Chapter Eleven
The Truth about Hector Grey
Ron and Heather continued not talking about the events of the Halloween Ball for weeks after it had happened. Both Harry and Hermione felt as if they missed out on something big. Even though the two of them still talked; it just was not the same as before.
One chilly November morning during breakfast, Harry, Ron, and Hermione went down to grab a bite to eat before class to find Heather no where to be found. The trio sat down at the Gryffindor table when April, Amber, and Amanda Miller walked by. Hermione took the moment to ask them if they had seen Harry's sister.
"Chaos is down there." April pointed down at the other end of the Gryffindor table. She had a portable cd player with her and she sat alone, upset about something.
"Why is she down there?" Ron asked as he grabbed for another hot cinnamon roll.
"Probably because someone pissed her off." Amber looked directly at Ron as she said this to accuse him of making her mad.
"Now, I wouldn't be surprised if the person ended up dead by the end of the night."
Ron gulped audibly, but Amanda put the prefect at ease. "Don't listen to her, Ron, she is just joking. She's not mad at you. It's that stupid asshole known as Professor Snape. He caught her and Danielle fighting again and gave her detention for a week, not only that but took points away from Gryffindor. Besides, Heather couldn't kill anyone with her wand-less magic…at least not yet anyway, but don't be surprised if you hear about some strange things going on around here…well stranger than normal anyway."
"Like what?" Hermione asked.
"Glass windows shattering, unexplainable injuries, and other things of that nature." April sighed. "Chaos always makes the day interesting for the teachers when she is upset."
"Okay, would someone please tell me how my sister got that nickname?" Harry asked, he was growing much frustrated he could never get straight answers out of any of the Chicago Institute students. It was as if they were trying to avoid the topic all together. "Because every time someone goes to explain it; no one does."
"Really? No one told you?" Mika looked surprised no one had told him why as she chose a seat next to Hermione. "I would have thought it was rather obvious why."
"I thought that too." India Jade replied as she and Mika joined the six of them at the table. India took a spot across the table from Mika. "Why do you think Mika and I are down here and not with her? It's best not to approach her when she is angry."
"Why are you down here then?" Hermione asked as she cut her sandwich into smaller pieces. "You should be down there making her feel better."
"No way!" India exclaimed. "I rather like my life thank you very much."
"It's just because things happen." Mika tried to explain.
"Like what?"
"Like she busts the bones of the person who infuriated her," April looked at Harry, who had asked the question, "and never actually touch them."
"When did that actually happen?" Hermione shot back. "That does not seem like a logical explanation at all. No one can break someone's bones with out making some form of contact."
"Heather always has…" Amanda began and her twin, Amber rolled her eyes to continue her thoughts.
"…and always will be…"
"…the exception to all the rules." April grinned as she finished her sister's thoughts.
"Chaos just needs sometime to cool off. You see, before she received that cd from Hector and before she learned to control her wand-less magic, she caused chaos inside of the school when she had reached some form of high emotional stress. That it is why it was so important for her to learn to control her emotions and her wand-less magic." Mika looked down at Heather and continued. "Hector burned an audio cd to help her with her anger management and to tell the truth it has helped immensely."
"What is on it?" Harry asked as Hermione took his hand and placed it in his own to calm him down.
"That is they mystery, Harry. No one knows except Heather and Hector. When ever anyone has approached her about it, she has changed the topic." India admitted. "Most people speculate that it is probably Hector's voice because he was always the safety on Heather's trigger. Whenever Heather was angry, he was always her voice of reason. He could always calm her down."
"Others, like me, speculate that the cd is some music Hector burned. Heather's world is completely surrounded by music and people would figure it help her calm down. Besides, music sooths the savage beast." Mika offered as she cut her food up with her fork and inserted it into her mouth.
Ron, Harry, and Hermione looked at each other and grinned at each other knowingly. The three of them had an encounter with Hagrid's three-headed dog named Fluffy in their first year at Hogwarts. Music had soothed the dog to sleep, so they could get passed to get to the Sorcerer's stone.
"What exactly was Hector and Heather's relationship? Were they best friends or something else?" Ron asked and Mika, India, Amber, April, and Amanda looked at each other expectantly as if they there trying to convince the others to speak up. "Well, what was it?"
"I don't think now is the right time to be telling you this, so why don't we get together later tonight and I won't only tell you, but I will show you." India spoke quietly as if it were some sort of secret,
"How about in the Head boy/ girl common room," Hermione offered, "it would be a little more private?"
"That sounds great! We'll see you then after dance team practice since Heather is supposed to have Animagi training tonight." India looked at her watch. "We'd better be going or we are going to be really late for our next class!"
*****
Heather was silent through much of transfiguration, even though many of the students knew it was her who had turned Draco Malfoy's water goblet into a frog instead of a bird. Professor McGonagall said nothing, but wanted to laugh as Draco Malfoy grew frustrated that he was performing the spell correctly, but the object did not turn into the object he wanted it to.
Neville, on the other hand and to his amazement, performed the spell correctly on the first try. Not only was Neville surprised but so was the whole class. "I think I am getting a hang of this whole transfiguration thing!" he exclaimed with newly found confidence. Harry had a feeling his sister had something to do with this situation as well. He'd have to ask her once it was safe to approach her.
The bell rang and the seventh years and the one fifth year began to head down to the dungeons for potions. If transfiguration did not go well with Heather; then potions did not sit well with her either. Professor Shift was not in class due to illness, so the students from the Chicago Institute were able to see Professor Snape in full force.
He picked on both Harry and Neville and took points away from Gryffindor because Hermione knew the right answer, but he did not like the way Hermione had presented her information. He gave Slytherin points for "attempts" at answering his questions.
When finally, Heather had enough, she marched up to Professor Snape and the two almost fought physically. "You silly little girl!" Snape sneered. "You actually think you can take on a Professor?"
"You should not be ragging on Harry and the rest of the Gryffindors like that!" Heather volleyed back to him.
"Get out of my class room, Potter!"
"Good! I didn't want to be here, anyway!" Heather sauntered toward the door after she picked up her books from where they were laid next to Hermione. She turned around once she reached the door. "You know, Professor, you are making a horrible mistake."
"Humor me, Miss Potter. Why is that?"
"Because you think Harry takes after my dad and I take after my mother. Well, Professor, to shed some light on the topic, he does not take after father, Harry takes after mother and I take after father. It's not Harry you need to worry about, Snivelus, it's me!" Somewhere in the depths of her eyes, they became much darker. "I'm my father's daughter." She turned around and stalked out, but not before uttering a spell over her shoulder and hung the professor upside down from the light fixture. Her laugh rang through out the halls on her way out from the dungeon. "PRONGS RIDES AGAIN!"
*****
After dinner was over for that evening, Ron, Harry, Hermione, and Heather reclined in the Prefect common room. "So, did your detention get extended for what happened in Potions today?" Harry asked his sister as she lay on the couch face down, but hung over the side of the piece of furniture. He and Hermione claimed the two arm chairs next to the couch on either side. Ron seemed content on the floor, next to the couch.
"I was lucky and I got only two more weeks worth of detention. Professor Gaddis was furious! Professor Dumbledore was the only one to calm him down. He told him that Professor Snape probably did as I said he did and I could not control my anger." Heather would have laughed if the situation was different and not so serious.
"What time is your animagi training?" Ron asked, trying to change the topic before it got out of hand.
"Oh, I am done with that. All I have to do now is get registered with the Department of Magic in the Secretary of Transfiguration division. Professor McGonagall said a representative should come here next month before Christmas break."
"What is your animagi form?" Harry asked his sister. "As you already know, Dad was a stag."
Heather grinned at her brother as she changed from her human form. Suddenly a black jaguar lay on her belly side down on the couch where Heather had been a moment before. She gave a good swipe of her giant paw at the now frightened Ron, who scampered away once she had taken form. The jaguar changed back into her human form. "That was bloody brilliant!" Ron exclaimed.
"Can you show us how to do that?" Harry was surprised it was Hermione who had asked this and not Ron, but Harry knew from the expression on Ron's face, he wanted to ask the very same question.
"Sure, but don't be too upset if you do not get it your first night. It took me about two years to learn how to do it, but I was told that was pretty fast." Heather sat up on the couch properly and looked at her watch. "I'd better get going otherwise I'll be late for detention. I serve it tonight with Professor Shift, since she is feeling better. See ya!" Heather walked out of the room with Ron, Harry, and Hermione making excuses to leave the prefect's common room as well.
"I need to finish my homework." Hermione said as she disappeared via the entryway of the Head boy/ girls common room door.
"Me, too." Harry headed to the door of the head common room, but Ron stopped him.
"Hey, I need to talk to you, mate. Do you think you can hold off the homework for a bit?"
The last bit Heather heard was her brother agreeing to listen to Ron's important message. Heather did not notice India Jade and Mika Salena come down from the girls' dormitories as she exited the Gryffindor House Tower Common room nor the fact in reality, Ron and Harry were procrastinating to allow the two girls entry into their head boy and girl's common room.
Once the five of them were safely in the confines of the room, Mika waved her wand and a television and a V.C.R. appeared. Mika pulled out her digital video recorder from the inside of her robes and connected it properly.
As she did this, India took center stage and addressed Ron directly. "Ron, you asked about what the exact relationship there was between Heather and Hector, correct."
"Yeah," Ron looked at her expectantly. Hopefully, he would get the answers he needed.
"Ever notice the necklace she wears; she never takes it off for anything?" Mika asked.
"You know, I don't think I have ever seen the pendant for that necklace." Harry recalled. "The most I have seen of it, is a silver chain."
"Well, let me show you this video and maybe you can figure it out." Mika pressed a couple of buttons and suddenly the image of Heather appeared on the television with a tall boy with jet-black hair and strongly built. He towered over her, but his friendly blue eyes compensated for this.
They skated on the ice gracefully around the rink; doing things Harry would never attempt to think of doing. When ever Harry had been on ice, gravity worked against him or Dudley worked against him.
As the two finished skating to the song, Mika turned off the television, "They won the junior Olympics together when they were twelve. They had planned next year to go to the Olympics in Helena this year."
"So, they're teammates, that's it?" Ron asked hopefully.
"No, don't you get it?" India asked him asked him if he were completely stupid. "When it comes to figure skating, couples have to spend a lot of time and put a lot of trust in one another, that is why a lot of the ones who go to the Olympics are either engaged to be married or are already."
"Some days I get the feeling she wishes she was there at the school when it happened and died along side them, instead of at work, safe and sound." Mika told them honestly. "Most days, though, I know she was glad she was at work because if she would have been at school, she would have never had met the three of you." Mika looked directly at Harry. "All she could ever talk about before meeting you was the brother she had never met and wanting to come and find him so they could be a family again."
"I do not think she knew how big of a price she would have to pay to meet you and be the sister she always wanted to be with you." India tried to explain.
Harry looked out the bay window, across the way from which he sat. He knew Heather had been through her friend's death and she took it pretty rough, but now the three of them knew why she had taken it so rough. Harry stayed silent, Hermione looked as if she was about to cry, and Ron punched a hole in a near-by plaster wall.
Ron looked at his bleeding hand and he did not care. He stormed out of the room more upset he did not see it before he was told rather than at Heather for not telling him about it.
*****
Once Heather came back to the dormitories, she could not have sense her brother, Hermione, and Ron had witnessed why she was distant with them. Harry and Hermione, in fact, did not realize she was even back in Gryffindor tower. The two of them were snuggled up against each other in front of the fire place, studying.
"Aww! Look at the two of you!" Heather smiled as the duo on the couch looked up.
"Hey, Heath." Hermione continued writing her essay for transfiguration.
"How was detention?" Harry asked, closing his History of Magic book. "What did Professor Shift make you do?"
"Write lines." Heather rolled her eyes. "I had to write "I-will-not-perform-spells-on-teachers" about a hundred times. According to Professor Shift, that is what I will be doing for the duration of the detention." Heather took a moment to glance around the common room. "Where is Ronny? He didn't go to sleep already, did he?"
"Ron went out. I'm not sure when he'll get back." Harry looked at his sister and tried to smile at her, but could not. He had a feeling he knew why Ron had left in a huff. Harry knew he had feelings for his sister and he had not realized how close Heather was to her ex-boyfriend.
Suddenly, as if on cue, the opening of the common room opened and Ron trudged into the door. He looked windswept with his bright strawberry blonde hair all over his head and his cheeks were pink. Ron held his broom in his good hand, and wore a cloth over his bad one. His face and Quidditch uniform were caked in mud.
"Hey, Ron!" Heather exclaimed as he came into the room. Ron said nothing to any of them and went into the prefect dormitories.
*****
End of chapter Eleven…more stress as I finish writing chapter twelve now. Oh well. God Bless, S'Eleene Paris