Mini-Hogwarts

A couple of pieces I wrote for a Harry Potter roleplaying site that I was COERCED into joining. They needed a Harry, see. It fell apart a week after I joined due in no way to my spotlight-hogging. It's what Harry does.

Harry sat in the Griffindor common room, chewing a nib. It’s not like he was deep in thought or anything. He just liked the taste. It reminded him of home. At least, it would have, if he could remember what his home was like. His memories of his place of birth were hazy and sadly lacking in nibs. It was all hovering broomsticks, liquid foods, green light, high-pitched laughter, and dead parents. He missed said parents sorely, even though he had spent less than a year of his life with them and had not really developed any emotional bonds. A tear trickled languorously down his cheek and to the side of his mouth. Harry’s tongue shot out, drawing the wayward teardrop into the confines of his mouth just like Sirius had taught him. The tear was salty. He liked the taste. It reminded him of home.

----------------

Harry soared above the ground, exulting in the abrasive feel of the wind on his tender flesh. This was what it meant to be alive – the vaguely uncomfortable removal of his outmost layer of skin. Harry pitied the poor people who never experienced broom travel. They were like animals, really. They milled through their lives without ever truly living, then were slaughtered and converted into delicious meat products. At least, that’s what Sirius had said. Lupin had said that Sirius was lying, that he was just messing with Harry’s head. But Sirius was his godfather and Lupin wasn’t, so Sirius had to be right. He just had to be.

Harry tried not to think about it anyway. It always made him hungry.

Suddenly, there was a movement in the periphery of Harry’s eye. A figure swathed in black and gold was meandering towards the Quiddich pitch. Harry immediately recalled that old “wizard rhyme” Sirius sung him to sleep with: “Black and Gold will strike you dead. They’ll break your legs and smash your head. If you see those colors, you should flee. Or before too long, a corpse you’ll be.”

Thanking his imminently knowledgeable godfather for this nugget of wisdom (silently, of course), Harry turned tail and directed his broom to the behind a seat in the bleachers. He laid down, the better to conceal his scarlet and gold robes (“Scarlet and Gold will slice you up. They’ll make your skull into a cup.”) From this secretive locale, he could hopefully watch this new and possibly leg-breaking person unobserved.

---------------

How did the stranger know Harry’s name? Was he a servant of the dark lord? Harry raised his wand, determined to end this contest before it started. Against such a determined and deadly foe, Harry had no choice but to use an unforgivable curse. He would just have to deal with the consequences later. It’s not like he would be sent to Azkaban or anything. He was the boy-who-lived, after all.

“CRU–“ Harry began.

But wait. Harry recognized this assailant. Ashling or Usher or something like that. From Hufflepuff. Probably not a threat, unless he was imperiused. Harry would have to play it cool.

“–el of me to have hidden when I saw you,” Harry recovered, converting his hostile wand-stroke into a clumsy wave of greeting. “I just wanted to see how well you could fly. It’s too bad you’re not in Gryffindor. I’d like to see you on our team. You would make a fine chaser.”
It all depended on small talk. If they couldn’t make small talk, then they were under the Imperius curse. Harry sniffed at the air. Imperius or not, he was certain that something smelled fishy. No doubt about it – this “Hussar” fellow was involved up to his freckles.

----------------

Not imperiused, then. No-one suffering from mind control could scream like a baby in such an exemplary manner. That was certainly a weight off Harry’s mind.

On the other hand, there was the issue of the spooky roar. Harry would, of course, have to investigate. For all he knew, the roar could be a portent of great evil to come. And if evil was coming, Harry wanted to be in the thick of it.

He might need Cracker to help him, though, and people were woefully unwilling to rally round if dead. In Harry’s professional opinion, this reluctance to provide assistance from beyond the grave was a serious drawback to most people’s attitudes. So Harry would have to save Trucker’s life.

Flinging himself towards the bewildered keeper-wannabe, Harry shouted, “Get down!”

That's everything. The kid's name was Asher and he may or may not have been a Death Eater.