I just wish I owned these characters, they're just so much fun to play with, but alas I don't.
Chapter 22, The Replacement
*****************Hogwarts, Harry's Room*******************
January 11, 2006
5:00 am
With a soft moan, Harry woke up to an empty, slightly cold bed. Last night after the evening hall patrol was done, well actually they had cheated and used the Marauder's map and found any and all miscreants quickly and used the time to catch up on some snogging, Hermione had only diverted long enough to her room to change into pajamas and had hopped directly into bed with him. When he grinningly asked what she was doing, she just replied that McGonagall could kiss her arse; she was going to sleep, which she promptly curled up against his chest and did. Harry just lay there amused and stroked her hair until he too fell to sleep.
As he awoke up, he instantly missed her, but a quick mental search located her in the castle, that's weird, she's up in the Room of Requirement this early? She usually doesn't work out in the mornings; she had been doing hers when I was at Quiddich practice. I do miss her at practice yelling from the stands. Harry climbed out of bed and glanced back at the rumpled sheets. It's funny if someone told me a year ago that if a beautiful woman literally jumped into bed with me, that I'd be perfectly content to just hold her, I would have thought them daft. He smiled to himself at the thought. Well if she's up, I guess I'll see if she wants company.
Grabbing a wand from under the pillows, he transfigured his pajamas into workout clothes and crossed to his dresser where a rack sat that held the Sword of Gryffindor. Or rather it normally held the sword, for now it was empty. Hmmm. Without another thought he swept out of his room on the way out of Gryffindor Tower.
*************************Room of Requirement. ***************************
A slim, brunette witch stood at the ready, a sword held easy in her hands. Without so much as a breath she exploded into motion. The sword snapped out in a lateral cut that progressed into a low cut that would take out an opponent's ankle. Instead of recovering low, she tumbled into a handless cartwheel that followed the path of the blade and flowed into a high stance with the sword held horizontally by her ear point forward, the edge upwards to the ceiling. She paused for a heartbeat then snapped the sword into a diagonal cut across an imaginary opponent and recovered with a movement designed to clear her immediate area. Her recovery had brought her back into her original stance, her eyes locked on an invisible adversary. Suddenly the silence was broken by the sound of soft applause.
"Damn it Harry don't patronize me." Hermione growled as her eyes came over to meet his, a dark, hard warning resting there.
"I'm not." He replied seriously and rapidly crossed to her to where she had stopped the kata. "I'm impressed, very impressed love. And not only by the fact that Godric has seen fit to allow you to wield his sword also." He nodded towards the sword. It had changed since that day long ago when he pulled it from a hat in Slytherin's vile chamber. The sword that day had been small and light, suitable for a twelve-year-old wizard. In his studies Harry had discovered that the original form of the sword had been a European broadsword, or possibly a claymore.
However soon after Harry had regained the sword from Dumbledore in his 6th year, it had changed to a form suitable to him as he was currently, both in size and in fighting style. The sword now had a slightly curved blade reminiscent of a Japanese katana, with the exception that the spine of the blade was sharpened for about half the length of the blade. The guard was a simple circle of dark steel inscribed with runes, and the handle was cord wrapped. Some things remained the same however, the same Gryffindor inscription was on the flat of the blade, with a small rampaging lion set at the base of the blade and the same flame red rubies were set in the handle. The really interesting thing was that if she could really wield the Gryffindor sword, it should have transformed to suit her. The fact that it hadn't seemed to indicate that she used the sword in an almost identical manner to Harry. The size wouldn't have had to change though; she was relatively tall for a girl, only about an inch or so shorter than Harry.
She glanced down at the sword then at Harry and gave him a small shrug. "I don't know, I woke up and couldn't go back to sleep, and for some reason I felt I wanted to look at your sword. I picked it up and I was able to draw it, I never could draw it before. And it just..."
"Felt like it belonged, Mione?" Harry interrupted.
"Yeah, I mean this is similar to what I've been working with, with Moody, as the Asian swords seem to fit me, and you I guess better. I just wanted to see Harry." She ended with a grin, like she was opening a present on Christmas morning.
For a long moment Harry regarded her with an unreadable expression. Love, you trust me? Harry asked her unnecessarily.
With my life and my heart Harry. She replied without moving her lips.
"OK" Harry murmured as he gazed into her eyes, "Appero Sword" and a true katana appeared in his hand, it was not exactly the same as the Gryffindor sword, but should be good enough for this. With a flash of his eyes he muttered, "Protego Duelus" and activated the safeguards in the Room of Requirement. Now if anyone was struck by a weapon, it would only leave a mark but the blade would pass though with out inflicting harm.
The two stood face-to-face about three paces apart and bowed slightly to each other. As their eyes met, emerald and chocolate, both sets suddenly glowed a bright blue. For both Harry and Hermione, time seemed to stretch into infinity. They seemed to have all the time in the world to launch an attack, only to be met with the exact same attack, as if he or she were attacking a mirror, instead of a live person. A diagonal cut from Harry was met with a sword coming in from the exact position to block it from Hermione. Her recovery from the block with an attack on his ankles was met with nothing but air as he tumbled over it, only to meet her incoming attack behind his back with the blade of his sword, without any hesitation at all. "Enough" Harry shouted and both stopped instantly and once again peered into each other's eyes. The blue faded from their eyes and once again their true colors were witnessed. Hermione and Harry stared at each other for a minute longer, until Hermione broke the silence.
"Honestly...that was weird." She whispered, a little shakily.
"Yeah" Harry replied and straightened up from his ready stance, Hermione also relaxed her stance. Walking over to her, Harry tenderly tucked an errant lock of hair behind her ear. It had escaped the shaggy ponytail that most of her hair was pulled back into. "Alastor and Remus said you were much improved, but damn it girl." He whispered with a small smile.
Hermione replied with a quick smile of her own, "Yeah, but I've never been that good. It was like I knew what you would do before I knew and vise versa."
"You may have, at least with me as an opponent." Harry said with a grin. "What was will the attack on the ankle dear?"
"Oh I didn't want you to get away again."
"Never"
**********************Hogwarts, Transfiguration Classroom #2*****************
10am
On the way to Transfiguration this morning, both Harry and Hermione's thoughts were still filled with bewilderment about this mornings duel? No, that wasn't the right word, for both knew that even if the protection charms had been off, somehow neither would have touched the other, even if one had somehow made a mistake. Both were slightly concerned with what might be next, first the telepathy and then today's performance. On top of that, last year only Harry could draw the Gryffindor sword from the sheath. In fact Harry had wondered about that change so much that he had had Ron and Seamus try and draw the sword this morning, but neither had succeeded. Ron interrupted this train of thought suddenly; he was running down the hall with a panicked look on his face.
"Oi, Harry, we have problems" Ron fairly shouted as soon as he found Harry in the hall with Hermione.
"This must be a real problem," Harry muttered to Hermione, "there's no sign of Luna." Ron and Luna had continued to be inseparable, and Ron had even started walking her to all of her classes, much to the annoyance of Professors like McGonagall and Snape who did not consider the mere fact that he was engaged to a sixth year ample excuse to be tardy.
Actually to be fair, McGonagall was pretty amused about the whole matter, after all they were both her Gryffindors, so Ron had so far only earned detention for this tactic in her class. Snape however had no such impediment and Ron had so far lost Gryffindor 50 points over the last two weeks, which Hermione and Harry had to make back up. Ron, my friend, my brother, I love Mione more than the air I breathe, but I usually still show up on time at places, Harry thought with an internal grin, as he glanced over at Ron. Hermione gave him a blinding smile at the thought.
"I better take this out here Hermione" Harry said to Hermione in an undertone.
Nodding, she gave him a peck on the cheek and went to get them seats for the class, heck, I'll probably even get Ron one too, Hermione thought to herself.
After watching Hermione walk into the classroom, Harry turned to Ron. "Ok spill."
"We got problems Harry." Ron repeated, even more flustered than he was a second ago, he rocked back and forth on his feet, as if he were thinking of running and didn't know where to go.
"You already said that." Harry replied with a slightly annoyed tone, and mimed heading towards his girlfriend and class.
Ron got the hint, "Ok.... well our third chaser, White, just got a letter from his mum saying that his grades were sucking too much since he took up Quiddich. She owled Dumbledore and McGonagall and got them to pull him, though they really didn't have a choice, he is only a 3rd year. We need a chaser mate, we have a game Saturday!" Ron finished, waving his hands in the air like a madman.
"REAALY Ron," Harry replied sarcastically. He just shook his head ruefully and went on as several Hufflepuff third years passed them in the hall. "What are our options, Lavender? Dean? I can't pull Neville or Seamus off beater duty."
Ron shook his head violently in response; "Lavender has been having problems on a broomstick ever since she had to help with that recon mission just before Christmas. Moody flew them around so for so long so Muggles and wizards wouldn't spot them that she swears she's done enough broom riding until she's twenty. Dean's just not good enough on a broom to be a chaser, he's an ok beater but Neville and Seamus are better, plus you have that almost mental link between Neville and Ginny..."
"Yeah you're right, Luna? Or start with 4th years?" Harry asked with a shrug, mentally running though Gryffindors that might be good enough to fill in, as a touch of Ron's panic was slowly started to infiltrate him too.
Suddenly Ron looked at the door that Hermione had just walked through, a huge smile slowly spreading across his face. "Harry...."
Harry had just noticed where Ron was looking and his thoughts met Ron's "I don't know..."
But Ron knew that he was right or at least he hoped he was, "She's good, Harry, she's better on a broom now than I was when I tried out for keeper. And you know her instincts since she gained her animagus form would make her a awesome chaser." Ron whispered the last part, just in case, even though no one as in sight.
"I'm just her boyfriend and your Co-Captain. It's up to her mate." Harry replied vaguely, and led Ron into the classroom without another word.
Harry spent the class glancing over at Hermione, even more so than usual, so much so that McGonagall noticed and challenged him to pay attention or show he could do the spell. Today's lesson was on animal transfiguration, Disillusioning a familiar or pet. When she asked, Harry absently waved his wand over Hedwig, who promptly started blending into the background. Since Harry had called her bluff she really had no choice but to congratulate him and give Gryffindor 10 points. Of course Hermione could also do the spell, the only reason that she hadn't beat Harry to the punch was that Crookshanks truly hated this spell. As it caused him to blend into the floor, he tended to run into things, so being the intelligent kneazle he was, he kept trying to get away. As she finally corralled the cat and got Crookshanks camouflaged, she looked over at Harry, What? She inquired silently.
I'll tell you after class, Harry replied with a thought. This seemed to satisfy her and they spent the rest of the class amusedly watching Ron try to Disillusion Pig. So far he hadn't been camouflaged. Far from it, Pig was currently glowing bright orange and swooping around McGonagall's head, much to the Professor's expressed annoyance. For some odd reason, it appeared as if the owl were somehow at fault, this time. Ron seemed to be casting the spell properly; it just wasn't taking. Finally as the class ended, Ron was able to use an impediment charm and stop the owl so he could catch it. He never did get the owl camouflaged.
Ron hurried over to Harry and Hermione. They were standing at the door waiting on him, Hedwig sitting on Harry's shoulder, with Crookshanks on Hermione's. Both familiars were their normal, respective snowy-white and ginger colors; the spell was easily enough removed.
"Bloody hell, you know that's no fair, you both already know that spell." Ron complained as he came up to his friends. He turned and gave Hermione a slight scowl, "And Hermione that bloody cat is huge; how can you hold it up on your shoulder?"
"Actually Ronald, I'm sure Harry and I know a great deal of spells that you don't." Hermione replied with a Cheshire grin. "He after all, listens to me. However for your information, I put a spell on his collar that reduces his apparent weight to about three pounds. He can jump really high with it on too." She finished with relish as on her shoulder Crookshanks looked hungrily at the still glowing Pig.
"Oh no, your pets isn't going to eat another one of mine." Ron said, his voice rising, his hands coming up to ward an attack away from his owl.
"RONALD...he never ate one in the first place, and if he had we would be better off right now." She replied her eyes flashing, her hands on her hips, as on her shoulder Crookshanks opened his mouth wide, ostentatiously showing his fangs.
OHH bugger, I better head off this train wreck. "Hermione, stop teasing him, and Ron just shut up, that damn rat was a Death Eater after all." Harry stated flatly, cutting them off before they really get started.
"But Harry" Ron whined, still shielding Pig.
"No, Ron. Now calmly and without regard to the gastronomic distribution of our various familiars, please, calmly ask Hermione, as a friend, what you were going to ask her." Harry instructed Ron evenly.
"No" Ron replied almost petulantly.
"Ok in the interest of time, I will ask. Hermione, Ron and I would like to ask if you would like to play Quiddich this Saturday." Harry asked looking away from Ron, who he was a little pissed at right now, due to his somewhat immature behavior. He had not really appreciated how much Luna actually increased Ron's maturity at times. Especially how much he missed it at this very second, as Luna was currently several hallways away in Firenze's class not down here with him.
"But you two already have a game on Saturday." Hermione replied, the confusion evident on her face, then, with sudden realization, "Oh."
A/N: HE HE Sorry it's been a bit since I uploaded, if all goes well I plan on upping several chapters this weekend.