Shadow Magic • Harry Potter X Theodore Nott •

(2) Shadows At Hogwarts

Harry wanders through the crowd around the Hogwarts Express, carefully dodging through a shadow when one person almost backs into him as they wave their arms and give tearful snuffling kisses to their parents. Harry still wishes for parents, sometimes, but he's glad he doesn't have some of these.

The month in Diagon Alley sped past. Harry read a lot and eavesdropped on a lot of people's conversations, wherever he could find mention of Hogwarts or his name. He still doesn't think he knows everything, but he knows a lot more than he did when he first got to the wizarding world.

People do expect him to be a hero. They do think he will change the world somehow, just by existing. And they do think that he's a bright, simple, innocent, polished, wise, naive lad, all at once.

Harry has already concluded that trying to be all those things is impossible. He will be what he can, what he wants, and sometimes what other people expect, but he won't tie himself in knots over their expectations.

He finds an empty compartment on the train easily, since he's there before most of them anyway. He thought about putting on his school robes right away, but in the end he went with black casual ones. He slings his trunk into the compartment overhead and sits down with a book on history. It seems, from some of the things he heard from the shadows, that Hogwarts's History teacher is awful.

No one bothers him until almost time for the train to get moving. Then the door of the compartment opens.

Harry starts to wind the shadows around himself automatically. If he does it right and holds still, he can sit there and be invisible; someone will look right at him and not be able to see him. He used that to escape Dudley and his gang a lot.

But then he hesitates. He's going to have to show up at Hogwarts in a way he never did at primary school. And he doesn't have a Dudley running around this time to make the other kids hate him and he hates the other kids.

So he lets the shadows go, and pretends to be reading so intensely that he only looks up when the other kid clears his throat.

Harry glances up with a faint smile on his face. He knows how to look sort-of friendly after his month in Diagon Alley. The boy who's looking back at him is pale and thin and has a large shock of dark hair that's tamer than Harry's. He's also staring at Harry so intensely that Harry thinks he might have seen him if he was wrapped in shadows after all.

"Is anyone else sitting here?" the boy asks quietly.

Harry shakes his head. The boy sits down on the other side of the compartment for him and also takes out a book, although it looks as if this one's on Transfiguration.

Harry is about to go back to his history book, and maybe send out some shadows to spy on people, when the boy asks, "What is your name? Mine is Theodore Nott."

He speaks formally, the way that Harry has mostly heard older wizards speak in the past month. Harry decides he probably has strict parents. He smiles back and nods a little and says, "My name is Harry Potter."

The boy's eyes widen. They flick up to his scar, the way everyone is always doing. Harry can smile politely enough by now, and go back to reading. Or he would, but Nott says, "You're nothing like I expected."

"What did you expect?" Harry asks. This is the first time he's been able to ask the question instead of just playing along with what people want to see.

"A parade of well-wishers, your loving family behind you, flying banners in red and gold," Nott answers immediately. "The last might be metaphorical."

Harry rolls his eyes a little. He knows red and gold are the colors of Gryffindor House, where he doesn't think he has much chance of going. It's concerning to think people know his Hogwarts House before he's Sorted, though. "What do you know about my family?"