Hermione's triumphant display was exactly what Nietzsche wanted to ignore.
But she paraded in front of him deliberately. Even when browsing a book for Defence Against the Dark Arts at Flourish and Blotts, she had to add a remark or two.
To be fair, Mrs Granger had wanted to remind her daughter to behave, but her husband stopped her.
"When have you ever seen her like this?" Mr Granger said, half exasperated and half amused, as he pulled his wife away from the two children hurrying ahead. "Don't you think this look of triumph is rather genuine?"
Genuine, yes.
These expressions were more endearing in her parents' eyes than seeing her buried in books.
This was Hermione at almost twelve years old, full of life and excitement, not a weary little worker bee who went to school, came home, did homework, ate, bathed, read, and slept in an endless cycle.
This energy was how she ought to be.
Mr Granger could not tell if Nietzsche encouraged it intentionally or not, though given who his fathers were, deliberate seemed more likely.
Inside Flourish and Blotts, Nietzsche used Defence Against the Dark Arts: A Guide to Basic Knowledge to hide his face.
"Hermione, while dragon heartstring is indeed more powerful than unicorn hair, don't forget Ollivander said it is also one of the hardest cores to control."
His mouth curved slightly as he watched Hermione's lively mood.
Yes, this was life as it should be, vibrant and unburdened, not a constant, anxious pursuit of rules imposed by those in authority.
"But as long as I learn fast enough, it will always be under my control!" she shot back.
"Hmph. If that is the case, you should not limit yourself to the first-year books."
"You reminded me. Yes, Theory of Magical Defence and Magical Potions too."
So, among all the new students, Nietzsche and Hermione stood out. Their stacks of books rose above their heads, forcing them to navigate by peripheral vision.
After paying, Hermione tottered out, arms full, heading for her parents.
Next came robes. For Hermione and Nietzsche, raised in the Muggle world, wizard attire was truly peculiar. The flamboyant ceremonial robes with elaborate patterns were difficult to describe politely. Even the regular school robes were nearly identical to one another.
"Sorry."
As Madam Malkin measured the pair, a burly man knocked over a rack of clothes.
It was the giant Nietzsche had seen at Gringotts. His beard was as wild as Sherlock's, and the boy beside him looked embarrassed at his clumsiness.
"Hagrid? Are you here for a moleskin coat?"
"I'm here to bring Harry."
"Harry? Harry Potter?" Madam Malkin gasped, covering her mouth. "Oh my, that lucky boy."
Nietzsche turned his head. The scrawny boy beside Hagrid looked oddly familiar. Madam Malkin lifted the child's fringe to marvel at the scar on his forehead.
Where had Nietzsche seen him before?
He thought through everyone he had fought. None matched such a slight frame.
"Nietzsche!"
The voice was not Hermione's usual sharp rebuke, but a cry of surprise and joy, the sort of tone one used when finding a long-lost friend.
Even Hermione raised her eyebrows.
Nietzsche only looked puzzled and shrugged.
"Sorry, have we met?"
"Me! Dudley's cousin!" Harry said eagerly. "You're the one who beat up Dudley, I recognise you. I'm sorry I couldn't speak up for you, I was locked in by Uncle Vernon the day you were expelled."
At the words "Dudley's cousin," Nietzsche's memory stirred.
Yes. That boy who was always pushed about by the fat lump. Nietzsche had been expelled after hitting Dudley rather too hard, though truthfully, a personal grudge had been involved.
"You don't know what it was like. After you beat Dudley, he stopped bullying people so much. That Vernon is a beast. If I hadn't been locked up, you wouldn't have been expelled at all!"
Nietzsche nodded smugly at Hermione and gave a mock bow.
Did you hear that? Even he says it was a good beating.
"You two know each other?"
Hagrid scratched his head in bewilderment, looking more surprised than Harry.
"He's the one I told you about. The only lad at school who ever beat up Dudley Dursley. Because of Nietzsche, Dudley spent his summer holidays learning boxing, still hoping for revenge."
Hermione studied Harry in silence.
So Nietzsche's reputation really was that broad. She could not help but wonder: if the children bullied at school one day realised they were safe, would they feel as Harry did now?
Harry was already lucky to have escaped the Dursleys, but meeting Nietzsche here must have felt like a miracle.
"This makes no sense," Hermione muttered. "Normally, once Nietzsche left, wouldn't those bullies just have taken it out on everyone else, worse than before?"
That was what such people did, they found joy in others' suffering.
But Harry shook his head. "I don't know. Dudley was terrified afterwards. Oh, I remember now. It was the same look he had when he saw Hagrid use magic!"
So that was it.
"You actually used magic—" Hermione began.
"No. Just a little psychological intimidation."
Hermione glanced at Hagrid and immediately shut her mouth. She quickly paid for a few sets of robes and hurried out.
Harry, meanwhile, was fussed over by Madam Malkin. At last he waved goodbye to the departing pair.
He realised with a start that they had treated him differently. They were not like the witches and wizards who gawked at him with feverish excitement. These two simply treated him as a person. And that was what he wanted, not fame, but friends.
"See you at school?"
"See you at school."
…
After returning from the Leaky Cauldron to Baker Street, Nietzsche settled back into his routine until the first of September.
He moved constantly between 221B and the Grangers' house.
In just two months, he had almost finished Defence Against the Dark Arts Theory and had already experimented with simple charms from Miranda Goshawk's Book of Spells.
"Magic can disrupt telecommunication signals like a magnetic field," Sherlock was saying irritably to someone.
The portly man listening with only half an ear was Sherlock's elder brother, Mycroft Holmes, also Nietzsche's uncle. He seemed more focused on Mrs Hudson's caramel pudding than on Sherlock's deductions.
"Sherlock, the government already knows of their existence," Mycroft said as he adjusted his seat. "What they want is to understand the magic."
"You knew all along?"
"I've always said our deductions are at different levels. Fortunately, we now have Nietzsche."
But Sherlock cut him off at once.
"Don't even think about it. He has his own path. His schooling is simply an opportunity to assist us."
"Yes, you're right."
Nietzsche, resting with eyes closed, was not asleep.
In truth, he could sense it, the same way he had once imagined sensing the Force, though he disliked the word 'magic,' finding it vulgar.
"Reparo."
He pointed his wand at a broken cup, moved his hand, and spoke softly.
At once he felt it: energy, flowing through him and drawing the glass shards together. Energy within everything, awakened by his own will.
The Holmes brothers both stopped to stare.
Sherlock was first to ask. "Is that healing or merging?"
"Not healing. I can't make something from nothing. More like atoms rejoining and rearranging."
Mycroft frowned in thought, then asked, "And if a piece is missing?"
"Then there will be a gap. But I can replace it with the same material, just as one builds a wall with bricks."
All three Holmeses fell silent.
The implications were staggering. This was the beginning of another Industrial Revolution. If England harnessed magic, society itself would change, resources would be reused endlessly.
"Someone is trying to destroy the relationship between wizards and the government," Mycroft declared, his mind already leaping to the larger scheme.
Sherlock was the micro-analyst, spotting tiny clues; Mycroft was the strategist, grasping the whole picture. It was why Scotland Yard trusted them both.
"I must report to the Prime Minister. Nietzsche, when you reach school, keep MI6 informed by letter."
With that, he donned his bowler hat and hurried out.
Only Mycroft was stirred by such matters of state. Sherlock returned to sorting cases, while Nietzsche resumed testing magic.
Yet after casting several defensive spells, he found the unicorn hair in his wand strangely unresponsive. It was like a blocked pipe, sometimes gushing, sometimes trickling. By contrast, standard charms worked perfectly.
So Nietzsche turned to studying the principles of ordinary spells.
His instincts told him: a charm was never simply wand-waving and chanting.