+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ *********

Chapter 19: The Curse of the Irish

*********

Friday morning was a beautiful day with the early September sun shining down warmly. The day was even more beautiful because Harry knew that he wasn’t in trouble, and, as a seventh year student, he could leave the school on weekends. The evening before Harry had received an owl telling him that Moody wanted him to come to Grimmauld Place to continue their training sessions. So once Harry had made all necessary arrangements he could leave the school at noon to join Moody.

Walking out naked onto the small balcony, Harry transfigured a regular straight chair into a small but comfortable deck chair for a bit of morning sunbathing. Even though he was in a tower at the top of a castle, Harry knew that he couldn’t just lay there exposed and air it out. There were usually a few early morning risers who went broom riding. Harry had thought about the problem and the answer was simple. Harry spread out his invisibility cloak and levitated it. Just like the one-way walls at the Unicorn, Harry’s cloak let the sunlight and warmth through like it wasn’t there. It just covered the magical user from observation by others. With the cloak levitated about two feet above him, Harry had all the protection of the cloak, and all the benefit of his balcony for a bit of nude sunbathing.

With a touch of his wand Harry transfigured a drinking glass into a pair of sunglasses before he settled into the deck chair. Stretching out he felt the twinges of morning wood coming on him, the first inclination of that sort since his ball squeezing session with the Inquisitor General the afternoon before. Harry started wondering if he had time to use the cotton gloves before going down to get breakfast because he found he was quite hungry. Suddenly he remembered just who the hell he was, and that he didn’t have to make such decisions.

“Winky, come to master,” Harry said in a low conversational voice. There was almost immediately a small pop and Winky was at his side.

“Winky obeys her good Master Potter.”

“Winky, I want you to bring me my breakfast, I want a large mug of milk, chilled; I want two eggs, scrambled. I want two small sausages, two slices of buttered toast with a bit of strawberry jam on them. That will do.”

Winky returned about 10 seconds later with Harry’s breakfast tray. Reclining on his deckchair Harry enjoyed his breakfast while Winky watched. It wasn’t breakfast in bed at the Ritz, but better, because it included a special service you usually didn’t get from the help in even the finest hotels.

“Winky, Master wants you to blow him,” said Harry as he lay back down, closed his eyes, and spread his thighs. “Yes, Master,” was all Harry heard. In a few moments he felt the little hands gently caress his testicles, and then a warm moist feeling came over his cock as Winky took it completely into her mouth. Then she began a wonderful rhythmic movement.

With his eyes closed Harry easily found himself imagining that it was Ginny riding his cock. Under such stimulation, it wasn’t long before Harry reached the short strokes and ejaculated a full blast of semen into Winky’s mouth. Harry had to admit that Winky was a pro at this. She kept up her rhythm until Harry’s seed was completely exhausted, and then she carefully drained the urethra of its remaining semen. Afterwards, she gently licked the head of Harry’s cock to take the last vestiges of his seed into herself. Finally, she produced a warm washrag to clean and dry his shaft.

The only drawback to using Winky for his satisfaction over an actual witch was that he didn’t get the psychological boost from the act that came from doing the act with a real female. Still it felt pretty damn good, and it was better than the cotton gloves. Feeling relaxed, Harry told Winky to lay out his clothes for the day on the bed, and then to awaken him at precisely 9:30. Harry had an interesting appointment to keep at 10:00.

A few minutes before ten, Harry stepped out his door into the shared hallway with the Head Girl’s room and found Pansy Parker standing there.

“Good morning, Chosen One,” she said blandly. “I hope you’re bloody well proud of yourself. Yaxley’s been expelled from school, and carted off by the Inquisition at Bartleby’s orders. He’s in a living hell right about now.”

“He put himself there,” replied Harry without an iota of sympathy for Yaxley’s fate. “Of course, others helped him get there, others who aren’t sharing his fate.”

“If you are referring to me I had nothing to do with it, not that I expect you to believe a word I say. But I didn’t put him up to it, and if I had known what he was about to do I would have stopped him myself.”

“I’m sure you would have rushed right in there to save me.”

“Potter, stupid stunts like a hallway ambush is indicitative of something only Gryffindors and other types of morons would try. A true Slytherin attack, such as I would have pulled off, would have been much more subtle, more deeply physically, mentally, and emotionally hurtful, wouldn’t have failed, and wouldn’t have been traceable to Slytherin House. I know you don’t like me, and the feeling is mutual, but at least give me a little credit in the intelligence department.”

“So it was Crabbe and Goyle who set it up then?”

“I didn’t say that, Potter. I just said they were morons, you know unimaginative and unintelligent.”

“All right, so it was Crabbe and Goyle,” said Harry who noticed a slight smile begin to cross Pansy’s face. “Look, can we at least leave off the insults and innuendos then. That’s what got everything going from the first. There’s too much tension here now for everyone to start playing fuck-fuck games. Yes, I over reacted to the level of the threat, but just remember who I’m used to playing against. I can’t afford to take threats lightly. So let’s just cool it and finish our last year out.”

“You really are scared of him,” Pansy said with a more serious look in her eyes. “But if you’re the chosen one then he can’t kill you.”

“It’s been others who called me the chosen one.”

“You’ve escaped from him and his followers more than anyone else ever has, so maybe you really are the chosen one. Anyway, I agree that blame is shared in this, and tensions need to cool. We have a truce.”

*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*

Lying contentedly in her bed, Euripita Balzhoff looked over at the figure beside her. Rolanda Hooch lay there still asleep, her arms around Euripita, and her head nestled on Euripita’s ample breasts. She had originally figured that neither of them would be getting much sleep when they first lay down, but it seems that what Roe had needed the most was rest, and comfort.

It brought back the thoughts of the old days to Euripita. Back then she had been simply known as Ripa to her schoolmates, and she and Roe had been inseparable best friends. They were both muggleborn, making them a couple of worthless mudbloods to the stuck up purebloods they had encountered. They had no magical family connections, no prestige, and no friends when they came to Hogwarts. Because they were muggle born they were shunted by the others into the mudblood carriage of the Hogwarts Express. They had bonded almost immediately out of desperation. Euripita was a little older, bigger, and naturally more self-confident than Rolanda; thus she became the leader of the two, and Rolanda always the follower. When thunderstorms came over it was Rolanda who would run to Euripita’s bed and beg to sleep beside her. By their fourth year, Rolanda was sleeping beside her even when the night skies were clear.

They became a witch’s set, bonded to each other by something that transcended friendship, or casual love. The two still liked good looking, athletic wizards, and both had had a number of male paramours over the years who satisfied their natural feminine lust, but there was still something that each only got from being with another witch. That need had always been especially true with each other. Euripita had slept with other women, but none had left her as fulfilled as Rolanda. Neither fully understood the bond, they just knew it was there.

After graduation Euripita had found it impossible to shake Rolanda. Euripita knew that Rolanda had the skill and courage to make something of herself, but as long as Euripita’s shadow was there, she was willing to stay in it. When Rolanda had gotten the job with the Inquisition, Euripita knew that she needed to be her own woman. So Euripita got a job on the continent at Durmstang, she and Rolanda had spent one final night together making love, and then she left.

Freed from her shadow, and forced to grow on her own, Rolanda’s talents had blossomed to where she was now she was a powerful senior officer in the Ministry. Euripita was very proud of her friend’s accomplishments, and had secretly followed her advance through the ranks. Euripita knew that by returning to Hogwarts it was inevitable that they would meet again. She wondered if Rolanda would understand why she did it, or would she hate her for having left. Feeling a light rustle in the covers Euripita looked down to see Rolanda’s beautiful blue eyes staring back up at her. There was only love in those eyes, so even if Rolanda didn’t understand why she had left, at least she had forgiven her.

“Hey, you,” said Rolanda Hooch. “What’s for breakfast?”

Euripita Balzhoff took two fingers and spread her labia apart to expose her pink interior. “You get to have breakfast in bed. Served al a carte.”

“Yeech,” said Hooch making a disgusting looking face. “I had that for supper last night, still got a hair or two in my teeth. Don’t faculty still get assigned a personal elf around here?”

“Oh, yes, I’ll whistle the little bastard up and get us a couple of trays. I’ll have him clean your knickers for you too; they’re probably still soggy from when you got to see me again yesterday.”

“You wish!”

“I know!”

They laughed and settled back into each other’s arms while exchanging kisses, it was almost like old times.

*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*

Promptly at 10:00, Prefect Crabbe entered Harry’s offices to learn of his detention. As he stood before Harry he seemed to have regained some of the demeanor lost the day before on seeing what had happened to the now expelled Yaxley. Apparently, he had been coached by someone on how to approach Harry. Probably Pansy’s doing. That was fine with Harry as he had other tools at his disposal to further discomfort Mr. Crabbe.

“Sir, I should like to make a statement of complaint over this detention,” Crabbe said.

“You may proceed with your complaint, Prefect Crabbe,” Harry replied.

“Sir, I feel it is very unfair to penalize me in this manner. In reference to the incident in question, I had just received my appointment to prefect and had no prior experience in discipline. I was only acting as I felt I should to restore proper order. I saw a student out of bounds and took action I though appropriate to deal with the person.”

“So you were only doing as you thought best then?” asked Harry.

“Yes, Sir, and besides you were not wearing your badge at that time and we had had no prior notice of your position. I had no way of knowing you were Head Boy.”

“I understood that perfectly well, Prefect Crabbe. If you had spoken to me in that manner knowing my position, the consequences of such insubordination would have been far more serious for you than twenty points taken, and a weekend’s detention, let me fully assure you of that.”

“Yes, Sir, but I only doing as I thought best.”

“I see, well that raises another question though. Tell me, Prefect Crabbe; did you think you were only doing what was best when you assisted Mr. Malfoy in letting Death Eaters into the castle to murder Professor Dumbledore?”

Crabbe nearly choked at the accusation. “Sir, I swear I don’t know what you are talking about. I’ve had nothing to do with that.”

“You are a lying sack of shit, Mr. Crabbe. We knew you three were up to no good, we took it in turn following you around under invisibility cloaks. Remember the ‘presence’ that frightened you in the hallway and made you drop the scales?”

Crabbe went bug-eyed at the recalling of the incident and was sweating heavily at this point. Harry thought the fat git looked as though he might shit his pants at any moment. Harry was quite satisfied that he was having the proper effect on Crabbe and continued.

“You and Mr. Goyle served as lookouts disguised with polyjuice potion at the entrance to the room of requirement while Malfoy worked on getting the cabinet fixed. You knew he was working for Voldemort. You knew they wanted to get in to perform dark magic. That’s more than enough to earn you a one-way trip to Azkaban; oops sorry my mistake, they’re not taking Death Eaters there anymore are they. The Minister has set up a special accommodation for you lot, the Black Room they call it. Oh it’s real Mr. Crabbe, it’s real. The Dementors still loyal to the Ministry suck out your soul there, they say it hurts like a motherfucker, they say you’d never want to see it done. You know what I say; I say I’d make an exception for you and Mr. Goyle.”

“You can’t prove any of that; I’ll swear it’s a lie.”

Harry reached into a desk drawer and withdrew a small glass vial containing a clear liquid. Holding it up to the light he smiled at Crabbe.

“I can prove all I need to with this. You know what it is? It’s Veritaserum; it forces you to tell the truth. I’ve found that my newfound skills in potions really are quite useful now. How’s about I send an owl to my new mate, the Inquisitor General? She’s quite pleased that I stopped that filthy Slytherin Death Eater from further harming her beloved little grandchild. I bet she’ll be just as pleased when I tell her I have found two more Death Eater wanna-be’s at Hogwarts involved in the fiendish murder of the beloved Professor Dumbledore. With her expanded emergency powers she can order you and Goyle to have a spot of tea with her, with a few drops of this in it. You three will then have a nice little chitchat afterward where you would spill your guts about everything to the Inquisition. Then it’s off to the Black Room for you lot, and a hot date with a Dementor that’ll surely end in a good night kiss.”

Crabbe totally lost it now. He began crying and pleading that he had not known what was happening that it had been all Malfoy’s idea. Harry put the bottle of water he had taken from his bathtub back in the desk drawer and looked measuredly at Crabbe.

“Although it goes against my better judgment I’m offering you and Goyle a second chance. If you want a second chance to square yourselves.”

“Yes, Sir, we’ll do that, whatever you want.”

“All right then, first of all I know you two were behind that bit of nonsense Yaxley pulled yesterday, and don’t bother to waste my time trying to deny it.”

“But, Sir, I can …, I mean it wasn’t …,” blubbered Crabbe.

“SHUT YOUR FUCKING HOLE!” yelled Harry as he jumped to his feet. “I already said I was giving you two tosspots a second chance didn’t I? Now here’s the way it goes. I don’t want anymore trouble for me, my friends, or Hogwarts. You and your lot stays out of our way, you mind your own business. Any hint of trouble out of any of you Slytherin bastards, and you and Mr. Goyle will finds your arses in the cart headed for the Black Room. If you think what I’ve done to you lot this week was retaliation, then you haven’t seen anything yet. Fuck with me again and see what happens. Got that, Prefect Crabbe?”

“Y… yes, yes, Sir, is that all.”

“No, it’s not, there’s still the matter of your detention for the weekend. I want you to know I thought hard on this one. The owlery has not been cleaned since the first of June. There’s a lot of owl shit piled up in there. I think a suitable task would be for you to clean it out for us, no wands though; you can clean it using only a spoon and a toothbrush. You should have plenty of time to contemplate just how quickly your own existence can be just as shitty as that owlery.”

*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*

At 10:30, Harry met in the Great Hall with those who had been given detention for taunting him with the gloves. In glowing detail Harry explained to them the nature of their mission. Remove the troll shit by picking it up and placing it in carts, then push and/or drag the carts into the edge of Forbidden Forest and dump it there in Professor Sprout’s compost pile. No wands were allowed, only gloves. They were to report first thing Saturday morning, work all day except for meal times, when curfew approached they could return to their common rooms for sleep, and repeat the next day. Dobby was assigned to watch over the punishment and ensure that no magic was used.

Harry made it clear that if anyone was caught using magic in any way the whole group would spend the next weekend hauling the troll shit back into the basement, so they could spend the following weekend hauling it back out again the way they were suppose to have done at first. The looks on their faces was precious. The younger detentionees were in a state of shock, the older students were livid. Harry saw a couple who acted like they wanted to curse him, but they had either seen what happened to Yaxley, or heard about it. They weren’t about to go up against him here and now.

*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*

After dealing with the detentions, Harry decided he needed to do a quick bit of research before leaving for the weekend. Ginny and Hermione had both referred to the Curse of the Irish affecting the size of men’s dicks. Harry hadn’t a clue what the curse was about, but he figured it must be somewhere in a library book. Hermione probably read it and then told Ginny about it. So Harry needed to hit the books too. As Head Boy he had a small private library of the common magical texts, a quick index perusal of which showed no mention of an Irish Curse in any of them. That meant a trip to the restricted section of the library was in order.

The restricted section was open only to seventh years and those students who had passes from teachers to use the books there. It was here that texts related to adult spells and dark magic were kept. Harry was legally permitted to browse the titles here, but he chose to use the cloak anyway. It just kept down embarrassing questions from Madam Pince and rumors if no one saw him there. Picking up several texts related to the history of curses Harry put them under his cloak and moved to the prefect’s private study areas.

Examination of the Marauder’s map showed it to be empty at the time. Upon entering the study area Harry did what Hermione should have done the other night if she had known how to, he put a whistling silent sentry spell on the door. If anyone opened the door it gave off a whistle that only Harry could hear to alert him to expect company, or go undercover. It was a standard Auror spell that Moody had taught him.

Looking through the book’s index, Harry soon found what he was looking for in a tome entitled Famous Curses of the Ages. In the book it told of an ancient Britannic king named Klingsor who had hired a number of mercenaries from Ireland to help him fight his neighboring kingdom. As his enemies began to take the day, Klingsor saw his Irish mercenaries begin to run away, ensuring his defeat. Wounded and dying in the battle, Klingsor in a fit of rage cursed the Irish saying that they were not men, and that their future sons would be born half a man and ‘sell themselves short’ in a woman. The result was that the male descendents of these men had short dicks and ejaculated prematurely during sex. The book described the effects of the curse as having amplified over time as the male only needed to have had one ancestor among the cursed to potentially be affected. Interbreeding with Magi had introduced wizards into the ranks of the cursed.

Harry now understood the cause of his problem, but not how to solve it. The book gave the only means of reversing the effects of the curse as Priapus Potion. However, the book gave no details of the making of the fabled potion, instead saying that it was not known to truly exist and might only be legend, or lost magic, from the olden times. The article did state that the legend of the Priapus Potion held that it could only be made by magical creatures who possessed intense sexual energy and could turn that energy into magic. The final comment was that all traditional accounts of the potion stated that it also required intimate contact with such a creature to activate the potion.

If Harry was to overcome the curse then he had to find someone who could control sexual energy, and he thought he knew where to start looking. Several odd things had happened that he hadn’t been able to explain had started to form a pattern in his mind. There was a way to test the theory that was forming in his mind, but it would require a bit of preparation before leaving Hogwarts. “Winky, come to Master.”

A little before noon Harry ran into Ron as they were making their way to the front gate. Ron was still trying to defrost tensions between them, and asked Harry if he wanted to go to Hogsmeade with him that weekend. Harry was willing to return to good terms with Ron again, but told him that he already had other plans, and had begged off claiming he had work to do at Grimmauld House. He did have to meet Moody there for continued training, but Grimmauld place was going to be Harry’s cover story.

Thanks to Madam Hooch’s efforts and Winky’s ministrations, Harry’s masculine organs had nearly ceased to be discolored and painful. They appeared to be in normal operating order for light duty usage. Harry knew that a number of Hogwarts seniors had already sent owls to Hogsmeade and rented a room at the Three broomsticks, and would then wait for their underclass girlfriends to show up on Saturday afternoon.

Under normal circumstances Harry would have done so too and then waited for Ginny to show up. However, the letter from Ginny’s mom had shot that idea in the arse. Ginny couldn’t leave the school grounds except to travel straight home by the floo network.

Harry dearly wanted to be with Ginny, but it was a damned difficult thing to do in privacy. There were secret passages out of Hogwarts and into Hogsmeade, but there were too many prying eyes inside Hogwarts and Hogsmeade who would love to make trouble if the two of them were seen alone. A single owl message home from a student about Harry and Ginny could easily be passed to Mrs. Weasley. The last thing he wanted was for Ginny’s mum to find out they were still a couple and pull her out of Hogwarts altogether. Besides that, there was still the danger of Voldemort attacking him through her. Harry knew that he needed a place that was out of the view of snooping eyes of students or Death Eaters. That pretty much ruled out Hogwarts and Hogsmeade.

It had taken Harry a little while to come to grips with the idea, but damn it he owned his own personal knocking shop. Not only could he make use of the finest fornicating facilities in the land dedicated to total sexual fantasy fulfillment, but he could do so for free. Hell, he owned a high security penthouse apartment in the place; he was safer there than he was at Hogwarts. If he couldn’t have the real Ginny this weekend in the tower, then he’d go where he could have anything else he wanted, the way he wanted, and as often as he wanted. After all Ginny seemed to like the idea that Harry was now experienced as a lover, and had forgiven him his past indiscretions with Tonks, and, unknowingly, with Fleur — and the elf.

There was the inconvenience that his absence would be noticed by friends and potentially by enemies. That was why he told Ron he was going to go to the Grimmauld house for the weekend to recover in peace, plus get in some training with Moody. This satisfied Ron’s curiosity, who presumably would pass the message on to Ginny and Hermione.

As a seventh year he was allowed to leave the grounds after noon on Friday, but must be back by 8:00 Monday morning. With his newly acquired skills in apparition, Harry could reduce travel time to only a few seconds each way, so effectively he had 68 hours to enjoy his freedom. Harry duly informed Professor McGonagall that he would be gone over the weekend to train with Moody and rest.

By 11:55, Harry had completed all his work and packed a small valise with a few belongings. He intended to buy a separate wardrobe for use at the Unicorn, and another set for Grimmauld Place, so that he didn’t have to carry much around with him when he traveled. It also reduced the chances of tracing spells being used if Harry had separate wardrobes. Harry told Hedwig where he would really be and made for the front gate of Hogwarts so he could apparate. Getting to the gate Harry was surprised to see Hermione standing there waiting for the tower clock to ring 12.

“Hermione, are you taking the weekend away too?”

“Yes, I’m … visiting my parents.” she said. “Ron said you were headed for Grimmauld House.”

“Yeah, I just need to get away on my own a bit. Plus the old place still needs a lot of work. I’ll need a regular place to live after this year is done, might as well work on it now.”

Harry and Hermione saw that many of their fellow seventh years were there for the purpose of enjoying their first weekend excursion from school. Harry knew that many would be back by nightfall as they really had no place to go, or money to do anything with. Just apparating to Diagon Alley for a few hours to walk around and browse the shop windows was a new luxury to them. The thought of it built in Harry an appreciation of the fact that he definitely had places to go and things to do, as well as the means to do them with. When the great tower clock began to chime the hour there was a flurry of pops as students disapparated. Harry apparated to the Grimmauld House to meet up with Moody, and found him already in the kitchen drinking a cup of coffee.

“Looks like all that apparition work we did was worth it,” he said. “You popped in here like a veteran that time.”

“You were right about it getting easier with practice, I just hate that I can’t practice more at Hogwarts,” Harry said. “Anyway there is something I have to tell you about.”

“If it’s about what happened yesterday than I already know all about it,” said Moody. “Kingsley told me all about it; you are damned lucky to have gotten out with a whole skin after you nearly killed Yaxley. The great git deserved it, but we need you to stay out of trouble till you are ready. Now look, I want you to tell me everything that’s happened this week, don’t skimp on the details.”

Harry started with the visit by Hooch in Hogsmeade to help heal him.

“Oh, shit!” Moody roared. “Harry, when she was wanking you off she was giving you a low end MPR. Those visions you said the treatment made you see, that was her pulling out your memories. She knows about you and Tonks, about me and Minerva training you. She knows about the Black Wand too. She’s got your balls under her bootheel and mine too. She can send either one of us to the Black Room on that information alone.”

It also hit Harry that she would have found out that he owned the Golden Unicorn as well. “I’m sorry,” said Harry. “I was in so much pain I couldn’t hardly stand it, and she was sent by Professor McGonagall. I…I trusted her. She did help heal me.”

“Not your fault, Harry,” said Moody with a resigned tone of voice. “She caught you in a moment of weakness; the Inquisition is good at that. I should have known that they would develop an interest in you and seek you out pretty quick. Now she knows, but hasn’t done anything about it yet. Maybe Minerva knows something about her we don’t. Like you said, she trusts her. Still, I wish I could have moved you somewhere only I knew, and then disappeared. ”

“They probably would have found you,” said Harry.

“No I mean disappeared, Harry. Of course I don’t really know how to do it. The only person I ever knew who could perform the black hole spell was Dumbledore, and I don’t think he ever taught it to anyone before he died.”

“What was the black hole spell?” asked Harry. “This is the first I’ve ever heard of it.”

“Black hole was my name for it,” Moody said. “Dumbledore was able to use his wand to draw a hole in midair. Just a black hole, you step into it and then pull the hole in after you. Inside it was like a cave that went on forever. Outside it was like you just disappeared out of time and space altogether. When we had gone far enough he just drew an opening in the darkness and we stepped back out into the world and the hole would just collapse behind you.”

“What did he use that for?” asked Harry.

“Well there are two fairly obvious uses, Harry, escape and evasion. If you are trapped by enemies it’s a pretty good bit of magic to just draw a hole in the air, jump into it, and pull it closed behind you. You just disappear literally into thin air as far as they are concerned. If you carry your wand and a few basic provisions then you can actually live inside the void. Albus told me last year that when Umbridge and the Ministry were searching high and low for him across the land he had gathered his belongings and went into the black hole and just stayed there for a few days at a time. He’d pop out when he wanted to, allow himself to be seen, and then go back inside. The Ministry goons were chasing their own tails all over the place.”

“What if someone else comes into the void looking for you?”

“Albus wasn’t sure; apparently he didn’t fully understand how it worked. I know that he thought that Voldemort might know the secret and was hiding in there. He made a number of trips in from his office last year looking for him and found nothing. The reason Albus carried me into the void was never escape though, it was evasion. Every method of movement can be followed if your pursuers are skilled enough. All magic leaves a trace, so floo powder, apparition, port keys, all can be traced. A highly sought skill specialty in the Auror service is a tracker.

“They follow suspects as they move around. That’s why we used such a complicated method to move you around from the hospital. Bouncing several times from place to place helps throw off trackers, as does switching up methods, like apparate to a mid point, then use a port key. Even muggle tricks like getting on a bus and moving that way can trip up a tracker as he’s got to find the spot you left from to begin the next trace.

“But the black hole apparently leaves no trace of its existence for a tracker to follow. You go in, move to another point in the void, exit back into the world, and you may be many miles from where you entered. He carried me in because he felt we were being followed, and that would throw them off. I tried my best to get him to teach me that trick, but he never would. That was a special bit of magic he kept to himself.”

Harry knew that the previous year Dumbledore had managed to leave Hogwarts repeatedly without anyone seeing him go, but he was often seen returning. Since he couldn’t apparate inside Hogwarts this was how he got out. Harry figured that at least part of the time he had gone to the Unicorn to settle business matters, and probably to make personal use of the facilities. Going back to the basement laboratory, they spent the remainder of the afternoon working on wand and power control, as well as some physical training to keep Harry in shape.

“Kingsley said for me to concentrate on helping you control your power flow, Harry. He feels you over reacted when you zapped Yaxley. Is that true?”

“No, Sir,” said Harry, who then went over exactly what had happened starting with the fight between the elves and the subsequent actions. The only thing Harry omitted was the specifics of why the elves were squabbling and that the elves were bonded to him now. Harry knew that Moody often talked with Professor McGonagall, and he didn’t want her to know of it as students were not allowed to have their personal house elves at school.

“I had perfect control at all times. I hit Yaxley just as I wanted to, and as hard as I wanted to. I fully intended to hurt him. The only thing I didn’t think of was what might happen to bystanders if we went at it there. That was my mistake.”

“Well you definitely sent a message,” said Moody, as he seemed to look at Harry in a different way now. “You need to remember that sometimes though there is a return reply to those kinds of messages. Maybe you should back off a bit.”

“What do you think I should do?”

“Go back to Hogwarts tomorrow just before the mid-day meal and let those on detention punishment off the hook. You’ve made your point, no need to grind your heel into them. Most now understand who the Head Boy is and won’t challenge your authority again. Those who are opposed to you won’t be changed by the punishment, but they will be viewed as troublemakers by the others now. If they do try anything else then come down hard the second time.”

Moody had to leave early to meet with Shacklebolt. He had hoped that Harry would stay in Grimmauld House where he was relatively safe, but Harry let it be known he had plans on going out.

“I hope you’re not planning to go out hunting trouble,” said Moody. “Especially around Godric’s Hollow. You need to rest.”

“I’m not planning on hunting trouble,” said a grinning Harry. “I’ve been cooped up in Hogwarts, or the Three Broomsticks, or St. Mungo’s for almost two weeks now, I’m tired of resting.”

Moody laughed brusquely, “Are you sure you have a safe place to go?”

“Oh yes, and I’ll go by Hogwarts tomorrow like you said. Are we training tomorrow?”

“Hell yes, you need all the help you can get while there is time. I’ll be here mid-afternoon tomorrow, and Sunday morning. We’ll work on shield spells some more. Things wouldn’t have gotten so hectic if you had simply blocked Yaxley’s spell, or maybe better yet, rebounded it upon him.”

“I could have bounced his Cruciatus spell back on him?” asked Harry. “That’s wicked! I wish I had known how to do that yesterday morning.”

“Well you will by Monday,” said Moody. “For now I have to go, look Harry, I can’t stop you from going out, but promise me you’ll be careful.”

“Of course,” said Harry. “Just like always.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of…” came Moody’s muttered reply as he was leaving.