HARRY POTTER :Dark Kingdom

She pulled two books, one dark red and the other black, literally out of thin air and handed them to him.

"These are your textbooks. Lessons will be held here, Monday through Saturday at 8:30 am til 11:30 am. You may return to the house for lunch or eat with your classmates in the classroom. Classes resume at 12:30 pm and continue until 2:30. You may remain in study period until 4:00pm, during which time your professor will be available for questions. After that you will be expected to return to the house immediately, and under no conditions are you to ever wander into forest without Mr. or Mrs. Sleuw. Again, stay out of the castle. You are not permitted to swim, fish, or boat in the lake without an adult present, but I'm sure if you help the Sleuws with their chores they might spare some time to take you. Do you have any questions?"

Harry gave her a weak smile. "Only a million and one."

She smiled back at him, her expression softening considerably. "Don't worry Mr. Potter, that's what these summer lessons are for. Now, I have to go talk to the professor about your sudden admittance before class starts, so why don't you go in and find a seat? Class is going to start in five minutes."

He nodded to her, and taking a deep breath he entered the tent, prepared to start his first day as a wizard-in-training.

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

McGonagal left Harry Potter feeling shaken. It had been many years since her self control had been tested so strongly. But to see him... to see the ghost of two dear friends made singular and whole in one frail, nervous little boy...

She didn't know if she wanted to weep or sing.

The entire situation seemed so utterly right and so utterly wrong. Lily and James' son at Hogwarts? Perfectly natural. Lily and James' son right under Voldemort's nose? She'd sooner see Snape cuddle a werewolf. Of course, Snape cuddling a werewolf wouldn't necessarily have been a bad thing to see in her opinion...

But by Merlin, how had Harry ended up here?

The Gryffindor professor took a brief detour on her way to the Headmistress's office to look through the papers she had been given. Lestrange wouldn't miss them for few hours. She probably wouldn't have missed them for a few days.

She considered holding onto the file for awhile yet, but when Snape's name came up as Harry's sponsor she quickly thought better of it. If that man knew Harry was coming, had actually sent him, than he doubtlessly be double checking or even triple checking his own reports. Since Lestrange had one up-ed him into becoming Headmistress, he'd been obsessive about crossing every 't' and doting every 'i'.

Lestrange was exactly the opposite. Since her promotion, she'd been increasingly lackadaisical in her duties. Although her sense of competition with Snape had hardly dimmed. If the crazy hag didn't manage to off the other man or humiliate him completely in Voldemort's eyes, than she doubted she'd be calling Lestrange 'Headmistress' for long. As much as she despised Snape at times, she despised Lestrange even more and at all times.

Merlin's beard, she hoped she could keep her Gryffindors out of that mess. Both Slytherins were notorious for taking their frustrations out on her house, for which she had little defense. They were favored by the Dark Lord, and she, well, wasn't. Sure he had let her remain on as Gryffindor's head of house without persecution for supporting Dumbledore during the war, but that had been a political maneuvering in her favor. The students and parents were familiar with her, trusted her, and her no-nonsense demeanor lead most to respect her. She had been spared, not out of kindness, but to grease the wheels for the new regime.

And that's how it all made her feel.

Greasy.

But if she could protect the children, ones like Harry who had no one left to protect them, to fight for them, to face this degradation for them... She could live with being a little greasy.

With a quick glance around the hallway, she ducked into a little nook and began to read.

Yes, I returned the original title, but altered the summary a bit. I plan on sticking with those from now on, so don't worry about accidently missing the story because of a name change. Thank you to everyone who left reviews, I appreciate it!

For those of you who are wondering where Voldemort is, he won't appear until chapter eleven. Sorry, but that's the earliest I could really squeeze him in. If you have any questions or think you spot an inconsistency, please feel free to ask! I promise to answer! And here's chapter 7. Enjoy.

Once inside the school tent, Harry was once again introduced to the same wizarding trick that had been done on the Sleuw's cottage. Although the tent's yellow cloth walls remained, they were lined with a series of shuttered windows that remained open to allow in light and fresh air. The floor was not grass or dirt, but wood and tables were arranged three by five with a mobile chalk board and a teacher's desk stationed at the front. At the very back of the class were three large book shelves packed with books.

Most importantly, the room was filled with students. Like him, they all wore their black student robes, but that was where the similarities ended. Where Harry was little more than an orphan, these children were obviously from good families. They all had an air of health and confidence about them, and mingled with each other in a sort of familiarity Harry envied. It seemed impossible to him that they could be muggleborns, ever questioned the strange nature of their world, or walked the halls of WYRA headquarters. They huddled about in small groups, playing games with small magical objects or showing off some magical nic-nac they had gotten for their birthday or with their allowance money. It seemed so unfair that they should have gotten such a large head start on him. Bloody hell, why couldn't he have cursed Dudley when he was eight?

Realizing he was just standing at the door stupidly, and people were beginning to notice, he searched the room for a place to sit. He spotted a single empty seat at the front left corner nearest the board, right next to girl absorbed in an impressive looking tome.

"Is this seat taken?"

The girl, rather pretty with wavy auburn hair held back with a french braid, looked up at him as if startled. She looked around the room, and seeing it quite full, she turned back to him.

"Help yourself," she said dismissively. He took the empty seat, setting his notebook and pencil down. He caught her looking curiously at his supplies, and felt embarrassed when he noticed her much nicer leather bound notebook and calligraphy pen. "I haven't seen a notebook like that since I left WYRA," she said, regarding him with a bit more interest and then introduced herself. "I am Hermione Granger of the Malfoy family, by the way."

"Harry Potter. Nice to meet you," he said, shaking her hand. Again she looked at him curiously, and then much to his despair she closed her book in favor of studying him.

"Have you gotten your wand yet, Potter?" she asked.

"Hm? No, not yet. I don't turn eleven until August 1st. Have you?"

"No. I turned eleven last April but my foster father won't let be get one until just before term starts. I wouldn't be allowed to use it yet anyway, of course, but I can't wait. I've been reading up on so many spells, and it's so hard not to be able to try them out. I've got an entire notebook just filled with spells I'm going to try once term starts. What about you? Do you have any spells you'd like to try?"

Harry shifted uncomfortably under her intense scrutiny. Now here was a witch who knew what she was doing. She already had lists of spells at her disposal. How could he even begin to think he was ready for this?

"Er... I dunno... I haven't exactly seen a lot of magics really. I'd like to learn that trick where can get from one place to another just by passing through a door or a clock or tunnel or something."

For a moment, he thought she was going to start asking him more questions about himself, but then her expression became vaguely dreamy.

"I believe that's called 'warping', and I don't think they teach that until seventh year... although you could look it up on your own, you know? Hogwarts has one of the finest libraries in Britain. They've got books up there that date back to the Founders. I heard there are even plans to add an extra wing for the extremely rare books and then another wing for experimental spells. Can you imagine-"

Her little lecture was interrupted by the loud, mocking snores of a black-haired boy sitting next to them. The others sitting around him broke up into laughter, and the 'sleeping' boy opened a greenish-blue eye and grinned over at them.

"Bloody hell, Granger, can you talk about anything other than books?"

"I don't know, Houghton. Can you say anything and not have people laugh at you?"

Everyone chuckled and 'ooohhhed' at that, except for Harry who just wasn't sure enough of himself to join them. He was spared having to respond by the teacher walking through the door. He was a middle-aged man with barely any hair and coke-bottle glasses. He wore a magenta colored robe over his beige slacks and plaid sweater vest, and despite looking utterly ridiculous he held a dark scowl that rivaled Snape's. The only difference was this man didn't have a sense of humor, not even a sarcastic one.

"My name is Professor Timbal," he began without preamble, flicking his wand so that the chalk began writing his name. "I will be your professor until the start of term- September first. I will be preparing you for Entry Level Fundamentals or E.L.F. tests."

The board wrote the short hand of everything the professor said, and feeling nervous, Harry started writing it all down. It couldn't possibly hurt to remember the teacher's name or look up something later. He was vaguely surprised to see Hermione was taking notes as well.