Unofficial Portkey Archive

Chapter 23-Devotion

Hermione left Luna in a hurry with nothing but Harry and Ron on her mind. She was going to find Harry and come to a reasonable solution about their little spat. She realized as she spoke with Luna how insignificant it was compared to Ron's and Luna's plight. She had given Harry a hard time about something that had turned out okay, even if the potential for disaster was there-it hadn't happened that way.

She found him polishing his Firebolt in the courtyard outside the front entrance. He was taking long strokes down the shaft of the broom with the polishing cloth, occasionally looking closely to get some spot or another shined perfectly. She watched him for a moment as he worked. He was using the servicing kit she had bought him two years before.

"Hi, Harry, what ya got there?" Hermione asked stupidly to break the ice.

Harry smiled at the question. "Oh, nothing but everything. You know something to distract me from my broken heart and injured pride." He looked back down at what he was doing.

"Harry, I have been thinking about what I said to you and I think I should be just as plain as I can. I am an incredibly independent person and since we became more than friends I have allowed myself to become more and more tied to you. I want to do that. That's what I chose to do. I just want you to realize that I will always choose to be with you over anything else. You don't have to convince me or choose for me. I can handle the consequences of my actions. I value your help and I will ask when I need it. That's all this is about." She stopped to think for a moment.

"So do you respect me again? What inspired that?" Harry asked, obviously hurt by the comments sticking up for Snape.

"I didn't mean it to sound so harsh. Harry, I don't know. You are so kind and loving. You would do anything for anyone in the right circumstances. I just don't like seeing you enraged like that. You had that same rage with Dean. Rest his soul. That kind of anger is ugly in anyone. The prophecy scares me. I don't want whatever powers Voldemort gave you to be evil and driven by hate. That's what I was trying to say, but I did a horrible job of expressing myself." Hermione put her hand on Harry's to stop him from polishing the broomstick and listen. "You know I detest Snape for the way he treats you, but your rage made you look worse than him. I don't want you to be as hollow inside as he is. I love you too much for that, sweetheart." She said with kind wispy voice. She could see the weight of the world lift from Harry's shoulders as she finished.

"Hermione, that's all I wanted to know…that someone understood. I thought about it too. I feel so alone sometimes that I panic and it's kind of like fight or flight-I just don't run away that often. The only ones I felt bad for in there that night was Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Hagrid and Lupin. I mean I never meant to hurt you either. But I wasn't wrong about anything I said, except when I forgot to talk to you with respect instead of yell at you."

"Harry, we were both on edge. I saw Luna today. And I realized how lucky we are to have each other, while Ron and Luna are facing a battle for their lives. We are too, but not as immediate as theirs." Hermione ran her fingers through Harry's disheveled hair and kissed him on the forehead. "I promised her we'd find Ron. She is really a sweet girl and I know for sure that Ron is lucky now that I know her better." She teared up as she thought of Ron. What she wouldn't give right now to watch him swallow a peanut butter and jelly sandwich whole. As disgusting as his eating habits are, it would be better than not knowing how he was.

"How can we find Ron?" Harry asked.

"We have to let the Order figure out their plan first. If theirs doesn't succeed, we'll have to do something. Ron would be worth nothing dead, so I am convinced he is alive." Hermione reasoned.

"I agree. Are you thinking what I am thinking?" Harry asked as he looked inside the windows to the corridor. Draco Malfoy was walking with Ginny to where the battle had taken place that night. They stopped and he pointed.

Hermione looked at them with a suspicious furling of her eyebrows. "Do you think Malfoy was in on it?"

"No, but Voldemort does not let his captives outlive their usefulness. He may or may not be an active participant, but he is involved in this somehow." Harry said with a nod toward them again. Ginny smiled and waved at them. They waved back.

"What do you intend to do?"

"I am going to give Malfoy the benefit of the doubt for a while. I will try to find out what he knows by not being too unfriendly. I think he'd be suspicious if I were too friendly too soon. Don't you think, Hermione?"

"Harry, he was pretty badly burned and beaten. How could someone not hate someone who did that to them?" Hermione asked with a grimace and shiver.

"What if there are spies watching your every move and the threat of the next round of torture is worse? You'd be inclined to do what you were told. I think that the best scenario is that Voldemort and Malfoy's objectives are lying in parallel at the moment. Voldemort will get rid of him when he no longer serves a purpose." Harry said with an air of certainty that chilled Hermione to the bone.

"Why? Is that what you would do?" She asked.

"If I were Voldemort, yes that is what I would do." Harry stated flatly. "It's sick, but I feel like I know how he'd think."

After a few moments of gesturing and pointing, Malfoy and Ginny walked toward the stairs Harry and Hermione had used. As they reached the corner, he took her hand. She paused for a second and then they continued.

"Well, that's quite a pair there, isn't it? Ginny and Draco sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g. First comes love, then comes marriage then comes little Draco in a baby carriage." Hermione laughed at the old rhyme. "I heard they were becoming very good friends. I hope he isn't what you say he is Harry. She'll end up heartbroken again." Hermione predicted.

+++++++++++++++

Harry and Hermione spent the next three weeks studying and visiting Luna when they were not in classes. They stayed away from their little corner of the library because of the spies that would watch them. They asked Luna if she would mind if they used the room of requirement out of respect. Harry and Hermione dreamed up an imaginary cabin with a bearskin rug, a fireplace, a modern stereo, and six and a half foot long couch with velvet cushions. They were lying in front of the fire face to face with their legs entwined leaning on their elbows talking.

"Hermione, I don't know if I could contain myself if we were together over the summer. I mean its one thing lying here with you with the fire and the music, but if I had to look at you in a bathing suit all day and then do this….I'd die." Harry said with a playful swipe of his index finger to Hermione's nose.

"Oh, wizard-boy can fight the forces of evil with one hand tied behind his back, but can't handle looking at his incredibly gorgeous girlfriend-I did say, incredibly gorgeous-in a two-piece bathing suit without ripping a hole in his pants, HUH? What a wimp?"

"Nope. If I saw you like that more than once I'd become Mr. Hyde instead of the mild mannered Dr. Jekyll. My eyes would have you looking like the centerfold in a girlie magazine in about 3 seconds. You love torturing me, don't you?" Harry asked quizzically with his tongue hanging out and his eyes crossed.

"I'll never forget the night pinned you and sat back to find little Harry joining us for a visit," she whispered suggestively.

"You're evil. You know that happens every time we get into a snogging session. And lately, you've been particularly bad. I think you're starting to tease me on purpose," said Harry a little cheeky that he was being played like that.

"Oh, you don't think when you put your hands in places they don't belong that I don't get just a little frustrated. Just because every time you excite me I don't pass out from the blood rushing from my head to my crotch that I don't feel like finishing what we started." She was being just as cheeky with Harry.

"Yeah, except all I have to do is look at you." Harry laughed. Hermione thought it was funny, but didn't have the nerve to tell him how she felt when they were here and the world disappeared around them. She wasn't sure she would fight to keep from succumbing to his advances. She reached over and tickled Harry's ribs and stuck her tongue out at him.

Harry thought that this was just not going to do. And tickling him was going to have dire consequences tonight. He rolled toward her and put his leg across both of hers and kissed her pulling her blouse out of her jeans as his hand went under her shirt. Hermione gasped and tensed at the sensation of his bare hand on her stomach. He started to tickle her then realized…what for….

Hermione's defenses were at an all time low. She knew it. His hand continued until it cupped her breast. She relaxed and let the wave of passion pass over her. Harry moved his hand out from under her blouse and began to unbutton it as he kissed her. The excitement of his touch through her bra and clothes left Hermione wondering what was next.

Harry was slightly surprised that unlike all the other times he'd become this aggressive, there was no resistance. He thought for a moment. "Hermione, I don't want to do anything you don't want to do. Are you okay with this?" He asked after undoing the third button exposing her cleavage.

"Harry, don't spoil it. Just be gentle. We can touch each other with out going all the way." Hermione's face was flushed and her voice husky with passion.

They lay there for hours naked from the waist up, just holding each other and tracing little pictures on each other's chests. The tenderness they felt for each other tonight made going all the way unimportant. They weren't as embarrassed with each other as they'd feared. They trusted one another to be gentle and passionate.

Hermione suddenly felt a chill and covered herself with the little afghan. "What's wrong, Mione?" Harry asked nervously with a guilty look on his face.

"You didn't do anything wrong, sweetheart. I felt a chill. As a matter of fact Harry, I wonder if you've had a girl back at the Dursley's to practice with during the summers. You seemed to be a little too sure of yourself there, Mr. Potter." She chided. After looking for a reaction, she added, "I love you, Harry. Just be patient with me. Tonight I wanted to be touched and feel what I had only imagined for so long." She cooed in his ear.

Harry didn't know if he could speak yet. He just listened to her breathing next to him. "I don't want to do anything to offend you. I don't want to anything we'd regret." He said in a worried tone. "Well, I could be fibbing a little," he said with a sheepish grin. "I think we have to be careful what kind of position we put ourselves in."

Hermione tossed Harry his shirt as she got properly dressed again. Once they were both dressed, she slid over and nestled under Harry's arm. She threw the afghan over them both. They started to get sleepy just listening to the music in the background. "Harry, I just don't want to miss out on being with you because if something terrible happens to one of us….I want to cry…." She sniffed. "Life can be so short. Sometimes I just want to do it so I know what it's like with you so….you know…if something happened to you….so I don't miss being with the one I loved most in my life."

"I've thought of that too, sweetie. It feels like everyday could be the last. If it weren't for you there'd be nothing but sadness in my life. Do you remember the day you found me after you saw the thestrals?" he asked.

"Yes?" she replied with a questioning look.

"I had prepared a little something for you. I've finally memorized it." Hermione listened and as he spoke, she knew she'd never love anyone as much as Harry. No matter how long she or he lived. He touched her soul.

"Do you like it? I thought it was silly until I realized how much I miss Ron and how much I owe both of you. It's terrible rhyming and just horrid poetry, but it said what I felt. I owe my life to you two-or…at least my happiness." There were tears in Harry's and Hermione's eyes. He loved them both for more reasons than he could count. "We will find Ron. No matter the cost, Hermione. No matter the cost."

Hermione knew what he meant. Harry meant that even if he had to leave behind the protection of Hogwarts and expose himself to Voldemort, he would get Ron home. Or die trying. Her tears were still mixed with the ones for the poem. She knew she couldn't stop him. He knew that Ron was taken for just that purpose. She knew that Harry knew this, but it had been left unspoken.