Harry was awakened in less than an hour by Pomfrey. She fussed over him until he convinced her that he really didn’t need anything but sleep. When the door closed again, Harry tugged the gap in the heavy drapes closed completely and hoped that was the last interruption.

“Mr. Potter?” a familiar voice woke him. Harry leaned over and pulled the drapes aside. The sun was low in the sky now. Professor McGonagall stood between his bed and Ron’s, her head cocked to the side.

“Professor,” Harry said a little sleepily. 

In a teasing voice she said, “We cannot start the party without you.”

“Party?”

“Yes. The headmaster thinks it best we keep everyone out of trouble as much as possible. Far too much magical celebrating went on last time in the middle of Muggledom.”

“What time is it?”

“Six-thirty.”

Shocked at how long he had slept, Harry swung his legs off the bed and stood up. He looked himself over and shook the worst of the wrinkles out of his robe.

“Uh ah. Dress robes, my dear,” McGonagall said kindly.

Harry’s foggy brain sharpened up at that. “Why?”

“There may be one or two photographers,” she said.

Harry scratched his head and went to his trunk. He pulled out his black dress robe with the satin collar and cuffs and his toiletry kit. His body was moving on automatic. At the door to the dormitory, he turned suddenly. Rubbing his eyes, he asked, “Voldemort is gone, right? I didn’t just dream that?” He readjusted his glasses and peered up at her better.

“Yes, Mr. Potter,” she replied. Harry could hear a smile in her voice.

Harry cleared his throat. “Good.” He opened the door and headed down. 

McGonagall waited in the corridor outside the boy’s toilet while Harry freshened up and changed. Dampening his hair, he tried to comb it into something presentable. Finally with a shrug, he gave up, put the comb back in his kit, and stared at himself in the mirror. He didn’t look like someone who had defeated Voldemort. He sighed as he met his own green eyes. They looked less than victorious, more burned out. He wished with an acute stab that his parents could see him now. They would be proud, he was certain, or at least very relieved. He sighed again and swallowed hard. All of that emotion from the battle was still very much at the surface.

McGonagall was waiting. If she hadn’t been, he might have spent the rest of the evening alone in the boy’s toilet rather than face everyone.

“All right, Mr. Potter?” his professor asked kindly when he stepped out.

“Yes, ma’am,” Harry replied quietly.

She stopped and put a hand on his shoulder. “Harry, are you up for this? You certainly don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” she added in a light tone. “I think you could ask just about anything from us, in fact. Frankly, we’ve been feeling badly, having the party without you. You missed the last one and that was your doing as well,” she added easily.

Harry gave her a small smile. “I wouldn’t want to miss it, Professor.”

She hooked an arm around him, ostensibly to lead him down the corridor. She gave him a half-hug first, however, and pushed his hair back. Harry looked up at her in surprise. McGonagall was usually much more restrained than that. 

“Professor?”

“We’re so proud of you, Harry, my boy,” she said, almost shrilly, and pulled him against her side again.

Harry dropped his gaze. “Thank you, Professor.”

They started down the corridor. “You aren’t insufferable at all,” she said, half to herself. “Why does Severus keep insisting that you are?”

Harry gave her a worried look then got distracted by having to keep up with her much longer stride.

In the Entrance Hall, Harry could hear the murmur and clink of a party going on beyond the doors. McGonagall steered him away from the first door, which he usually used since it was closest to the Gryffindor table. At the center doors, she gave him an affectionate smile, pulled open the large carved door, and gestured for him to lead the way in.

Harry glanced into the hall as he followed her gesture and hesitated on the threshold. The Great Hall had been arranged similarly to the way it had for the Tri-Wizard Tournament Ball, with large round tables, each with their own cluster of floating candles. Four tables sat on the raised platform at the end, with chairs only facing forward or sideways. Double the number of people were in the hall than normal.

Conversation died away as Harry took in the room. Heads turned to him. Chairs shifted. One of the head tables captured Harry’s attention as Dumbledore stood up, his flowing baby-blue robe sparkling in the candlelight. Fudge moved to stand as well. They started clapping. The rest of the room picked it up immediately.

Stunned, Harry required a nudge from behind to get moving again. He walked dazedly along a narrow aisle up the middle, through the sea of now standing and clapping witches and wizards, up to the platform. Dumbledore met him at the edge and shook his hand. 

“Come up here, Harry,” the old wizard invited.

Working hard to take in what was happening around him, Harry took a seat beside Fudge, facing the rest of the hall. The clapping faded and a commotion from a table to the left caught his attention. Harry stiffened a little when he saw Fred and George leading the rest of the Weasleys in holding up their cups. “To Harry!” the twins roared. The rest of their table and a scattering of others around the room joined in, echoing it as well as the following hip-hip-hooray! Harry smiled lightly at their antics. The state of the Weasleys and the cups made Harry suspicious about whether that explained McGonagall’s more outgoing behavior as well.

Dumbledore, still standing beside his chair, put a hand on Harry’s shoulder. “Thank you all for coming. Especially on such short notice,” he added congenially. “I thought it only fair that we make up two rounds of parties to Harry, who wasn’t exactly cognizant of the last festivities the wizarding world held to celebrate Voldemort’s defeat.” 

Harry was glad to see no one hissed this time. Someone shouted, “Here, here.” It sounded like Hagrid. Harry looked around to try to find him, figuring that should be easy. A sea of ecstatically happy faces met Harry’s own as he scanned the crowd. At a table on the right, Hagrid sat talking with Mundungus. He winked at Harry when their eyes met.

“Harry?” Dumbledore was saying to him. Harry’s head snapped up at that. “Would you care to give us a few words on this historic occasion?” Harry blanched, but the old wizard had his arm out to invite him to stand.  Dumbledore leaned close as he guided Harry out from behind the table. “This could end up in a future History of Magic textbook, my boy,” he winked.

Harry cleared his throat. His eyes took in the rest of their table as he stalled. Professors Sprout and Snape were there as well as someone who appeared to be the Bulgarian Minister of Magic. “Well,” Harry began slowly, “the first thing that comes to mind is: good riddance.” The room laughed lightly and murmured conversation broke out for a moment.

He took a deep breath and assembled his scattered thoughts. “We all have lives to go back to,” he said, thinking, I have a life that starts right now, forget going back. Bolstered by that, he thought about the frantic lives of the teachers who were also Order members, and went on. “Everyone needs to try to remember what was important to them before this all started, because those things are what really matter. Not the things you do because you have to.” A few sounds of agreement came from the closest tables. 

Harry wanted to say something about those who didn’t make it to see this day, but just considering it made the frail foundation he stood on tilt crazily. Far too many eyes were upon him to risk anything like that. He had been silent too long—the shifting feet around the room told him so. Mentally backing frantically away from unsettling thoughts, Harry said lightly, “Myself, I am looking forward to a lifting of the ban on Quidditch.” The room laughed more this time.

“That will be arranged, Harry, I assure you,” Dumbledore said.

Ron’s shout of joy made Harry grin as he looked over at the Weasley table. Harry scanned the full set of redheads. Even Percy was there although, as usual, he looked like he disapproved of something. “It is good to see so many here,” he said without thinking.

“Yes, Harry, it is,” Dumbledore said, patting Harry on the shoulder. “And we have you to thank for that.” As though he realized the unstable ground Harry had tread onto unthinkingly, Dumbledore went on, “Please, everyone, enjoy your dinner. Dedalus Diggle has promised us a fireworks show from Hogsmeade at ten o’clock.” With cheerful conversations roaring back to life around them, Dumbledore led Harry back to his seat and took his own beside him. 

“Well spoken,” McGonagall leaned over to say from beside the headmaster.

“No one warned me,” Harry said with a hint of accusation.

“Impromptu speeches are always better,” she said as though it were perfectly obvious. She toasted him with her cup and drank a large gulp, confirming Harry’s suspicions. Harry suspected he would find butterbeer in his own chalice. It had mulled mead instead, to his amazement. It burned his throat even with just a sip. He took another gulp anyway.

Plates of roast mutton and goose appeared on the table, dressed with vegetables. Suddenly incredibly famished, Harry served himself from the closest plate and waited impatiently for others to serve themselves so he could start. The Bulgarian Minister smiled broadly at him when Harry looked his way.

“I do not know if you vil remember me,” the wizard said. 

“I think so,” Harry said. “From the World Cup.”

The wizard smiled more. “Yes. I am most flattered. But we were not properly introduced,” he said in his slavic accent as he stood and held his hand out across the table. “Gorazd Obolensky.”

Harry leaned forward for a quick handshake. “Good to you again, sir.”

As Obolensky sat back down, straightening his stiff dress robes as he did so, he said, “I think I was verily lucky on the drawing of the tables tonight.” He grinned at Dumbledore and stabbed his fork into his meat.

Harry took this cue and started devouring his plate.

“Do they not feed you here?” Obolensky asked, seeing this.

After swallowing, Harry said, “Yes, sir. It’s just that I slept through lunch.”

“Ah, yes, the appetite of a—what are you, sixteen?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Ehem,” Fudge cleared his throat making Harry wonder whether maybe he shouldn’t be talking around his own Minister. “Have any future plans, Harry?”

Harry almost rose to the question, but held back on instinct. “Still considering things, sir.” In his peripheral vision, he saw all four teachers at the table pause as he said this. He glanced at McGonagall, who gave him a disapproving look, then rolled her eyes as though she were giving up on him.

“Well, young man, be sure and let us know what you decide, hm?” Fudge said, sounding the doting uncle.

Harry silently congratulated himself for keeping mum. He didn’t want to get into the very competitive Aurors program that way.

“Things are going to get much easier,” Fudge went on. “We’ll have to relearn what it is like to worry about something as trivial as the consistent thickness of cauldron bottoms.” He chuckled to himself.

Harry made it through the meal, although it seemed to stretch on a little long. Fudge pushed his chair back and said, “Have to make the rounds.” He tossed his bundled serviette onto his bone-strewn plate and bowed to the table before moving off. The plates soon cleared themselves and the next course appeared. Harry took a rice pudding from the serving tray that circled slowly above the center of the table before vanishing again a minute later.

Obolensky shifted down a seat, bringing his own slice of chocolate cake with him. “Do you mind?” he asked. Harry shook his head between bites. Obolensky made a noise of pleasure at his first bite. “Very good. My compliments to the chefs,” he said to Dumbledore.

Dumbledore nodded acceptance of the compliment as he poured tea for himself and McGonagall beside him. “Things in Bulgaria will settle down quickly, I assume?” the headmaster asked.

“We expect. We have lost all of our Dementors and vahmpires but presumably some will try to return. How we will handle them then…we shall see.” He smiled at Harry as he took another large bite of cake. “Such minor problems,” he said a little dreamily. He shook his dark head. “I heard rumors about you, Mr. Potter, how you werle expected somehow to do what you did before. And I remember the small boy from the top box at the Whorld Cup and I thought, he has not a chance.”

Harry laughed. “Did you put money on that?”

Obolensky started to answer then looked taken aback. “Of course not.”

“Well, that’s all right, then,” Harry said amiably.

The Bulgarian Minister pulled himself together. He seemed to find Harry’s attitude a little worrisome. “I hope to be as flippant as you are about this someday, Mr. Potter. Or perlhaps the mead that is the explanation?”

Harry shrugged. The other extreme was less sustainable, but he wasn’t going to try to explain that.

Obolensky picked up his serviette and shook it out with a spell that flattened it neatly. He arranged it with the Hogwarts seal on the top left and leaned in close while he fished in his pocket. “Vhould you mind, terribly?” he asked as he pulled out a never-out quill. He shook the quill and incanted something that made the nib into a little hard sponge that filled with black ink from the never-out charm of the quill.

“What was that charm?” Harry asked, distracted from what he should have seen coming.

Obolensky smiled widely. “I can teach a spell to the famous Harry Potter,” he murmured with a hint of reverence. He shook the quill back to normal with a canceling spell. “This spell is Znakpisatel. Herle…” he repeated it, canceled it and handed the quill to Harry. 

It took three corrections of his pronunciation, but finally, Harry made what was essentially a Muggle marker pen out of the quill. Harry had been missing marker pens in his wizard life and thought this a clever spell.  “Cool,” Harry said happily.

“Would you mind?” Obolensky repeated, shifting the serviette over a little closer. “I promised Victohrl I would return with your autograph vor him.”

Harry blinked at him in surprise. “Victor?”

McGonagall cleared her throat. Harry glanced at his teachers, who gave him looks of mixed amusement. Snape rolled his eyes.

“Victor Krum?” Harry asked the minister in disbelief.

“Yes. I know dat you have met sometimes, correct?”

“Yeah,” Harry confirmed. He looked down at the cloth before him, a bit dazed. “What would you like it to say?” Harry asked slowly, thinking of how fun it was going to be to tell Ron about this.

Obolensky murmured something in Bulgarian as if trying it out for sound.

“You’ll have to spell that out,” Harry said, amused.

“To my dear friend, Viktohrl,” Obolensky suggested.

Harry took a deep breath and in his best hand, wrote that out and signed below it. There was a lot of blank space at the bottom. He thought a moment and then added, Voldemort Demise Party, May 1997,  along the bottom edge.

“Ah, velry nice,” Obolensky said, admiring it. He folded it carefully and put it in his pocket. Harry gave him the quill back as well.

“Tea, Harry?” Dumbledore asked when Harry sat back with a tired sigh.

“Please, sir.” 

“Then I think we shall allow a few of the reporters in when you have perked up a little.”

Harry made a small noise of disgust. He took the offered cup and saucer and held them while Dumbledore poured. “You said something about fireworks?”

“Yes. In order to avoid Mr. Diggle getting into difficulty with the Ministry again, he was invited to set off his spells here in Hogsmeade. Quite a party is going on there as well tonight.”

“What did he get in trouble for?” Harry asked as he sipped his tea.

McGonagall crossed her arms. “Last time, he filled the sky over Kent with magical fireworks. Fortunately, the Muggles thought they were shooting stars. The hordes of owls flying by day they remembered much longer.”

At Harry’s alarmed expression, Dumbledore leaned close and said, “That is why we have all of the troublemakers here tonight.” Then he winked.

Harry looked around the loud room and commented, “People do seem pretty happy.”

“Everyone but you, Potter,” Snape commented stiffly.

Harry gave him sharp look but didn’t reply. He couldn’t deny that he felt as though someone had taken him apart and put him back together with the pieces crooked.

“Come now, fame and fortune await,” Snape went on.

“Severus,” Dumbledore said with mild correction. “Harry has had a very long day.”

Harry has had a very long six years, Harry thought.

“The minister is not here,” Snape said as he crossed his arms.

“A minister is,” Dumbledore pointed out mildly.

Obolensky leaned close to Harry. “You have an arch-nemesis?” he asked with a glance at Snape. He sounded genuinely amused.

“Yes,” Harry replied dryly.

“Another pudding, Harry?” Dumbledore asked kindly. “Or anything else?”

Harry, feeling testy, looked up at the headmaster. “Do I get to join the Order now?” He had meant it as a joke, but found himself far more raw about it than expected. Dumbledore’s blue eyes pierced him in return. The instinct to back down tugged at him, but Harry overcame it easily for the first time ever and held that bright gaze levelly.

McGonagall interjected airily, “You still aren’t of age, you know.”

Harry’s emotions seesawed into annoyance with them all. He looked away from them out over the room. Many tart replies came to mind. He swallowed them all on the assumption that he would regret them later.

Obolensky pushed his chair back. He patted Harry’s hand and said, “It vhill look better in the morning, I think.” He stood up. ”I should really be doing as yourl Minister Fudge is. If you vhill excuse?“

Harry nodded as the others made noises of ascent. When the Bulgarian had stepped to the next table, Dumbledore said, “I will not apologize for protecting you, Harry.”

Harry fixed his gaze out over the room as fury flashed through him. That protection had cost him Sirius. If he had been anywhere else, he would have gone into a rage. He would have screamed that if Snape were such a useful Order member, he would have killed Voldemort himself. He would have pointed out that their protection had not really been all that good anyway. He swallowed and blinked hard, struggling desperately to bury it all.

The noise of the room faded out and a rush sounding as wind filled his head. Queer, muffled voices cried out from a distance. A grey-green haze overlaid the Great Hall filled with bright flickering green strands like a massive dilapidated spider web. An odd thing came at him. He squinted to try to see it better. It looked like a black star with amorphous, straining limbs. The stretched voices got louder. Other dark patches circled slowly, hungrily, feeling their way through the haze. Harry jerked back to escape it.

“Harry?” Dumbledore said in a very concerned voice. Harry’s chair had been turned to face Dumbledore’s and he had Harry’s arms in his hands. McGonagall was on her feet leaning over the headmaster’s shoulder. “What happened?”

Harry caught his breath. “I don’t know,” he replied. Though fear had tempered his anger he still didn’t feel generous enough to work out how to explain what he had just seen.

Dumbledore frowned at him. “We cannot help you, my boy, if you do not let us,” he said stridently. When Harry refused to look at him, he said gently, “Perhaps the party is not the best place for you right now.”

“I want to stay,” Harry insisted. He didn’t relish the thought of lying alone on his dormitory bed imagining everyone down here having fun, waiting for that green world to just suck him in for good the next time.

“I can see that your self-control is too thin. Understandably, given the strain you were under just prior to now.” Dumbledore turned to Snape. “Severus,” he said and tossed his head. Snape stood immediately and departed. Harry watched him go in confusion.

McGonagall sat back down, pushed her chalice away and poured herself some tea. She kept her eyes on Harry as she rapidly sipped it down.

Presently, Snape returned and slipped something surreptitiously to Dumbledore before returning to his seat and taking on an expression identical to McGonagall’s, one of careful scrutiny.

Dumbledore took Harry’s chalice of mead and, behind the table, poured the contents of the vial into it. As he set it back on the table, Harry asked, “What is that?”

“It is a mood altering potion,” Dumbledore said. “I would normally strongly resist giving you such a thing, but I insist you drink it if you are to remain this evening.”

Harry gave him an accusing look and his anger built again, although fear of the vision cut it off short. 

“I’m doing this for your own good. You are more than free to rant at me another time, but a scene here tonight would mark you forever in everyone’s minds. I will not risk that happening.”

Harry glanced at the cup, then stared at Dumbledore’s hand on the table, at the glittering silver rings on his fingers. He felt utterly drained and strangely defeated. He lifted the chalice and downed the contents in a fiery set of gulps.

“Thank you, Harry. We’ll let that settle in and then we’ll give the reporters their chance while the potion is at its peak. Have another pudding,” Dumbledore suggested, pulling a dish of chocolate bonbons off the tray that had appeared as he said it.

Grudgingly, Harry bit one in half. They were frozen solid. His breath turned the chocolate white on the remaining half. Harry stared unseeing out across the Hall as he thought about what had happened. The vision didn’t make any sense. He replayed it in his mind and wondered if he had fallen asleep for an instant. He started to care less about it. His shoulders felt disconnected from his body, too lax somehow. A group of wizards discussing something with grand arm motions caught his gaze. They were jesting and laughing. A witch sat slightly away from that table with a toddler in her lap eating cake with its fingers. Chocolate was smeared over its face and hands, the mess completely disregarded by everyone. With a painful twinge, Harry wished away everything in front of him and longed to rewind his life backward to let it play out again another way. 

“He is fighting the potion,” Snape observed, drawing Harry’s thoughts back to the immediate table.

Dumbledore stood up and peered down at Harry. “I don’t mean to,” Harry tried to explain.

“Come, let’s visit some friends. You are in need of a distraction.”

Harry followed him off the platform and over to the Weasley table. “Harry!” several of them shouted when they saw him step over. “We thought you’d got too good for us,” Fred said. At Harry’s look of hurt disbelief, he slugged him lightly in the stomach. “Just kidding, Harry,” he insisted quickly.

“Great party,” Ginny said, stepping over from a nearby table full of students. She gave him a light hug. “I don’t know what we’d do without you,” she said playfully.

“Harry,” Mrs. Weasley said emotionally from two seats away. She reached across the table toward him in vain, as it was too far. Harry wondered how many chalices she had consumed as he humored her and walked around to her seat. Without standing up, she hugged him around the middle, pressing her cheek into his belly. “I can stop worrying about you so much now, I guess. I can’t believe you did it.” She sniffled.

“Mum,” Ron said uncomfortably. “Sorry, mate, too much mead,” he said to Harry. Harry just shrugged that it didn’t matter. She finally let him go. He went around the table in a floating haze, shaking hands…even Percy’s. 

As they stepped away from that table, Dumbledore whispered in his ear, “I much prefer the real you, but this will have to do.”

At the allotted hour, they settled on the lawn to watch the fireworks. Diggle outdid himself by everyone’s estimation. The extravagant display went on and on. Harry sat on the grass between Hermione and Ron to watch it. The other guests of honor sat in overstuffed chairs near the steps. Harry was certain he could have joined them but had no desire to.

An hour into Dedalus’ show, Harry could feel the potion wearing off. As the fireworks continued, he felt more and more like a boat left aground during low tide. 

Hermione touched his hand. “You all right, Harry?” she asked quietly enough that Ron didn’t hear over the sounds of the crowd and the fireworks.

“No,” Harry answered. “I feel really strange.”

She gave him a pain-filled frown and fiercely grasped his hand. “Even though you should feel better not having Voldemort rattling around in your head, it will probably take some getting used to,” she said hopefully. “Do you feel relieved at least?”

“Yes, definitely.”

“Everything is ahead now.” She smiled earnestly at him. It was infectious, easing the ache in his chest at least as well as the potion had. He took a deep breath as a giant flower in blue and red burst into the sky, its petals segmenting and drifting on the wind.

As the display went on and the crowd quieted, Harry leaned back in the cold grass and closed his eyes. The colored lights flickered through his eyelids. Eventually, he fell into a calm sleep.

Hermione noted Harry had drifted off, despite the whistle and sizzle of the spells over Hogsmeade. She nudged Ron, who rolled his eyes and shook his head. “He’d fall asleep during a World Cup Quidditch match too, I think, even if he were playing in it.” Hermione giggled. Ron took her hand and held it across Harry’s supine form. 

A time later, someone bent close from behind. Hermione turned and found the headmaster crouching near Harry’s shoulder. “How is he doing?” Dumbledore asked. At Hermione’s shrug, the old wizard frowned. “Perhaps it is time to take him to his dormitory.”

“He is sleeping all right,” Hermione pointed out.

“I doubt if the cold ground is doing him any good,” Dumbledore commented quietly.

“I’ve been using a warming spell on it for him,” Hermione said.

Dumbledore gave her a soft smile. “We shall leave him here then.”

A booming firework woke Harry a half hour later. The memories of the day flowed through him as he watched a thousand spinning wheels throw sparks throughout the night sky. He sat up and looked around the lawn. It had thinned down to half the number as before. Harry looked up as Fred and George came by with steins, full to the brim.

“More mead, Harry?” one of them asked.

Harry accepted a heavy mug. It was pleasantly warm, so he wrapped his hands around it gratefully. Ron took one too. Hermione insisted that she would share Ron’s. 

Halfway through the mead, feeling sleepy and over-warm, the fireworks finally finished. Everyone clapped for a long time. Harry wondered if the many distant figures moving around the side of the lake could hear them. The figures flashing in and out of the firelight made him catch his breath. It reminded him of the things moving around in his green-hazed vision. 

“Harry?” Dumbledore queried from nearby, closer to the castle steps. They all stood up and stretched at this cue. The headmaster clearly wanted to ask something, but the crowd pressed in, touching Harry and expressing their gratitude. Harry drew his eyes from Dumbledore’s and addressed each person as much as possible.

The next morning, breakfast was served an hour late to accommodate the party ending after two in the morning. As everyone settled into their seats, Dumbledore stood up. “Welcome, everyone, to your first full day of freedom. We are going to make this a Hogsmeade day for the Third to Seventh Years.” Cheering interrupted him at this point. “Wait, wait,” Dumbledore said in amusement. “I’d also like to announce that we have decided, after much deliberation, to cancel end-of-year examinations.”

Ron jumped out of his seat at this. “Yes! I love you, Harry,” he said, shaking his friend’s shoulders roughly in celebration.

Dumbledore went on, “As well, we shall have an exhibition Quidditch match on the afternoon immediately following the last day of O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. testing. Yes, yes, you cannot skip those, I’m afraid. This match will be composed of teams combining two houses. Hufflepuff and Gryffindor will form one team. Slytherin and Ravenclaw another. Two practices will be scheduled for the weekend before for each team. Equal numbers from each house must be on each team, including the backup. I will let the captains work out how positions will be assigned.”

Much conversation followed this announcement.

“That is all,” Dumbledore said. As he sat down, plates of food appeared in the center of the tables.

“Did you see this?” Hermione asked Harry with a nudge of her elbow. She held out the Daily Prophet for him.

Harry took it and gaped at the photo below the two-inch-tall headline of “Voldemort Defeated!” It was a black and white image of himself standing over Voldemort’s body, taken from the level of the outside steps, so it looked slightly up at him. At first he thought the image wasn’t moving, then he realized that the hem of his robe shifted as though in the breeze. “I didn’t see a photographer,” Harry said thoughtfully.

“Apparently the Ministry leaked the picture, one of their recording staff took it when they came in with the Aurors.”

Harry glanced through the article, glad to see there was no mention of his lack of a girlfriend. There were lots of quotes from various officials and diplomats, even Muggle ones, praising Harry’s success. He finished the lead article and looked back at the picture. His eyes looked haunting, even to him, like he was seeing something far off that no one else could. When he tried to give it back to Hermione, she told him to keep it. She had another copy.

“We’ll have to find Zacharias after breakfast,” Ron said. “Work out the teams right away.” He had a deeply committed tone to his voice.

“You can be captain, you know,” Harry said as he bit into an oily strip of bacon.

“You are,” Ron said in surprise.

“No one is, Ron. There weren’t any teams until two minutes ago.”

Ron looked at him closely. “You want me to do it instead of you?”

Harry considered the best tactic here. “I’m sort of tired of doing everything,” he hedged.

“I mean. I will if you really want me to. But I think you should be captain.”

“Co-captain, remember. And I’d rather you do it. Really. You and Zac for this match. Honestly, Ron, you sound like you care more about winning than I do. That makes it better for the team.”

“You still want to be on the team though, right? Seeker?”

“Yes, I would. But we’ll work that out with Zac later.”

Zacharias Smith found them before they finished. “Mind if I sit down?” he asked. He had three other players in tow. He sat beside Ron and leaned over him to talk to Harry.

“Ron is Gryffindor captain,” Harry pointed out.

“Oh, okay.” He turned to Ron. “I figure it like this: Me, Bell and Weasley as Chasers. Sloper and Riggs as Beaters. You as Seeker,” he pointed at Harry. “And since Eleanor is really bumming about not playing, you and she have a face-off for Keeper.” He said this last to Ron.

Ron thought a moment. “Okay, I’m all right with that, except, who are we going to swap out if I win the position? Not you,” he said to Harry. 

“I didn’t say anything,” Harry insisted. “I know Katie really wants to play as it’s her last year. Jack might be willing to play as extra.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Ron said. “What kind of formations do you like to use?” he asked Zac.

As breakfast wound down and the co-captains debated, many students came over to congratulate and thank Harry on their way out. Harry chatted with them, thinking that it would be good to get over this so things could return to normal. Dennis Creevey asked him to sign his copy of the Prophet.  Harry grinned and used his marker pen charm before putting his signature in the bottom corner of the photograph.

“Where’d you learn that?” Hermione asked.

“Minister Obolensky,” Harry explained after the Creevey brothers had left. “He had me sign a Hogwarts napkin for Victor Krum at the party last night.” At Ron and Zac’s expressions, Harry added with a quirky smile, “Said Victor’d made him promise to bring something back.”

Ron shook his head. “I’m sorry, Harry, but Voldemort is just not as important as Quidditch.”

“Tell everyone else that.”

At lunchtime, McGonagall stopped by their table and put three letters in front of Harry. The top one was from Mrs. Weasley. He gave his teacher a questioning look. She paused in departing to say, “See me after lunch and I will explain, Mr. Potter. And, no, I am not doubling as a school owl, if that is your question.”

As instructed, Harry headed up to his Head of House’s office. He hoped his fellow students settled down soon, their grateful outpourings were starting to wear thin even over his own relief.

“Ah, Mr. Potter,” she said in a welcoming voice when he stepped in after knocking. She bent over behind her desk and lifted up a wooden box which she placed on top. “These are yours, I believe.”

Harry froze and blinked at the box, which was almost three quarters full of letters.

McGonagall went on. “We have put a diversion spell on the castle for the owls delivering post to you. Here is today’s.” As Harry peered tentatively into the crate, she went on, “They have all been checked for curses, so have at it.”

Harry put a hand on the lip of the box and said, “I have assignments due tomorrow, Professor,” he pointed out, trying to imagine opening and at least perusing all of these.

McGonagall’s lips curled slightly as she gave him a much softer look than normal.

“Professor?” Harry prompted, when she didn’t speak.

She came around the desk and said, “I think I can probably assist for a little while.” She flicked her wand and three more smaller crates appeared on the floor. “Let’s see what we have here,” she muttered as she reached into the large box. With a letter opener from her desk, she slit the first one, unfolded it, and glanced over it. “General appreciation,” she stated and dropped it into one of the boxes. The second and third were also so classed. The fourth, on much finer paper, she looked at a little longer before handing it to Harry.

Harry unfolded the creamy smooth paper and read the first line of flourished script. He glanced at the envelope and the fancy seal in white wax on the flap. Freelander, it read, with a crest of a sheep and a flying pheasant. Harry had to reread the first two sentences to understand them. “Is this guy a nutter?” Harry asked his teacher. 

“Lord Freelander is a very nice man, Harry. I’ve had the honor of meeting him on at least two occasions. His great grandfather was a wizard and so is he. Some families have magic only every few generations and his is one.”

“But he doesn’t know anything about me. Why in the world would he want to adopt me?” Harry asked as he glanced at the rest of the letter. 

“Succession, Harry. He has no children of his own, I believe.” She dropped two more letters into the first box. “If I were you, I would not dismiss it out of hand. You could do worse than an estate with a wing of your own, horses to ride hither and thither, and all the personal tutors you could wish for to continue in whatever career you fancied.”

Harry gazed at her as though she too had lost her grip on reality. He accepted the file folder she handed him to store the letter. The last sentence caught his eye as he started to fold it. It offered, independent of the other things, to pay for his apprenticeship, should he require it. Harry, feeling a little numb, slipped the letter back into its envelope and stowed it. McGonagall handed him two others.

“I hope those aren’t the same,” Harry said, seeing one on almost equally nice paper. 

“One is…similar,” she said. “The other just exceptionally well written.”

Harry opened the top one, written on scented pink parchment. It was an offer of a daughter’s hand in marriage, the accompanying photo wasn’t too bad. He was very glad she wasn’t anyone he knew from school. He folded it away and dropped it into one of the unused crates. McGonagall, seeing this, dropped the one she had just opened on top of it with a wink. Harry shook his head in dismay as he unfolded  the second one.

“Have a seat,” McGonagall said, pulling a chair over from the wall for him. 

Harry accepted it as he read the letter in his hand. The handwriting was simple but the words were startlingly eloquent, forcing him to imagine they were intended for someone else in order to get through them. He wished he had had such words last night when he had been asked to speak. When he had finished, he folded it carefully. Gratitude conveyed in that manner felt very different from everyone else’s. 

McGonagall continued opening and sorting as Harry stared at the cages on the far wall. When he finally returned to himself, he was surprised at her patience. He dropped the letter into the fullest crate and accepted the next handful.