried and Snape more calculating.

"Are you sure?" Sprout asked. "You can't just change dorms when you want."

"I'm sure," was Harry's quiet reply. He did not look at Snape.

Harry was soon situated in the Slytherins boys' dorms, with Draco, Crabbe, Goyle, Nott, and Zabini. He had to admit that he was scared. He had known the habits of bullies long enough to know sleep was a very vulnerable time...and he quite regretted the choice he had made. Still, there was no going back, and, if it came to it, he knew that he was experienced enough to avoid being bullied, at least somewhat. And it wouldn't be long, anyway- he just had to hold out until the holidays. And...would Professor Snape notice him, now that he was rooming with the Slytherins?

All too well, as it turned out. He entered and left the Great Hall for each meal feeling uncomfortable black eyes scrutinizing him, and he always seemed to come across the man in the hallways. He usually took points- just enough to show his disapproval (of what, he didn't know)- and not enough to really deplete the Slytherin house point hourglass. Which was a good thing, because only Blaise Zabini of all his dorm mates seemed to want to talk to him. Nott asked the occasional question until he finally seemed to decide that Harry was too boring to talk to, and Malfoy was following the lead of Snape, like most of the rest of the house, and giving him the silent treatment. And Harry doubted Crabbe and Goyle were capable of intelligent expression...

His only other friends so far were Neville Longbottom and the two Slytherin girls in his year, Daphne and Tracy, and he could only talk to Neville in the library or in the halls, except when they partnered in Herbology, because the other Slytherins did not tolerate inter-house communication with Gryffindor house.

His classes, though, seemed to go well, even if he had to borrow some muggleborn orientation pamphlets from Deborah McKay, one of the Hufflepuff prefects- he especially like Charms. He thought he would like DADA too, but the professor, professor Quirrell, was a shy-looking man who stuttered excessively and seemed afraid of his own shadow. Harry didn't like the way he looked at him. Not at all. That man gave him the creeps...and not only because by the third week he was already talking about entrail-expelling curses.

And then it was Friday, and his first Potions class. Even with how cold Snape had been to him so far, Harry was almost bouncing in anticipation. He would be in his father's class!

The enthusiasm lasted only a few moments after Professor Snape entered the classroom, as the man started laying into him because of his supposed "celebrity". Harry sat in silence, head bowed, forcibly calming himself. He would not cry, at least in front of his teacher and housemates. There would be time enough for that later.

But it was so hard. Especially when Snape concluded his absolutely breathtaking introduction by pummeling him with questions that he had no possible way of knowing, using the excuse that Harry hadn't been taking notes, which he certainly had been, as he wanted to do well in Potions.

"Tell me, what would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to and infusion of wormwood?"

"Um, I don't know sir."

"Hmm, apparently fame isn't everything. Let's try again: where would you look if I asked you to find a bezoar?"

Jewel, on his wrist, muttered: ~Probably in hisss ingredientsss cupboard~ and Harry, who had been flushed with rage, eyes stinging, stifled a giggle. He knew better than to say that, though.

"I don't know sir."

"What might be the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

Harry tried to swallow the lump in his throat. He shouldn't have expected Snape to be anything but cruel, the Dursleys certainly were and they knew they were related to him. "I- I don't know, sir."

Snape looked displeased. "For your information, Potter, asphodel and wormwood make a sleeping potion so powerful it is known as the Draught of Living Death. A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat and it will save you from most poisons. As for monkshood and wolfsbane, they are the same plant, which also goes by the name of aconite. Well? Why aren't you all copying that down?"

Everyone hurriedly began writing. After they had finished, Snape put a recipe for a simple burn salve on the board and told everyone to do it.

They began. Everything went fine until Neville's cauldron blew up, injuring him, and Harry offered to take him to the hospital wing. Snape told Seamus Finnegan, a Gryffindor first-year, to do it instead, and then proceeded to blame Harry for somehow being too arrogant to tell Neville he was adding the porcupine quills before the heat had been turned down, as if he could have even noticed at all, much less in time. Not only that, but the distraction afforded by the accident gave Malfoy (at least, Harry assumed it was Malfoy) a chance to throw something in Harry's partially completed burn salve, which was already creeping up the sides of its container, resulting in the entire thing cracking and leaking smoking grey slime. Snape banished it peremptorily, looking furious.

"Ten points from Slytherpuff, for being lazy and incompetent. Just like your father!"

"Unfortunately," Harry hissed between gritted, shoving his books in his bag rather too fast and bolting for the door.

"Potter! Where are you going?"

"It's evident that I will never learn anything, so why stay to be verbally attacked for no reason?" Harry responded, flinging said bag over his shoulder and resuming his flight.

Snape stared after him. He had sounded, if he could have only known it, like an eleven-year old Severus in Slughorn's biased class.

Harry, however, continued running until he had reached the owlery, where he leaned on the wall and then slid down it, tears overcoming him. It was clear that his father would prefer that he not exist. At this point, Harry was so upset he was considering indulging him.

~He'ssss just being a carrion-eater,~ Jewel told him, coiling comfortingly around as much of his body as her little frame could manage. ~He doessn't dessserve to be your ssseed-giver.~ (There was no word in parseltongue for "father".)

~But he isss, and I can't change that. I jusssst want ssomeone to care about me asss a blood-mate.~

~Make him,~ she suggested. ~He needs a good bite in the tail.~

Harry gave a watery giggle, running one finger along her scaly back. ~You are a great sssun-ssissster,~ he told her, using the word for close friend. ~I don't know what I would do without you.~

~Have more ratsss to yoursself,~ she told him, giving a serpentine impression of a laugh. ~Just finisshh your sssalt-rain, you'll feel better. He doessn't know what he isss missssing.~

Harry cried for a long time, intermittently stroking Jewel, before at last the tears died to hiccups, and Harry simply leaned back against the cold, slightly dropping-spattered wall of the owlery and closed his eyes. And that's when a voice startled him into wakefulness. "Mr. Potter?"

Severus was actually feeling rather ashamed of himself. To be sure, he'd made more than one first year cry before, but there was just something about those green eyes in a face so like his enemy's, and perhaps the fact that he should have been the boy's father, that made him lose his head. But that didn't excuse the way he had been treating him. The boy, a Potter or not, was still one of his students, and in his house, and he had no right to treat him like that. He tried to forget the pain in that emerald gaze, the curl in pale lips as he spoke achingly familiar words, but somehow he couldn't, and after a few minutes of trying desperately to get back on track, he dismissed class ten minutes early- something he'd never done in his life- and began to pack up in a rare temper, shooing the little menaces out as he did so.

And then he grudgingly went to look for the boy- not to apologise, just to- to what? Why did he care? Potter probably just went crying to Professor Sprout, who would give him sweeties and sympathize with him and other such nonsense, and then Dumbledore would call him into his office and give him a lecture, and then he would endeavour not to torment the arrogant brat until he graduated, or until the unlikely but welcome occurrence of him being expelled or Dumbledore allowing Severus to quit his teaching duties, and that would be it.

So why did he feel so bad about himself? Perhaps it was because Potter was one of his little snakes.

He only began to worry when Professor Sprout told him that she had not seen the poor boy at all that day, much less in her office. Severus then went to Hagrid's hut, but the half-giant had not seen Potter either, nor was he in the library...or the kitchens...or the Great Hall...or the common room. And then, at last, he found him.

Potter was huddled into a small ball, back against the cold and dropping-splattered wall of the owlry, and what Severus could see of his face was red and puffy with tears. He was evidently asleep. Severus watched him breathe for as long as he dared, strange emotions that he could not understand sweeping over him. At last, he seemed to snap out of it. "Mr. Potter?"

The boy's head jerked up, cracking painfully against the owlry wall, green eyes flying open. "P-professor Snape?" he asked, unusually hesitant.

"Mr. Potter," Snape said again, unable to think of anything to say. "I- I apologize for being so harsh with you."

Those eyes, so like the boy's mother, widened, staring up at him with an almost hopeful expression, as though he had just offered him sweets instead of apologizing. Somehow it made him feel worse. "It's...it's okay, sir, really," the boy replied in a tone that made it clear that it was anything but. "But thank you so much."

Were those words calculated to make the guilt rise in him? Severus scowled and regretted it as he saw the boy flinch. "Still...it was...unprofessional of me. Especially as I am supposed to be your head of house."

"Apology accepted," was the soft reply. "And- oh! I'm going to be late for Charms!"

"I will write you a permission slip," Severus told him, conjuring a quill and transfiguring a bit of floating owl fluff into a perfect permission slip.

Potter stared at him, a sort of...longing in his face that Severus couldn't understand. "Thank you sir," he replied, reaching out to take the slip once Severus had written it. And that was when a black and grey snake popped out of his collar.

Severus froze. "Potter," he began in a low voice.

Potter blinked at him, and then went cross-eyed looking at the snake, which Severus had by now identified as a highly venomous exotic karait. And then he hissed. Severus had only ever heard that noise once before, and that was when he was with the Dark Lord. Potter was a parselmouth? By the way the boy was hissing away, Severus certainly thought so.

And that was when the boy realized that he was still there. "Oh, Merlin, am I in trouble?" he asked.

Severus could barely pull himself together enough to reply. "No, except perhaps for having a pet that is not regulation, but we will have to go speak to the headmaster."

Potter froze, green eyes glinting with panic. "Please don't- I don't want- Dumbledore can't know!"

The snake hissed, and Potter tensed even more, replying to the snake with a stream of quiet hisses. A last he straightened. "Please sir, don't tell him- if you need to tell anyone, please just tell Professor Sprout. I have to- I don't want-"

The snake gave another hiss; it sounded calming.

"No!" was the boy's agitated reply. "Jewel, ssshssiss ssethss ssh!" he told the snake forcefully. "Ssss shzz ssessis!"

Severus could not easily forget that horrible sound flowing from innocent pink lips, and it was all he could do not to run. The boy seemed to see his fear at that moment though, or perhaps the snake smelled it, because his eyes flew to Severus's face.

"Sorry sir, I forgot that- I- never mind," he said uncertainly. "But please, please don't tell Dumbledore."

Severus blinked. "He will not punish you," he began.

"I wouldn't care if it was just punishment," the boy replied in a tone that really unnerved him. "But he can't know- it's already bad enough that I'm in Slytherin- he'll never trust me- he'll think I'm 'going evil' and try to stop me-"

Severus was startled by these accusations. "The headmaster-"

"Please, just promise me-" the boy gasped out.

Severus thought for a long time. He wasn't sure why Potter was so afraid, and Dumbledore did need to know, but there was no reason that Dumbledore had to know right now. And the boy seemed so desperate! "I...very well. I promise that I will not tell Albus Dumbledore your secret unless it is absolutely necessary."

Potter seemed a little relieved. "Th-thank you, sir."

"Now you'd best get to Charms, or at least to the library, seeing as the class is likely almost over," Severus said, shaking himself out of his stupor. "And twenty points from Slytherin for having an unregulation pet."

The boy nodded and rose shakily, putting one hand out to steady himself and then slowly walking down the spiral steps, descending from the owlry, and hissing to his snake out of the corner of his mouth. Severus stared after him for a long time and left the owlry himself, to go to his next class.

He really needed a calming drought or maybe even something stronger. Potter was a parselmouth. Potter did not at all act like a Potter. Potter had a pet karait which he apparently hid in his shirt. Potter was going to drive him to drink within a month!

After that first eventful class, relations with the surly Potions Master eased up a little, and Harry, for the first time, entertained the thought telling him the truth. He didn't, of course, but every time the wizard gave him a few points or paused to correct his potion-making technique, Harry couldn't help feeling warmed. Even if his father might never be a true father to him, the fact that he was at least trying to be fair went a long way towards making Harry's day.

All of that, however, was suddenly called into question by the first Halloween.

Harry had, on that day, been one of the only students to be subdued. Most of the others were excited by the prospect of the sweets which would be available at the Halloween feast that night, but Harry could not stop thinking of what that night had cost him, ten years ago, and he was one of the few who seemed even to remember his parents at all, remember that terrible night, nothing more than a scream and a flash of green light emblazoned on his memory, and a high, cold laugh that made the hairs rise on his neck and arms even now. But aside from a few of the older Slytherins grumbling about "the Dark Lord" being gone and some of the Hufflepuffs lighting candles, it was all about the celebration!

And the classes! After having had to intercept the third note about the feast, Professor Flitwick abandoned the lesson plan he had made and resigned himself to teaching all the first years how to make orange flashing lights on the ends of their wands and how to conjure black paper bats that really flied, and even Binns stopped droning about the goblin rebellions forty minutes in to class and gave an impromptu history lesson on Samhein traditions before going back to his mindless mumbling about Algork the Third and Lothbrok the Unwieldy. Even the Upper Years were talking about the mad Divination Professor, Sybill Trelawney, predicting "Halloween horrors" and the Ancient Runes Professor having her students translate passages from the Hallows Book.

Harry just wanted to sink into the floor. First the total obliviousness of all his classmates, followed by the pitying or apologetic looks of those who belatedly remembered was enough to drive anyone mad- he just wanted everyone to go about life as normal; well, as normal as was possible on this day, recognizing that it was a day of suffering for him but not pitying him, or worse, trying to sympathize. But at last, after an interminable day, it was at last time for the feast, which promised to be equally interminable. He might actually have stayed in the dorm, if that had been allowed, but unfortunately it was not if you were well enough to go, no matter who you were grieving, and Harry didn't want to have to ask for a special exception for himself. He might have claimed illness, though, but he didn't know any illness-causing spells, and the only other options to get himself into the infirmary would be to do something stupid like jump off the moving staircase, let Jewel bite him, or eat something moldy, so he decided just to put up with it and go.

The food was, he decided, almost worth it. They had all sorts of party snacks on levitating trays and far, far too many sweets to eat at one sitting, and someone had released actual, live bats- not the conjured paper ones- to fly around the hall. Pumpkins the size of Cinderella's carriage in the fairy tale had been carved with grinning or snarling faces, and the backs were cut out so that two or three children at a time could climb inside and sit down on the benches which had been affixed- somehow- to the walls of the enormous jack o' lanterns. Harry almost found himself enjoying it, that is, until a callous remark from another student reminded him that his parents had died on this day- well, his mother had. And she had died for him. Harry was just ruminating dismally on this topic, while a disillusioned Jewel, on his shoulder, tried to cheer him up:

~Your birthgiver would not want you sssubdued, Harry,~ she told him Grieve when you get back; ssssunbathe now~ when suddenly Professor Quirrel burst into the Great Hall at a run.

"Troll! Troll in the dungeons!" he screamed, and then toppled backwards in a dead faint in front of the head table. Wait, backwards? Harry frowned, even as the other students burst into a pandemonium of motion and screaming, and the teachers leapt to their feet. Why would he be falling backwards if he had been running, unless it was an act? If he had really fainted, the momentum of his running would have made him fall forwards, if anything. And why had Dumbledore just told everyone to go to their common rooms just now, when two of the common rooms were in the dungeons, where the troll was? Shouldn't they be staying in the Great Hall, with the doors bolted? Something was definitely not right.

~I sssmell your uneasse,~ Jewel hissed in his ear, shifting to make herself more comfortable against his bare neck. ~What isss the matter?~

~There isss a troll, a nassty, dangerous animal, and it issss loossse in the casstle,~ Harry told her out of the corner of his mouth as one of the prefects shouted for him to come along.

~Then why are you leaving the sssanctuary?~ Jewel asked, and Harry had to resist the urge to laugh. Even a snake knew better to leave the Great Hall with a troll loose in the castle. Granted, Jewel was an unusually intelligent snake, but still!

~I honessstly have no idea~ he told her in return as he began to follow the other Slytherins back to the common room. ~Either Dumbledore isss sstupid, or he hassss an alterior motive.~

~The sssecond one; I could ssmell the desssseit on him~ Jewel hissed, and Harry resisted the urge to repeat something for which Aunt Petunia had washed Dudley's mouth out with soap for. How could Dumbledore do something like that in a school full of children and not get caught? In muggle primary school a teacher who pulled something like that would have been sacked, and Dumbledore was the headmaster.

~Leaf-mold covered sson of a impotent ssslug!~ Harry hissed, unable to stop himself.

Jewel gave him a mild ~Language, Harry~ and one of the other Slytherins shot Harry an odd look, but the boy didn't care at all, not with how angry he was. At last, when they were almost to the common room, they heard a sudden, irate roar.

~Ssso there iss actually a troll!~ Harry said in shock, not even realizing that he was still speaking parselmouth, and he ran along with the rest of the students. And then, just as Harry was going to enter the common room, one of the older students shoved him aside with such force that his head cracked into the wall on the opposite side of the corridor.

When he was able to focus again, the door had already shut behind the rest of the panicked first years. And he could hear the troll lumbering down the corridor behind him, mingled with the clatter of armor that the creature was probably striking on the way. He ran to the stone where the entrance should be.

"Pureblood! Asphodel! Hippogriff! Torjurs pur!" he tried, listing all the passwords he could remember in his panicked state. The door did not open. ~Jewel, do you remember the passssword?~ Harry asked the snake hurriedly. He could almost feel the creature's fetid breath- and he could certainly smell it.

~No,~ Jewel responded after a moment, and Harry could have cried. Instead, he took off running again, hoping his speed could counterbalance the lesser mountain troll's habit of trying to chase anything that moved. Damn it, why couldn't his imbecilic housemates so much as bothered to tell him the password?!

Severus Snape was not in the best of moods. It seemed as if he was the only one who remembered what had happened on this night, the only one who remembered that their peace had come at the cost of so many lives, his Lily among them. His Lily. Merlin, he missed her. He always missed her, with every beat of his pulse. Some days, like now, every breath he drew did nothing but remind him that she was no longer breathing. It was not as if that mattered, though. He didn't not have the luxury of maudlin sentiment, and should he show the slightest grief, the slightest hint of something other than gladness or possibly anger (as a "loyal" Death Eater, it would not do to pretend too much joy on the day on which the Dark Lord, however temporarily, vanished off the face of the earth) he knew that it could- and would- be reported.

It was so hard, though, to have to pretend that it was just another day. Not even Albus knew what Halloween truly meant to him, and Severus would never tell him, either; better to let the meddling old man assume some story of tragic and unrequited love than to know the truth, that she had come to him for comfort from her abuser and that he had taken advantage of that. Besides, those memories were too private, too personal. He had never quite trusted Albus in general, but the one time he had let himself slip, the old man had crushed him. Severus never made that mistake again. He was no saint and certainly never had been, but he knew he would not be able to stand the grim disapproval in the old man's eyes. He was already remorseful enough, himself.

His classes were, as always on this day, much more unmanageable than usual, and Severus was nearly ready to throw a jar of pickled fire salamanders at the next student who thought it would be amusing to pass notes. Instead, since he did still have a bit of self-control, he made said student (a very terrified Hufflepuff) read it out loud to the class. It was about the feast, of course; they were always about the feast: "Are you looking forward to it?" "Do you think they will serve fuarag?" "What are you going to dress up as?" All they cared about was the feast! Not that this day marked the day of the elder Potters' deaths, not even that this day was the day that the war ended. Not even that today was Samhain, the night upon which the veil was thinnest, a night known to be associated with spirits walking the earth, necromantic and animantic rituals, and the summoning of demons and sprites; a night where ancient magic, blood magic, and death magic was strongest. A night where, if you were not careful, the darkness would sweep you away.

Severus was so tired, the exhaustion bone-deep within him. He finished his classes, retreating into his chambers with a pile of quizzes and papers to grade, thinking that even if he was miserable, he might as well get something done and then have an early bedtime. He had just picked up his red pen, in fact, when there was a knock at the door.

"Come in," he snapped, swearing privately to himself that if this was some student only out for extra credit, he would hex him or her. As it turned out, it was Albus.

"My boy, haven't you forgotten the feast?"

'Oh, no, here it comes,' Severus thought, too dismal even to snap at his employer. Albus always found something for him to do on Halloween, allegedly to keep him busy, to keep him from remembering. Severus personally thought that it was to keep an eye on him, considering that it was never enough to dispel his memories while still managing to make sure he couldn't have a moment to himself. Perhaps Albus thought that he would give in to his alleged addiction to the dark arts and try to contact Lily's soul or bring her back. Or perhaps Albus really was trying to help. Severus personally thought that the latter was unlikely, but then, it would be easier to reach the far-away stars than to predict what passed for thought in the old man's mind. "Of course not, sir," he replied, carefully keeping his tone neutral.

"It is in one hour, you know."

"Yes."

"You're chaperoning, my boy, have you forgotten?"

"I fail to see how I could have forgotten something which was never communicated to me," Severus responded, making a concerted effort not to let his frustration show on his face. Evidently it had worked, because Dumbledore did not bat an eye. Either that, or the old coot just didn't care.

"Well, I suppose you know now," Dumbledore told him, that infernal twinkle kindling in his eyes again. "Am I to assume that you will be ready in time?"

Severus didn't bother with a response, at least until the headmaster raised an inquiring eyebrow. Then he sighed and nodded tersely.

"Excellent! Be at the Great Hall at eight, then."

Severus nodded again and, knowing he would likely not get another chance to work on his grading, picked up his red pen and poised it over the stack of quizzes.

"One more thing."

Severus suppressed the urge to ward the headmaster out of his chambers and instead said in his calmest, most dangerous tone: "Yes sir?"

"Keep an eye on Harry, will you?"

Albus had interrupted him to say that? Why in Merlin's name would he care to keep an eye on Potter? Severus struggled to make an appropriate response. "Yes sir. Now may I please grade my papers? I doubt that I will have any time once I have to transition to baby sitting sugar-hyped students."

Albus had the nerve to laugh as he left Severus's chambers.

Severus did, indeed, keep an eye on Potter, mostly just out of curiosity. The boy was surprisingly subdued, and though he ate and talked with the other students, the usual light in his eyes was quite gone. Severus felt a momentary flicker of sympathy. The boy's parents, after all, had died this day, ten years ago, and it was clear that the other students, like the senseless creatures they were, hadn't even considered that he might be grieving. Then Longbottom said something to Potter, who smiled and picked up a cupcake, replying to whatever he had said with a laugh, and the moment passed. Severus went back to watching his Slytherins to make sure that they weren't up to something and wishing that he was permitted to leave. It would be a long night.

It proved to be quite longer than he'd thought, as, an hour or so in to the feast (it's not like he had had the time or inclination to cast a tempus) Quirinus Quirrell crashed in through the great double doors and ran up to the staff table, blurted some nonsense about a troll in the castle, and pantomimed a faint, throwing the entire hall into chaos. Severus knew instantly that it was a distraction. First of all, the faint was clearly faked (Severus was a good enough actor himself not to see that) and second of all, even had Quirinus been sincere (which was not something that Severus believed he could do) there was no earthly reason a troll would be let into a castle full of school children unless someone was planning to distract Dumbledore in an attempt on the stone (or if Hagrid was particularly drunk, but he seemed sober enough. Besides, not even Hagrid could appreciate a troll.)

Dumbledore appeared to have taken the bait though, as he immediately ordered all the students back to their common rooms. Severus bristled. His Slytherins slept in the dungeons, allegedly where the troll was! He had been about to go check on the stone, but on hearing this, he hissed to McGonagall to make sure it was safe and slipped out of the hall like a wraith, in search of the supposed troll. It would be easy enough just to bind it or knock it out, right?

Severus swooped through the halls of Hogwarts like the bat that the more impolite of his students always compared him to, wand half out of its holster so that he could draw it within seconds. After far too many minutes of fruitless searching, he drew his wand with a muffled curse and hissed "Point me, troll." The wand spun in his hand immediately, and then pointed in the general direction of the Slytherin common room. And Severus ran, faster than he ever had in his life.

It was then, at last, that he saw the troll. It was trying with all the force and ingenuity it could muster (the former considerable and the latter quite negligible) to ram its way through the barred door of an empty classroom. Severus came at it from behind, casting a binding spell (the troll was too stupid for a stunner to have much effect) and repeating said binding spell until it toppled over, bound. Then he cast alohomora on the door and through it open, in an effort to discover why the troll had been attacking him. What he found was certainly not what he had expected, considering that the moment he opened the door, a bottle full of moldy potion (he wasn't even sure what kind it had been, though it was probably a cheese potion; they did tend to be the likeliest to mold) flew straight at his head. It was only his considerable combat experience that kept him from being hit.

He entered the classroom, this time with a full-body shield up, to see Potter, with his wand clutched anxiously in his fist, his snake arching defiantly over his head.

"Potter!"

Luminous green eyes caught his, and the tense little body relaxed ever so slightly. "Professor Snape," he replied, lowering his wand. "Thank God!"

That was probably the first time anyone had thanked God for his arrival, but it wasn't as if there was time to dwell on the unique sensation. "For Merlin's sake, why are you out here! You were ordered to your common room!"

Potter ducked his head. "I'm sorry sir. I didn't remember the password."

"You didn't remember the password?! For Merlin's sake, boy!"

He did not understand Potter's flinch, but it made a very odd feeling rise inside him. He was about to mollify his statement slightly when the boy replied: "They don't always tell me, sir, and I didn't get to the door before it had closed." Then he lowered his eyes as though he expected to be struck.

There was something very wrong about all of this. "They don't tell you the password?" Severus asked, incredulous.

Potter mutely shook his head. At Severus's raised eyebrow, however, he elaborated: "I don't get along well with them, you know. At least Blaise talks to me..."

Severus felt an uncomfortable flashback to his own youth, where the only ones in his house who would talk to him were those who would later "convince" him to join the Dark Lord, but shoved it away. "If you can't make any friends, sleep in Hufflepuff. It's not my problem!"

Sea green eyes blazed with rage, and the snake- Jewel, was it?- spat threateningly. Potter tilted his head. "Ssss, shhh, stesssas smass," he said to the snake. He frowned. "Sssss. SppsSsss."

The snake must have made some reply, because Potter seemed to grow angry at its hissing. "Jewel, sssSssssrrs! No, I am not shssshs spsss snisss smssms! He's sssststsss-ssisi!"

"You will not what?"

Potter blanched, then shot "Jewel" a look. "N-nothing sir. Can I go?"

"Evidently it's not nothing. What is the animal trying to tell you?" Severus had to admit that he was curious.

"That, sir," said Potter, beginning to turn his wand over and over in his hands, as though itching to use it, "is private. Can you please just tell me the password and let me go back to the commons?"

Severus had honestly decided to do so; it was nearly after curfew, the feast was over, and he and Potter didn't seem to be getting anywhere. "The password is nepenthe; see that you don't forget it. And five points from Slytherin for not seeking out a teacher."

Potter shot him a poisonous glance at this, as if to say "when would I have done that, in between leaving the Great Hall or almost being clobbered by a troll?" and Severus almost, for the first time in his teaching career, gave back the points. There was just something about those beautiful green eyes that bewitched him, and always had. He might even have done it, too. But at that moment, Peeves crashed through the wall. "Ickle Potty's in a classroom with Sevvie!" he shouted, cackling maniacally. Oh, splendid. He would have spread a completely falsified version of events all over the castle by ten 'O'clock that evening.

Severus huffed and turned back to Potter. "I suppose I should walk you back to the commons. Are you coming?"

Potter paused to have a hissing conference with his pet, and then finally nodded, and Severus walked him back to the Slytherin common room, both of them having to step over the troll on the way, while Peeves pelted them with chalk all the way to the common room entrance. And yet somehow, Severus had the odd feeling that Potter was happy that he was there. Wasn't that an odd thing to contemplate!

After the troll episode, Harry's relations with Professor Snape were much more amicable (or, at least, as amicable as Professor Snape could manage; seriously, Harry often wondered if it would take a few overpowered cheering charms to put a smile on the dour man's face). Classes otherwise continued as normal, and soon, the signup sheets for staying for the holidays began to be passed around in the various houses and posted in the various common rooms, and the children began to talk about Yule and gift shopping at Hogsmeade (although it was Harry's personal opinion that it was rather too early to be talking about Yule already).

Harry, having signed the signup sheets for both of the houses that he was a member of, just to make sure; he didn't really know which one he should do, and it wasn't like he was going to go and ask his current acting head of house even if he was now on more friendly terms with the man. He otherwise went on as normal, once Professors Snape and Sprout had told him that he was staying, and didn't have to go back to the Dursleys for Christmas. Merlin, that would have been horrible.

As the days grew progressively colder and frost patterns began to trace the windows and outline what few leaves that remained on the trees of the Hogwarts grounds with false crystal, the classes grew harder, but as if in consolation, it seemed that most of the Slytherins had at last warmed to having the "Chosen One" in their house, and he had even made a few friends, although Malfoy was still being a prat and Crabbe and Goyle followed his lead. He and Blaise, however, were both study partners and very good friends, almost to the point that Harry wanted to show him Jewel (although he hadn't yet, and wouldn't until he knew that the boy was both not in the Death Eater camp and relatively trustworthy). Susan Bones and her friend Hannah Abbott were the other two friends that he had in his year, although Susan was considerably closer. In the other houses, though, he had a number of acquaintances (good and bad), and two other friends, Padma Patil and, of course, Neville.

It was on one of the days that he had stopped by Hagrid's place (with Blaise and Susan in tow) that he learned of the breakout at Gringotts, and the fact that the thief seemed to have been going after the little paper package that the half-giant had picked up on "'Ogwarts business." He was, naturally, curious (how could he not be) but Hagrid did not seem to be very forthcoming, and Harry stuffed the knowledge in the back of his brain for the moment, wanting to focus on his grades (Merlin, there was so much that the regular introductory books just didn't tell him, especially about Potions). But Hagrid had mentioned something about a Nicholas Flamel. Where had he heard that name before?

~When the tall dark boy wass helping you go over your passst-sstudy,~ Jewel commented unexpectedly in his ear, and he realized with a start that he had spoken aloud. Thankfully at that same moment, a particularly sap-laiden branch which Hagrid had added to the fire had let out a hiss of smoke and a few crackling sparks, and so the hiss was not heard by any of Harry's companions. Jewel was particularly quiet, after all. Hmm. Harry might have to figure out some kind of spell so that her hisses were only audible to him, as well as something that could hide her more easily than his Slytherin scarf. Who could he ask, though? "Excuse me, I need a spell to be able to hide my supremely venomous and technically illicit familiar...but make it so I can hear her so we can chat." That would go down well... Harry sighed and stroked a finger down her smooth back, under the guise of rubbing his neck.

Nicholas Flamel. What had she said? Oh, about his history study period last week with Blaise. They had talked about goblin rebellions (that was all Binns ever put on the tests; not that he could write new ones now... It seemed that he had a hard enough time grading with a quik-quotes pen, as often, even the most sloppy and poorly written of Harry's essays would come back with an "O" scrawled on the top, even if he had gotten literally everything wrong. Not that he did that often, but still!) They had also talked about other, more interesting things though; Harry remembered Blaise complaining that he had actually liked history before Binns, and Harry, having only ever taken European History in primary school, besides History of Magic, asked what it was like, and how he could enjoy a few hours a week of dry facts and useless dates of useless battles. Blaise had stared at him.

"You actually think that's what history is supposed to be like?"

Harry had shifted uncomfortably. "I don't exactly have much experience now, do I? How would I know?"

"Oh my- here, I'll teach you the way it's supposed to be," Blaise had said, dark eyes beginning to sparkle. "History is not just battles, it's magic, love, hate, drama...it's like the best suspense book you'll ever read! Stories about best friends, enemies, traitors to the crown...there's Abe no Seimei, who was this really powerful Japanese wizard sort of like our Merlin, and there's Merlin himself- did you know that a witch named Nimue (or Vivian) who was apprenticed to Morgana Le'Fay herself dosed him with a love potion to get her to teach her his particular brand of magic and then trapped him in a tree with a ritual he had taught her? And then there's Barnabas the Barmy, who tried to teach trolls ballet and ended up getting clubbed to death; the poor guy shouldn't have tried to teach trolls... There's Dr. Dee, who practiced Demonology; really nasty business, that, and then there's Nicholas Flamel- he created the philosopher's stone!"

"What's that?" Harry had a feeling that he should have known that and, if he had been wizard-raised, he probably would have.

"It's a chunk of minerals and potions sediments held together by literal crystalized magic, and you can use it to brew a potion that, if you keep taking it, makes you live forever. Plus, you can literally make gold from it. Like, not transfigured gold or leprechaun gold, I mean the real deal. Permanent gold."

Harry had stared at him. "Whoa."

Now, sitting by the fire in Hagrid's hut with Jewel tucked comfortingly around his neck and listening to Hagrid's stories while Blaise and Susan drank their tea and made an effort to gnaw on the rock cakes, he realized that he already knew what had been in that little brown package. The philosopher's stone. The question was, who exactly had made an attempt to steal it (Harry had a feeling that there were a lot of wizards who would if they could, but there evidently weren't many who could break into Gringotts, if the tone of the yellowed newspaper article was any indicator) and why, exactly, was it "'Ogwarts business?"

Harry put the thought aside after careful consideration, and then forcibly focussed back on the kindly half-giant, who was telling yet another story, about an Acromantula ("a giant spider," Blaise filled him in) which he had kept when he was a student and, when he had been expelled (he wouldn't say why, but Harry decided it might have to do with the killer spider the size of Uncle Vernon's company car) he had let it go into the Forbidden Forest, where it had been his friend ever since, reporting to him a lot of the gossip of the forest, like when to steer clear of the Black Lake because the merfolk were having a fight with the Giant Squid, and who had deposed who in the centaur political circles and when the percutis pox was sweeping the thestral herds.

But he as soon as he had left the hut and the buttery light of the fire behind, the wonder and worry about the philosopher's stone returned full force, and, although still managing to make the correct little noises at the correct times in order to seem as though he was listening to his still-chattering friends, he was still off in his own world. The philosopher's stone. The philosopher's stone! Hagrid had collected it from Gringotts. It seemed that he had taken it to Hogwarts, because Gringotts was unsafe. It logically followed that it was what was on the third floor that no one would enter, although honestly, Harry knew a lot of boys who would be curious and ready to rush of and see exactly what was in that corridor, so it didn't seem like it was very safe at all. And why was the thing hidden in a school, anyway? Why had Nicholas Flamel not kept it, though, if it was not safe? Surely a wizard who Blaise had said was five hundred years old would know how to protect his property...

~What isss troubling you?~ Jewel asked abruptly, once Susan had turned to make her way back to the Hufflepuff commons and Blaise had parted ways on the grounds that he had an essay due in a few days (the Slytherin always studied proactively).

~You know the tunnel that the headmasster said wasss dangerouss?~

~Yesss. I hope you are not planning on going there?~

~Isshhtar, no!~ Harry responded; somehow 'Merlin' came out Ishtar in parseltongue.

~Then what isss the problem?~

~I think that the headmasster isss hiding sssomething there.~

~Hiding what?~

~The rock which makess you live forever and turns dark metal into shiny yellow metal.~

~Oh.~ Jewel's bright eyes glinted with a serpentine sort of curiosity. ~The hairy large one ssaid that sssomeone attacked the former cache?~

~Yesss.~

~Ssso you worry that ssomeone will attack it here?~

~Yesss.~

~Why should it be your consssern?~

~Think of the trouble there would be if sssomeone takess it! Think of sssomeone who can never die! And the yellow metal!~

~What about it? It sseemsss cold. Ussseless.~

~You know how humanss ssspeak of 'money'?~ Harry had to speak that last in English, because there was just no word for it in parseltongue. They simply had no concept of it.

~I believe ssso, yesss. I do not underssstand it, though.~

Harry hesitated, trying to come up with a good way to phrase what he was going to try to explain to her. ~Humanss cannot jussst hunt,~ he said at last. ~At leassst not all the time. Not only that, but there are thingss we can't hunt for, that have to be made by other humans, and ssso on. We use the yellow metal inssstead asss a ssort of...I don't know...exchange medium. Like, I give the the short frizzy one~ (that was Hermione Granger) ~A dark-water-feather~ (that was a quill) ~and sshe givesss me a piece of yellow metal. Then I can give the pretty dark-sskinned one~ (that was Parvati or Padma Patil) ~the metal, and she gives me a blank talking-leaf.~ (That was muggle paper.)

Jewel blinked, readjusting herself on his wrist. ~I think I sssee,~ she said after a moment. ~Humansss are sstrange, though. It sseemsss sso odd to use metal like that, but I sssupposse that you do usse many thingsss ssnakesss don't need, and it would be wonderful not to have to hunt sssometimes. But how do you get the yellow metal? Other than by magic,~ she added hastily.

~You work for it.~

~What?~ Jewel asked, and Harry realized that the second word hadn't translated. Snakes didn't have a word for 'work', either.

~Do thingsss for other humanss for the metal. Sssometimes it is giving them ssomething to get it, or other timess you make sssomething or do ssomething for them that they can't do, do you see?~

~W-work,~ Jewel said thoughtfully, testing out a parseltongue approximation of the word. ~Hmm. But where did the first humans get it?~

Harry stifled a giggle. She asked as many questions as Granger sometimes, and on as many subjects! ~The firssst humanss dug it out of the ground, I think,~ he responded. ~Not sure how they knew what it was or how it wasss there, though...~

Jewel gave a giggly little hiss. ~I see.~ A pause. Then: ~Don't you have your talking leaves to do for the motherly one and the stern one?~

Harry blinked. Then blinked again, and started with a muffled ~wormgutssss!~ as he realized that his homeworks, an Herbology lab for Sprout and an essay for Mcgonagall, were due the very next day. He was likely going to be spending the rest of the day and most of the night in the greenhouses and then the library. ~Right. Gotta get going. Can you hide again, Jewel?~

~Yesss,~ the snake replied, burrowing tighter into his scarf and letting Harry cast a notice-me-not on her. ~You'd better finisssh your talking leavesss before they give you a tail-slap.~

Christmas was in the air, and Harry could smell the spice and pine. Blaise, Hannah, and Harry studied ever so much harder, so as to be ready for the pre-break exams, and the castle began to ready itself for Christmas. Well, to be more specific, the people and house elves began to ready themselves. The Weasley twins took to hanging mistletoe charmed to stick whoever walked under them to the nearest wall until they were kissed; cheek kisses were ok for anyone under 3rd year, two people were related, or if someone was a teacher, but you had to actually kiss on the lips, which was the cause of a good deal of embarrassment among the various students. (These were finally taken down due to the fact that because Argus Filch was the caretaker and not a teacher, he was stuck to the wall for twenty-four hours, until Filius Flitwick managed to break the difficult charm work, and the twins were given detention with said incensed caretaker. Not that it subdued them enough that they stopped their special brand of holiday cheer; they just diverted it to other projects which had not yet been explicitly forbidden, like teaching Peeves inappropriate lyrics to the usual Christmas songs and charming the angel on the top of one of the trees that Hagrid had dragged into the Great Hall to stick a finger up her nose.) The children began to talk about the holidays, too: who would stay and who was going home to their family, and what everyone wanted for Christmas.

Harry was just glad that he was not going to be at the Dursleys' for the holiday. Just being able to have a lie-in and maybe Christmas dinner would be an improvement, and the first time that one of the Hufflepuffs asked him what he was hoping for (of course it was a Hufflepuff; Slytherins would not do something so crass as to ask what someone wanted for Christmas) and he'd just said "Oh, I don't know. My family doesn't do much for Christmas." Well, not for him. Said Hufflepuff had squeaked in total horror, and Harry guessed that they were all planning something, judging by furtive looks and the rapid crinkle of paper being carefully and lovingly fitted around packages that were swiftly hustled out of sight.

Today, however, he was thinking about his own contribution. He knew enough about how normal families and friends worked to know that it was considered polite to give gifts if you wanted to recieve them, but he obviously didn't have anything with him and he was not so good at complex spells that could potentially be used to make a gift that someone might actually want. And, while he was astounding at gift-wrapping (having to wrap twenty or more boxes for Dudley on every possible gift-giving occasion had given him almost preternatural skills in that department) he was not so good at figuring out what to get for anyone, considering that he had never had anyone to give anything to, or resources to get or make something to give. He didn't know what to do, but at last he decided to ask for help, since, upon making a comment to Jewel (whose limited understanding of human culture did not stretch to Christmas traditions) said only that he should get them all prey (which, considering that there was going to be a Christmas feast, would likely end up being both odd and unnecessary).

Harry stewed all through defense, (which, since he had a horrible headache on top of Malfoy trying out the new cutting curse they were learning, lascero, on him definitely qualified as torture) before at last deciding to go seek out Nymphadora Tonks, a clumsy, humorous seventh year whom he felt he knew well enough to confide in but not enough that she would feel sorry for him and make the next few years awkward, considering that she would be graduating soon. He didn't have to tell her everything, either.

"Uh, Tonks?" Everyone knew better than to call her Nymphadora, either to her face or even anywhere where her extra-sharp hearing could pick it up. He didn't know her that well, anyway.

"Oh, hi Harry," the seventh year replied distractedly, messing up a pile of papers about runes and hieroglyphs and basic cursebreaking for aurors, and Harry said "Sorry" and was about to help gather them up when she flicked her wand and all the papers flew back to order in an instant. Harry's eyes widened. "You can do that?"

Her only response was a boisterous laugh. "When you drop your homework on the classroom floor on a regular basis, yeah, you learn," she told him, and Harry felt better.

"Can you teach me?" Harry asked, totally forgetting what he had been about to ask her.

She hesitated. "Sure, I guess," she said at last. "I don't know if you'll have enough power and concentration to pull it off, though, so don't be disappointed if it doesn't work. The incantation is consistuitese, and you have to move your wand like this." She demonstrated. "It takes a lot of practice, though."

Harry tried it on a couple of sheets of paper, but nothing happened even after Tonks had corrected his technique, so at last he gave it up, a little angry with his lack of success. Tonks told him that it was a sixth year spell and not to worry, but Harry was still frustrated even if he knew that technically it was a spell that he wouldn't be required to know for years. In the end, he just picked up the papers and gave them back to Tonks by hand.

Tonks just grinned and took them. "You'll learn them soon enough," she told him. "Anyway, paper organising charms aside, was there anything else you wanted to talk about? Only, I'm kind of studying for the midterm for Runes..."

"Oh, sorry!" Harry replied. "Uh, it's not really that important."

"Oh, I don't mind. I mean, I do have to study at some point, but I'd also rather not, if you know what I mean."

Harry did, of course. He leaned ever so slightly closer, trying to cover his vulnerability, and then finally said: "Um, I just...I need some gift-giving advice, if you've got time. I just don't know what to get people or what's appropriate in the Wizarding World or whatever."

Tonks looked a little surprised, and the tips of her hair tinted turquoise at the ends, but then she just started nodding. "Ok. Well, if you don't know someone that well, like a housemate who's not in your year or whatever, just get them candy or a trick quill or something. Otherwise, I'd say you just watch someone to see what they're like, or ask them. Or you can ask their friends, if you don't want to telegraph that you're getting them a present."

Harry could probably have figured all that out, given time, but it was helpful to have all that laid out in front of him like that. "Thanks, Tonks," he said, and was about to say goodbye and leave her to the tender mercies of her Runes study guide, but then something else occurred to him.

"Wait, how can I buy gifts if I can't leave the castle?"

"Oh, right, you can't just go to Hogsmeade," Tonks exclaimed, as if she had only just thought of that. Granted it was probably true..."Well, I could pick whatever you wanted up for you, and you could pay me back later," she suggested, "And then there are owl-order catalogues, of course."

"Owl-order catalogues?"

"Yeah, they're basically for when you want to send away for something. You just circle whatever you want to buy, tap the order form with your wand, and put your Gringotts code, and then they'll owl you whatever you sent away for. Here," she added impulsively, handing him a thick catalogue. "I'm finished with it anyway, and I think there are still a few forms in it."

Harry took it and stared at it, then started to flip through it. This might actually be the answer to his problems! This would be perfect, except that he wasn't sure where his Gringotts code was, and that he knew that he could likely find without any problems. "Oh, yeah I see. Thank you!"

"Oh, no problem! Is there anything else I can help you with?"

"No, I don't think so." Harry did not want to keep her from her studying, especially now that he had the catalogue to look through.

"Right then. See you around, Harry?"

"Yeah, sure!"

Tonks' grin was blinding and her hair was oscillating between pink and purple as Harry left, or, to be more specific, left that part of the library. However, as soon as they were out of hearing distance, Jewel popped up from under Harry's collar. ~I don't understand,~ she commented finally. ~This human ritual is absurd.~

Harry, on the other hand, thought that Christmas, now that he was going to actually be allowed to take part, was probably going to be great. ~Oh, I don't know about that. I think that this is going to be fun.~

~Hethi,~ she began, and Harry straightened up at once- she did not often use the parseltongue bastardization of his name, since snakes usually referred to each other in terms of the relationships they had with one another: sunbrother, sunsister, nestmate, mate, seed-giver, egg-layer, competitors, predators, or prey.

~What isss it?~

~Your enemiesss~ (she used the word meaning predator here, meaning an enemy which would actively hurt him rather than just taking food and mates away from him) ~might ussse thiss Time-of-Lit-Trees-and-Ssshared-Prey to give you presssentss with food-venom.~

Harry blinked, trying to parse the snake language. Time-of-Lit-Trees-and-Shared-Prey obviously meant Christmas, but... ~Oh, you mean ssomeone might poissson me?~

~Poisssson?~ Jewel flickered out her tongue as if to taste the new word. ~If you mean venom that comesss from insssectss that ssssting and plantss that are no good to eat, then yesss. I alssso worry that ssomeone might try to put p-p- oh, Ishtar, I mean food venom in your gorging-day prey.~

~Gorging-day prey?~

~The prey they give out when it is a sspecial day...what wasss the human word?~

~Feasst,~ Harry told her, and she dutifully repeated the word.

~Feasst. Right. In any cassse, you shhould probably be on your guard.~

~I sssuppose that would be ssafessst,~ Harry said reluctantly. He did not want to mistrust his friends, but being poisoned with a magic poison did not exactly appeal to him either, for obvious reasons. ~But asside from that, what on earth sshould I get my friends as presentsss?~

~I don't know. Didn't know the lassst time you asssked me, either,~ she went on, and Harry blushed. ~The plump kind one [Neville] likesss plantss, sso that isss probably a good ssstart, and the short frizzy one [Hermione] likess talking-leaf-stacksss, sso you could probably get her one on anything and shhhe would read it. I think the pretty dark-skinned ones [Padma and Parvati] like shiny rock-powder and flower-scent, so you could probably get them that, but maybe talk to the happy one and the chatty one [Susan and Hannah] ssssince they know what human femalesss like better than I do. Ssspeaking of the happy one and the chatty one, they would probably like just about anything, but I don't know them too well, sso I sssay sstick to sssweet-prey and fancy dark-water-feathersss. I don't know what the tall dark boy would want, though.~

Harry grinned at her. ~All of those are good ideas.~ He paused. ~But...but what should I get for my ssseed-giver?~

~I don't know your sseed-giver that well,~ Jewel responded. ~And...I don't know much about Time-of-Lit-Trees-and-Ssshared-Prey, but I think it ssshould be from you.~

~But I don't know what to get him. What if he doessssn't like it? What if he laughsss? What if he'sss angry?~

~Don't tell him who it'sss from. Just send it without a note, or with a note that'ss been magic-written sso that he doesssn't know it'sss you. Then if he likesss it, he likess it, and if he doesssn't, you'll never know.~

~But-~

~I think if you didn't get him anything, you would be upssset with yourssself. Just get him sssomething nice like some soft-sweet-food or some dizzy-drink or something for hisss stinking-water-mixes.~

Harry took a moment to translate that. ~Yeah, I guesss. But-~

~No butss. Finish reading the commerce leaf-stack and then go get your presssentss. And maybe talk to the other humanss, too- they probably know what iss good. I'm a ssnake, after all. All I want is a nice plump mouse, or maybe a gerbil.~

Harry filed that last away in his mind for future reference and left the nook in the library for his dorm, still reading the catalogue.