Harry was walking down Diagon Alley, after having finished his purchases and bemoaned the state of his wallet. There were so many interesting things to buy in the Wizarding World, but he was too broke to get them. He was just coming up with a plan on using the Room of Requirement to find some coins when he saw a head of purple loitering about in front of a quidditch supply store and frowning at a newspaper. He hefted the extra book he'd been able to get by buying the other stuff second-hand, 'Duelling throughout the ages.'
"Heya Tonks," he said after he'd spent a minute or so sneaking through a throng of robes and singing frogs to get behind the girl. Tonks, understandably, startled and dropped her newspaper. Harry had just enough time to see the moving image of a ferocious werewolf snarling at the camera before she bundled up the newspaper and stuck it under her arm. She spun around and tried to bop him on the head. Harry ducked under the hand and went in for a grapple, briefly hugging the girl before disengaging when he became at risk of another fist.
"Stop that." He frowned. "I've already lost enough brain cells recently."
Tonks rolled her multi-coloured eyes at him, which he noted were underscored by dark bags.
"You're like the annoying brother I never wanted, you know that, Harry," she said in a long-suffering tone as she looked around. Maybe she was waiting for someone. Harry looked her up and down, and noted that she was wearing some nice blue robes for once, not school ones, but that she looked unhappy.
"How's it hanging?" he asked. "You don't look too hot."
"Wow, Harry, really, thanks. I'm just waiting for someone and reading a newspaper."
"I asked how you were doing, not what you were doing," Harry prodded gently with a soft voice while locking eyes with the girl. She avoided his gaze.
"I'm doing fine, I passed all the exams I needed to pass and the rest doesn't concern you," she said stiffly. Harry noted that she was hiding her true feelings, obviously, but he also recognized a losing battle when he saw one. He switched topics.
"What was that about the werewolf? On the front page of the paper."
"There's been an attack near Cornwall. It seems that the werewolf population has grown again. Which is not a nice thought," she said grimly. Harry nodded, before shaking his head as Tonks looked around again, trying to find a face in the crowd.
"Well, it was nice seeing you, let's not be strangers at Hogwarts, alright," he said and patted her on the arm.
"Sorry, I'm a bit rude today, wanna tell me how your summer has been before you go?" she asked with a small wince, before glancing around again.
Harry smiled, Tonks was a teenage girl, she was allowed to be a bit impolite sometimes. Wanting to leave her to her appointment he just shrugged. "The usual, sex, drugs and rock and roll," he said and waved goodbye to the lost-looking young woman waiting for someone on a shop corner and reading a probably depressing article about werewolves. He'd lied naturally, his summer had mostly consisted of Occlumency, arithmancy, charms, sorcery, wine, women, friends and family. He didn't do drugs and considering how only a week or two of summer left he didn't have much time to get into the habit of doing so.
-/-
"You don't look very happy, professor. I hope it wasn't anything I did," Harry said with a grin as he entered the Leaky Cauldron and found his professor sitting at a table in the corner, sipping a glass of butterbeer. The man looked grim indeed but brightened up when he saw his student.
"Mr. Evans!" he said, "Don't say that, I haven't had trouble with you since… Well, there hasn't really been an instance, has there?"
Harry shrugged. "I imagine I take up a fair bit of your time nonetheless," he said, at which the half-goblin simply waved him off.
"I became a teacher because I enjoy it," he harrumphed. "I haven't heard anyone who actually likes the job complain about a too-dedicated student," he said, and Harry saw an entry point to mention duelling. This was the fifth day that he and Flitwick were meeting up and they'd already covered all the charms. Now, Harry hadn't mastered all of them to an outstanding level, skurge in particular, was giving him some issues. He just couldn't properly motivate himself to learn how to clean ectoplasm, when it really wasn't an issue he'd regularly encounter. However, he could comfortably do everything on an EE level, which was fine by him. If he could squeeze Flitwick into giving him some spells used in the duelling circuit for the last three days. Well, that would just be the cherry on top.
"About that, professor, I recently gained an interest in duelling and I was wondering if we could look at something in that direction since we still have three days," Harry suggested softly, trying to look innocent. He still remembered how badly his quest for Occlumency had gone when he had prodded Slughorn on the topic back on his first visit to Diagon Alley.
Professor Flitwick sighed sadly at the request. "That's where a bit of bad news comes in," he hesitated and buried his face in his hands, he dragged them down slowly before slapping them on the table and grunting angrily. "The ministry, in their infinite wisdom, has chosen to interpret our missive of your test being in a week, as it being today. Since we started instruction on a Monday and today is a Friday. Technically they claim, we had a week. A work week. Also, they want to oversee the exam," the man explained tiredly.
Harry.exe crashed and he tilted his head, a variety of curses actually threatened to spill out of his mouth and onto the floor. He looked around the Leaky Cauldron, witches, wizards, Tom, a guy using wandless magic to stir his tea. Was he dreaming? He looked back at the professor, who looked, if anything, defeated and for once seemed his size. The man's enthusiasm usually filled a room. Now he just looked deflated. He considered once again if the ministry had just cost him 3 days of personal duelling instruction with a former champion, before taking a deep breath to calm down. "Arithmancy as well?" he asked and received a nod. "I'm angry," Harry admitted, "but I'm also sure I can pass everything with at least an EE."
Flitwick sighed in relief.
"That's good to hear, we haven't revised the theory yet. I was waiting for the last day before the exam was supposed to take place."
"How much time do we have, maybe we can do it now?" Harry asked. Flitwick only gave a small shake of his head.
"The exam is in an hour, we can revise as we walk, but since the examination will take place in the ministry, we should get there early. If only the headmaster was here, he could probably solve this, but he's at an ICW conference. The way it was explained the ministry's reasoning is air-tight, if malicious. If we don't do it now, the proposal for the skip might be scrapped by the board entirely in response."
"Let's just get this done with," Harry sighed. "We should apparate and wait there, who knows when they'll choose to try to push the time forward and claim we were late."
Flitwick nodded, downed his butterbeer in one go, threw a few Knuts on the table and led Harry outside. Once there the student took the professor's elbow and they apparated into a spacious atrium, where Harry was promptly pulled out of the way by the much smaller man. Only when looking back at the dozen or so spots settled against a corner of the gigantic space did Harry see that they'd landed in the designated apparition spots and that the next wizards and witches were already appearing. All of them were rushing out from where they'd landed in great haste, robes swishing and faces pulled tight. Quite frankly, everyone looked stressed as fuck. Harry was still being pulled as they passed the abominable golden statue of a wizard and witch standing at the top of a bunch of magical creatures, all of them looking up at the hard-faced man with worshipful expressions.
"Wow, that's gross," Harry commented, liking the wide atrium a lot less. The white marble bricks looked more performative than aesthetic and the wideness reminded him more of a short man overcompensating by starting a world war than an architectural decision.
"Quite," Flitwick commented as he pulled them to a stop at a fast-moving queue, where they had to have their wands checked and state their purpose of visit. 'Testing.' The clerk informed them of the room they were to go to and so they did. Flitwick finally let go of Harry's sleeve, by which he'd been pulling him and they walked to the elevator doors, of which there must have been more than twenty, all standing in a row with a long queue of wizards and witches waiting their turn. They joined the jittering line mostly consisting of people who probably thought they had better things to do than wait around, when a voice rang out from behind them.
"Professor Flitwick?" said a deep male baritone, which caused both the aforementioned professor and Harry to turn around to look at the man who'd spoken. Shoulder-length wavy black hair, grey eyes, aristocratic cheeks and a light stubble, Harry's eyes widened.
"Sirius, how often have I told you to call me Filius," the professor chided with a small smile, his mood seemingly improving from seeing his erstwhile student. Sirius scratched the back of his head and blushed a bit.
"Sorry, Filius. It's just a hard habit to get rid of considering how often I was in detention," he said before he took a glance at Harry and paled.
"Well, if you hadn't been such a hellion you wouldn't be in so much trouble now. Although I'm glad to see that you did something for yourself. Senior Auror, last I heard?" Flitwick teased, not noticing the shift in mood.
"Ah, yes, couldn't let James lord it over me forever that he was a higher rank, could I?" Sirius joked and looked away from Harry. "What brings you here? Not often I see any Hogwarts professor at the ministry. Only the headmaster at Wizengamot meetings sometimes," he asked, as they all moved further up in line. Flitwick proudly patted Harry on the shoulder at the inquiry and used the opportunity to brag a bit.
"My brightest student, skipping ahead a year in Charms. You should see his Auqamenti, as strong as yours back then," he said, drawing a confused tilt of the head from the apparent Auror. Harry observed the dress of the man, noting that perhaps the dark brown trench coat was the uniform. Hadn't Moody worn a similar thing in the movies?
"But we didn't learn that spell until our O.W.Ls..." Sirius trailed off, and looked Harry up and down again, appraisingly this time. "Well, bugger me sideways. Way to make a man feel inadequate."
"Mr. Black!" Flitwick said at the cursing and Harry couldn't help but chuckle at the ridiculousness of an auror being scolded for saying 'bugger', causing both men to look at him. He shrugged.
"We're not at school Professor Flitwick," he said with a grin. "I've heard worse. Let the man curse."
The half-goblin harrumphed as they entered an escalator and put their arms up to grab onto the golden ropes, right before the elevator did a lateral jump that would have thrown them straight onto the ground if they hadn't held on for dear life. "Don't defend him. Mr Black should learn to keep his tongue better. Especially now that his children will start arriving at Hogwarts," Flitwick said, causing Harry to do a spit-take. He hadn't thought, hadn't considered. If Sirius Black was alive, then why wouldn't he have children? But why were they only a year younger than Harry? That would mean that he'd have to have had them immediately after graduation. Harry looked at the dopily smiling Sirius, who seemed pleased that he could still cause such outrage within an authority figure, more than a decade after he'd left their institution. The look of a man who'd forget to use contraceptives every now and again.
"Harley's been jumping up my back about it recently, yeah. Do take care of her if she lands in your house, prof. Although she's definitely more of a Gryffindor," the man said, causing Flitwick to groan, probably at the thought of another marauder entering Hogwarts. It would probably mix horribly with the twins, who'd started pranking people more and more as the previous year progressed.
Harry meanwhile was stuck on the fact that Sirius had named his daughter Harley. It fit his profile of disdaining tradition and Harley was a normal American name, if a bit rare. But looking at the man, Harry somehow got the feeling that he'd picked it because it was also the name of a motorcycle. He narrowed his eyes and Sirius turned his attention to him, perhaps at the stare, perhaps because he had a question.
"So you're probably in Ravenclaw, right? Smart cookie like you," he teased with an unnecessary wiggle of his eyebrows. Harry shook his head.
"Hufflepuff actually," he corrected. "It's not like a thirst for knowledge can get you anywhere if you're not a hard worker in the end," he said as Sirius nodded along, his shaggy hair flailing all about.
"What's your favourite subject then? I definitely remember Charms being mine," the man continued to prod.
"Probably because it had the biggest potential for misuse in the hands of a student such as you," Flitwick murmured darkly from beside Harry.
"My favourite subject is Charms too. Nothing beats that versatility. I think Defence against the Dark Arts would be a contender, but I can't say considering our professor was a bit…" he trailed off and all members of the trio grimaced at the reminder of Twix having at some point held the position. She'd been a curse-breaker on retainer by the ministry or something, so it made sense for Sirius to have known her. The Aurors office probably dealt with cursed objects every now and again and needed specialised help. Although Harry really didn't know how good Twix actually had been. He couldn't imagine her being particularly competent when one considered how she'd gotten lobotomized at the end of the year. Although to be fair, Voldemort's curse on the DADA position still held strong so it had probably influenced her fate somewhat.
"Well, if it's the lack of a good professor keeping you back, then I have some good news!" Sirius suddenly said, Flitwick immediately interjecting with a warning tone.
"Sirius, that's confidential for the moment," the professor warned, only for the auror to wave him off.
"I know, I know, just saying that there's finally something to look forward to in that regard," he said before perking up as the elevator voice announced that they'd all arrived at the Auror's office. "Anyway, I have to go now, don't do anything I wouldn't, alright!" he said before exiting, presumably to go do his job, probably, to hide some fire-crackers under a toilet seat.
The professor and student continued their journey in silence until they reached the Department of Education and also stepped off the lift.
"I'm curious where Harley is going to get sorted to," Harry eventually stated, breaking the silence. Flitwick chuckled weakly.
"If she's anything like her father, Gryffindor," Flitwick said as they walked down a wide, but empty corridor to the testing room that they'd been assigned. As they got closer they saw that a person was leaning against the wall opposite of the room, despite it being still 40 minutes before their appointment. It was a female figure dressed in a brown robe with her hair and a bun and smoking a cigarette. The smoke curled up lazily in the air but seemed to disappear without leaving a smell.
It was Professor Vector.
"Hello professor, Vector," Harry greeted when they came within talking distance and the woman glanced at them and their approaching footsteps.
"Howdy, Mr. Evans. Seems like they got both of us, huh, Filius," she said nonchalantly.
"They have indeed, I do wonder if they know that provoking Albus like this is not a good idea," Filius greeted back. Vector snorted, finished her cigarette and flicked it into the corridor. It disappeared before it landed, fading like some sort of mirage and dissipating into wisps of nothing. She took a step towards Harry and enveloped him in a surprise hug. It was an oddly good one, it ended with his hair tousled.
"Hope you had a good summer, kid. It's over now," she said as she locked onto his green eyes with her own brown ones, before turning to Flitwick. "I doubt they were thinking overly much. They just saw a half-breed and a blood traitor giving the wrong kind of half-blood a chance to excel. Everything else was just instinct, knowing this institution," she said, before sighing and bringing up a hand to cradle her face in.
"Septima," Filius said warningly, throwing a sideways glance at the youngest present. Harry understood it as a sign that calling out the blood-purism of the ministry was not very bonne tonne and not suited for his own young ears. He rolled his eyes and plopped onto the ground, leaning his head back against the wall.
"What's the point of this stupid politicking and getting high of bureaucratic power when we exist in a society in which a single individual can grow more magically powerful than the entire country combined," he said as he closed his eyes. "Never thought I'd be experiencing institutional marginalisation as a white person in the United Kingdom," he finished morosely, feeling a bit down from the stupidity of recent events. If this was how it felt being stuck in this situation as an adult, he couldn't imagine how bad an actual 12-year-old muggle-born would have it. It brought up the same rage that he used to feel in his previous body whenever some psycho politician or bank owner had gone on a power trip and ruined thousands, if not millions of lives on a whim of greed. But he had magic now.
Did that mean that he could change anything? Maybe, but not anytime soon so he preferred not to think about it too much. He didn't want to get classed as a malcontent with revolutionary intentions before he could defend himself from such an accusation and the brute force arrest or silencing attempt that would come with it. At least in this world, he could grow more powerful, powerful enough to be free of things like this in the future if he continued working. Magic made for a great equaliser.
Nobody said anything to his statement, and they waited there for a few minutes in silence, waiting for the ministry examiners. Harry meditated and the adults probably had their own coping mechanisms for annoying wait times. You couldn't get far in life without the ability to efficiently distract yourself. Harry could have quizzed Flitwick and Vector about some questions, a sort of revision. But he felt prepared enough.
The silence stayed, but not long, before two pairs of shoes started approaching them in the corridor. Harry identified one pair of high-heels and one pair of flats. So at least one woman was coming towards them. He didn't bother opening his eyes for the ministry employees' likely arrival. They didn't merit the respect the gesture would show. His eye twitched, however, when the footsteps stopped right next to them and an annoying sound precluded one of the worst possible people who could have been involved in this fiasco.
"Hem, hem," a shrill, girlish and high-pitched voice started, "I'm so glad you got our notice that the testing would start 30 minutes earlier than originally discussed, hello professors. I am undersecretary Umbridge," it started, already grating on Harry's nerves. Professors Vector and Flitwick gave cool greetings in return, after which the voice turned to Harry and tutted. "Didn't your mother teach you to greet people when you first meet them?" it asked silkily, barely hiding its glee. Harry opened his eyes and glared at the offensive pink blob that had somehow gained the audacity to waddle in their direction rather than have some dignity and die in a sewer.
"Ave, pusillus animo grapheocratus," Harry said as he stood up and continued ignoring the woman, whom he saw gained a confused look on her face at his words, before smiling sweetly. He heard Flitwick exhale powerfully from beside him and Vector chuckle. The old woman standing behind Umbridge remained unamused and seemingly uninterested.
"The official language of the test will be English, Mr Evans, I hope you manage to regain your capacity to speak it by the time your examination starts," she said, clearly not understanding what he'd said but refusing to admit it, and went over to push open the door of the examination hall. It opened to reveal a small room with two tables, one small, in the middle, holding one chair and one big, with three chairs behind it.
The professors and the old woman nodded at each other as Umbridge disappeared into the room and they were forced to follow. "Marchbanks, I look forward to what you have to show us today," she quickly introduced herself and went to sit at the large table without much preamble and tilted her head down to close her eyes. Harry remembered her being an examiner for the O.W.Ls and from her promptly falling asleep recognized her as a woman after his own heart.
"Any explanation why the ministry is trying to muscle in on Hogwarts matters," Vector said as she went to stand by the table. Umbridge, who had opened the briefcase to pull out two large envelopes, an ink well and a quill, shot her a victorious look.
"A student progressing beyond the curriculum before even their second year is highly irregular. The board of governors determined a need to more closely oversee the qualification process for such a move and minister Crouch agreed, offering to provide the facilities and services of the governor of the wizarding examinations authority," she said, but frowned as she noticed that the governor in question had seemingly fallen asleep in her chair. Harry couldn't fault the woman. She likely only ever examined people doing their O.W.Ls and up after all. A second year would be boring in comparison. "Hem, hem. Anyway, let us start the testing, on your table, you will find the Arithmancy and Charms exams. Seeing as you'll be doing both, you have two hours, starting now," Umbridge said and pointed for Harry to sit at the wooden chair in the middle of the room, where she'd deposited the contents of her briefcase.
"Will you all just watch me take the exams for two hours?" he asked in an amused tone as he sat down, before grimacing. The chair was incredibly uncomfortable. He brought up both his legs to sit on it in the lotus position.
Better.
"It seems like it," Flitwick answered when Umbridge said nothing. Harry just rolled his eyes and turned his attention to the two stacks of parchment on his desk. One was Arithmancy, and one was Charms. He took the quill, dipped it in the ink, and started writing. He started with the Charms theory, which, despite its supposed higher level of difficulty, mostly looked the same as what they'd done in the first year to Harry. Although, considering that he was already making his own spells, his sense of scale was probably a bit off.
He finished the entire thing in what he thought was thirty minutes. The ministry hadn't provided the room with a clock. He stood up, hefting the parchment and brought it to the table seating the three adults.
"I'm done with Charms," he announced, gave a bland smile and returned to his seat to finish the other half. Marchbanks woke up and the four adults started poring over his test and debating it. Thankfully one of them remembered to put up some sort of silencing spell so the noise wouldn't disturb him. But from the red-faced duo of Umbridge and Flitwick and the unamused counterparts of Vector and Marchbanks, it seemed like there were some disagreements.
Harry huffed and finished the Arithmancy paper in the same amount of time, this one being substantially more difficult than Charms, perhaps because he'd never actually taken an Arithmancy exam before and thus hadn't known how to prepare properly. He also brought the exam to the table that seemed to have come to a decision while he'd been working. Umbridge looked unhappy, telling him all he needed to know about the results.
"I'm done with Arithmancy," he announced, throwing the parchment on the table and going to lay down on the cool marble ground in front of it. "Tell me when you need me to do some spells," he said from his position gazing at the intricate engravings of what must have been one of the goblin wars spelled in gold on the ceiling. He didn't hear a reply to his statement, so he assumed the same boundary of silence had gone up.
It didn't take long before Marchbanks, apparently fully woken up after the grading, told him to stand up, so she could announce the results. "The Charms theoretical exam has been passed with a perfect score, while the Arithmancy one has been passed with merely an outstanding," the woman said in a bored voice the moment Harry met her gaze, from where she was folding her hands underneath her chin on the table. Umbridge was scowling, but while she'd been hemming and hawing in the beginning, when she was delivering the minister's verdict, Marchbanks' authority as governor of wizarding examinations seemingly didn't give her room to talk much now. "An Exceeds Expectations in the theory part of a subject is grounds for subject advancement if paired with the necessary practical excellence. Seeing as arithmancy does not have a practical exam attached to its theoretical one, I hereby grant advancement to second-year arithmancy," she declared.
Harry looked at Vector, who smiled like the cat who'd caught the canary. "I thought this exam was supposed to be about admitting me to first-year arithmancy."
"Considering the qualifications that students bring to first-year arithmancy are nothing and nothing, it wasn't hard to upgrade an entrance exam into an end-of-year one," the woman said with a shrug, before standing up and making to leave. "It would have been a complete waste of everyone's time if you'd languished through introductory arithmancy with the third years," she said, lit a cigarette and left the room. No one bothered to keep her, considering that her part in the whole fiasco was apparently done. Harry turned to Flitwick.
"I did do the second-year exam, right?" he asked and received a reassuring nod.
"Onwards to the actually exciting part of this whole day," Marchbanks began. "Mr. Evans, it was communicated to me that one of the reasons you were being considered for advancement was your mastery of the water-making charm. Would you please demonstrate," she demanded, leaning forward a bit and finally showing some interest in the proceedings?
Harry looked around the flat room, its only occupants being the two tables and four chairs. Flitwick correctly interpreted his desire, came up and conjured him a rough wooden basin, about the size of a children's inflatable pool. Marchbanks quirked an eyebrow.
Instead of saying anything Harry opted to point his wand at the basin, "Aquamenti," he enunciated clearly. Whereas three months ago it had been akin to turning on a normal garden hose, now the stream more resembled something used by the fire department. Harry had spent more than a week at the seaside. He'd gotten some practice in when it came to his understanding of water and its related sorcery. He cut off the stream once the basin had been filled to the brim, the whole construct having been pushed back a bit at the force of the spell. He turned to the table to look at Umbridge's pinched face and Flitwick's quirked eyebrow.
"That's an impressive output, perhaps toning it down a bit and working on the control would be the next step," the man suggested, making Harry blush. Marchbanks, meanwhile, was more impressed. Her eyes had widened a bit and she was smiling as if she'd just seen a pug do a backflip.
"Marvellous execution, Mr.Evans. The water-making charm is much more complicated than its fire counterpart, due to its production of actual matter, instead of just energy. It's technically a conjuration. May I ask how we are not testing you today in a transfiguration capacity as well?"
"Now, three subjects, that's unheard of," Umbridge interrupted sweetly. "Even Dumbledore only advanced in two."
"I have to agree with Secretary Umbridge," Flitwick said as if it pained him greatly to do so. "The workload would have been immense. Similarly, from my understanding, Mr. Evans only has this one argument for his transfiguration advancement and hasn't learned anything beyond the curriculum that belongs solely to the subject. Or has that changed?"
Harry shook his head. "Charms are more my thing."
Marchbanks frowned "Well, do try this year if you can manage a few transfiguration-style conjurations I doubt McGonagall would allow you to not try. Now, you're supposed to know the disillusionment charm as well? Another sixth-year spell, technically," she prompted.
Harry tapped himself on the head, incanted, and disappeared from sight. He started walking around quietly, happy to see how only Flitwick was able to follow his vague outline. It seemed that the charm had improved once again, considering how he was dodging gazes in a brightly lit room. It made sense, considering how much he'd used the spell during his time at Hogwarts. Not losing access to the Room of Requirement was good motivation indeed. Especially now that it was slowly becoming time to start reselling its valuables. He was sick of not being able to afford anything.
"Homunem revelio," Marchbanks eventually cast, apparently sick of not being able to determine where Harry was. He released the charm, from where he'd been leaning in the corner of the room. She nodded at him.
"This seems satisfactory if you can demonstrate the second-year charms up to an EE standard. Why don't you start us off with the fire-making charm," she suggested, causing Flitwick to grimace and erect a barrier between Harry and the examiners.
"Surely that won't be necessary." Umbridge frowned, looking at the orange globe mistrustingly.
Harry grinned and raised his wand. Not at the proctors but parallel to their seating arrangement. "Incendio," he whispered as he thrust his wand forward.
The world erupted in flames.