Harry flashed immediately up onto Fawkes’ perch, nearly giving the poor bird a heart attack.

#Hello Breeze,# Fawkes greeted him after nearly falling off his perch when his friend suddenly arrived next to him.

#Sorry, Fawkes, I didn’t intend to give you a fright,# Breeze apologized. #In fact I had something urgent to talk with my Grandfather about.# He threw a glance at the Headmaster’s desk, curious about the voices he was hearing.

Dumbledore was just in a meeting with Minister McNeill. He sighed and turned to Fawkes again. #Do you think their conversation will take long?#

#You know that’s the boss of those who believe all the eggs belong to them. As the bad ones got their wings clipped a few weeks ago, they are discussing new nests for their hatchlings.#

#Oh, Fawkes, that’s just what I wanted to speak with Granddad about. But I can’t transform here now,# Harry told his friend urgently.

#Don’t panic, Breeze. Let me talk to the meddling old coot,# Fawkes replied and turned to Albus. #Albi, Breeze had an idea concerning what you are just discussing with the all-mighty fool. Shall he flash out of your nest, transform and enter again in his human form?#

Albus gave him a nod, before he excused himself with his visitor. “I’m sorry about the interruption; my phoenix sometimes thinks he has to give advice, which can be useful, but in this case it wasn’t.”

In the meantime, Breeze had flashed away after Fawkes had told him, #The Password for the annoying busy-body outside is ‘Chocolate phoenix’.#

He transformed back into Harry, shaking his head about how bold and at the same time funny Fawkes was. He told the Gargoyle the password and knocked on the door of his grandfather’s office, thinking feverishly about what to say in order not to be thrown out immediately. Finally, he was called in and hesitantly entered the office he had only left minutes ago.

“Minister McNeill, Professor Dumbledore,” he greeted the two men, before he silently added, “Hi Fawkes.”

“Nice to see you, Mr. Snape,” the Minister returned the greeting, while Dumbledore ushered him into a seat.

“I’m sorry to interrupt your meeting, Professor. Maybe I should come back later,” Harry said, suddenly feeling very bad about interrupting a meeting with the Minister.

“No, Harry, I believe what you wanted to talk about just fits into the topic the Minister and I were speaking about, therefore, I would appreciate hearing your idea first,” his Grandfather ensured him.

“All right then; to make it short, I had an idea. As you know, we don’t need the Shrieking Shack anymore for werewolves because of the Wolves Cure, so I thought; maybe we can completely renovate the building and turn it into an orphanage for wizarding children. That would also solve the problem about what to do with the Death Eaters children, who have lost their parents and relatives when they were kissed by the Dementors.”

Seeing that both men were listening intently, he continued, “Apart from the orphanage I think we should give students, who do not have a proper home to return to during summer holidays, the possibility to stay in a part of the orphanage during the summer break, and furthermore, I think we should have a Primary school for wizards, perhaps in an adjoining building. Probably, the money in my vault will suffice for the supplies, renovations and construction that will be needed. With the money from the Order of Merlin and the money that will be coming in because of my translations, I think we should be able to do a lot, shouldn’t we?”

“Yes,” his Grandfather confirmed. “Although, I don’t want you to pay for everything, the ministry should be able to at least pay for the wages of the teachers we need to work there. And I think your ideas are not only extremely good but also very reasonable. They wouldn’t be too difficult to put into motion and complete either. What do you think, Dermot?”

The Minister seemed stunned. “How can a twelve-year-old have so many good ideas?”

“Dermot, I have told you where Harry comes from, haven’t I?” Dumbledore asked and when the Minister nodded, he told him about Harry’s experiences growing up without his parents.

“All right,” the Minister said pensively. “I would like both of you to accompany me to the Ministry for an impromptu meeting. I appreciate your ideas very much, Mr. Snape, and I intend to put them into motion as soon as possible.”

The Headmaster threw a look at his watch, seeing that the last morning class had just finished, and turned to Fawkes. “Fawkes, please go and get Professors McGonagall and Snape here quickly.”

Fawkes flashed away and was back within two minutes. #They are coming.#

A few minutes later, the two professors entered the room and sat down, where they remained speechless when they were told about Harry’s ideas. “I just wanted you to know that I’m taking your son accompany us to the ministry, Salazar. I would ask you, Minerva, to take over the school during my absence,” Dumbledore asked. When everyone was in agreement the Minister, Dumbledore, and Harry used the Floo to get to the Ministry of Magic.

-----

Harry and his grandfather spent the whole afternoon at the Ministry. By the time they returned to Hogwarts, the planning was done. Within the week Harry had to make a floor plan for all floors and rooms within the new building, which Albus and Harry would then present to the Ministry in a week’s time. On Monday they would have another meeting at the Ministry together with the two wizarding architects they had agreed to entrust with the renovation, which was going to take place during the next week. Of course the architects would be able to build the interior by themselves, but as it was Harry’s idea and as he was the one donating the money, everyone had agreed that he should have the privilege of designing the building.

They returned to Hogwarts just in time for dinner. Since Harry hadn’t had a chance to eat lunch, he was very hungry, although he was even more tired than he was hungry. When he asked his grandmother, who had been waiting for them at the Headmaster’s office, if he could go back to their quarters instead of having dinner with everyone else, Minerva took her grandson by the hand and pulled him down to the Great Hall. “Your friends have been so worried about you because they didn’t know where you were that they have skipped their Charms lesson in order to look for you. Fortunately they were clever enough to come here first. So, you will have to have dinner together with them before you return to your room, and you must eat something, since I know that you were probably so busy you did not stop to even think to eat,” Minerva told him strictly.

His friends were more than relieved when Harry showed up for dinner. However, as he had eaten breakfast together with them, he sat down next to Severus at the Slytherin table. He couldn’t tell his friends what he had been doing in the Great Hall anyway – they just had to wait until they could meet in his room after dinner.

Later in his room, he told them the whole story and his friends were stunned. “What a great idea, Harry!” Severus was the first to find words, and hearing this, the others started to talk at the same time.

“How did you come up with this idea?”

“How are you going to arrange the interior?”

“Have you already made plans?”

“What is the building going to look like?”

“Now, wait,” Harry said tiredly. “The only thing I have thought about so far is that I want to have a three store building. The first floor should be the Primary school for the children from age six years until age eleven when they will then be entering Hogwarts. The second floor and part of the third floor are for the orphanage. However, on the third floor I want to have some space for the students, who don’t have parents or a proper home, so that they can spend their holidays there instead.”

“Will the Primary school be accessible for all wizarding children or only for the children of the orphanage?” James asked interested.

Harry sighed. “Frankly speaking, I hadn’t thought about that, but I think it would be a great idea to make the school open to all wizarding children. They could come to the school either by Portkey or by Floo every day, so that wouldn’t be a problem. In this case, however, we’ll need five classrooms and five different teachers, so that every year has its own classroom and teacher.”

“But that’s not so bad; parents can pay tuition for those that are not in the orphanage and send them, it only needs to be free for the children of the orphanage,” Severus threw in.

“Of course, and there will be enough parents who will be happy to send their children to Hogwarts Junior School or whatever it’ll be called that it will pay the salaries of the teachers and the supplies that are needed to keep it running,” Sirius added.

“I actually like the idea. Maybe we can call the orphanage ‘Hogwarts Children’s Home’ and the school ‘Hogwarts Junior School’.” Harry confirmed.

-----

During the next few days, Harry spent every minute he had free planning the new building. On Friday, he had finally finished his plan but was still contemplating whether it would be better to re-build the Shack or to just enlarge the building magically. The only thing he was sure about was that the new house would need twice the space of the old Shack apart from the third floor they had to add on the top.

He had made three different plans, one for each floor. For the ground floor he planned five classrooms, a huge multi-use hall, like the Great Hall in the castle, which could be used as a dining hall or meeting room, a small Potions lab, toilets, and a staff room. The multi-use hall as well as the staff room would be equipped with fireplaces that could at least be connected to the Hogwarts internal Floo system. The Entrance door would be situated on the side of the street leading from Hogwarts to Hogsmeade, so that it was easily accessible.

The second floor would hold a nursery, a playroom for the toddlers up to the age of three, one playroom for the older children, one study room for the children that wanted to read or do their homework, one multi-use hall similar to the one on the ground floor, toilets, a staff room and one teachers’ apartment. Finally there would be a tiny kitchenette, with a connecting door to the Hogwarts kitchen, which would be providing the food needed for the building. Harry knew that his grandfather was able to add additional rooms and doors within the castle, and he intended to ask him for this connecting door. In case it could be easily added, he even wanted to have a connecting door from the Entrance hall of the castle to the Entrance of the building.

On the top floor Harry planned to have several dormitories that could hold four to six beds, depending on the number of children in the orphanage. Then he planned five smaller rooms with two to four beds for Hogwarts students who had to stay during the summer holidays. This floor would also hold washing rooms as well as a Hospital room with a connecting door to Madam Pomfrey’s office, although Harry hadn’t yet spoken to his grandfather or Madam Pomfrey about it. Then there would be one teachers’ apartment and a guest apartment that could be used for anything.

“On the third floor, you should make a common room for the students staying over the summer, so that they don’t have to spend all the time in their dormitory rooms, especially when they have friends staying too,” Salazar advised Harry, looking over the detailed plan. “One more point is that they need a library with children’s books, which I would place on the ground floor, so that it is accessible to the day school children as well.”

-----

After dinner, Harry and his friends met in Harry’s room for their Animagus training as usual. Apart from Severus, everyone had managed to transform completely during the last two weeks. However, on this Friday evening, Severus succeeded in transforming into his snake form, too.

“Wow, Severus, you did it,” Lily beamed. “You’re beautiful!”

“Very good, Severus,” Harry hissed to his friend in Parseltongue. “How does it feel to be a snake?”

Severus glanced at his friend. “It feels strange,” he admitted. “It seems that I have to get used to it. At least I’m able to talk to you, which is very useful.” He slithered around the room for a few minutes, before he finally transformed back into his human form.

“As you all have managed the transformation by now,” Harry began to tell his friends his newest idea, “what do you think about having an Animagus Party? We could meet in the forest, for example tomorrow evening after curfew and play in our Animagus forms.”

“That’s a very good idea,” James shouted immediately.

“Brilliant,” Sirius agreed.

“Maybe we could finish the party with a picnic near the lake. I’ll ask the house elves for Butterbeer and something to eat,” James suggested eagerly.

They agreed to meet at the edge of the forest at midnight on Saturday night. When Harry arrived in his phoenix form, the others were already there and were running around playfully. He sat on a branch of a tree, happily watching the others, deciding that he really needed to thank his father for giving him the opportunity to spend such a great time in the past, together with his parents and their friends. Suddenly, he was pulled out of his thoughts, when Lily sat down next to him.

#Shall we go for a flight over Hogsmeade?# the beautiful owl trilled.

#Yes, I’d like that very much,# Breeze answered, happy to be able to communicate with his Mum.

They flew all around Hogsmeade, and afterwards they went for a flight around the castle, glancing into every window they passed. The time flew by, and they noticed that James had already transformed back and called everyone together for their picnic. The house elves had supplied James with drinks and food for a whole class, so that they spent the rest of the night enjoying the food and talking animatedly. Nobody even thought of being tired – they only noticed that the darkness slowly began to fade, and they hurried back into the castle.

-----

On Sunday morning, Harry told his friends that he wanted to visit the Shrieking Shack in order to take some measurements of the rooms. His friends decided that they wouldn’t let him go on his own and would accompany him. Directly after breakfast, which they only attended with the purpose of meeting each other in order to do something together as they had only eaten a few hours ago, they headed for the old building.

They climbed up to the upper floor in order to figure out how much the building had to be enlarged on each side, and magically measured the length of each of the walls. Peter had just pointed his wand to the ceiling in the largest room, when a huge part of the ceiling broke and fell down onto Harry and Severus. The two boys were buried under a huge pile of rocks and wood.

Alerted by Peter’s shriek, James, Sirius, Remus and Lily came running over – just to see that the floor had broken in and the pile of rocks and wood that had obviously fallen down from the ceiling was now falling onto the ground floor even knocking a hole into one of the outer walls.

“Harry and Severus, where are they?” Lily asked horrified.

“They were hit by the rocks and then buried,” Peter confirmed.