Not Who You Think

Seven

Harry glanced around the dorm, checking that he was alone, before tapping the top of his trunk, causing it to shrink in size so that it would fit in his pocket. It was a handy addition that he had gotten over the summer; it made taking his research and everything else stored in his trunk to meetings a lot easier. He grabbed his shrunken trunk and pocketed it, leaving his old trunk, which was now unused and kept disillusioned under his bed, in its place, so that no one noticed his trunk was missing. It was a move that he knew Ron and Neville would repeat when they came up to grab their stuff for the meeting.

He went to leave the dorm, but as he neared the door, he felt something in his core stir and start tugging on his magic. He mentally shrugged, reaching for the movement in his core and grabbing. He felt the shadows of the doorway erupt around him before shrinking away again. He looked around, slightly surprised to see that he was in the corridor by the Room of Requirements now; their normal place for meetings since meetings required them to arrive at different times, to not arouse suspicion, meaning the Chamber was too inconvenient. They mainly used the Chamber if a meeting was running over and they had to turn back to continue without being missing for too long.

He looked around again and blinked in surprise, before shrugging it off. He reached for the place that the tugging had come from, which was now settled, like it had always been in his core. He grabbed again and the shadows surrounded him. When the shadows disappeared, just moments later, he was back in his dorm, this time on his bed. Thankfully, no one was in the dorm to see him arrive. He considered the feeling of the shadows around him, slowly likening it to the feeling of Shadow Travelling in his Animagus form. Well, the test did say that he was going to develop the ability to Shadow Travel. He looked around again, making sure no one was around, before reaching for his core again, willing the shadows to surround him and take him to the seventh floor. He stepped out of the shadows right in front of Ginny and Luna. He was glad that it was just them and not anyone else; that would have been hard to explain.

"What?" Ginny blurted out, staring at the wall Harry had seemingly emerged from.

"Did your phoenix finally fully merge Shadow?" Luna asked.

"That they did Flicker," he replied. Luna simply smiled in response. Ginny looked like she was about to ask what they were talking about, but just as she opened her mouth, Fred and George walked around the corner.

"Why are you three just standing there?" Fred asked.

"Open the room," George urged. Harry rolled his eyes but complied, walking past the wall three times, thinking about their meeting place. When the door appeared, the room that they always used was waiting for them.

In the middle of the room was a large table, with eight chairs placed around it. There was also a bookshelf against one wall, while the rest of that wall was taken up by an enlarged version of the Marauders Map (there was another enlarged Marauders Map on the wall in the Chamber as well), which allowed them to monitor what was going on around the school. In another corner, there was a small area with one dummy and a target hanging on the wall. Off to one side, opposite the bookshelf and map, near the dummy and target corner, was a kitchen, since Harry sometimes cooked before a meeting so they could eat together after the meeting; he was quite a good cook, thanks to the years he had honing his skills while living with the Dursleys.

The five of them entered the room, claiming their seats around the table. They each pulled a shrunken trunk out of their pockets and placed them on the ground before unshrinking them. One by one, they each entered their trunk and collected whatever they needed for the meeting, which was made up of everything they were currently working on, had finished or found since the last meeting, and a notebook to keep track of what everyone was doing or had done.