The Lion's Den (Book One of The Savior Fables)

Chapter Six

Harry gets a surprise, and it's the first day of classes.

***

Harry woke up the next morning to a tapping noise coming from his trunk. He shot out of his bed, accidentally tripping over Neville's hand, who woke and yelped. Harry opened said trunk, seeing two nifflers messing with his Galleons and chittering about them to each other happily.

"Ted? Teenie? What are you doing here?" he laughed, picking Teenie up, smiling as she nuzzled into his neck.

Neville walked over to him, seeing he was holding something, and his eyes widened as he stared at the two stowaway nifflers. Ted stared up at him with wide eyes, and Harry somehow knew that Ted knew he was in trouble. Just like Teenie is. "Did they come from your trunk?" asked Neville, carefully taking Teenie as Harry picked up Ted.

"Yeah. this is Teenie," Harry confirmed, turning to Neville and showing him how Teenie liked being scratched.

Seamus turned, groaned, and opened his eyes, but shot up once he saw Harry holding the Niffler. "Is tha' a Niffler?!" He yelled, causing Dean to shift and open his eyes. The only one not awake was Ron, and Harry knew he and Neville both had no intention of waking him up. He cast a tempus charm, something Queenie had taught him, and saw that it was 6:30, and that they had an hour before breakfast, and two hours before classes would start.

"What are you going to do with them?" Dean asked, shifting to sit up on his bed.

"These two have always been mischievous, and my uncle is going to be so mad at them. But it's not like I can put them in a box and ship them back to America. They'll just have to stay here with me. I'll give Ted here to Draco," he answered, holding up Ted.

Ted chittered at the sound of his name, beady black eyes peering up at the curious boys. "You mean Malfoy?" Seamus asked with a small frown.

"His first name is Draco, yes," Harry frowned in reply. "Is that a problem?"

Seamus hesitated, looking over at Dean. "We just . . . didn't hear some nice things about him while on the train," Dean elaborated, fidgeting at Harry's narrowed eyes. "That his family is dark, and they would likely want to kill you."

Harry blinked, then Neville jumped in surprise when the boy started laughing. "Oh, yes, they definitely want to kill me," Harry chortled, having to wipe his eyes. "Then I must be a zombie, because Draco had every chance to try and kill me when he stayed with my family for a week before we came to school."

"Really?" Seamus asked in surprise.

"We met in Diagon Alley, and we met Hermione later that same day," Harry nodded. "We've been pretty inseparable ever since. Honestly, I don't get why everyone is expecting children to be exact mirrors of their parents. We're our own people, we can be ourselves."

Neville smiled sadly. "Sometimes, I think my gran expects me to be just like my dad."

Harry scowled. "Well, that's mental. You're Neville, you aren't your dad. Just like I'm Harry, I'm not my birth dad. Or my birth mum, or my adopted mum. I'm just Harry."

"No adopted dad?" Dean asked.

Harry shook his head. "Just me and my mum . . . and my two aunts. And my two uncles. They're not my blood, but family doesn't just mean they're related to you by blood."

"I'm certain I saw Percy Weasley turn as red as his bloody hair when he heard your name," Seamus remarked. "Or, well . . . names, I think?"

"Titles," Neville corrected. "If a student is the heir to their family's House, it's included in the Sorting."