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The other Slytherins backed away while still staying close enough to see his reaction. "And what, pray tell, is a 'Howler'?" Harry asked nonchalantly. Across the room, Harry could see Jim and Ron standing up to get a better view and openly laughing, so he doubted it was anything good.
Theo answered urgently. "It's an angry letter, Potter. A very angry letter. The longer you wait to open it, the louder it will be. And if you wait too long, it will explode."
Harry glanced around the room again. His housemates were all waiting to see how he responded. In fact, the noise level in the whole room dropped to a soft murmuring as the wizard-raised children all seemed to know what a Howler was and didn't want to miss the show. At the Head Table, most of the teachers looked somewhat interested, though Lily Potter had her hand over her face in an expression of absolute horror.
Harry chuckled. "Wow. An screaming explosive letter. And a school that tolerates them being sent to eleven-year-old children at breakfast in front of their fellow students. How ... professional." He reached forward and slashed at the Howler's seal a butter knife and then leaned back in his chair casually, picking up his pumpkin juice to sip as he listened.
HARRY POTTER!
WHEN JIM /hic/ WROTE TO ME ABOUT YOUR SORTING I COULDN'T BELIEVE IT! I KNEW ... JUST KNEW LETTING YOU COME BACK TO US WAS A MISTAKE! NO POTTER HAS EVER BEEN SORTED INTO SLIMY SLITHERY SNAKEY SLYTHERIN! AND AFTER YOU'RE DONE /hic/ DISGRACING OUR HOUSE, I HOPE NO POTTER EVER IS AGAIN! I'M /hic/ WARNING YOU NOW, IF YOU STEP ONE FOOT OUT OF LINE, IF YOU GIVE THE TINIEST HINT THAT YOU'RE /hic/ TURNING EVIL OR ANYTHING, I WILL YANK YOU OUT OF THAT SCHOOL AND WANT YOUR SNAP... I MEAN SNAP YOUR WAND MYSELF! I WILL DISINHERIT YOU FROM HOUSE POTTER AND HAVE YOU BACK WITH THOSE DURGLES ... /hic/DURSLEY MUGGLES BEFORE THE SUN SETS! THIS IS THE ONLY WARNING YOU'RE GOING TO GET!
YOUR HUMILIATED FATHER,
JAMES CHARLUS LORD POTTER
And then, the letter burst into flames and quickly disintegrated. Silence reigned over the hall. At the Head Table, most of the teachers bore expressions of shock and embarrassment. Even Dumbledore seemed astonished by James's vitriol and cruelty, not to mention the fact that he was quite obviously drunk when he wrote and sent the Howler. Lily Potter jumped up and stormed out of the room. Only Severus Snape maintained his composure despite his personal delight in how James Potter had humiliated his entire family with a single letter. He waited to see what happened next. How the Potter boy reacted could make or break him in Slytherin House. Personally, he expected the boy to break and run out crying to the laughter of his own house and that of his revolting twin. Instead, to Snape's astonishment, the boy ... burst into laughter.
"Amazing! So my dad's a drunk as well as an idiot. Good to know." And then, he stood and held up his glass of pumpkin juice in the direction of his younger twin in salute.
"And nicely played by you too, Little Brother!" he called out across the hall with the appearance of good cheer, as if the Howler had just been an amusing little prank. "Did you have to break curfew to tattle on me last night? Or maybe petty little rules like that don't apply to the Boy-Who-Lived."
Jim's face grew furious at that, and he jumped up onto the table, knocking over dishes and pitchers. "YOU THINK THIS IS FUNNY, YOU SLYTHERIN FILTH!" he yelled, which only made Harry laugh louder as he sat back down.
Finally, just as Jim was ready to yell something else, Minerva McGonagall's voice bellowed across the room. "James Potter. Jr., sit down this instant! I don't want to hear another word from you! And twenty points from Gryffindor for disrupting breakfast and for insulting another House!" Jim looked stricken to have cost his house so many points before classes had even started, and he slowly sat down, sparing one final hateful look towards Harry who was wiping tears of laughter from his eyes.
Over at the Slytherin table, the rest of the House slowly returned to their seats while warily studying their house mate and his strange reaction. His laughter over, Harry returned to quietly eating his breakfast while going over notes for his first Transfiguration class. His mood was obviously (and to his classmates, bizarrely) cheerful.
"Uh, Potter?" said Nott timidly. "Are ... are you okay?"
"Never better, Theo. May I call you Theo? I hope that's not presumptuous of me. You can, of course, call me Harry if you wish."
"Okay then, um, Harry. You took that Howler, well, much better than one would expect."
"Oh that bit of rubbish," Harry said with a grin. "There's nothing to that. Just a ridiculous man yelling at me. And I've had people much more ridiculous than him yelling at me for years and usually a lot more loudly." He took a bite of toast and chewed it slowly as if collecting his thoughts before turning back to the other boy. "For a long time, I put up with that sort of thing because I didn't know any better and didn't have any other choices. And now, I do. You see, Theo, that man imagines that he's my father and that gives him some sort of right to be abusive to me. But the truth is, he's never been my father in any way that matters. And no matter how much he yells and makes a fool of himself, I know full well that he's got no power over me that I don't allow him, and I've just decided to allow him none at all." He chuckled quietly. "It's ... good, actually, that things came to a head so quickly. I was toying with the idea of at least pretending to be a good son to James Potter. But after that display? Nah. Not a chance. It's total war now."
Theo looked at Harry with something very much like awe, but the rest of his classmates seemed to think he'd gone mad. Meanwhile, Harry turned towards Draco.
"Speaking of which ... Mr. Malfoy. I know we're not very far into our association, but might I ask you for a small favor?"
Malfoy, who for some strange reason was mildly jealous that Harry hadn't asked to use his first name, said, "What sort of favor, Mr. Potter?"
"Would you mind very much owling your parents and asking if they could recommend a good solicitor? One experienced in Wizengamot inheritance laws?"
Draco Malfoy stared at the Brother-Of-The-Boy-Who-Lived. And then, it was his turn to laugh.
Later that evening, Harry was alone in the Slytherin common room finishing up his homework for the first day before going to bed. His first day of classes had gone rather well, notwithstanding his birth-father's tantrum. Transfiguring matchsticks into needles still eluded him as it did everyone else in Slytherin, but he'd been awarded two points in Charms. He'd also made a few allies ("friends" was premature, but Harry was optimistic). As Harry stood up and stretched, he noticed a painting above the fireplace of a puff adder curled over some books on a writing desk. Feeling slightly foolish, he walked over to the painting, looked around to make sure no one else was present, and then focused his attention on the snake. "Um, hello. My name's Harry," he said softly. The snake in the painting twitched and then looked up at him before hissing a response. Harry smiled warmly as another friendship of a different sort was born.
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