Date: Mon, 02 Oct 2006 19:39:10 +0100
From: jpw20@kent.ac.uk
Subject: Hogwarts story: begginings part 5

Sorry for the long wait guys. I hope any fans I have enjoy what I've
written, though after the delay I doubt I have any left! Reality bit hard,
and know I'm back at Uni, so I doubt I'll post regular like. Still, I hope
someone reads this.

I officially do renounce any claim that this is original or real. It is
neither, for those who think the Harry Potter universe is original I refer
you to the excellent series and related books published by
J. K. Rowling. If you think this is real I refer you to the nearest
Psychiatrist. Seek help.

Enjoy!



Christmas was coming

It seemed, to Yoni, brought up more in tune with so-called `pagan'
festivals than Christian ones, somewhat hypocritical to worship
Christmas. The Christian calendar had been changed so many times that it
seems just as likely that Jesus shared his birthday with Harry than he was
actually born on Christmas day. Also so many modern festivals were old
Pagan festivals by another name. A canny of the Roman's to culturally
subvert those whom they conquered

"We won't stop you worshipping you r festivals just call them this instead"

Nevertheless, Christmas was a holiday. A holy day to reflect on the joy of
giving (only somewhat marred by the fact that everyone focused on the joy
of receiving) and the joy of not having to do any work. Despite that Yoni,
Ron, Harry and Hermione regularly spent time in the library searching for a
person Nicolas Flamel. Harry said he had seen the name somewhere, so Yoni
concentrated on books that might have caught Harry's eye, or ones he might
(or should) of read for homework.

Hagrid, despite infrequent interrogations, refused to yield up any
information. Yoni though it a waste of time, the only way Hagrid would
betray a confidence was by mistake; not exactly a comforting thought, but
one he kept to himself. Harry seemed unusually about criticisms levelled at
Hagrid, probably surrogate father/brother dynamic there.

The holidays started, Yoni spent the time at school not, as his friends
assumed, because he wanted to, but because he had to. The lessons with his
demon trainer couldn't be interrupted, Chardanassar had made that clear.

At first the three friends had been enjoying themselves too much to worry
about Flamel. They played wizard chess and plotted ways to get Malfoy
expelled.

When the House elves came around midnight Christmas Eve Yoni pretended that
he was asleep, but kept grunting and shifting when they came too
close. Eventually Jitty worked out it was a game, and he was actually
awake, they played this for the better part of an hour until they deposited
his presents and left.

Yoni though it was best that he wait for the others to wake up, but the
presents were calling to him. They whispered and plotted and schemed to get
him to open them now. After another hour, when the moon shone clear through
the window, he gave in, got up and opened his presents. Quietly.

From his mother he received an enchanted jacket. It had four pockets, two
normal ones on the outside, and two on the inside, halfway down (it was
floor length) and seeming big enough to hold a book or two. In actuality it
could hold a library (though the book you wanted out at this point becomes
problematic). The best part was he wouldn't feel the weight of whatever he
put in there.

While Yoni hadn't made a big thing at being rich he hadn't made any kind of
effort to conceal it either. As a result he imagined the presents his
friends would get him would be fairly generic; after all he had everything
he wanted.

Instead he was hard pressed not to laugh

Ron had got him a second hand book: "Bargain hunter; the book to buy for
the thrifty wizard" It was filled with ways to save money

Hermione had given him a selection of sugar-free sweets and teeth -flossing
string-mints

Harry had given him a book simply called "Argos" that seemed to be
advertising muggle things. Obviously Harry had been paying attention when
Yoni had said he barely knew how the average wizard lived, let alone
muggles.

He had also received the usual plethora from his extended family; books
from his Uncle's on history, including a fascinating one actually written
by his Uncle Kurchoskhov (not an actual Uncle, more like Great-Uncle three
times removed or something) that he had written on the habits and
life-styles of Russian wizards.

And games from his female relatives including a new release from
Hamnmerschmitt where you directing a Quidditch game (minus the snitch) with
your wand and any time you scored your opponent got squirted with gobstone
goo. Harry would probably enjoy playing that.  Yoni amused himself with
some of the games and read until Harry and Ron started to stir. Harry
seemed quite surprised to get presents

"Happy Christmas" said Ron sleepily as Harry scrambled out of bed and
pulled on his dressing-gown

Yoni was tempted to say "and Merry new year", but refrained himself

"You too, and Merry Christmas to you Yoni"

"Likewise, and a very Merry Christmas to you young Ronald" Yoni said in a
pompous tone, but mellowed it was a smile

Harry laughed, Ron just threw a pillow

"Hey, will you look at this? I've got some presents!"

"What did you expect, turnips?" said Ron, turning to his own, much bigger
pile, of presents.

There was the usual opening of presents repeated a million times throughout
England, with the accompanying exclamations, Yoni just kept
reading. Apparently werewolves were first sighted in Russia, though Rumours
of them had been endemic for years in a large area of, what we now think of
as, the Middle East.

Harry was very pleased with Yoni's gift of his own wizard Chess set, bought
at the last minute through OwlOrder (The two O's you can rely on) after
cancelling the set of seeker gear, Yoni would save that for another
celebration.

Meanwhile Ron was staring open-mouthed at Yoni's gift to him.

It was a Quaffle, a standard ordinary Quaffle. Signed by all the Chudley
Canon's. He turned huge great saucer eyes to Yoni, a mute appeal for
confirmation. Yoni nodded, grinning widely

"I won't tell you how I got it, but it's yours, I hope you like it."

Harry, intrigued, had gone to Ron's side and read the signatures, and then
he looked up, grinning like Yoni, at Ron.  "Aren't you going to thank Yoni,
Ron? It's bad manners not to, you know."

Ron swung a mock-punch at Harry than garbled out some inarticulate thanks
to Yoni.

"Thanks... I mean ... it's ...uh"

"You know, you're cute when you're inarticulate. Your welcome, I'm sure."

It was at this point that Harry discovered his last present; something
fluid and silvery-grey went slithering to the floor where it lay in
gleaming folds

"That's an invisibility cloak! You've got a good friend somewhere Harry."
Yoni said

"Try it on" said Ron, so Harry picked it up and slipped it over his
shoulders

"I don't feel any different" said Harry.

"Look in the mirror" said Yoni, smiling. Harry moved to the mirror and
stared at his floating head.

"There's a note!" Ron suddenly said "A note fell out of it"

Harry picked it up and read it while Ron admired the cloak; Yoni got up and
passed over to Harry.

"May I see the note?" he asked, silently Harry passed it over, then stared
at the cloak with a peculiar look to his face.

	Your father left this in my possession before he died
	It is time it was returned to you
	Use it well
	A Very Merry Christmas to you

It was in Dumbledore's hand, Yoni having seen it before on his letter of
acceptance into Hogwarts.

At that moment Fred and George came bounding in and Harry, Yoni noticed,
quickly stuffed the cloak out of sight. Greedy?

"Merry Christmas all!"  "Hey look – Harry's got a Weasley jumper too!"

Fred and George were both wearing jumpers with their first initial on.

"Harry's is better than ours, though" said Fed, holding up Harry's jumper.

"She obviously makes more of an effort if you're not family"

"Why aren't you wearing yours, Ron?" George demanded "Come on, get it on,
they're lovely and warm"

"I hate maroon" moaned Ron half-heartedly as he pu8lled it over his head.

"You haven't got a letter on your" George observed "I suppose she thinks
you don't forget your name. Buy we're not stupid – we know we're called
Gred and Forge"

"What's all this noise?"  Percy stuck his head through the door, looking
disapproving. He had clearly come halfway through unwrapping his presents
as he, too, carried a lumpy jumper over his arm, which Fred seized.

"P for Prefect! Get it on Percy, come on, we're all wearing ours, even
Harry got one."

"I – don't – want –"protested Percy as the twins forced the jumper over his
head, knocking his glasses askew

"And you're not sitting with the Prefects today, either. Christmas is a
time for the family" stated George

They Frog-marched Percy from the room, his arms pinned to his sides by his
jumper.

Christmas dinner was lavish, as only Hogwarts feasts could be. Harry seemed
surprised by the Wizard Crackers. After dinner they all had a snowball
fight, where Yoni though it politic to get a hit a few times, but not too
many. After all, snow is COLD.

The after supper entertainment consisted of Percy chasing Fred and George
around the common room because they had stolen his Prefects badge.

Finally, they all went to bed. Ron went to sleep almost immediately but
Harry seemed Restive. Yoni faked sleep, as he sometimes did when one of his
room-mates couldn't sleep. After a while Harry pulled out the cloak and
looked at it. Then swung it on and disappeared from view.

From view perhaps, but that left another sense, almost as good if you train
it right. Yoni listened to Harry cross the room and walk down the
stairs. Yoni gave him a count of ten, and then followed him. It wasn't
easy, Harry could move on, when Yoni would have to stop and hide but,
luckily, they met no-one.

It quickly became clear that Harry's destination was the library, and it
became absurdly easy to track him when he picked up a lamp.

He made a bee-line for the restricted section and Yoni though about
stopping him, didn't he know that some books are aware? Probably not, still
the burned hand teaches best, and so Yoni, instead, stealthily climbed to
the top of a bookcase, and hid in the deep shadows there.

Sure enough, the book screamed, Harry panicked and knocked over his lamp,
and probably panicked further when he heard Filch coming. Yoni, who had
been concentrating on sound, had been hearing him for some time. Harry
fled, straight past Filch, while Yoni let Filch get past him, then leaped
to the next bookshelf, and slid quietly down, and out of the library.

Outside Yoni stopped and listened, he could just hear Harry's footsteps
fleeing, so he followed them, he didn't worry about being quiet or
stealthy, he let Harry stay a corner or more ahead, and he doubted Harry
was listening for pursuit. He sounded too...panicked.

Finally he stopped, and Yoni slid into a nearby shadow

"You asked me to come directly to you, Professor, if anyone was wandering
around at night, and somebody's been in the library – restricted section."

Filch had obviously used the shortcut behind Melinda the beautiful.

"The restricted Section? Well, they can't be far, we'll catch them."
Replied Snape

Why would Snape ask to be specially informed of night-time activity?

Yoni felt safe where he was, it was unlikely that either Snape or Filch
would see him, in the deep shadow of a buttress, but Harry would bump into
them if he didn't move, the only way he could go was in through an ajar
door near him. This he evidently did since neither Filch nor Snape slammed
into him. If Harry had backtracked, Yoni was sure he would have heard him
passing, which Snape and Filch shortly did, so Yoni quietly crossed to the
door and slipped in while he could still hear Snape and Filch, trusting
that Harry wouldn't be coming out.

Yoni was already thinking of how to explain his presence when he realised
it was unnecessary, Harry was leaning against a wall breathing deeply,
evidently listening intently, but had failed to detect Yoni's stealthy
entry.

"He must have his eyes closed" Yoni though

 He quickly crossed to a corner and stood there unmoving. It's amazing what
people don't see when they don't expect to see it. Yoni looked around with
his eyes.

The only thing of interest in this dusty, disused classroom was a huge
floor-length mirror, evidently put there out of the way. It had an ornate
gold frame with the inscription Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on
wohsi, which Yoni presupposed was Welsh or its ancestor; Celtic. It was
resting on two clawed feet.

Harry moved towards it, pulling the cloak off his head. Presumably he
wanted to see a floating head again. Yoni rolled his eyes and settled in
for a long wait. He was wrong.

No sooner had Harry stepped in front of it than he whirled around, hand
clapped to his mouth. Yoni frowned, he couldn't have seen him: Yoni
couldn't see Harry, not even his head, so Harry presumably couldn't see
him.

But he should, Yoni quickly realised, the mirror didn't reflect Harry's
head, but it should. Obviously a magic mirror, but what caused Harry such
discomfort?

Harry had turned back now; he looked over his shoulder and bock, obviously
calming. Slowly he approached until his nose almost touched the
glass. There he stayed for at least half an hour. Yoni was getting
impatient to look in the mirror himself. Harry was so engrossed Yoni
doubted he would notice if a herd of Hippogriff's stampeded
through. Nevertheless he stealthily crossed to the door and back in the
corridor then used a simple levitation spell to bang a branch on a
window. He hoped that would be enough, Yoni dared not risk making too big a
noise, Snape and Filch might still be prowling.

It was enough, he heard Harry leave, so Yoni himself went in and up to the
mirror. And smiled.

Prepared for anything the sight in the mirror didn't seem that surprising.

It was Yoni, older and more mature. Laugh lines round the eyes and a
twinkle in his eye. He, or I, was sitting at Dumbledore's desk, behind him
was a picture of Harry cursing Voldemort, sign of victory? While on his
other side... was Ron.

On both their right hand was a matching ring, a serpent biting its tail;
ancient Wiccatta marriage practice: a symbol of eternity for a wedding
ring. They were married.

So does the mirror show the future? Probably not, though not
impossible. Many Wiccatta's had made divination their study, and one thing
they quickly learned was that with the exception of historically
indispensable people, no-ones future was set, or predictable. History
doesn't care about individuals, just the sweep of the general mass.

But they could be wrong

Yoni wanted his relatives to be wrong, wanted the mirror to be right. To be
accepted on his own terms as a man of lore and have a man such as Ron for
his spouse? Who wouldn't want that?

But Yoni, mindful of his danger, left after a few moments more. Head
probably spinning as much as Harry's who, he hoped, wouldn't notice that
Yoni's bed was empty...