Harry McGonagall (Completed)

Chapter 25: Friends of the Family

"Excellent. I see you're all on time," greeted Remus Lupin as he opened the door to his classroom. Harry, Hermione, Padma and Brianna walked in. It was Saturday morning, the day of their first Patronus lesson with Professor Lupin.

"To begin with, let's see how well you're doing so far. Harry, you first."

While he stepped forward and summoned his wand out of his holster, Remus was once again struck by how much this blond boy with an American accent otherwise reminded him of his old friends. His face was almost identical to James' at that age, except for his eyes, which looked exactly like Lily's. He was brought back to the present by the spell being cast.

"Expecto Patronum!" shouted Harry, causing a round shield of light to come from his wand.

"Good job, Harry. I'm sure that helped hold back the Dementor on the train."

"For a few seconds," he replied, slightly blushing, "but then it was able to push it to the side like my Patronus was nothing."

After the other three had demonstrated the spell, Brianna complained, "I couldn't even get that small shield up at all when that monster was in our compartment," sounding ashamed.

Remus nodded. "It is much more difficult to cast the spell when a Dementor is near, and you're all going to have to work very hard to master this spell. It's actually a N.E.W.T. level charm, so it's amazing that you've already had any success with it, especially you, Brianna. You should be proud of what you've accomplished. Now, let's see if we can't improve all your Patronuses before this lesson is over…"

-HM-HM-HM-

After lunch, the four students went to Professor LaVelle's French class, which had twenty-nine students of all grades and houses. Since it was that small, she decided to keep them all in one class – every Saturday afternoon. Hermione knew everything covered in the first lesson, but still wanted to continue in the class. Harry found he was having much difficulty learning a second language.

The next morning was the Ravenclaw Quidditch tryouts, with Roger Davies, the new captain, having everybody earn their positions, even if they'd had them the previous year. Harry found that they went very much the way they had under Michelle the previous year, starting off with everyone flying around the pitch to eliminate a few hopefuls who couldn't fly a broom to save their lives.

Roger obviously kept his starting position, and Sean Bradley, a 4th year who'd been on the team since his 2nd year, was clearly the best Chaser candidate and would naturally keep his starting position. That left one open spot on the starting team, and the competition was fierce. Hermione, on her Nimbus 2001, gave her best, and from the stands Harry could easily see she'd improved a lot over the past year, even if she wasn't as good as Davies and Bradley. When Chaser tryouts were over, he honestly couldn't predict who would win the coveted position on the starting team, but told Hermione she'd done a great job.

When it finally was time for the Seekers to try out, Cho Chang was, yet again, Harry's only competition. She had improved over the previous year, but Harry managed to beat her to the Snitch, yet again. Since it was only the two of them, it was obvious that Harry would be a starter while Cho would be a reserve.

-HM-HM-HM-

As soon as the tryout was over, Harry and Hermione went to lunch, sitting with Padma, who had spent the morning doing 'Muggle Studies' homework.