Chapter Summaries

After making up with Ginny, Harry tried to share the news with Ron, but Ron accused him of overshadowing and exploiting him. Their argument ended with Ron shutting Harry out, leaving Harry to realize their friendship had fractured.

• Harry watched a wilderness survival show featuring Bear Grylls and decided to have a television installed in his secret base.
• Harry apologized to Ginny in the Great Hall, and she accepted, while Lavender reacted uneasily.
• Harry returned to the dormitory and told Ron that he and Ginny had made up.
• Ron accused Harry of taking everyone’s support and claimed that Ryan had only wanted Harry for the Moon City trip.
• Harry argued that Ron had caused people to avoid the Rose Garden, but Ron accused Harry of looking down on him and shut his bed curtains.
• Harry went to bed without changing, stunned that he and Ron had fallen out.

Harry told Ginny, Neville, and Draco about his fight with Ron, and Draco explained that Ron’s jealousy had driven his behavior. Ginny condemned Ron for interfering in her relationship with Harry, but Ron overheard her, accused Harry of being unfaithful, and was hit with Draco’s Langlock spell.

• Harry found Ron gone from the dormitory and told Ginny, Neville, and Draco what had happened the night before.
• Draco argued that Ron was jealous of Harry’s fame, achievements, and place in the Weasley family.
• Ginny angrily accused Ron of meddling in her relationship and taking his resentment out on Harry.
• Ron arrived, overheard Ginny, and called her words proof that Harry was a shameless hypocrite.
• Ron claimed Harry had pursued Lady Grey and Cho Chang before Ginny, and Draco cast Langlock at him.

After Ron stormed out of the Ravenclaw common room, Harry walked with Draco and admitted that he had once had crushes on Cho Chang and the Lady Grey. Draco advised Harry to give Ron space until he calmed down, and Harry revealed that Dumbledore had said he was immortal, leaving Draco concerned about his distant future.

• After Ron left, Harry felt relieved that Draco had stopped him from saying more hurtful things, but guilty that Ginny had defended him unconditionally.
• Draco brought Harry bread and invited him for a walk, and Harry gradually felt his frustration fade as they circled the Black Lake in silence.
• When Draco asked whether Ron's accusations were true, Harry admitted he had once had one-sided feelings for Cho Chang and the Lady Grey, but had never confessed or dated them.
• Harry told Draco he wanted to repair his friendship with Ron, and Draco advised him and the others to leave Ron alone until he cooled down.
• Harry said Dumbledore had probably told the truth about his immortality, and Draco worried that Harry would be lonely in the distant future.
• Harry was moved by Draco's concern and imagined accepting a confession from him.

Harry spent the last days of the Christmas holiday missing Ron and considering how to repair their friendship, while he and Ginny watched wizarding television and he sought advice from people he trusted. Dumbledore canceled Harry’s private lesson, leaving him without the chance to ask for his advice before term began.

• Draco comforted Harry as he worried that his quarrel with Ron might end their friendship.
• Harry and Ron remained estranged, and Ginny stopped Harry from going to find him.
• Harry and Ginny watched several wizarding television programs at Harry’s secret base, which helped distract him from missing Ron.
• Harry asked Hagrid, Lupin, and Sirius for advice, and judged Hagrid’s suggestion to consult Dumbledore the most useful.
• Dumbledore canceled Harry’s Saturday lesson because of his quarrel with Ron and told him to use Scourgify often, leaving Harry frustrated that he could not ask for advice.

Ryan returned to Hogwarts after Christmas and listened as students discussed television, Harry and Ron’s falling-out, and the vanished Rose Garden. Rumors about Ron’s conduct with Lavender spread through the school, leaving him known as Hypocrite Ron.

• On the first day of term, Ryan listened to students complain about Hogwarts lacking television while Hermione gathered Bouncing Beans in Herbology.
• Ryan rejected a proposed television program that portrayed Fudge favorably and suggested making a program about Umbridge instead, but the proposal was ignored.
• Students returning from Christmas discussed when Harry and Ron would make up and lamented missing the Rose Garden.
• Rumors about Angelina Johnson, Ginny, Harry, Ron, and Lavender circulated, with students noting that Ron and Lavender had returned to the castle together at one in the morning.
• Students repeated Ginny’s criticism of Ron, his slander of Harry over Cho Chang, and his work with Dervish and Banges, earning Ron the nickname Hypocrite Ron.

Ryan used magic to alter Ron’s and Ginny’s memories, making Ron believe he had wronged Harry and Ginny experience Ron’s perspective as his older brother Kinley. Ron reconciled with Harry, while Ginny was left questioning how much Ron cared for Harry.

• Ryan saw Ron isolated and resented by their classmates, and decided to intervene like a loving father.
• Ryan’s magic made Ron remember himself as Rhon Weasley, who loved Harry and blamed Kinley for exposing their relationship.
• Ron came out of his daze feeling guilty, and Harry sat beside him when he realized they had reconciled.
• Ryan used magic to make Ginny experience Kinley’s memories of trying to protect Rhon and feeling betrayed by Harry.
• Ginny returned to herself and wondered whether Ron, like Kinley, truly liked Harry that much.

Ryan read the absurd recommendations in the magazine Eyes of the Future and explained its appeal to Kate, who had returned to a childlike form and was experimenting with borrowed shadows. After their argument turned into a battle, Ryan wondered what roles Hermione and Luna would develop next.

• Ryan read Eyes of the Future’s recommendations and noted that the magazine remained popular despite Skywalker Alchemy Workshop’s success.
• Kate teased Ryan, then used Levicorpus and shadow-borrowing magic to change her position and appearance.
• Ryan explained to Kate that Eyes of the Future attracted readers with simplistic marketing and advice that ordinary people would dismiss.
• Kate and Ryan argued over whether the magazine’s readers were idiots or merely easily fooled, and their debate ended in a battle.
• Ryan reflected on Kate’s shape-shifting attacks and hoped Hermione and Luna would be ordinary witches like Penelope.

Harry and Ron reconciled, but Draco’s Love Potion theory sparked rumors that Snape had secretly used potions on people he fancied and fathered Daniel Paige. Dumbledore confronted Snape with evidence linking him to Daniel’s mother and asked whether he had given her a Love Potion.

• Harry Potter and Ron Weasley made up after Herbology and became inseparable, while Ginny Weasley stayed close to Harry.
• Draco suggested Ron had been given a Love Potion, but Professor Snape examined Ron and declared that no spell or potion had affected him.
• A rumor spread that Professor Snape used high-grade Love Potions on people he liked, and a Hufflepuff student claimed Daniel Paige was Snape’s son.
• On Friday, January 14, Dumbledore told Snape that Daniel’s mother had bought Love Potion ingredients and had been at Hogwarts with a Potions grade of zero.
• Dumbledore showed Snape a photograph of Daniel’s mother and suggested she resembled Lily, then asked whether Snape had given her a Love Potion.

Dumbledore told Snape about the newly formed NOTME organization, whose members wanted to hasten the integration of the wizarding and Muggle worlds without considering the dangers. He asked Snape to take charge and guide them, while Ryan reflected on how this early version differed from the organization’s later history.

• Dumbledore explained that NOTME had recruited Mrs. Paige and sought to expose Muggles to magic, believing the worlds were ready to merge.
• Dumbledore warned Snape that the organization’s reckless approach could lead to serious harm, and said recent changes had made its members mistakenly think their moment had come.
• Dumbledore revealed that ambitious members of smaller pure-blood families were behind NOTME and asked Snape to use his standing in Slytherin to guide them.
• Ryan learned about Snape’s new assignment and considered NOTME’s later role in a future where the Ministry remained unjust and ineffective.

Harry questioned why Snape had been promoting Vincent Evers’s broom-maintenance business, and Draco pointed out that Ron and Ginny’s sudden closeness was also suspicious. Ginny revealed that she and Ron had shared a dream of switching identities, leaving Harry horrified after Ron confirmed the dream included intimacy with him.

• Harry noticed Snape appearing in Daily Prophet headlines to promote Vincent Evers’s broom-maintenance tools, and questioned why Snape was involved.
• Ron explained that new policies encouraging student businesses had made professors’ endorsements common, but Harry remained unconvinced.
• Draco pointed out that Ron and Ginny had become unusually close and had avoided explaining how they reconciled.
• Ginny revealed that she and Ron had dreamed they switched identities and experienced each other’s lives from birth onward.
• Draco asked whether the dream included intimacy with Harry, and Ron instinctively nodded.
• Harry backed away from Ron, while Ginny angrily confronted him and Ron fled to find Lavender.

Harry attended Hagrid’s Care of Magical Creatures class, where the students learned about Porlocks, and he heard a mysterious song that others could not hear. After class, Krum privately repaid Harry for his help in the first task by hinting that Harry should fly with his Dragonhide Earmuffs and Fire Dragon Toy.

• Harry noticed Krum flying through the snow and wondered whether it was connected to the riddle.
• Hagrid taught the class about Porlocks, and Padma discovered they approached people covered in horse-scented straw.
• Harry mentioned hearing a song in the Forbidden Forest, but only Neville said he might have heard it too.
• Krum congratulated Harry on making up with Ron and told him to fly with his Dragonhide Earmuffs and Fire Dragon Toy to discover a surprise.

Harry and his friends reasoned that the second task involved flying dragons, protective clothing, and a song, then Harry triggered the Golden Egg’s message while flying high and fast. The song revealed that the Champions had one hour to find and reclaim what had been taken from them.

• Harry shared Krum’s reminder with his friends, and Ron inferred that the task would involve dragon flight, protective clothing, and a victory condition hidden in a song.
• Ron suggested that Krum had flown high so others would not hear the song, and Ginny agreed that the Champions’ training might relate to the task.
• Harry flew high into the sky with the Hungarian Horntail toy, and Ron and Ginny followed on their brooms.
• Harry noticed golden light on his earmuffs and realized the song might require both high altitude and fast flight.
• Harry flew again, heard the song describing a one-hour search for what the Champions treasured most, and returned to Ron and Ginny.
• Ron and Ginny wondered what creature would prefer staying on the ground to flying.

Harry, Ron, and Ginny deduced that the second task would involve Veela influencing the Fire Dragons, and that the Champions would need to free the dragons from their charm before finding the treasure. They left the discussion speculating that Fleur’s magic could give her an advantage, while Ginny argued that Harry could still win by impressing the livestream audience.

• Harry, Ron, and Ginny returned to the Great Hall after identifying Veela as the answer to the riddle, then discussed the unknown obstacle and treasure.
• Ron and Ginny joked over whether they counted as Harry’s most beloved treasure before Harry redirected them to the task’s dangers.
• Harry concluded that the Veela would affect the Fire Dragons rather than the Champions, and Ginny proposed that the Champions would need to break the dragons’ enchantment and retrieve the treasure.
• Harry reasoned that Fleur’s charm could influence her dragon and help her find the treasure, while Ron suspected Krum had learned about the task through his connection to the Bulgarian team.
• Ginny argued that Harry could still be the final winner by giving the audience the most impressive performance.

Harry attended a Charms lesson where Professor Flitwick made students rigorously practice spells and counter-spells. Hermione worried that Voldemort might return sooner than expected, while Ryan explained Flitwick’s strictness as preparation for a distant danger and then vanished with Hermione.

• Harry realized the competition would take place in the sky and that the Champions would ride dragons, though Krum still trained on his broom.
• Professor Flitwick quizzed the class on spells and ordered students to practice using the General Counter-Spell against their classmates’ magic.
• Professor Flitwick praised Harry and Neville while correcting other students, leaving the class wondering why he had become so strict.
• Hermione asked Ryan if Voldemort was about to return, and Ryan compared Flitwick’s preparation to parents who worried too much about ordinary dangers.
• Hermione complained that Voldemort’s return was still months away, then accidentally bit her tongue when she tried to bite Ryan.
• Ryan made a thin gray membrane pass through himself and Hermione, and they disappeared.

Harry and Ron overheard three Ravenclaw students behaving strangely and learned they had mistaken Dried Feces of a Veela for Dragon Claw Powder. Ginny explained how costly Dragon Claw Powder helped Slytherin students study and why Ron could not easily obtain it, leaving him regretting that Charlie had taken Norberta to a Romanian dragon reserve.

• Harry and Ron overheard three students discussing spells, accepting a Knut as a Galleon, and babbling nonsensically until Penelope appeared.
• Ron learned the students had snorted Dried Feces of a Veela after mistaking it for Dragon Claw Powder, and Harry worried about their health.
• Ginny explained that Dragon Claw Powder was expensive, unregulated, and supplied through connections to families with dragon reserves.
• Ginny told Ron that he was not stupid, only lazy, and that his access to Dragon Claw Powder was limited by its scarcity and the families who controlled it.
• Ron regretted that Charlie had taken Norberta to a dragon reserve in Romania, imagining he could otherwise have had an endless supply.

Harry, Ron, and Ginny visited Hagrid, suspecting he was secretly raising dragons, but discovered he was working with the Ministry to prepare the Champions for the dragon-riding task. Hagrid accidentally revealed that Veela affected dragons and suggested they could be blindfolded and guided by commands, then became upset that he had shared information he was not supposed to give.

• Ron suggested visiting Hagrid because he suspected Hagrid was secretly raising dragons, and Harry and Ginny went with him to the hut.
• Harry confronted Hagrid about raising dragons, while Ron asked for Dragon Claw Powder, but Hagrid said he had no dragons there and was doing Ministry work.
• Ginny explained that the riddle had pointed the Champions toward the dragons and Hagrid, and Hagrid confirmed that Harry had nearly been the last Champion to discover the task.
• Hagrid explained that his job was to help each Champion meet and get used to their dragon before the individual task.
• Harry realized that Veela affected the dragons and that Champions could blindfold them and use commands, but Hagrid became distressed after realizing he had revealed that information.
• Ginny, Harry, and Ron reassured Hagrid that they had already worked out the dragon tactics themselves.

Ryan discussed his effort to master the Hall of Time’s cyclical power, which could create automatic time loops, and explained Kronos’s connection to time itself. He left the power unconquered, estimating that mastering it would take about half a month.

• Ryan soothed himself by affectionately sniffing Jerry while Penelope ate noodles beside him.
• Penelope asked whether Ryan had figured out the other vessel in the Hall of Time, and Ryan explained its endless cycle of a living thing’s changing states.
• Ryan described how mastering the cyclical power could let him automatically return to the past and retry after failure.
• Ryan told Penelope that the vessel’s creator had used his bloodline’s resonance to draw power from Kronos, whom Ryan considered time itself.
• Ryan explained that Kronos’s descendants had displayed clocks and other timekeeping devices in the Hall of Time to observe and study that power.

Ryan told Penelope that the Peverell bloodline could eventually awaken ancient wizarding power and return the world to chaos. Harry bonded with the Hungarian Horntail Lyle, then joined Ron and Ginny to discuss dragon byproducts and watch television, while Ron avoided explaining why he had skipped seeing Lavender.

• Ryan identified Ignotus Peverell as the source of a bloodline that could one day bring ancient wizards back and collapse modern society.
• Harry visited the Hungarian Horntail Lyle with Hagrid, who had made the dragons docile and arranged for Lyle to obey Harry until the next task.
• Charlie asked where Ginny and Ron were, and Harry explained that Ron feared asking for Dragon Claw Powder while Ginny wanted to follow the rules.
• Harry explained to Ron that dragon byproducts belonged to Dragon Tamers only under certain circumstances, and Ron regretted not obtaining more Dragon Claw Powder.
• Ginny criticized Ron for following Harry around and lusting after Angela Baby on television, while Ron avoided explaining why he had not gone to see Lavender.

Harry noticed that Snape had changed his usual Potions lesson and asked Hannah whether the professor had been busy lately. Hannah eagerly offered to share what she knew about Snape, leaving Harry awaiting her gossip.

• Ron complained that Snape kept staring at him during Potions, after Snape had told the class about Death Potion and the Potion Killer.
• Snape assigned an essay on undetectable poisons, and Harry explained the homework to Ron, who had only listened to the story.
• Harry noticed that Snape had told a story, praised him less, and seemed to be repeating familiar compliments.
• Harry asked Hannah whether Snape had been busy, and Hannah excitedly said she knew a lot about him.

Harry and Ginny discussed Ron’s shifting identity after Ginny suspected he was embracing both Ron and Rone. Harry realized Ron’s Smoke Bomb had revealed Rone, and the chapter left them wondering whether Ron wanted to remain close to Harry as both versions of himself.

• Hannah told Harry gossip about Professor Snape, but could not explain why he had been appearing in the papers.
• Neville took Hannah away, and Ron told Harry and Ginny that he needed time to adjust to feeling like someone else.
• Ginny said Ron was avoiding Ron’s interests and had begun seeing himself as Rone, unlike how she had separated her Ginny and Kingsley identities.
• Harry recalled Ron making a wandless Smoke Bomb, and Ginny proposed that he had poured Rone’s feelings into the spell.
• Harry remembered seeing Rone’s figure in the Smoke Bomb and suggested Ron might keep Rone hidden while staying by his side as Ron.