Ok guys, so so sorry it took me so long to update. I had everything mostly written up but I kept getting side tracked and I was so busy I couldn't see or think straight. But I'm finally back with another update that I hope you'll all like. Officially, this marks the turning point in the story so pay attention to the details. I edited it about 3 times to be sure everything flowed smoothly, so constructive criticism is very welcome, but if you didn't like it, be specific on what you didn't like so I know what direction to take this. Thanks all!
Note to all: Ok well I fixed that little Ron/Josie part that was throwing everybody off. Well at least I think I did. Let me know if there is anything else that is backwards or what not and I'll get it taken care of. Sorry about that, but keep in mind that I wrote this at very late hours of the night for the past week, and I just edited it at 1 this morning.
Next chapter:
Harry and Hermione napped peacefully in their blanket, totally wrapped up in each other on the soft sand. Hermione may have been asleep, but she was very aware of how warm and soft Harry's skin was against hers. Harry knew it too. She was comfortable and in a deep sleep, but also keyed into the fact that she was with Harry and the cool night air danced on their faces. It felt like home. While they cuddled up to one another, Josie was quite cozy with Ron. He was on his stomach, but one side of him was draped comfortably over Ron. She wrapped her arms around him and continued to sleep from underneath him. Ron, however, was having a very vivid dream and a nice one at that….
The sun was shining brightly above them, and Josie continued to kiss him all over his mouth and cheeks. Never once did he complain. Suddenly he felt something cold trickle down the side of his face. As he looked up at Josie, she had no expression. Not even the slightest smile. He felt it again. It was stinging him but cold at the same time. In the next breath, his feet and legs felt quite heavy, like something was trying to drag him off somewhere. He began to panic and started to break free of what had a hold on his ankles. His dreamy vision blurred and he finally fell out of his dream and back to the reality he was once in…
"Ron! Get…up!" a female voice shouted, dropping his feet to the ground very quickly.
Ron opened his eyes and looked up. The clear, bright, blue sky flooded his eyes, and he soon met eyes with Harry, Hermione and Josie at his feet. They all looked rather unhappy and had their arms folded. He found it hard to sit up, due to the fact that he was lying on a slope, with his head at the bottom on the lower end of it. He managed to lift his body up a bit but fell back down and sat up very quickly, feeling a familiar sensation on the side of his face.
As gravity caught up with him and he was sitting straight up, ice cold water trickled down his face, stinging his apparently sunburned skin. The salt water appeared to be dripping from his hair. He took another good look at the three people in front of him and discovered they were soaking wet as well, but from the waist down. He suddenly lost control of his balance, due to the slight slope, and tumbled down; landing his lower half in water.
Ron finally jolted to a standing position and looked around. The tide was in, and was coming up to where he had just been sleeping. That explains the water in my hair and the SEAWEED, he thought, pulling a long strain of the plant from the top of his head. They all laughed at him a bit. All of them had slept clear through the night and now had a new situation on their hands. Slowly Ron turned back around and looked at his friends. "What time is it," he asked hesitantly.
All three of them looked panicked as they stared at him. "I'd say it's about noon," Hermione said in a sarcastic, frustrated, what-does-the-time-matter-now, kind of voice.
"How long have you been up?" He asked them.
Josie bit her bottom lip and thought about it for a little bit. "We just barely woke up." She paused, "Is everyone alright?"
They looked each other up and down for a few moments, then checked themselves over. "I think besides the fact that we're drenched in salt water we'll be fine," Harry said with a sigh. "But-" he started slowly.
As if to be tuning into each other's thoughts, the same exact thing dawned on them at the very same moment.
"The SHIP!" They all shouted in panicking voices.
Automatically they all turned and rushed to the edge of the water, which wasn't more than a few steps away, and sprinted along the sand to get a view of where the ship was docked. The wet mush splashed all over their legs as they kept moving, weaving in and out of trees and jumping over rocks. Harry arrived first and held out his arms for the rest to stop.
The dock was totally empty.
Now all four of them began to panic. No ship meant that they had been left behind, no thanks to all of them falling asleep on the beach the night before. There was no sign of civilization as they listened closely. All they could hear was the waves washing up onto the shore, and receding back through the various clustered rocks. Harry stood on top of the sea cliff, looking out into the empty water. The cerulean tint to it swirled in and out of itself.
"What are we going to do?" Hermione asked, wrapping her arms gently around Harry from behind.
He breathed deep and closed his eyes, then turned around in his spot, letting Hermione cling to his front. "I don't know what we can do. We can't apparate because we don't know where the ship's headed exactly, or if it's already docked."
Ron and Josie looked at each other for a few long moments. "Harry," Ron started, inching closer. "It's on its way to the Marshall Islands and if we can-"
"I'm afraid you are mistaken," a strange feminine voice interrupted.
Ron curved around and all their eyes rested on one of the islanders. Her black hair came down to her waist, and her skin was medium toned and smooth. She wore no shoes, but had a tribal type ornament around her ankle. Her blue sarong tied around her waist and rested above her knees, matched with a pastel yellow halter top.
"Who are you," Josie asked. She inched closer to the strange girl in a defensive manner.
The girl was about Josie's same height and she just smiled. "My name's Chloe."
Ron seemed a bit too quick on the draw and rushed up to shake her hand. "I'm Ron, and these other people are my friends."
Josie's jaw dropped and she stared at him. When he stepped back, she nudged him hard in the ribs. He jumped and looked at her with a somewhat innocent face. "What was that for?"
She shook her head and looked the opposite direction.
Harry and Hermione were still holding on to one another, watching the situation between Josie, Ron and this Chloe character play out.
"So why wouldn't our ship be headed to the Marshall Islands," Hermione finally interrupted.
Chloe looked out at the water for a few moments, in a mysterious manner, then back at the small group of stranded magic folk in front of her. "Because of the storm."
"Storm? What storm?" Ron spoke up defensively.
Chloe smiled at him and turned to point at the tossing waves. "See how the tide's in?" she stopped and they all nodded. "Now see all the seaweed gathered on the shore and the violent waves?" They nodded again, and Ron briefly remembered how he had just pulled some seaweed from his hair a few minutes earlier. "Usually when the tide comes in, and brings seaweed with it, there has been a great storm out on the water. This particular storm was on its way to the islands. I'm sure the ship went around it and is now headed to one of your other destinations."
Harry slumped his head down in defeat. "So we're basically stuck here, then?"
Hermione looked up at him and kissed him softly on the cheek. His frustrated behavior was hard to resist sometimes.
Ron plopped himself back on the sand and stared blankly at the water to the islands in the distance. Josie sat down behind him and began rubbing his shoulders as they all waited to hear their first course of action.
Chloe's soft footsteps in the sand indicated she was moving away from them. Josie silently cursed the girl under her breath, while still working out all the tension in Ron's shoulders and back, giving him twinges of pain here and there from her little spurts of frustration.
Hermione could see right through Josie's behavior and peeled herself away from Harry long enough to notice Chloe disappearing back into the trees.
"I'll be back. I want to find out all that I can from this girl," she whispered in Harry's ear, making him shiver. He trailed his hand down her arm as she moved away until their fingers linked for a few short seconds before breaking away totally. Following her instinct, she slowly crept off toward Chloe; hoping to get some answers. Harry and the others gave her a careful glance, but she waved them off and they all watched her slightly disappear down the stretch of sand. Hermione caught up with the strange girl and finally spoke, "Chloe?"
Chloe stopped her leisurely walking manner and turned to face Hermione with her eyebrows raised. "Yes?"
Hermione stopped once she caught up with her and clasped her hands behind her back, thinking of what to say. "Is there any way we can get back to our ship," she asked.
Chloe smiled a gentle smile. "It's possible. But first someone has to find out where your ship is headed." She slowly turned to start walking, but Hermione called out to her again, having to catch up with her peculiar movements.
"You're from around here. So, you can help us, right?" she began to pace around her, desperate to keep her attention.
Hermione and Chloe were in a batch of trees, making it hard to see anything around them with only a small amount of sunlight pouring in from above them. "I know how to get you out of this." She said slow and soft.
Hermione raised her eyebrows and folded her arms nervously. There was something odd about Chloe, but being that she was a total stranger cleared Hermione's suspicions in a blaze. Chloe led her through the trees some more, crunching over branches here and there in her bare feet. Hermione watched where she was walking, trying everything in her control to not trip over the branches. That has already happened on this trip and it didn't need to do it again. 'But I got a kiss out of it,' Hermione mused mentally to herself, referring to a couple days ago when Harry tripped over a tangle of vines and landed right on top of her. She smiled and continued to follow close behind Chloe as they stepped through bushes, trees, and large rocks.
****
Meanwhile, back on the beach, the sun beat fiercely down on Ron, Josie, and Harry. So far, no one had thought of the sun repelling charm, and apparently the sun was baking all sense out of them.
"Harry?"
Harry shifted to a comfortable position against the rock he was leaned up against. "Yeah?" he asked with closed eyes and a peaceful expression on his face.
Ron sat up from the comfort of Josie's embrace and felt her arms coil away from around his chest to rest at his sides, tickling his hot skin. "Hermione's been gone an awfully long time. Don't you think we should go looking for her?" He asked.
Harry opened his eyes and looked warily at Ron and Josie, cuddled up against one another. A smile played on his lips at the sight but nearly an hour had passed since Hermione left, and he was beginning to think something could be wrong with her being gone so long. "She said she would try to get as much information out of Chloe as she could but that girl gives me the shivers," Harry answered cautiously.
Ron nodded and Josie rolled her eyes from behind him. At least he wasn't showing interest in this strange islander anymore. Josie then sighed as she rested her forehead at the back of his head.
"She'll be fine. Hermione's a tough girl," Josie answered from behind Ron. "But what if Chloe isn't who she seems and Hermione gets into trouble. I know she's smart, but Ron's right. She's been gone a little too-" Josie slowed, and smiled when she saw Harry already brushing himself off, getting up to leave. He started to walk, but flinched when the collar of his shirt rubbed his neck the wrong way. 'I sure could use Noni's soft hands right about now,' he said softly to himself. A short moment later he turned around and saw Ron and Josie working up the strength to move. "You two coming?"
Ron stood up all the way and helped Josie to her feet gently, closing the large gap between them as she stumbled a bit. "We better go," Josie said softly. Ron looked over at Harry who had started walking again, a bit slower, but he was definitely moving forward. Every now and then, Harry would fiddle with his shirt to position it comfortably on his body. Josie took Ron's hand and led the both of them toward Harry.
It made Josie giggle to herself at seeing Harry struggling with his shirt. It was incredibly uncomfortable for him, and that was clearly a problem. "Harry, just take it off."
Harry stopped when he heard their footsteps and Josie's voice. He watched them move closer at a rapid rate, then they stopped right in front of him. "What?" he asked cluelessly.
Josie rolled her eyes. "You can be so clueless at times. If your shirt is bothering you so much, you should just take it off."
Harry felt an argument stir in his head. "Josie, if I take off my shirt, I'll just burn more and more, then what good will that do?"
She rolled her eyes and spun him around to look at his skin. Harry stood there confused, but let Josie do her thing, with her fingers trailing along the scarlet skin on his neck. "Well for starters, it will get you extra treatment from Hermione."
Harry sucked in a breath but Josie cut him off. "Second, either of you two guys were too dense to take out your wands and do something about our burning skin."
Ron put his hands on Josie's shoulders as Harry turned around. "Well Jose, I don't recall you remembering either," Ron said smoothly.
Harry folded his arms and just waited.
Josie turned around and had a sensual glint in her eyes, like she wanted to kiss someone. But as Ron smiled in anticipation, she reached down into his pocket and pulled out his wand. His eyes rolled back and his face flushed when he didn't get his wish. "Thank you! And I actually did think of it, a while ago, and used it on myself but I'm surprised neither of you thought of anything." Josie said sarcastically. "Harry, turn around," she said impatiently, swirling her finger in a circular motion.
He felt frustrated but did as he was asked. Josie muttered something and his skin suddenly felt tingly and cool at the same time. After the sensation passed, he turned back around to thank Josie. "Thanks. So what did that do?"
"It blocks your skin from burning anymore, but you'll have to put something on your skin later tonight when we get things figured out. So in other words, you can take off your shirt without burning anymore."
Harry smiled and shot a cheesy grin at Ron from the look on his face. Ron was staring at Josie, then repeatedly from her to Harry. Obviously he thought Josie was coming onto him.
Josie immediately turned around and did the spell for Ron. "Now Ron, you can take your shirt off as well."
Ron felt relief rush through him when he realized Josie was just trying to help, and she wasn't hitting on his best friend.
All three of them turned to face the same direction and realized they stood at the entrance to the forest of palm trees, where Hermione and Chloe had ventured into. As they looked on, Harry was slowly unbuttoning his shirt. Little did he know, he had an audience. A few moments later his shirt slipped off his shoulders and slipped away from his body completely. To keep his shirt on hand in case it came in handy, he slid it through one of the belt loops in his shorts and let it hang down in two separate parts as it hung from its middle. The light material waved in the gentle breeze. After a long silence from Josie and Ron, he looked at them.
"So what's the plan," Josie said nervously. Harry's glistening skin shimmered in the sunlight, showing off each crease of muscle on his muscular upper half. No matter who you were, one look at that body could weaken you significantly; as long as you happened to be a girl. And Josie was feeling it, despite the fact that she was attracted to Ron in more ways than one.
Harry sighed and looked at Ron and Josie. "I guess we take a walk through and see if we can find them. Most likely they're on the other side where all the rest of the islanders are. It's not that far," he said, putting his hands on his hips and wiping his forehead with the back of one hand.
'I'd like to strangle that girl right about now,' Josie muttered under her breath, causing the two boys to give her strange looks. She sounded as if she was mad at Hermione, but had to correct herself so the boys didn't lecture her about it.
So with a deep sigh, they all set off into the coolness of the trees in search of Hermione, and hopefully some answers as to what to do about being left behind. Harry led the way and soon they came out on the other side with an interesting sight in front of them. Ron and Harry had their mouths open in shock, and Josie just rolled her eyes.