In the days that followed, Henry's schedule remained full.
When he had no classes, he practiced in the abandoned classroom—working through new spells or reinforcing the ones he had already begun to master.
Every afternoon at four o'clock, tea was laid out, sometimes with company and sometimes without. He would invite a few Slytherin classmates, or occasionally some of the Hufflepuff students, alternating between the two circles with deliberate care.
During Quidditch practice, Flint's attitude toward him had completed its journey from cautious observation to something closer to open appreciation.
Henry's flying was improving steadily, and his tactical observations from the sidelines were being incorporated into training with increasing regularity.
He remained quiet about it, never positioning himself at the centre of things, but the team had genuinely begun to treat him as one of their own, a young, clear-headed reserve who contributed more than his years suggested he should.
He had also arranged, through Lucy, to have a Nimbus 2000 sent from Diagon Alley. A skilled craftsman required proper tools, and without a competitive broom there was little point in thinking about matching Potter in the air.
He wrote to his family on weekends as well, sometimes about ordinary things and sometimes about recent events at school, maintaining the correspondence with the same care he brought to everything else.
The festive atmosphere in the castle built steadily as October wore on. Pumpkin lanterns that emitted peculiar noises appeared along the corridors, swarms of bats drifted below the ceiling, and the suits of armour had been enchanted to bang their shields or release low, dramatic sighs at unexpected moments.
Peeves was in his element throughout, materialising and vanishing at will, stuffing sticky spider-shaped sweets into students' hats, or positioning himself just around a corner to produce a passable imitation of Professor McGonagall in full scolding mode, which sent more than a few first-years into a panic.
The finest moment, by general agreement, was when Peeves acquired a large live spider and threw it directly at Ron Weasley's face.
Ron was reported to have screamed at considerable volume and covered a remarkable distance in an impressively short time.
Henry kept to his usual routine, though when practising in the Room of Requirement he took care to avoid the more elaborately decorated corners of the castle where Peeves was most likely to have concealed something unpleasant.
Afternoon tea with the Slytherin circle continued without interruption, and conversation had recently turned toward the coming weeks.
"Flint said training intensity will go up after Halloween," Draco said, stirring his tea with a silver spoon, his expression carrying a particular brightness. "He said we can't afford to let our guard down over the holiday."
"The first match is close," Henry said, setting down a scone. "But there's something I've been noticing that concerns me more than Quidditch at the moment. Have any of you observed that one of the professors has not quite been himself lately?"
Pansy dropped her voice immediately. "Professor Quirrell? You can smell the garlic from halfway down the corridor now. And his stutter is considerably worse, yesterday in Defense Against the Dark Arts he was attempting to describe a reanimated zombie and nearly walked into the display stand."
"I also heard," Daphne added, in a quieter tone still, "that some Hufflepuff students reported strange sounds near the east corridor on the fourth floor last night. Something large being dragged, and a low sort of whimpering. Mr. Filch investigated and apparently found nothing."
The restricted corridor on the fourth floor's east side.
Henry's attention sharpened momentarily. It appeared Quirrell had taken the bait Dumbledore had laid for him.
Though one question remained: without Draco provoking the trio into a fake duelling challenge, would Harry, Ron, and Hermione have found the trapdoor at all?
"The castle is very old," he said, his tone unhurried. "Strange sounds are not unusual. Even so, we should be careful after curfew. The prefects have been clear about avoiding isolated corridors and stairwells—and I think that's sensible advice worth taking seriously."
Draco gave a light, dismissive wave. "As long as we don't actually run into anything dangerous. Trolls, giant spiders—" he said it as though naming things that could not conceivably be found in a school.
Pansy and Daphne both frowned at this, neither of them apparently sharing his confidence on that point.
By evening, the Great Hall had been transformed.
The ceiling had gone entirely black, scattered with simulated starlight and long-tailed comets, while thousands of conjured bats circled lazily beneath it.
Giant pumpkin lanterns floated in the air, their carved mouths flickering with shifting light that made their expressions appear to change from moment to moment.
The long tables were already set with festive appetizers: eyeball-shaped meatballs, spider-shaped cheese arrangements, and drinks that bubbled with an unsettling green foam.
The Slytherins arrived in their neatly pressed dark green robes, filing into their seats with characteristic composure. Henry sat with Draco, Pansy, and Daphne, while Theodore, as was his habit, chose a quieter spot somewhat further along the table.
Henry appeared to be taking in the hall's decorations. In fact, his attention was on the staff table.
Dumbledore, in deep purple robes embroidered with silver stars, was speaking to Professor McGonagall beside him with evident good humour.
McGonagall remained perfectly composed, though she was eyeing the plate of mummy-finger appetizers before her with what appeared to be principled disapproval. Snape sat like a dark statue at the end of the table, his expression blank, his gaze making its occasional cold circuit of the Gryffindor table.
Gryffindor was unusually animated: the Weasley twins appeared to be demonstrating something new, drawing repeated bursts of laughter from nearby students. Harry and Ron were in the middle of it, talking across Seamus and Dean with characteristic enthusiasm.
Henry noticed that Hermione was not there.
The feast began. Dumbledore's brief toast was precisely as witty as expected, and the applause that followed was genuine. Plates filled quickly, and the noise in the hall rose by several degrees.
Henry ate at his usual pace, with his usual propriety.
"Apparently," Pansy said, settling into conversation after a few bites, "the Hufflepuffs were talking about something from Charms today. There seems to be some trouble in Gryffindor."
"That would be the insufferable one, I suppose," Draco said, with his customary air of satisfaction. "No wonder she wasn't at the Gryffindor table."
Henry continued with his meal, making no particular comment as he used his knife to portion out a mummy finger—which was, on closer inspection, simply a sausage that had been shaped and seasoned to alarming effect.
He turned the situation over quietly. Perhaps this was worth raising with Dumbledore at some point.
He was not, in any case, concerned about Dumbledore's opinion of him. The conversation that had taken place in the Headmaster's study a few days earlier was unknown to him, and even had he known of it, he would not have worried.
Dumbledore was a perceptive man, but he was not going to look at the prince of the Muggle world, a boy with a family, a country, and a throne waiting for him, and see another Tom Riddle.
The comparison required a kind of reasoning that even Dumbledore's more elaborate thought processes were unlikely to produce.
Henry had no interest in performing for Dumbledore's benefit, or in engineering a friendship with the trio. Harry, Ron, and Hermione were, by any objective assessment, magnetically drawn to trouble in ways that made proximity to them genuinely inadvisable.
His actual interest was simpler. Through the trio, he could get to know Hagrid.
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