Harry slowly transformed back and couldn’t see a thing; it was completely dark. As a magical creature, the phoenix could easily see in the dark, which was only one of the phoenix’ abilities but back in his human form Harry didn’t have this comfort. As Harry didn’t have his wand, he tried to cast a wandless Lumos Charm, which fortunately worked immediately. He looked around; he was in a large room. The room was so dusty however, that Harry could hardly recognize anything. He attempted to use his wandless magic to clean his surroundings up a bit, but it didn’t work. Harry contemplated feverishly what to do. Would he be able to flash back? He wasn’t sure, but he did know he wanted to figure out where he was.

Suddenly, a thought penetrated his mind. If he was at Hogwarts, he could just try to call Dobby and he’d find him. “Dobby!” Harry whispered anxiously, and an instant later the small house elf appeared with a crack. Harry relaxed immediately and tried to resist the urge to pull the little elf into a hug.

“Harry Snape, sir, what is Harry Snape doing here?”

“I transformed into a phoenix and flashed here by chance,” Harry explained quickly. “Dobby could you please cast a cleaning spell. It’s so dusty here.”

Dobby snapped his fingers and in an instant the dust was vanished away. Harry anxiously eyed his surroundings and found that he was in a place similar to the Ravenclaw common room. “Dobby, do you know where we are?” Harry asked curiously, but the elf sadly shook his head.

“Dobby is sorry, Master Harry, but Dobby not knows where is here.”

Suddenly, Fawkes appeared in front of Harry and Dobby. #What are you doing here, my nestling?# Fawkes asked, astonished and Harry explained how he flashed himself here by chance.

“Where are we, Fawkes?” Harry tried once more, raising an eyebrow as he looked at his familiar.

#This is the fifth house,# Fawkes answered shortly. #I will explain to you back in your room tonight, all right? Your parents are very worried about you; I have to take you back home.#

“Only if you promise to bring me back here tomorrow and explain everything about this fifth house,” Harry challenged, and the phoenix agreed immediately.

-----

When Fawkes and Harry arrived in the Snape quarters, Lily and Severus were very upset. “Harry, where have you been?” Severus asked sternly, trying to cover his anger, in order not to frighten the child.

“I’m sorry, Mummy, Daddy,” Harry apologized immediately. “Fawkes wanted to teach me how to flash and at first I managed in my room, but then I wanted to flash out here but I ended up in an unused room somewhere here in the castle. Fortunately, Fawkes came to bring me back as I don’t know if I’d have been able to flash back here properly. Sorry.”

“It’s all right now, Harry,” Lily said softly, putting a calming hand on her husband’s shoulder and pulling Harry close with her other hand. “But please be very careful from now on, Harry.”

“Now, let’s go to the Great Hall for dinner then,” Severus suggested and Harry suddenly noticed how hungry he was.

“Yes, I’m hungry,” Harry agreed immediately. Somehow he seemed to have missed lunch, perhaps when he had been asleep in the Headmistress’ office.

-----

Later in the evening, after Severus had read a story to Harry, and Lily had tucked her son in, Fawkes explained to Harry what he knew about the fifth House.

#I don’t know if you’re aware of the fact that I was Merlin’s phoenix.#

When Harry looked at him in awe, Fawkes continued, #Anyway, I’ve known this castle from the beginning. About two hundred years after the foundation, the heir of Ravenclaw, who was a teacher and Head of Ravenclaw at that time, invented the Fifth House. The reason was that the Sorting Hat always complained that there were students that didn’t fit into any house or those that would fit into more than one house. So, the new House was founded and the Sorting Hat sorted all students he couldn’t sort properly in that house. However, about one hundred years later, there were a few years when only ten students were in the House, and the teachers decided to close the house.#

“But why? I mean, it’s a very good thing actually. As far as I remember from the first time I came to Hogwarts, the Sorting Hat couldn’t decide if he should put me into Gryffindor or Slytherin. And why have I never before heard of this house?”

Fawkes let out a trill, sounding like a small laugh. #That, my nestling, is because nobody knows about the House any more. But now as you have discovered it, you only have to make your discovery public to the Headmistress, so that the information will once more show up in the respective books.#

“So as long as I don’t tell anyone, nobody will know, right?” Harry asked mischievously.

#Yes, that’s true. As long as the Headmaster or Headmistress of Hogwarts doesn’t get this information, it won’t show up anywhere. Only the Sorting Hat and I know about it – apart from some of the ghosts of course.#

Before he sank into an exhausted sleep, Harry decided not to tell anybody about his discovery.

-----

Two days later, Harry finally had the opportunity to visit the interesting place again. In the meantime, his parents kept a close eye on him so that he couldn’t get away, so he had to wait as he didn’t even want his parents to know about the House he had found. At first, he wanted to discover everything about it on his own.

On December 23rd Harry helped his parents, Minerva, and Filius to decorate the Great Hall and the huge Christmas tree in the Hall. However, the magic he used to conjure baubles and to place Christmas Charms on the tree, which his mother taught him, was obviously too much for his small body and Harry sat down tiredly.

Severus had watched him the whole time and had admonished Harry several times to stop doing magic but Harry had thought he had known better. Severus sighed, looking at his son. “Fawkes, could you please take Harry back into his room? Harry, I want you to take a nap. Mummy or I will return before dinner to wake you up.”

Harry only gave his father a small nod, already grabbing Fawkes’ tail feathers. When Fawkes had flashed Harry into his room, he turned to the phoenix and said excitedly, “Please, Fawkes, flash me into the Other House, so that I can have a look around. We still have three hours until dinner.”

#I can do that nestling, but you know that your big chicks will go ballistic when they notice your absence. Are you sure you want to gain spider points?#

“It’s worth a few spider points, I don’t mind,” Harry answered curtly and grabbed Fawkes tail feathers. “Please Fawkes.”

Seconds later, Fawkes and Harry arrived in the room, which probably had been the Common room of the House. This time, Harry fortunately had his wand with him as he had needed it to help the teachers decorating. With a few waves of his wand, he cleared the whole House of dust, not only the Common room as Dobby had done a few days ago.

Harry looked in every room throughout the House but couldn’t find anything interesting. While the Common room was similar to the Ravenclaw Common room, the dormitories were exactly like those in Gryffindor. The only thing really unique in this House was the colour. While the other houses were done in two colours, this House was more colourful and was done in green, blue, red, and yellow. Everything looked very bright and friendly here, and Harry liked it immediately.

Harry held out his arm to his phoenix to step on. “All right, Fawkes. Thanks for bringing me here. Now, I’d like to find out where exactly we are. Let’s take the exit from the Common room and try to find our way back home, all right?”

#All right, nestling. Go on and let me sit on your shoulder,# Fawkes replied approvingly.

Harry opened the Portrait hole seeing that the portrait on the other side of the door didn’t hold a human being like in the portraits leading to the other Common rooms. This one here was a picture of several – magical as Harry noticed – creatures. He could make out a phoenix, a basilisk, a unicorn, and several other animals he didn’t know. Several of them started to talk immediately when they spotted Harry and Fawkes. Harry however could only understand the phoenix and the basilisk.

#What are you doing here? Oh, it’s Fawkes, right?# the portrait’s phoenix asked excitedly.

While Fawkes trilled a reply, Harry turned to the basilisk that had asked, “Who are you? Are you a ssspeaker?”

“Hello, I’m Harry. Yes, I can understand you,” Harry replied in Parseltongue. “I will come from time to time to visit you if you don’t mind,” he added, glancing hesitantly at the other animals that were talking as well in spite of the fact that he couldn’t understand them.

“Come back any time. I’m glad to be able to talk. Haven’t met a speaker in a few hundred years and it’s getting boring,” the basilisk told Harry.

“Will you let me in any time, or do I have to know a password?” Harry enquired, just to be on the safe side.

“Just come and talk to me. I’ll let you in,” the basilisk promised and Harry turned to Fawkes, seeing that his familiar had finished his conversation too. “All right, let’s see where we are,” Harry said, looking out of the window where he could see the Forbidden Forest. He started to walk in the only direction possible, waving his wand from time to time to clear up the dust in front of them. Harry and Fawkes passed several classrooms on both sides before the hall led to a wide flight of stairs, which Harry recognized to be near the Ravenclaw Common room.

‘Ah, all right, now I know where this house is,’ Harry thought. ‘Strange that nobody has found it before; it’s so near to Ravenclaw. But of course, even if people discovered the portrait with the animals, they wouldn’t know what was hidden behind it and they wouldn’t be able to talk to the animals either,’ he reminded himself.

Now that the excitement about the discovery and his curiosity had come down a bit, Harry suddenly felt very tired and asked Fawkes to take him back to his room, where he lay down and fell asleep immediately without even having a chance to think about what he had seen and heard.

-----

The next day was Harry’s eighth birthday and Harry was very excited. It was his first birthday together with his Mummy, and Lily had organized a birthday party for him. Harry had always had a small party together with the teachers and students who had remained at Hogwarts during the winter holidays and Tom had always organized a birthday party for Harry at Riddle Manor a few days later, but he had never had a birthday party at Hogwarts, which was his home.

Harry was awake very early. He excitedly glanced at the green dragon clock above his door, noticing that it was only five o’clock. Nevertheless, Harry got up and went straight to the Hourglass to cheek his points. Seeing that he had eighteen phoenix points, while the spider was angrily licking its mouth, Harry became very eager. He only had to receive two more points and he would be allowed to choose a new book! ‘What can I do to get two points?’ he thought feverishly and finally decided to have a look at his mother’s office. Maybe there were some papers to grade.

Harry hurried into his mother’s office and immediately noticed several piles of test parchments on her desk. He picked up the pile with the first year tests and started to grade them, which was very easy for him. Harry loved grading the students’ work and he enjoyed himself so much that he didn’t notice how fast the time passed. When he was finished with the first and second years’ tests he reached out for the third years pile when another pile of parchments caught his eye. He knew that it were the papers his mother used for her lessons.

When he picked up the first few parchments and looked at them curiously he noticed that they were completely mixed up. Parchments for the first years on the top were followed by parchments for the sixth years and so on. It was a complete mess. Harry sighed. His mother must have been really tired to leave her lesson papers in such a mess. He pulled the pile of parchments over to the part of the desk that Lily had assigned him and started to sort every parchment according to the year that was written on the top of it. This took quite a time as Harry didn’t remember any spell to do the work for him but had to sort the papers manually.

When he was finally finished, he was famished. He went over to the other side of the office where Fawkes was peacefully sleeping on the back of a chair and pried the bird’s feet off the chair and onto his fingers from where the phoenix lazily stepped over onto Harry’s shoulder. Together with the bird Harry left his mother’s office and stepped into the Snapes’ living room in order to look for his parents.

Harry couldn’t see his father anywhere but his mother was crouched in front of the fireplace talking to someone. Harry stepped behind his mother and recognized Minerva in the fireplace. “Good morning, Granny,” he shouted happily. His happiness however vanished quickly when Lily let out a huge gasp and turned to him, so that he got a look at her tear-stricken face.

“What’s wrong, Mummy?” he enquired, horrified.

“Where were you, Harry?” his mother asked back, obviously trying hard to stay calm.

“I was in your office grading the first and second years’ tests,” Harry replied proudly and gave his mother a true smile.

However, Harry’s smile turned soon into a gasp when he heard Minerva’s voice sounding throughout the school. “Harry has been found safely in his quarters, thank you all for searching. Please come to the Great Hall for breakfast.”

“Have you been looking for me, Mummy?” Harry enquired and – seeing that his mother was still crying – went over to Lily, pulling her into a hug. “I’m so sorry, Mummy, I only wanted to help,” he told his mother, crying now too.

“It’s all right, Harry, you’re safe now. We just didn’t know where you were, and Fawkes was gone too, and Daddy couldn’t find you on the Marauders’ Map, so we were very worried,” Lily said, letting out a relieved sigh.

An instant later, Severus entered their quarters and went straight over to Lily and Harry, pulling both of them into an embrace. “Harry, where were you?” he asked softly, noticing the tears on his son’s face.

“I’m sorry, Daddy, I didn’t intend to hide; I was in Mummy’s office grading tests and arranging some papers,” Harry answered quietly. “I noticed that I need two more phoenix points, and I wanted to do something to help,” he added softly.

“Thank you very much, my son,” Lily answered calmingly and put a few kisses onto Harry’s face.

“Of course, Lily’s office is new, so it couldn’t be on the Marauders’ Map. All right then, Happy Birthday, son,” Severus said, pulling Harry close.

Before Harry could even answer, Lily echoed, “Happy Birthday, sweetie.”

“Thanks. Um… I’m very hungry. Can we have breakfast now?” Seeing his parents nod, Harry hurried to the Great Hall.

-----

After Harry had devoured two large pieces of birthday cake, Severus addressed his son. “Originally, we intended to let you open your presents now, but due to the happenings this morning it has become very late. Hermione and Luna have offered to take you to the bookshop in Hogsmeade as several people have given you book vouchers. Therefore, I recommend that you only open the envelopes containing the vouchers and have a look at your other presents later as your friends will be arriving in about three hours’ time and you’ll have to be back by then.”

Harry agreed happily and gratefully accepted and opened the envelopes his father summoned for him. Afterwards, he struggled to put on the red snow suit with small lions Minerva quickly conjured for him. When he had finally managed, he turned to his mother. “Mummy, could I borrow your wand for a second, please?”

Lily gave him an enquiring look but knowing that her son normally behaved very reasonably she handed him her wand. Harry pointed the wand at himself and used silent magic to change his outfit to a dark blue colour with small green dragons on it, before he gratefully handed back Lily’s wand.

“Oh, getting fashionable, are we?” Rolanda teased him and everyone laughed.

“Very well done… your silent magic,” Luna commented the boy, and Hermione nodded her head approvingly.

Severus put both hands on Harry’s shoulders and whispered, “I’m proud of you, son, and so is your Mummy. Be careful when you go to Hogsmeade. Fawkes will flash you.”

-----

Two minutes later, Harry, Hermione, and Luna arrived at the bookstore. Before Harry could rush over to the children’s bookshelf, Hermione asked, “Harry, are you aware of how much money you can spend? Have you added the amount on the vouchers?”

Harry shook his head. No. He hadn’t thought about that at all. He hastily pulled the six vouchers out of his robe pocket and handed them over to Hermione who gave him a stern look. “Hmm?” Harry asked innocently.

“You can already do maths, can’t you, Harry? Hmm?” Hermione asked, looking straight at Harry, who shifted uncomfortably on his feet.

“What have you been doing this morning to be so tired, Harry?” Luna stepped into the conversation, quickly taking the vouchers from Hermione and counting them for Harry. “By the way, Harry, just to let you know… I didn’t give you a book voucher because I’ve thought about something else. From me you’ll get a membership card for the huge Muggle library in London. I’ll take you there as soon as your parents let me.”

Harry’s eyes started to twinkle happily. “Thank you, Luna. I love libraries.” He only knew the library at Hogwarts, but it couldn’t be so different now, could it?

It took Harry nearly two hours to choose six books he wanted to buy. When he showed the selected books to Hermione and Luna in order to know if he had calculated correctly and could actually buy the books, Hermione threw Harry a proud glance seeing the kind of books the boy chose. There was a Potions book, a book about wandless and silent magic, a children’s book on Ancient Runes and three children’s books with stories about animals. Getting his friends’ approval, Harry proudly went to pay for the books and smiled happily at the voucher that was left. He carefully put it away so that he could use it the next time.

-----

Fawkes flashed Harry, Hermione, and Luna straight back straight into the empty living room of the Snape quarters. While the two young teachers took the Floo to their own quarters, Harry brought his new books into his room. He proudly put the pile of books onto his desk and stopped dead in his tracks when his eye fell onto the Hourglass. The phoenix smugly smiled at the eighteen marbles in its glass, but now the spider was feeding from two marbles! Harry glared horrified at the Hourglass ready to kill the spider that looked at him evilly.

‘Why? What have I done?’ Harry thought, terrified. Was it because they had been searching for him in the morning? But that hadn’t been his fault, and his Daddy had said ‘All right’. Hadn’t he been such a good boy all the time? Harry just couldn’t understand what had happened. Very upset, he made the few steps over to his bed, threw himself onto the bed and started to cry his eyes out.