The Three Brothers: The Cure

End of a Year

13th June 1992

Harry shuffled silently on his way to the Great Hall for the End-of-Year feast, the chatter of the students around him mixing into an incomprehensible din. He winced slightly as a small pain shot up from his stomach; a result of his repeated requests to be released early from the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomphrey had assured him that although it would take some time, he would heal completely. As Harry's gaze turned towards Ron, he saw that his friend was busy chatting animatedly with Seamus about the Quidditch League.

Harry shook his head absently. Although he loved Quidditch, Harry often had no idea about anything when Ron would start telling him about the Quidditch League and his favourite team, the Chudley Cannons—which Harry found out too late had a reputation for always being at the bottom.

It was times like these that Harry still felt separate from the Wizarding world. Despite the fact that he had found Hogwarts to be a comforting and accommodating place for him, Harry had no idea about Wizarding culture and etiquettes. Despite being the supposed hero of this world, he was still an outsider for all purposes.

But Harry was glad for his friends. They had made this whole year—the good and the never-want-to-repeat-again bad—totally worth it. Even his exams, which he hadn't had any confidence in, had gone well. Surprisingly, he had been the top of the class with Mark—who was way more brilliant than him—in Defence Against the Dark Arts, and in the top ten in everything else except Potions.

Potions. Harry remembered the end of the year exams, with Snape prowling around the classroom intimidating everyone as they tried to prepare a Forgetfulness Potion. The greasy bat had spent more time looking over Harry's shoulder than the rest of the class combined, hoping to catch him making a mistake. But Harry managed to brew an acceptable potion, and so he had passed.

The entirety of this year, Harry had wondered just why Snape was so hell-bent to pick on him. That was until Quirrell and then Professor Dumbledore provided him with the answer. The fact that Severus Snape and James Potter had been enemies at school had been a shock to Harry. Professor Dumbledore had even compared it to Harry's own feud with Draco Malfoy as an example. Given that, it was no wonder that a mean bully like Snape treated Harry horribly. From what people had said, Harry even looked like his father.

As Harry stepped inside the Great Hall, his sight was filled with green and silver; the enormous room was fully decorated with silk banners in the Slytherin colours in celebration of Slytherin having the highest House points total and thus winning the House Cup. While everyone at the Slytherin table was full of raucous joy, Harry found himself return to gloom as he was reminded again of the hundred-and-fifty points he had lost Gryffindor.

Snape's biased attitude over the course of the entire year was something the Gryffindors always had to fight against. But his apparent hatred of Harry had only added fuel to the fire. In addition, despite winning at Quidditch against Slytherin, they had lost the recent match against Ravenclaw as Harry had been stuck in the Hospital Wing. So, Harry wasn't exactly wrong to think that their current position at the bottom of the points tally was, to a large fault, his fault.

Thankfully, most of the older students who had been angry at Harry before seemed to have forgotten about that incident. No one seemed to be particularly angry at him, but somehow that made Harry feel even more guilty about the whole issue; especially since his last conversation with Professor Dumbledore.

There was no denying that he had a tendency to act rashly. Even though he had known—or rather, suspected—that Voldemort was going for the Stone, Harry had rushed in without a plan. It had been sheer luck that none of his friends had died; sitting there, in the Hospital Bed, Harry had spent hours agonising over the very real threat that they all had managed to escape. And, to top it all, he hadn't even managed to save the Stone.