Harry potter : Forgotten Lord

Deciding that it would be best to move on before Percy demonstrated the famous Weasley temperament, after remembering the incident in the hospital wing, he spoke. "Penny, it's fine," taking the high road, as he slipped his arm around her, pulling her away from the older red faced male.

"He should apologize to you Harry," Penny argued heatedly while looking over her shoulder and sending the Gryffindor an angry scowl. Her words echoing back to the audience and the red faced lion.

...

Fighting to keep the smirk off his face, knowing full well he was winning the private battle between the two of them over the Ravenclaw prefect's friendship.

As they walked down to the pitch, he noticed that Penny made no effort to break the hold he had on her and had instead been moving closer to him, rather than pulling away, as Padma finally caught up with the both of them.

In hindsight, it had started since leaving the hospital wing and his recounting of the fight against the mountain troll. It started mainly with spending more time around him, and her increased willingness to assist him with his studies and errands, rather than her own.

She even went out during one of the Hogsmeade weekends and did some shopping for him, picking up some potions supplies for his current brewing projects, and some chocolate frogs.

Of course, he had paid for it, but it had been unexpected since the only person who had ever done anything for him had been Bloodmoon, and that was because it was in the goblin's best interest to help...plus he was being paid to. After all, his relatives had never helped him out, and they were his family, however loosely he used that term.

Then the physical distance between them had also decreased, Penny often sitting as close as physically possible to him, almost sitting on his lap a couple of times without realizing it. It was bit disconcerting actually, it seemed a bit rapid for the natural progression of a friendship.

Even though he could sense no ill will from Penny and her increased desire to be close to him, it was still unsettling. He was just unused to it, but he expected he would get used to it in time, like how he managed to bond with Padma over her fears of losing her sister and being alone. Coming out of his memories he turned his attention back to the Great Hall.

Deciding to get some peace and quiet, he silently glided his way out of the Great Hall, and started heading towards one of the quieter sections of the school, hopefully where he could find an abandoned classroom to practise his magic.

Walking along one of corridors leading away from the great hall, he noticed Hermione was accompanying her two saviours to the feast, talking amongst themselves. They didn't notice him since they were so caught up in their discussion, to the point where he had to sidestep the trio to avoid being steam rolled by them.

Resisting the urge to aggressively tell them, 'watch where you are going,' and privately hoping they walked straight into the potion master himself, he overheard a part of their discussion.

"It was Professor Snape, I'm telling you, his lips were moving, plus he wasn't breaking eye contact," Hermione argued to Ron and Neville, as the trio headed in the direction of the Great Hall.

Once again he had to resist the urge to butt in, and point out that it could have been a simple counter curse, and that the potion's master was sitting with the rest of the staff. But it really wasn't his problem if someone was trying to harm Longbottom. He was no hero and he certainly wasn't responsible for Neville's safety.

He looked out for himself first and foremost, getting involved would just mean needless trouble. That was something he wanted to avoid as much as possible; getting caught up in Neville's drama would just cause him problems in the end.

However, it was good that the girl finally had someone to talk to, he wasn't totally heartless, it truly sucked not having friends. But he wondered how long it would last before it snapped, he gave it another 2 weeks, a month max, before the red headed fool said something stupid and hurtful enough to drive her off.

"It was Snape, I'm sure of it," Neville stated with certainly and a good amount of spite, ending the debate as his voice echoed down the corridor.

At the mention of Professor Snape once again, he was reminded of his need to find some time to practise his potion making skills, as well as needing to dust off his codex, and remove the mental 'junk' that had accumulated.

...

Smiling, he looked down at the cooling mixture with a clear sense of pride. It had taken several failed attempts to successfully brew the Draught of Living Death, but he had done it at last! It appeared just like the textbook had described, the potion itself was like water in consistency, but was greyish black in color, almost like tainted silver.

Of course the only way he could truly know if it worked was to test it on something living. He could test it on a plant, but that would give unclear results, since the potion was not designed with the intention of being used on plant life. After all, it was meant to put individuals and animals into a death-like coma, not plant life, and was widely believe to be the poison Shakespeare described in Romeo and Juliet.

He bottled the potion in an unbreakable vial he had charmed earlier that day, before slowly making his way over to the window, his mind deep in thought as he looked over the grounds, mentally debating just how he could test this potentially lethal potion.

Throwing and catching the charmed vial in the air, he thought over the problem, thinking through several possible scenarios of testing the potion.

It had to be on an animal of some sort, there was no other way to test it effectively, since he wasn't stupid enough to test it on himself or another person. 'Maybe a rat? Or a mouse?' He thought, since both animals would go unnoticed from around the school, and could be found around the grounds or in the forest itself.

After all, he had to be careful not to test it on someone's pet by mistake, and it wouldn't do to test it on an owl, since they held a special place amongst magicals.

Frankly, he couldn't test it on any animal within Hogwarts' walls, just in case it was a familiar of a witch or wizard, that would undoubtedly just cause trouble and attention. However, he was half tempted to test it on Ron's pet rat anyways, after all, the fool had been nothing but an annoyance, and a headache, and there were plenty of cats around that could possibly take the blame if need be.

In truth, he couldn't think of any positive thing about the boy, but then again, he didn't really know him, nor cared to for that matter.

Nevertheless, the Sorting Hat had to see something 'noble' in him, to sort him into Gryffindor.

He had also heard that the rat had originally been Percy's pet as well, prior to being given to Ron sometime after joining Hogwarts... So the rat had to be pretty old anyways, since most rats had a life cycle of around 3 years only, and it would be nearing the end of its natural life anyways, giving him another reason why he could test the potion on the rat, if everything Lavender said was true.

Frankly, it was amazing what Hogwarts students talk about, and was one reason why he put up with Lavender sitting with him, since she proved to be an invaluable source of information when it came to getting bits of knowledge about students, even if she was insufferable most of the time.

Truthfully, it was a fair price to pay for getting the low down on an individual, plus it meant Parvati sat with Padma more often. Once again he confirmed his first day impression about Lavender, reinforcing the need to stay on her good side rather than run afoul of Hogwarts' rumour mill, or at least stay neutral in that regard.

Turning his attention back to the problem, he started thinking over the downsides of testing it on the rat. First, he would have to break into their dorm rooms and locate the rat without being noticed.

However, even before doing that, he would need to find out the password to the Gryffindor common rooms, which he doubted would be easy to acquire. Unless he slipped on his invisibility cloak and stood outside the door for a while, waiting to overhear the password from someone entering. All in all it was easier said than done, and there was no certainty that the rat would even be there.

So, reluctantly, he dismissed the idea; the Weasleys so far had been nothing but an annoyance, so no point in testing something that could possibly kill out of spitefulness. That would be irresponsible, and after all, how long until he started losing his morals and started to cross that line between light and dark?

He knew he wasn't ever going to be a strictly light wizard, he had far too much anger and hate in him due to the years at his relatives. Who wouldn't hate such people after suffering grievously for a decade? Almost dying due to their abuse and losing his childhood? The best he could ever be would be light grey, but more than likely he would be grey... he kind of liked power in all its forms.

Probably end up just being grey at best, he mentally admitted to himself only in the privacy of mind.

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