Chapter 19

Dec 1st

That morning after Harry had finished his breakfast, he walked up to the Head Table at stopped in front of Professor Flitwick. The professor looked at him with a question of what he was doing there in his eyes, so Harry said "Professor I need to schedule a time to speak privately to you on some matters, sir."

Professor Flitwick looked at him then asked "would 9 o'clock today be good for you Mr. Potter?"

Mentally thinking over his schedule Harry nodded and said "that would be perfect sir, thank you." Harry nodded and walked back and sat down where he was previously sitting. Looking across the table he saw Hermione almost bursting with questions, so he decided to alleviate some of them when he said "I asked to have a meeting scheduled today as I need to ask Professor Flitwick some questions. One of them concerns the question raised yesterday."

Hermione nodded and asked "I don't suppose that I would be able to accompany you, would I?"

Harry shook his head saying "no not really. It would look bad if all of us trooped in there, or it might appear confrontational, so I would prefer to go alone for right now. If I go alone it can be made to appear as if it concerns just normal stuff, not what I am actually going for. It might be pointless misdirection, but every little bit helps." Hermione nodded and the conversation turned toward more normal pastures.

At about 8:55 Harry knocked on the door leading to Flitwick's office. Harry opened the door when he heard an "enter" and sat in a chair directly across the desk. Once there he said "I want to thank you for agreeing to see me on such short notice sir."

"Not a problem as I'm always available for one of my Ravens. How may I help you today Harry?"

Scratching the back of his head in somewhat of a nervous manner Harry said "well I am actually here for a couple of things sir. The first thing is to see if you could ask Professor McGonagoll to inquire where one of her Lions, one Ron Weasley, discovered that I actually killed the troll; as he is persistently spreading the tale that my killing of the troll is a sign that I'm going dark and on the path to becoming a Dark Lord. Now I don't really care all that much right now as anyone with a working brain will realize it's a lie, but I am somewhat concerned as the public acts a lot like a flock of sheep at times, especially if someone with a position of influence encourages or espouses it."

Flitwick nodded as he thought over what his student had said and who he was carefully not mentioning as one of the suspects for the information given to Mr. Weasley. He mentally went over what he knew of his colleagues, once he finished he said "I will speak to Ms. McGonagoll personally Mr. Potter and will attempt to have her quell these rumors. I am afraid that is the best I can do, unfortunately."

Harry nodded and said "I thank you in advance for all the help you can do in this matter sir. Now my next question was to ask if some of my friends from the other Houses can join the Ravenclaw study period that I have to attend. It seems that there are no dedicated or prepared places that they know of that they can use to practice their spells. This will hopefully allow them a place to practice."

Professor Flitwick nodded and said "please feel free to invite anyone you wish as long as they aren't disruptive. I hope this will lead to some better inter-House unity. The disruptive and aggressive posturing by both the Slytherins and the Gryffindor's these past few decades has been awful."

Harry nodded and said "thank you for allowing them entry sir. Now the last thing I have to ask is rather delicate." Clearing his throat nervously Harry continued on with "I and some of my friends have been studying Occlumency and have progressed rather well in it. You might not know what Occlumency is but one of the side effects of mastering this skill is a reduced need for sleep. True masters can get by on as little as two hours of sleep a day. My friends and I are not quite that proficient but our need for sleep has decreased somewhat. I personally need about 3 to 3 1/2 hours a day. I am personally the one with the least need for sleep but the others are catching up rather quickly. Now I and Hermione, one of the friends I mentioned earlier, are ok as we can meet in the common room and use one of the set aside areas to study and practice. However three of my friends are in other Houses and they have no such area to practice in and one of them is currently all alone in his House. This leads me to my question, which is to see if we could be issued a somewhat more lenient curfew or even some sort of a blanket allowance to be out of our respective common rooms and able to travel between them and a preselected meeting area. This would allow us to meet together throughout the night, as well as allow us to travel to and from the area. Frankly there's not much to do at night when everyone else is asleep."

Professor Flitwick leaned back deep in thought as he pondered on what had been asked. He himself knew almost nothing of Occlumency, as being descended from a goblin gave him a natural form of it. Unfortunately he didn't receive any of the side benefits that wizards gained when they delved in the art. He wondered who were the friends and deciding to ask he said "who are the fellow students you wish for you join you in this area at night Mr. Potter, and what are their Houses?"

"Um, Hermione Granger, Neville Longbottom, Daphne Greengrass and Tracey Davis; Hermione is of course a Ravenclaw, Neville Longbottom is a Gryffindor, while Tracey and Daphne are in Slytherin. That's all of them for now, but we might be adding on more in the future."

Filius sat in thought for about 3 minutes before he said "while I can't give you permission quite yet, as I need to talk to the other Heads about this, I do have a question for you. Can you teach a person this Occlumency? If so, will they then receive the same benefits as you? The reason I ask is if it is so, I can have possibly our Head Boy and Girl learn this and then they will be able to guide your group to and from a prepared room."

Harry leaned back and thought about it for a few minutes as he ran everything the books had to say on the decreased time for sleep. Finally he said "I don't know if they will have the decreased need for sleep or not sir. As far as my information goes there is a good chance, about 7 out of 10, that they will have the decreased need for sleep happen as well; but it is by no means assured. That being said I am more than willing to teach them and give them copies of the books that I have. Since Occlumency is not a restricted magic I can teach it to anyone that I want so that potential hurdle is out of the way. After that it depends on their work ethic as to advance themselves in the art, it takes some time to get started and you need to spend about an hour or two a day to get good at it. If they are in the majority of those who will gain the lack of sleep it would take about two months to get down to where we are."

Flitwick nodded then said "well then I will present your idea to my fellow Head of Houses. I will tell you what I learn from them and where we go from there. Is that all?"

Harry thought for a few seconds and said "yes I do believe so. I want to thank you once more for your help I this sir."

"Not a problem lad. Now off with you as I believe that you have that DADA class to prepare for."

Harry nodded and left the room and went to the class room he used for teaching the class. After the class was over Harry motioned for his friends to stay behind and once they were alone led them to a secluded spot. Once there he cast the standard security charms and said "I believe that you all are aware that I requested a meeting with Professor Flitwick this morning. I want to tell you what we discussed so that if your Heads ask any questions you will know why." He paused for a few second to let that sink in and said "the first thing I asked was if he could meet up with Professor McGonagoll and see whether the source of Ron's accusations about my killing that troll were from her or another source. He accepted this and I hope to hear from him some time in the future about this matter."

"The second thing I asked was permission for all of you to join Hermione and me in the Ravenclaw study sessions. I have to be there anyway, as I am the designated leader for our year as it pertains to Ravenclaw, and I thought that if all of you could join us it would help as we wouldn't be excluding you in studying. My schedule is getting pretty full and I don't always have the time available to go into the library to study, in addition there aren't that many places that we could meet where we can practice our spells. He agreed to this, so if you wish to join us the study session takes place on Monday from 1615-1745 and Wednesday from 1430-1600. It's just the first years of Ravenclaws who attend for right now, but if you want to extend the invitation to some of your fellow first years please do so."

Hermione had listened to this and asked "if this was all you were going to ask then why did you have us come out here? I mean none of it's really that much isn't it?"

Harry nodded and said "if that was all that I asked you would be correct, but the last thing I asked is." He looked at them and said "now all of us has been sleeping less due to our use of Occlumency and from what I've been able to pick up by overhearing the other students talking I have come to the conclusion that the Slytherin's, Gryffindor's and Hufflepuff's do not have a room off of their common rooms where they can go and practice. Is that assumption correct?"

Daphne tilted her hand as she said "your assumption is partly correct Harry. We have a place where we can practice potions, but it is restricted for fourth years and up. So no firties allowed at all."

"The Gryffindor's don't have any place like that from what I know; at least nobody I know uses anything like that" Neville spoke up when she finished.

Harry nodded as he said "ok then, well as I said I had already deduced something of this sort so I decided to ask if he could allow us the privilege of going to a meeting place and practicing or studying or even hanging out after curfew; as none of you had a place to do so and it get's extremely boring if no one else is awake when you're up. He asked in return if I would be willing to teach the Head Boy and Girl Occlumency so that they would be available to escort us, as well as keep an eye out for us." Harry looked at the group and encouraged by their expressions he continued "I of course agreed to this as Occlumency is not a forbidden or restricted discipline in anyway. I agreed to give them a copy of my books and help them if necessary as well. I also informed him that not everyone will have a decreased need for sleep; as according to my books only about 7 of 10 people will be able to gain that benefit. So it is possible that they won't be able to gain this benefit, but it was the best I could do. He agreed to this and said that he would meet with his fellow Heads of Houses and discuss this."

Daphne asked "so if our Heads ask we should tell them that we have gained the benefit of not needing eight hours of sleep from Occlumency then?"

Nodding Harry replied "right. I also figured that if the people I teach this to ask about testing their mental defenses that I could possibly even look around and see if they would be open to the idea of the Old Religion as well. I see that as an added bonus as it were." Looking around at their faces he asked "do you have any comments or concerns?" Seeing all of them reply in the negative he said "ok then that's what happened. So is there anything else we need to talk about before going to lunch?"

Daphne spoke up saying "there is one thing Harry. Our father has contacted Tracey and I and in his letter he mentioned something about you, Hermione and Neville getting some personal instruction in a muggle style of self defense and eventually dueling. Is this correct?"

Harry nodded and said "it is. I have a distant relative of yours by the name of Patricia O'Shanery that comes here three times a week and personally instructs us. In addition we exercise twice a day as well. By this time next year or even sooner I believe that she will be teaching us dueling, but for right now she wants us to get our bodies into shape before that happens. Why do you ask?"

"Well Tracey and I want to join you in this as we have seen how your bodies have improved in the short period of time you've been here and we want the same thing. In addition we feel that it would help us magically as well as it is little known but it your body is in good shape you can cast spells longer. So can we join" Daphne asked?

Harry nodded replying "sure thing. Do you have exercise clothes? If you do then we meet up at the front entrance at 0550 or even earlier now that we don't sleep as often. In matter of fact I was thinking we could change our starting time to 0515 if that's alright with you guys?" Seeing them nod he said "great. In the evening we start around 1945, ok? I'll see you there then." The group then moved onto the library to study and carried out their regular schedule with Tracey and Daphne joining them in exercising at that point from then on.

Conference Room later that day

Flitwick had passed along a request for his fellow Heads of Houses to attend a meeting to discuss something and set up this meeting. He was sitting down as he waited for Septima Vector the recently appointed Head of Slytherin to come in. Once she did so he cleared his throat and said "now I am sure you are all wondering why I asked all of you to attend. Earlier today I received a request that would affect all four of us as well as students from three of our four Houses. Mr. Potter had a meeting with me earlier today and in it he asked if he and some friends, who had become proficient enough in Occlumency to lose the need for sleeping eight hours, could have a room set up and permission to be allowed travel between that room and their common rooms after curfew. For those of you who don't know Occlumency is a discipline that allows a witch or wizard to protect their thoughts from someone using Legilimency. Now there are some side benefits to practicing this which are: increased recall of memories to where it is indistinguishable from an eidetic memory, better mental retention, better comprehension of something you read and, in most cases about 7 out of 10, a decreased need for sleep which in mastery would mean about two hours. He and his friends have obviously been practicing this and have become rather bored as they are up and awake when the rest of their House mates are asleep."

"In addition to this Harry also mentioned that his friends don't have any place to practice spells at a convenient place. So Harry also asked permission for his friends to attend the standard Ravenclaw study sessions. This would allow them all a chance to study and practice spells during the day. I agreed to this as I see it as a wonderful way to promote some much needed inter-house unity. I realize that tensions are much less this year than it is normally, but this would help in reducing some isolationistic tendencies as much or even more than now." Filius paused then asked "now I was wondering if you would accept this proposal as it would mean some permissions being granted that haven't been granted in recent memory, if ever. Namely that either the curfew restrictions on Harry Potter and his friends would either be lifted in their entirety, or asking the current Head Boy and Girl if they wished to learn Occlumency with the understanding that they would then need to escort some first years spread cross three Houses, for now, to a room and overseeing them as they study or practice spellwork."

The other Heads pondered Filius requests for awhile then Septima asked "who are the specific students that you need this for Filius?"

"They are one Hermione Granger in Ravenclaw, Daphne Greengrass in Slytherin, Tracey Davis also in Slytherin and Neville Longbottom in Gryffindor. Harry also mentioned that there might be more in the future, but not when or whom. I feel that in any case we can add future members if they join to what we decide with this group now."

Minerva asked "how long does this Occlumency take Filius? As you are certainly aware of, our fifth and seventh years are under a lot of pressure and constrained in time right now due to the need to learn almost two years worth of material on top of revising for their N.E.W.T.s and O.W.L.s."

"According to Harry it should only take an hour or two a day for a couple of months, before the decreased need for sleep will be felt, but the other benefits of Occlumency should appear much sooner. This would help them as they would learn faster and retain more of the information when they learn. So the benefits clearly outweigh the loss of an hour or two a day" Filius replied.

Pomona asked "if they don't agree, could we ask the sixth year prefects and see if they would be willing? They aren't under the additional pressure of studying for O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s after all, so they might be more willing to do something like this. In addition I would like to have you ask Mr. Potter if he would be willing to teach other students this skill as well."

Filius thought about her proposal and finally nodded and said "if the Head Boy and Girl both refuse for whatever reason then I would be more than willing to ask the sixth year prefects. In fact it sounds like a better way to do this as they would have less reason for refusing. As for having Mr. Potter teach Occlumency to anyone who asks I don't know if he would be willing to take on such an enormous task by himself or not. As you might be aware his schedule is already pretty full. Not only is he attending classes and is in first place academically, he is also teaching the DADA class, in addition he is also the head of the Ravenclaw studying sessions for his year which takes about up to three hours a week; he is also going to the etiquette class as well. Add in studying ahead and some free time it doesn't leave much free time except for at night, which he only gets due to his Occlumency."

The group nodded as when it was laid all out it didn't sound like much free time. McGonagoll said "well I for one approve of this as Neville is one of the better students in my year, certainly much better than Ronald Weasley! I thought the twins were bad but Ronald takes it to a whole new level. At least the twins are dedicated to something; all Ronald seems to care about is chess and mooching other people's homework. At the rate he's going he might be held back a year. If he doesn't improve I'll have to brave Molly about it."