Unofficial Portkey Archive

Disclaimer: Um…just read the ones in the first chapters, I don't feel like writing one right now.

Um…the feedback on chapter 2 was REALLY disappointing on ffn (I mean ONE review! That's embarrassing actually, but I guess people don't understand this at all), I hope this chapter gets a little more than that. Not that lack of reviews will stop me from writing, but their presence makes me write faster (though some of you might not want that at all if you didn't even think it was worth reviewing). ^_^

Well, here's some answers to your questions: Jae, bamaslamma29 and Mel: Er…well, this fic is supposed to be a two part thing, Bite of No Mortibus in sixth year, and Other Side of the Veil (might change the name) for seventh. I had planned on no romance in this one, but I just can't seem to stop sweet scenes from writing themselves out (as you probably will see in this chapter) so some interaction between them will pop up all the time between them, but I think I'll put a lot of angst afterwards to make it even ^___^ don't kill me, please! Willow and shawnpickett: I really think that Hermione is the ONLY one that truly understands Harry, and I just can't help slipping a few hugs in there, which I truly think he needs, because words can just wash off people, but physical warmth is concrete and real and true. Davaca, melanieblack and Victoria87: You'll find out about Aunt Petunia further on (don't know when to actually stick that in, but it will pop up and be rather important along with something else ^__^). And a special thank you to all the KoaM readers who reviewed this as well. I love you all! And a big hug to J Choo and Michelle White for their wonderful beta reading.

Two words on this chapter: for one, it's LONG, but my betas thought it would be a bad idea to chop it in two because it would interrupt the flow, so if you feel you have to, you can read in two sittings (or more) but don't forget to review! And two, if you think the gifts are kind of perverted (>__<) I actually based them on a couple of my brother's sixteenth birthday gifts and I couldn't help but refer to them because my little boy is so much like Harry in so many ways, and I thought it could be rather funny. Hope I'm not offending anyone.

And now I'll stop writing your eyes off and let you read the fic.

Harry Potter and the Bite of No Mortibus

Chapter 3: Happy Birthday, Harry

"Harry!" A voice called to him. "Harry!" This time more anxious. "Harry! Wake up!" And the world was roughly pulled out from under him, sending him tumbling down in an endless voragin. Actually, it wasn't the world that had been pulled from under him, only the blankets, and not a bottomless voragin he fell to, only the cold floor.

"Finally!" Hermione huffed. "I can't believe it took three of us to get you down! Oh, I knew you weren't getting any sleep, it looked like you were carrying the world under your eyes!"

"H-Hermione? What-?" He mumbled as he rubbed his eyes to clear his eyesight. Lost cause: his glasses were still on the nightstand. Before he could blindly attempt to reach for them Hermione had already perched them on his nose for him. "Thanks," he grunted, now able to finally see. He felt as though he'd slept for the first time in years, and made up for all the lost time in one sitting. Groggy and rested at the same time.

"Harry, hurry up and dress. Dumbledore's waiting for you in the kitchen," she urged him.

"Yeah, with Snape," Ron added, pronouncing the name as though it was the foulest in the world. Not that it wasn't. Harry didn't care, though.

"I'll be right down," he told, letting the girls know that they were to leave the room. Why would Dumbledore come to see him so early? He dressed quickly and sleepily stumbled down the stairs and into the kitchen, where, sure enough, sat Albus Dumbledore and stood Severus Snape. Harry was glad of Dumbledore's presence.

"Morning Professor," he yawned.

"I see you slept well," Dumbledore commented, his eyes twinkling at him over those halfmoon spectacles, never leaving his own. He seemed relieved that Harry wasn't angry with him.

"Hmm," was Harry's articulate response as he used one sleepy hand to try and pull his hair down after noticing Snape's sour expression upon seeing it. He knew he was only making it worse. Eh!

"How are you feeling?" The Headmaster's tone was serious while asking.

As was Harry's upon answering. "I'm not." He was suddenly wide awake.

Dumbledore knew this, of course. It was his turn to "Hmm." He watched Harry for a while as he thought things that Harry would never be able to guess. "You've noticed the lack of events since the Department of Mysteries, haven't you, Harry?" The boy nodded. "You think he's preparing himself for something?" Despite the fact that he'd asked a question it felt much more like a statement. Harry nodded again. "Do you think he'll try to confuse you again, like he already has?"

"I'm not sure," Harry answered honestly. Dumbledore watched him waiting for further explanation. "Sometimes I think that he won't use the same trick twice. Other times I think that he could turn that trick around endlessly so that I'll never know what to expect." Dumbledore nodded.

"It seemes that the latter has most propability of being accurate," he didn't have to look to Snape to indicate that it meant he'd heard something. "Unfortunately, we already know from the last episode that Severus is no longer trusted among Voldemort's ranks, so we cannot rely on him to find out exactly what is going on, but we could prevent the intrusion on Voldemort's part."

Harry knew what was coming. "Occlumency," he voiced for Dumbledore. The ancient wizard nodded. "But…aren't you worried about Voldemort…hearing all this?" Harry was referring to his nemesis being able to breach into his mind.

"No," Dumbledore answered immediately. "You said yourself, Harry. Right now you're not feeling anything. Though that saddens me to know, at this time we could ask for nothing better. You're not giving him any indication as to what is happening to you. You're making him think that nothing out of your ordinary is going on," Harry nodded, remembering how the only times he'd felt what Voldemort might have been doing was when he'd been overtaken by strong emotions.

"You will be starting tomorrow with Severus, right after breakfast," he instructed.

"Yes, sir," Harry replied. "Is there anything else?"

Standing up, Dumbledore answered, "Yes, there is," as he walked around the table to lay a hand on the boy's shoulder. "You've grown quite a bit, Harry, you're getting tall," Harry didn't know whether to be proud or confused, though a smile was born on his face nonetheless. "Happy birthday, Harry." His eyes widened. He'd forgotten, again, that it was his birthday. "I believe that Minerva will give you your present later today."

"Thank you, sir," this time the smile that spread his face wide was genuine, and it seemed to spark something in him. What? He didn't know yet.

"You're welcome, Harry," Dumbledore smiled at him once more before regretfully taking his hand off his shoulder, and leaving after having said, "We'll leave you to your breakfast and your friends, now."

Snape left with him. He hadn't said a word throughout the short exchange, not even a taunt, or a complaint about having to teach Harry again-who thought it was rather strange. He hadn't even looked annoyed or disgusted at him. What had he been thinking the entire time?

"Happy birthday, Harry," Mrs Weasley's voice wrapped around him as quickly and unexpectedly as her arms did as they came from behind him. "What would you like to have for breakfast on your birthday?" She sounded close to tears.

"Oh," Harry cleared his throat. He didn't really want anything at all, but he didn't think that would make her very happy. "Why don't you surprise me with something?"

Her lip quivered. "Whatever you like, Harry." Oh, he hoped she wouldn't breakdown.

"Thanks, Mrs Weasley," he mumbled as he sat in one of the chairs that were situated around the table-noticing that they were much more comfortable than they had ever been before-and ran a nervous hand through his hair. Would she ever treat him normally again? Would Ron? Would anyone?

"Hey, Harry," Hermione called as she sank in the chair to his right, "er, I'm sorry about before." Harry knit his eyebrows at her as she nibbled on her lower lip.

"Huh?" He questioned intelligently.

"You know, about knocking you out of bed without wishing you a 'happy birthday'. It's just that you were so out of it, and it was as though you couldn't hear us, and Dumbledore was waiting, and I thought it was important that you came straight down, and-," Harry stopped her mid ramble.

"Don't worry about it, Hermione," he calmed her, "thanks for waking me up," he grinned at her reassuringly. She smiled back embarassed. "If it hadn't been for you I might have slept through my birthday."

She giggled at that. "Happy birthday, Harry," she said to him while placing her hand on his shoulder, much like Dumbledore had a few minutes earlier. Her touch was even more soothing, somehow. Harry missed it instantly when she withdrew her hand.

"How does it feel to be sixteen, Harry?" Lupin's voice was like having a warm blanket pulled away in a cold night. It brought him back to reality. To the reality that it was his sixteenth birthday, and that Sirius wasn't there with him to celebrate.

"Er…I don't know really," he replied uncertainly. "Still trying to get used to it, I guess."

Lupin smiled back at him, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. "Don't bother. You'll end up trying to get used to it for the rest of your life," he joked as he took a seat that, Harry noticed, was the furthest from him.

"Where's Ron? And Fred and George? And Ginny?" Harry asked upon noticing that they still hadn't entered the kitchen, even though the smell of a delicious breakfast was more than slightly detectable.

"Oh, Fred and George went to open up the shop already, they should be back for lunch, but it's never sure because business is going so well for them. I'm sure Ginny's still barricated in her room trying to get ahead of the program. She hopes to get away easy with OWLs, and as for Ron, I think he wanted to give one last glance to that poster from 'Witches Pinned Up' that Fred and George snuck him-and that he thinks I ignore the existance of-before coming down," she told him as she rolled her eyes at her friend's behaviour. "Honestly!" She huffed.

"Hey, how did you find out about that?" Ron's indignant voice came from the doorway.

"Oh, please! Don't you think I noticed that you hide it in the pages of Quidditch Weekly? You can't be that slow of a reader! You should turn the page at least sometime," she replied indignantly. At this point Harry would have expected some kind of angry mother goose reaction from Mrs Weasley, but she'd obviously been too busy trying to cook and keep from crying at the same time to pay any heed to the conversation.

"I study the plays," Ron tried to defend himself.

"Oh, yes, and what plays those are!" she exclaimed. "I still wish I'd never found out about the existance of moving pornographic pictures!"

"What?" Harry asked, completely startled by the turn of conversation.

"Yeah, Harry you want to see it?" Ron asked eagerly.

"Okay," Hermione nearly screamed, "could you please pick up this certain topic of conversation when you're in your room and out of my earshot, thank you?"

Harry was surprised when a bout of laughter burst out of him from the inside like a volcano erupting, but he couldn't seem to stop all of a sudden. He'd never laughed so much and so heartily. He laughed until tears blurred his vision. It had been as though he'd been watching the whole scene from the outside, and somewhere in the middle of Ron and Hermione's argument, the familiarity of it all pulled him back into his own body and into the warmth of his life with that, even if only for a short time. Maybe later he would unconciously go back to feeling numb, but right then he felt more alive than he had in months. Ron and Lupin were rather dumbfounded at this improptu display of vitality on his part.

And in the center of it all there was Hermione's face, smiling at him and laughing with him for no reason that she was aware of, making him even merrier. And then, as sudden as his unexpected bout of laughter, an image filled his mind. One that he'd entirely forgotten about in this short period of time. Hermione's face, dead, from his dreams came to replace the smiling joyful expression that she was wearing still.

Fear gripped him.

He'd already forgotten what fear felt like, so it's sudden uprising was even more intense than it should have been. It was like a damp, dark vice grabbing hold of his heart and lungs, long bony fingers tightening around his organs, making his breath impossible, and the palms of his hands clammy. His face burned with it, but there was a biting chill that overtook his body, his nails automatically dug into his palms as the mental image became clearer and clearer. He tried his hardest to hide his shudders from his friends. Hermione noticed. Of course she would. "Harry, are you all right?" She asked, her hand on his shoulder again, seeping warmth into his tense body, relaxing him.

"Yeah," his voice was shaky and slightly raspy. He cleared his throat. "I just remembered something," he gave in sense of explanation, and, nervously, he brought his hand to rub his scar in thought. Dumbledore's words came back to his mind. Snape was not well trusted among the Death Eaters, and the information was filtering in thin, but, from Dumbledore's tone, Harry had gathered that the Headmaster thought they'd use Harry again for whatever it was that was being planned (and something was obviously being planned). He'd been worried since the start of those dreams that Voldemort's next target would be Hermione, but, for some reason, after seeing her so lively he'd entirely forgotten about them all together, as though his subconcious had judged her too strong and intelligent to fall victim to him.

Now, though, the fear was back entirely, even if he refused to except the images. Maybe he should have spoken to Dumbledore, but would that be the right thing to do? What if Hermione was just a diversion, a way to have him in the right place at the right time, like it had been for the Department of Mysteries? He didn't know what to do. If he told Dumbledore, they'd try to protect Hermione, but, if she wasn't the real target, her protection would only be of hinderance because if would leave Voldemort more possibility of arriving at whatever goal he'd set this time, and maybe someone else would be lost. Still, even though Harry knew with a certainty that he could trust Dumbledore, another part of him still remembered the way everything had been done without him and kept from him before.

He needed to talk to someone. Generally in these situations he spoke to Hermione, but she was definitely out of the question-it was probably not a good idea to tell her "Hey, Hermione, I've been having this reoccuring dream where you die, do you think I should tell Dumbledore?" Nope, not a good idea, even though he was pretty sure that she would say 'Yes'-and Ron was already walking on eggshells around him, he didn't need him to start doing so around her as well. All of the other Weasleys were ruled out as well.

"Harry, your breakfast is getting cold," Hermione told him, slightly shaking him out of his state of spaced out contemplation.

"Huh?" He asked as he pulled himself out of his thoughts. Looking down he saw a far too full plate-bearing sausages and eggs with corn bread and blueberry muffins-sitting right under his nose. There were also several other plates in the center of the table containing various breakfast foods. Everyone had been decent enough not to ask what he'd just been thinking of. "Oh," he mumbled as his cheeks tinged pink, "smells great Mrs Weasley," he said before digging in. He didn't feel very much like eating-especially after that traumatizing mental image-but Harry didn't feel like making his best friend's mother cry quite so early in the morning. He stopped forcing himself when he began to feel the urge to gag. At least he'd halfed the portion that had been given to him.

"Don't you like it, Harry?" Mrs Weasley asked from across the table. She looked ready to cry. Harry repressed a groan.

"No, it was great Mrs Weasley," he replied quickly. "Just too much," he reassured her, "I'm not used to eating this much anymore, specially at breakfast." That was true, generally he got a slice of bread-when lucky-even though Aunt Petunia had been sneaking him small muffins whenever she thought nobody was going to notice. That seemed to calm down the motherly woman enough.

"Mmh," Hermione moaned as she swallowed her last bite, "that was wonderful, Mrs Weasley, thank you. We'll be going now," she said as she grabbed Harry's shoulder and heaved him up like she had the night before, pulling him out of the kitchen.

"Hey, wait for me!" Ron shouted as he shoveled the rest of his food in his mouth, and, grabbing three muffins before going, ran up the stairs and into the room he occupied with Harry.

There, the trio spent the day together with Ginny, who-after a couple hours-had deemed that she'd studied enough considering it was Harry's birthday. They played Exploding Snap and Wizard's Chess, mostly, and talked. It had been pleasant, for the most part, though there was a strain in Ron's behaviour-and Ginny's, too, though she was much more subtle about it-since he still didn't know quite how to behave around him. Except, of course, when the talk came to Quidditch. Absolutely no strain there. As a matter of fact, they spent most of the time talking of nothing but that. Strangely enough, Hermione hadn't seemed to mind. On the contrary, she seemed to have learned quite a bit about it (Ron thought that maybe she'd eaten a copy of Quidditch Trhough The Ages, or something like that, Harry just figured she'd been around them too long). She hadn't said a word about homework the entire day (not that they had any after the OWLs) or getting ahead of the program.

They stayed there without ever coming out. The only exception had been when Hermione had gone to get some sandwhiches from the kitchen for lunch. Nobody else would have even thought of food had not Ron persistently insisted on it.

Mid afternoon, though, Lupin came to call them.

"Hermione," he turned to her after coming in. "Everyone's waiting," he informed her. Harry wondered who was waiting for what. She beamed, though.

"Great, thank you!" Hermione exclaimed, jumping in a standing position instantly. She'd become a lot quicker and more agile since the last time he'd seen her, Harry noticed, where did all that come from? "Come on, Harry," she turned to him, grabbing hold of his hand and pulling him up effortlessly again, "we have to go." A lot stronger, too, he added. It was strange though, because her frame hadn't changed one bit, though she did stand a little differently. Actually, she hardly stood at all, and, when she did, she had a tendency to lean against something.

"Go where?" Harry asked, being forced to run with her since she was still holding on to his hand.

Looking behind her, wearing the brightest grin she could muster, she answered, "To celebrate."

"Huh?" He called to her articulately. Her grin simply broadened as she led him to the study, the same one where he'd seen the tapestry that Sirius so hated. Would that still be there, or did Lupin destroy that as well? Giggling, Ginny and Hermione opened the door simultaneously, and, as soon as he stood in the doorway, he was showered by confetti and the loud shout of "HAPPY BIRTHDAY HARRY!" He thought he'd gone deaf. And blind. Someone had just shot a magical picture of him. When he was able to blink he realized it had been Fred and George, both holding a camera.

It took Harry a while to figure out that he was supposed to step inside the room. It was just so different. He knew it had to have been redecorated, like the rest of the house, in the Gryffindor style, but much richer than any other room he'd seen.

It made him think of Sirius. Even though it was covered with seemingly thousands of banners wielding the mantra of 'Happy Birthday Harry'. In on corner of the room was a long table, similar to the ones that adorned the Hogwarts Great Hall, completely covered by food and presents. Here and there a little bit of scarlet and gold embroidered tablecloth would peek out. And, very strange thing, there were three Quidditch hoops on each end of the room. And everyone was there. The twins, Mr Weasley with Bill and Charlie, Dumbledore and McGonagall along with Madame Pomfrey and half of the Hogwarts staff (including Snape), Tonks, Mad Eye, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Mundungus Fletcher, Mrs Figg, and everyone who cared for him and wanted to support him. Even Dobby and Winky. He could feel Hermione's hand on his arm leading him forward, her whisper by his ear as she wished him "Happy Birthday Harry," again.

"So," Tonks said as she stepped up to him and leaned on his other shoulder, "what do you say about what Hermione went through for you?" She was definitely a lot brighter than she had been the previous day.

Harry turned to Hermione in surprise. She looked at him sheepishly before casting her eyes to the floor and nibbling the right corner of her bottom lip. Obviously she didn't want him to know it was her idea. Even more awed he looked again at the spectacle that the room had become, and at all the people that she had gathered for him. Than he looked back at her. She started to torture another lock of hair under his scrutiny, and it took him a second before he found his speech. Clearing his throat, "Wow," was all he could say. Her eyes met his, and a small blush tinged her cheek.

"Thank you," he said quietly. She simply smiled her welcome, before suddenly brightening up.

"So," she started, in much the same manner that Tonks had, as she leaned on the opposite shoulder, "what do you want to do first? Open your presents or play?" She asked, her grin bright and contagious.

"Play?" He asked, baffled and intrigued.

"Play it is," she didn't answer his question, but she slapped the same shoulder she'd been leaning on affectionately. Stepping over to the Table of Wonders she picked up his Firebold-when did that get there? He hadn't even noticed it-and handed it to him. "Ginny and Lupin, Fred, Ron, and Harry on one team; Tonks and Kingsley, George, Bill, and Charlie, respectively in the positions of Chasers, Batter, Keeper, and Seeker," she instructed as she grabbed a large, rather agited, chest out from under the table, and placed it on the floor between them. Harry noticed that everyone she'd named was weilding a broom. "Alastor Moody is refereeing, Professor Minerva McGonagall commentating," with that she stepped back and took a seat at the foot of the table, where the rest were already sitting, some munching on the goodies that-no, doubt-Mrs Weasley had provided.

Professor McGonagall cast the Sonorus charm. Mad Eye took the spot that Hermione had just vacated. "I don't need to tell you that I want a clean game, but I'll tell you still," he said in his best referee voice. "I want a clean game!" His tone made that perfectly clear. "Happy Birthday Harry," he added patting his shoulder. "Players on your brooms." He ordered. Harry, still not really believing any of this, did so. "Play Quidditch," he told them as he gave a strong kick to the chest he'd kept his foot on till then. Two bludgers shot out, and, almost instantly, he threw a quaffle straight up, that Ginny took no hesitation in grabbing before Tonks had even been ready. Quidditch! But he'd been banned for life from it.

"And the game begins! Ginny Weasley has possession of the quaffle, passes it to Lupin who dodges magnificently a bludger from George Weasley and passes back to Ginny!" McGonagall was doing a rather impressive commentary, she almost sounded like Lee Jordan in later years. And she was also completely ignoring the fact that Harry, along with Fred and George, had been banned for life from the game. He shrugged. He turned back to the game, but something seemed off.

It looked like everyone was pushing their broom at rather steep angles either up or down, but they stayed pretty stationary, and they appeared much further from him than they should have been. The room was only so big. Just as he thought that he heard the whizz of a bludger racing to him from behind, and, instinctively, he raised his broom at a steep angle to avoid it, only to realize that he was going to run head first into the ceiling. Yet he didn't. What was going on? And then he remembered the time in third year when the Ministry had provided Muggle cars that magically fit more people than phisically possible, and realized that the same charm had been cast on the room to allow as much flying space as needed.

The game became a lot more fun from then on. Ginny was an even better Chaser than she was a Seeker and in fifteen minutes she'd already scored seventy points with the help of Lupin, who was himself a good player. Tonks was a better player than Harry would have expected-once she began paying attention to the game she began giving Ginny a hard time-and had scored thirty points. Kingsley had a good eye, and smart plays, but he was rather slow on a broom. Fred and George were having a grand time playing against each other.

Harry hadn't felt so good and alive in ages. There was no wind in a closed room, but there he could feel the emptyness below him, and the gravity fighting against his broom. He felt like the heaviest, yet lightest thing in the world, there was nothing holding him up but a stick of charmed wood-sublime as it was. Nothing was as excitingly scary as a dodged bludger, or a race against the pull of gravity in one of his heartstopping dives as he would reach for the Snitch. And there was definitely nothing like the feeling of a cold, smooth Snitch fluttering its silver wings against the strong hold of his hand, trying to free itself from the prisony of his palm. And the knowledge of having caught it. However, there was no sign of the Snitch. Harry began to wonder if the charm that had been cast had a limit. Could the Snitch fly endlessly in the room? If it did it would be almost impossible to find. Yet, just as Harry thought that, he saw a glint of gold fluttering quickly a few meters behind and below the other Seeker's broom. Charlie still hadn't noticed.

Harry decided to try and get closer since, if he were to bring the Snitch to Charlie's attention, despite the fact that he had a much better broom, there were very little chances of Harry coming out victorious. He began circling the action while heading in Charles' direction, but realized that, because of the charm, Charlie was even farther away than he looked, and so was the Snitch. Just then the Snitch zoomed out from its hiding spot under Charlie's shadow. Harry didn't need to look to his opponent to know that he'd noticed. Harry had no choice but to make a mad dash for the desired Snitch.

His's heart thumped madly as he thought that he would never make it on time, all the while flattening himself against his broom to push it to higher levels of velocity. The Snitch was changing directions, diving to the ground below, forcing Harry to change his trajectory to a sharp angle. Charlie was riding nearly perpendicular to the ground, so he had the added advantage of full gravity, but, Harry realized, the redhead was much further from the Snitch than he had originally appeared. Sproning his broom on as much as he could, he accelerated to the point that his eyes watered, and he held his hand out to try and catch the elusive Snitch. He didn't know if he would reach it, or if it was just an illusion of the charm, but when he closed his fist he felt a cold metallic fluttering within it, his heart nealy lurched in triumph.

He ignored it, and pulled up and to the side so that Charlie wouldn't slam into him while still concentrated on his dive. His breath was impossibly ragged, even more so than it should have been. He'd won. He'd caught the Snitch. It was there, in his hand, trying to escape. He was hardly listening to the cheers from below, and the strong hands that were slapping his back in congratulation. His heart was thumping madly in its ribcage, his blood was sounding its beat in his ears, his skin burned and prickled with excitement, his warm breath tickling his parched lips. Everyone of his nerve endings was drawn as tightly as could be in a euphoric hum.

He was overwhelmed by the feeling of vitality that had completely overtaken him.

His friends had guided his broom down near the ground, and were heartily congratulating him, but he was concentrating on the strange feeling of his feet on the ground once again. He stood slowly, and found it a little unsettling, as though he hadn't tried walking in years. He suddenly realized that the muscles in his cheeks were burning from all his smiling.

°*°*°

"That was a great play Harry," Charlie spoke from behind him.

Harry, with his mouth full of a chicken drumstick, swallowed, immediately embarassed. "Uhm, thanks," he mumbled while cleaning his mouth. "But if you had a better broom it might not have gone like that."

Charlie grinned. "Maybe," he replied amused.

Harry watched him in thought. "Why didn't you try to play professionally? Ron said a lot of teams offered you great positions," that had been one of the topics of conversation the previous hours.

He shrugged. "I like playing," he started, "it makes me feel good. Forget all my problems when I'm up on a broom. But I don't want this to be my life. It's my refuge. It's what I turn to when I want to try to get away from my life and forget what's bothering me. If Quidditch became my life, it would be great for a couple of years, but after that probably everything that's in it would become something that I want to get away from. Then what would I turn to?" He asked rethorically.

Harry nodded. On one side he understood Charlie, but on the other, Quidditch was the only thing that he was good at on his own. He excelled at it with his own skills, and the only thing that he would ever think of excepting fame for. Something that had nothing to do with his scar. Yet, Harry asked himself the same question. If he were to play Quidditch for a living what could he take as his escape from everything that his life included? Then again, that old idea of becoming an Auror didn't seem any good anymore. He hadn't even been able to save Sirius.

He hadn't even figured out that it had all been a stupid setup. He sighed deeply. He should have listened to Hermione. She always knew. Harry never did. He didn't even know what to do about those stupid dreams of his and the fact that he couldn't possibly think of telling her about them made the whole situation unnerving.

"Hey, Harry, are you still in there?" Charlie asked him with a mix between worry and amusement.

"Oh," Harry replied, shaking himself out of his thoughts, "yeah."

"Well, good. It's time for you to open your presents, and I have other things to do tonight so lets get this over with," Tonks told him as she slapped his shoulder. She was definitely too cheerful considering that it was Harry's birthday and that the previous day she looked ready to bite. It was then that Harry noticed that everyone was watching him expectantly with their presents in hand.

"Oh," Harry whispered. He had never opened presents in front of so many people before. "Ok, what's first?"

"Here, take mine first," Tonks shoved a badly wrapped package in his hands. By the shape and size he could have guessed it was a something along the lines of a magazine in the format of Quidditch Weekly.

…

Well, it was a magazine of sort…

He just didn't know what to say about a magical sexy kittens pin up book.

"uhm…" he began with a squeak, turning the gift over as to avoid seeing the embarrassing image on the cover just to find another one on the back of it. He was red up to his ears with embarrassment at the fact that he was holding such things. In front of his friends and teachers. Rather flustering.

"Whoa, Harry! That's from the first, unfindable edition!" Fred exclaimed, grabbing it out of his hands and whistling appreciatively as he flipped through the pages.

"Bloody hell! Let me see that!" Ron shouted as he huddled next to his brothers.

Harry was very relieved that he didn't have to hold it anymore, and grateful for the fact that the twins were distracting Tonks from noticing that he had no idea of what to say of the gift. He probably should have thanked her, but that hardly seemed appropriate in front of Snape and McGonagall, and he had no idea of what Dumbledore might have thought of it. Not to mention Hermione. Especially after that discussion at breakfast.

"Hey, Harry, you have to let us borrow this for a while!" George exclaimed, getting a wooden spoon over the head once Molly Weasley realized what the contents of 'gift' implied.

"This is Harry's," she chastened, taking it from them and handing them to Hermione, "and I'm not giving it back until he turns of age and he asks for it," she warned them.

"What?" Ron screamed. "You can't do that!"

"Oh, yes I can!" She replied stubbornly, "Harry's still an underage wizard, and I won't let you corrupt him until the law considers him old enough to make his own choices," she probably had not realized how this could have affected Harry.

The room seemed to still. They all knew that one of the things that had continuously brought Harry to have one of his temper rages had been the fact that everyone made the choices for him, completely forgetting that he'd saved their world as they knew it times over, and that he was more than able to choose for himself.

He sighed. He knew that to the Weasley matron he would always be a boy who needed to be sheltered. And he also thought that, maybe, she was so protective because she didn't want to admit that the danger they were in was as fierce as it was, and that her children weren't truly risking their lives like they were. Still, it stung. She should have known better by then.

Fred and George looked at each other. "Well," Fred began, "I guess you'll have to settle for this," he handed over a heavy rectangular box.

"It isn't exactly a first complete edition of Witches Pinned Up, but I think you'll find that it comes in as a close second," George boasted. Their leering grins were slight scaring him. Tentatively, he opened the package, expecting the worst, and finding a pair of, seemingly, innocent Muggle binoculars. But he knew that whatever might have passed through Fred and George's hands could look decieving. Especially when they were grinning like Chesire cats and couldn't seem able to sit in their own skin. "Go on, Harry," George incourage him, "try them."

Not knowing what to say he looked through them. He blinked confused. They seemed completely normal binoculars. At least they did until they fell on Professor Sprout. With a horrified scream he fell off his chair.

"Harry are you okay?" He heard Hermione coming around to help him up, and, with another great display of strength on her part, pulled him to his feet, though he still looked rather disturbed. "What did you see?" She asked concerned, and took the binoculars from his hands.

"No, Hermione, don't!" Harry tried to stop her, but she'd already looked at Snape.

She dropped the cursed object in horror. "Oh, Merlin, I'm scarred for life!" She said as she became deadly pale and looked ready to feel very sick.

"What? What do they do?" Tonks asked as she picked them up. Hermione stopped her from bringing them to her eyes.

"I strongly advice you not to do that," she warned, her voice sounding nauseous.

"Why not?" The young Auror asked, confused.

"They see through clothes," Harry answered, trying to rid himself of the mental image of his Herbology teacher. Tonks seemed rather interested, but before she could test them out, Hermione took them and placed them back in the box. Snape, who seemed rather angry at Hermione's reaction, sneered. "Is this perverted idiocy going to be a reoccuring theme here?"

"Let's hope not," Harry mumbled, never having been that flustered in his life before, finding this even more embarassing than any uncomfortable Cho Chang moment.

"I believe that Minerva and I might be able to interrupt this cicle," Dumbledore seemed rather amused as he sat there sipping a lemon sherbet.

Harry looked to him. The Headmaster did not look away. Harry couldn't keep a small smile from tugging at the corner of his lips. At least Dumbledore seemed to mean what he'd said before Harry had left Hogwarts.

"Minerva, if you will," the ancient wizard prompted his deputy as she stepped forward, placing an envelope in Harry's hand. Harry looked down in puzzlement. He gingerly opened the envelope, scrolling over the words, understanding their meaning but not registering them. He looked up at his Headmaster and at his Head of House. She looked stern, yet pleased with him. "Congratulations on your first victory of the season," she told him, referring to the game he'd just won.

"Harry," Hermione exclaimed, after having read over his shoulder the contents of the piece of paper that he was holding. "You're back on the team!"

He was. That insignificant piece of parchment stated that, after having taken under consideration some of the decisions made by High Inquisitor Dolores Umbridge, his banishment from Quidditch had been reconsidered, and, therefore, cancelled. He was free to play all he wanted.

"And that's where my gift comes in handy," Ginny smiled as she handed her brightly wrapped package to her brother's best friend, who had, recently, become a good friend of hers (as soon as she'd stopped mooning over his, that was, of course). Harry, now feeling a little more confident about the gifts that he was beginning to recieve, tore through the flashing paper eagerly. "Wow, Ginny," he began.

"Rather nice, aren't they?" She asked as she picked up the woderful, mohogany colored Quidditch gloves. They shone as though they were made of metal.

"Armordillar skin," she explained. "Might prevent a bludger from breaking your arms, and they mold to your hand, so they're not uncomfortable," she grinned as she handed them back to him. He wore one, and instantly it magically shrunk to fit him perfectly, barely adding any width to his wrist and forearm. "And," the redhead continued, "they're hex proof. Might be helpful when playing against Slytherin." Harry couldn't help smiling his thanks to her.

"No fair," Ron piped up, "makes my gift look boring," he pouted as he handed Harry another package that could have been a book, or another magazine. Harry looked worried again, but was glad to see that it was not another first edition of "Witches Pinned Up" but a black leather bound book whose cover read in rich golden letters: A guide for expert Seekers: historical tecniques and innovative plays for the daring by Quick Catchit. Flipping through it, Harry saw that it was written in perfect detail and accompanied by clear wizard illustrations. It must have cost a fortune. Much like Ginny's gloves.

"Where did you get the money for this?" He asked in wonder.

Ron turned as red as his hair while Ginny replied for the both of them. "We've been helping Fred and George in stocking their store. Basically we make and charm a good part of what they sell," she told him, sounding rather proud of herself. After that, there were so many presents that he almost got lost in them. There was the usual sweater from Mrs Weasley, a Muggle toaster from Arthur Weasley, a wristband covered in real dragon's teeth from Bill(the ladies love them, he said) with a matching dragon claw necklace from Charlie (supposedly powerful, but stylish nonetheless), and a lot of school material from the Hogwarts staff. Harry was rather scared when Hagrid placed a heavy box at his feet. It probably measured five feet in width and three in height, and the Boy Who Lived could not, for the life of him, guess what it was. He just hoped it didn't have fangs, or stingers, or claws, or anything that might, somehow, lacerate skin or disintegrate bones.

Hagrid had been babbling as he gave it to Harry. "Dunno why I didn't give it ter yer earlier, 'Arry. Fergot all 'bout it, s'pose. 'Ad it sittin' in de back o' my closet all alon'. Neveh knew why I kep' it really. Jest thought ye might 'a want'd it sumday." His eyes were slightly watering when he said this, and Harry was even more bewildered then before he spoke. Uncertainly he took off the wrapping to see a gigantic box. Doubting that Hagrid might cry over a box, he opened it, only to stare in open awe. There stood something that he never would have thought he would ever see. A Muggle motorcycle. A vintage Harley Davidson. And there was only one Muggle bike that he could think of Hagrid ever having. He knew that, if he were to try it, it would have been able to fly noisily. He knew that, if he'd asked when Hagrid had gotten it, the date would coincide with the first fall of Voldemort. And he also knew that, if he were to ask how Hagrid had gotten it, the answer would be that Sirius had given it to him while telling the giant to take the newly orphaned baby away to a safe place.

Why had Hagrid kept it? Harry remembered clearly, in third year, when Sirius had been thought to be a murderer and a betrayer, Hagrid had expressed a deep hatred, disgust, and anger toward the only man that had ever escaped from Azkaban. If that had been the way he'd felt, then why had he kept something that had belonged to Sirius? Hagrid cleared his throat nervously. "I jest…jest thought ye might a want'd it, is all," he finished nervously. Harry wordlessly hugged him. Hagrid cleared his throat nervously patting his shoulder. "Glad ye like it, 'Arry."

The Weasleys, especially the Weasley matron, looked a little put off that anyone had dared to remind Harry of the godfather that he had so recently lost and that he probably wanted to forget. Mrs Weasley was glad at least that nobody had mentioned the name, considering the guilt that Harry had to have been feeling toward the only man that had behaved as a father would have toward him. She didn't even begin to fathom how far from how Harry was feeling she was. Then, of course, Lupin spoke, and she looked like she was either going to cry or murder the werewolf, or perhaps do one while acting on the other.

"Harry," the kindly ex-professor called to him, "there's something I want to show you," he said, walking over to the spot where the tapestry of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black once stood, which was currently covered with a massive birthday banner. Taking hold of a corner of the banner-weilding a roaring Gryffindor lion-he gave a strong tug, making it fall away at once.

It took Harry a long time to realize that he was, in fact, staring at the infamous tapestry of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black, and he came to that conclusion only after seeing the golden embroidering reading said words at the top of the scarlett fabric. It did not look like the same tapestry anymore. Once, there were many names and some burnt holes there where the name of the family 'black sheep' had been written. Now, there was a noticably decreased amount of names, and in place of the charred spots that used to be there the fabric was knotted, as though the thread had been wound tighter there to hide the damage that had been made. There seemed to be no trace of Doxies anywhere, but the most amazing thing of all, Harry realized, was not what might have first caught the eye. The names had been inverted. The ones that had once been deleted were now the only ones remaining, while the others were hidden under the more thickly threaded parts, and, in the middle of it was Sirius Black, his name more richly embroidered than the rest, standing out like the brightest star in the sky, the golden letters almost twinkling there on the deep red canvas.

Sirius Black, the very best of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black.

Someone had to have cast some sort of hex on Harry. There was something in his throat that kept him from making a sound, kept him from breathing, kept him from his numbness. Several times he tried to say something, but only managed to gape his mouth like a fish out of water. "H- " he started, but his voice was nothing but a strangled squeak. Clearing his throat he tried again, though the only word he could manage was "How?"

He could see that Mrs Weasley was about to kill him for rendering Harry practically speechless (not that he'd been speaking much earlier), but Lupin smiled nevertheless. "I thougth that was rather obvious, don't you?" He asked rethorically while sending Hermione a meaningful glance. Harry turned to see her blushing under their scrutiny.

"It was Remus's idea," she told them quickly. "I just helped him and Professor Flitwick with the spells."

Harry didn't know what to say. So he didn't say anything. He just walked up to the canvas, and lightly tounched his godfather's name, feeling the thread under his fingers, the light giving a golden glow to the letters. Lupin's hand was on his shoulder, and Harry didn't think he could look at him at the moment. A very uncomfortable silence ensued, though Harry noticed Dumbledore's eyes twinkle behind his half moon spectacles, while McGonagall looked quite proud of them. Hermione's eyes were glistening as well as she looked at the tapestry and at the way Harry was touching it so affectionately.

Fred and George were, of course, the ones to break the icy atmosphere, offering to teach everyone how to use their Hoversticks and asking if anyone wanted one of their new binoculars (which had not been named yet) which was enough to get Mrs Weasley to stop being so overprotective of Harry for a little while and everything was back to how it was before anyone had mentioned anything about presents.

Soon enough the underage wizards were being shooed to their rooms because a meeting of the Order was to ensue shortly, and Harry was being hugged from all sides and saluted with the best wishes for his sixteenth birthday. Hermione, who'd been speaking in a subdued, secretive, slightly conspirive tone with Madame Pomfrey, suddenly jumped to speak to her Head of House.

"Professor McGonagall," the transfiguration master turned to her.

"Yes, Miss Granger?"

"Oh," Hermione couldn't keep her eagerness out of her voice, "I was wondering if you knew anything of our OWL scores," Ron groaned behind her, while Ginny gasped in horror, as though she suddenly remembered that she could have been spending the day getting ready for the dreaded exams.

"The results have already been calculated," Professor McGonagall answered readily. "You will recieve your scores with your Hogwarts letters, along with your schedules for the year, within the end of the week," and with that she left.

"Schedules?" Ron asked, looking like he hadn't liked the sound of it. "What schedules?"

"Oh, honestly Ron, think about it," Hermione huffed. "We've had five years in which we learned the basics for our required courses. The OWLs' purpose is to see which subjects you should and can take to higher levels, then the careers that you've taken into consideration with McGonagall are confronted with your results to outline your schedule for the next two years," she explained as she began to step out of the room and headed up the stairs to where their beds were.

"Oh," Ron looked like he liked the sound of that even less as he shuffled past Hermione and into his room.

"Uhm…Harry?" Hermione called him. He turned to her. "Can I…talk to you? For just a second?" She asked nervously.

"Oh! I forgot I need to ask Ron something about the OWLs!" Ginny suddenly exclaimed and disappeared into the boys' room, making Harry think that she knew what Hermione was going to say to him. After all, why would she go to Ron-of all people-to ask about the OWLs, especially after he'd seemed so put off by the idea of the new schedules?

"Sure, Hermione," Harry replied, hoping that she wouldn't start behaving strangely now, right when people finally seemed to understand that he didn't need to be treated like a piece of glass. Wordlessly, she led him into her room. Nervously she indicated for him to sit on the edge of the bed, and he followed suit. She was fidgetting rather badly. "Harry," she began, reaching for the trunk at the foot of her bed, "I know I should have asked you first," she apologized while nibbling anxiously on her lower lip, "but I took the liberty of taking-borrowing-this," she pulled his family photo album out from under her things.

Harry was really rather confused. "Why did you take it?"

Hermione seemed to read accusation in his tone, though there was none. "I know I should have asked you, but I thought it wouldn't be much of a birthday present if I did," she replied.

"Birthday present?" She nodded. "I thought that was the Quidditch game."

"Oh, no," she told him quickly, "that was just an idea that I had when McGonagall told me that Umbridge's educational decrees were being cancelled. Dumbledore and McGonagall thought it would have been a nice way to say 'Welcome back to the team."

Harry furrowed his eyebrows. "What about the tapestry?"

"That was Lupin's idea, Harry," she explained readily, "I just helped him charm it so that Mrs Weasley didn't know." She took a deep sigh. "She said it would have made you feel guiltier…about what happened," the air seemed to still with what she'd said. It had been the first time that anybody was confronting Harry-truly confronting him-about the feeling of Sirius's disappearance caused in him.

Harry looked away.

"Lupin and I thought she was wrong, though. That's why we did it, Harry," she placed a hand on his shoulder, making him look at her. "I can guess at what you're feeling, Harry, because I've known you all those years, but I don't think you know what you're feeling."

"I'm not feeling anything, Hermione," Harry replied quietly.

"That's not true, Harry," she contradicted him. "You think you're not feeling anything, because you don't want to feel anything and because-even if you did-you probably wouldn't understand what you would feel, and I can understand that," she was handing him his album as she spoke, "so that's why I chose to give you this."

He took the leather bound picture book from her, opened it to the first page, and, seeing what had always been there, flipped rapidly through until he found something completely new, and completely foreign, at least to those pages. Muggle pictures, people captured in an eternal smile, a still posed that would remain forever, or as close to that as possible. And in each there was Sirius. Sirius with Harry, Sirius with Ron, Sirius with Hermione, or the Weasleys or some Hogwarts staff member. In most of them, the people rappresented didn't look as though they were aware of being photographed. Harry stared at them all for so long that Hermione felt the need to justify her action.

"I took them last Christmas," she explain, beginning to ramble already. "You know, sometime at home we get visitors so I can't put out any of my moving pictures, and I wanted some so that when I would look around I could see them in the kitchen, or on the wall by my bed, so that I could see you all-I have that one right by my bed," she mumbled as Harry was looking at a picture of himself laughing next to Sirius about something that his godfather had said, "and when everything happened-the Department of Misteries…well, I was afraid that you would try to forget Sirius, or that you'd hate him, or hate yourself for what happened, and I think a little of all three has happened, so I…well, I thought that this would be a good way to think about things because you don't really like to talk about what you feel and you especially don't talk about it with me, and considering how Ron and everyone else is behaving I knew you wouldn't talk to them either, so at least this could help a little. You can be alone in your thoughts and everything, but I think that at least you'll think about…something…or other, or-," she inhaled violently after all that ramble, and she was about to begin again, had not Harry stopped her.

"Hermione!" Harry his hands up in surrender, so that she wouldn't start again. She looked to him, her face anxious and worried about what he might have been thinking as she twirled on her hair again. "Don't spoil this for me," he whispered, appreciating those pictures more than almost anything else in his life. She watched him speechless. And in awe she watched him as he ran his fingers over a picture-her picture, the one that she'd told him was by her bedside-tracing the laugh lines of Sirius's eyes, watching his own expression as though it were foreign, looking as though he was trying to remember something so far and remote in time that it could have been from a past life. He looked as though he were thinking of everything, yet of nothing at all.

She sighed heavily as she placed a hand on his back, touching ever so slightly in soothing circles. Watching him she felt as though she had seen his fragility for the first time. She knew Harry was human, she knew he had feelings, and she knew that, therefore, he was not invincible. He did manage to make that impression, though. Since the first day she met him, he seemed as though nothing could harm him, yet as she began to know him, she realize that there were many ways to hurt Harry, and the most effective one was to hurt his friends. Still, even with this weakness it seemed as though nothing, absolutely nothing, could physically hurt him.

But that wasn't true. Not of him, not of anybody. Perhaps she had thought that because, though she'd been in life threatening situations before, she'd never-truly-gotten hurt enough to know the fear of losing her life. Human bodies were vulnerable on their own, but when the mind was bothered as well…well, a human could become very weak. She knew that, yet she'd never been faced by that reality before. And that this reality would have to face up to her in the form of Harry, the never wavering pillar of strength and morality…she sighed again.

I wish you'd tell me what you're thinking, Harry, she told him in her mind, but she knew that wasn't the right thing to say to him. "Do you miss him?" To most people that would have seemed like a stupid, pointless question. But it wasn't. It was Harry's turn to sigh. "No…yes-I don't know," he mumbled, trying to figure out his thoughts. "It's as though I think so much that it's almost like not thinking at all," he fumbled with his words. "Last year, I was so mad at everything. I couldn't stop Cedric from dying, and Voldemort was back, and the Dursleys hated me more than ever, and the Dementors, and Dumbledore who wouldn't look at me, you and Ron were Prefects and I thought you were going to leave me behind, and Snape was worse than he'd ever been, and Cho was trying to talk of Cedric when it was the last thing to do, and…" what else was there to say? He sighed again. "And then…the Department of Misteries. And Sirius and the veil.

"When it happened, I lost it. I screamed and destroyed Dumbledore's office, and the prophecy-…" oh, yes, the prophecy. What of that? He'd almost slipped it to Hermione, he'd almost told her that he would either die or become a murderer. He didn't want her to know about that. She knew that he was holding back what he was about to say, it was all over her face, and she wouldn't have been Hermione if she didn't notice it, but he refused to speak of that. He didn't want his friends to know that. "At the end of the year feast I ran into Sir Nick, and Luna…and I talked to them. They said a lot of things and I didn't know what to feel anymore."

He looked at her finally, watching her watching him. "When I smashed Dumbledore's office, I felt so guilty about Sirius it was eating me alive, but then after I spoke to them, it just disappeared. I didn't know if I was to feel anything anymore. Was I supposed to be mad, depressed, guilty, scared, hopeless? I didn't know. So I just ended up feeling nothing. And that was the easiest thing to feel," he suddenly thought of the dreams he'd been having, and how, after the numbness had gone, it had made him terrified. "It's good to be numb," he told her suddenly, "because everything just washes off. You can feel a dull throbbing, but nothing else."

"No, Harry," she told him, brushing some hair away from his eyes. "It's not good to be numb. It's better to bleed and cry and hurt and feel everything in one swift passing, then to have a constant dull throbbing that'll grow everyday stronger for the rest of your life. It would only make you a involucroul for pain and self loathing. Because that's what that numb feeling is. It's the lack of those vibrant feelings that make you alive. The only things you'd feel are those that drive people to kill themselves, Harry," she looked down at the floor. Maybe she'd said too much. Oh, hell! If she'd said too much she might as well go through it all with it. "Harry, Sirius doens't want you to feel that. Nobody does."

He stared at her for a second, then, exhaling deeply, he looked back down at the picture that had been staring at him since he'd turned to it, still as it would ever be.

"It's strange," he whispered.

"What is?" She asked him, furrowing his eyebrows.

"Right now I feel that…looking at these pictures makes me think that…" He began, and she combed some more strands of hair out of his face to encourage him.

Harry watched her poignantly. "Right now I feel that Sirius isn't dead."

She blinked. Out of all the things that Hermione Granger could have expected him to say, that had not been placed in her list of possibilities. She frowned slightly, already working an equation in her mind. "What do you feel he is then?"

Harry was surprised that she hadn't tried to dissuade him from that feeling, that she hadn't told him that it wasn't possible and that he had to move on. He looked back down at the photograph. "I don't know," he mumbled. "I think he's lost. Someplace where he's stuck and he can't get out." He sighed. "I know it sounds crazy."

"Do you think it's crazy?" She asked him, rethorically.

He shook his head with certainty. "I know it's crazy. But I just have this feeling. I look at this pictures, and they don't move, but there's just something that tells me that he's not dead."

"And how does this feeling make you feel, Harry?" She was staring with an absolutely open face, an almost conspiring look in her eyes, a promise of complicity, that what he would say would be between them and them alone. He closed his eyes, and thought. He took in a deep breath and sighed. "Alive," he told her finally. Closing the album in his lap she hugged him. "I wish I could tell you that this is true, Harry," she began.

He interrupted her. "I know…I know it can't be true…but I…I don't know."

She pulled away enough to look at him. "That wasn't what I was going to say, Harry." He watched her confused. "I can't tell you that it's true, because I don't know, and I don't think anyone else does."

"But," he was about to interrupt her again.

"Listen, Harry, I really don't think anyone knows what that veil was or what was behind it. Yes, it scared me, and everyone made up their own idea about it, but nobody actually knows what it is, or it wouldn't have been in the Department of Misteries," she told him sharply. "And what that could imply is very complicated. Or very simple. He could be dead, simple as that, but how could we know for sure?" She asked him. He was thinking about his conversations with Nearly Headless Nick and Loony Lovegood, and he thought of what Hermione was trying to say. He didn't know what to think.

"He could be lost, Harry. He could be in some kind of Limbo or in a different time in space, a different dimension, he could be locked somewhere, or he could have just disappeared. We don't know Harry." She told him firmly.

He looked more baffled than ever. "Than…what am I supposed to think?"

She smiled at him. "I can't tell you what to think, Harry. I never even tried." He looked ready to object again. "I can tell you, however," she stopped him before he started, "that if that thought made you feel alive, then you need to think about it. You need to think about it, and be confused about it, and eventually come to terms with whatever you think."

"You make everything sound easy," she mumbled.

"Oh, thinking's not easy, Harry!" she exclaimed, becoming playful. "I would know, wouldn't I?"

He smiled at her. "Yeah, you would."

Returning his smile, she hugged him again. "Thank you, Hermione," he told her as he held her tightly. She pulled away to look him in the eye as she told him, "Happy Birthday, Harry." She gave him one more squeeze, and wished him a good night. When Harry returned to his bedroom, he fell asleep almost instantly, with the photo album by his side. However, instead of dreaming of Quidditch, of friends, of Sirius coming out of the veil, he dreamt of Dementors. He dreamt of dark sellars being opened, of wands being retrieved, of madness being restored. He dreamt of Lucius Malfoy and Bellatrix Lestrange free, and of Voldemort's glee. And that didn't allow him to think or feel or live anymore for several days to come.

To be continued.

Now, there's my angsty ending for a generally happy chapter (at least for this story)! Er…sorry if I'm no good at Quidditch scenes (recently I bought the Quidditch World Cup for PS2, so that should help me be a little more creative, since I always seem to write the same thing). Anyway, please, I need feedback, good or bad I don't care so long as it's constructive.

Love

Pearl