Okay everyone. Here I go again. I read about the competition on portkey.org and decided that I just had to enter it. I love to write, and I've been told I'm good at it. Anyone interested in betaing for me, or in reading the original novels I've written, please email me at sirena192005@yahoo.com. PS, if you're an agent or an editor, or happen to work for a publisher, please please please want to read my stuff. I pour my soul into what I write. It's the most important thing in my life.
Title: Keep your enemies close
Rating: Pg-13 to R. Language, sex, violence, and probably a little bit of darkness.
Summary: Harry, Hermione, and Ron don't return to Hogwarts for their seventh year. Neither does Draco. Ginny leaves before her sixth year, stowing away with H, Hr, and R. Harry is determined to have revenge on both Snape and Voldemort.
Dedication: To Kali. The one person who never thought my passion for spinning a story was just folly and silly. For believing I could make this my life if I really wanted to.
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Nothing helped ease the raw grief. The sorrow. The guilt. Not watching Bill and Fleur standing in front of the Minister of Magic taking their wedding vows. Not passing his Apparition test in July, watching Ron do the same. Nothing helped. It was always there. Hounding him, nipping at his heels. There was no rest from it. He wasn't quite sure he wanted a rest from it. It kept him going, kept him searching. Looking for those responsible, the ones that had to pay.
He watched Ginny bloom from a girl into a young woman, only four months younger than him. She was beautiful. He wished they had been able to see if they worked together. Both understood why they couldn't ever be anything but friends. Why, despite the attraction that had been there, they liked it better as friends.
He saw Ron find solace in Luna. Loony Luna Lovegood he'd called her, but when it had counted that night in the castle, she'd been there for him. She'd helped him survive. And they'd come together out of desperation and fear. It was a powerful combination, one of terror and hopelessness. Harry was glad when Hermione didn't mind. Thankful.
It would have been awkward to say the least. The three of them, travelling the whole of the wizard world searching out Death Eaters. Living in cramped quarters, sharing space and a bathroom and, in some particularly tight rooms, a bedroom.
Hermione had emerged from her books. Oh, she still took a library with them when they travelled, but she didn't spend her free time in them. No, her free time was spent searching newspapers for suspicious activities, looking for clues as to the whereabouts of Voldemort and Snape. That and practicing spells, writing new ones that Voldemort wouldn't have defenses against. If anyone could do it, it was Hermione.
Harry knew most would call them vigilantes. Doing the job of an Auror without the certification and training. He also knew they were more qualified to face down Death Eaters than any Auror, and that if push came to shove, that they had a better chance at defeating Voldemort. He couldn't believe there was even a small chance they would fail. The hope of success was the only thing that got him through the night.
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They found him a few days past Harry's eighteenth birthday. In Diagon Alley, perusing wands in Ollivander's. There was a new owner, Ollivander's son, but the wands were still the best. Hermione's had been damaged in a battle with Death Eaters, and she needed a replacement.
"Malfoy."
Draco turned around, found himself met with two wands pointed at his chest. He could practically see them bursting with the Avada Kedavra. "Potter. Granger. Weasley." He nodded at each of them. "Put those away, would you? I'm unarmed at the moment."
Harry merely lowered his. "We need to talk."
"Doesn't sound like you want to have a friendly conversation, Potter. And I'm not in the mood to duel at the moment."
"We aren't feeling too friendly towards you at the moment, Malfoy." Ron said, keeping an eye on Hermione as she examined wands. "What are you doing here?"
"Needed a wand." Draco jerked a shoulder. "Not a crime as far as I was aware. Has that law changed recently?"
"The last thing we want is a Death Eater getting a new wand. You're going to put that back, and you're going to leave."
Suddenly, Draco looked paler and much more frail than he ever had before. The man simply looked defeated. He shook his head. "I'm not a Death Eater, Potter." He laughed, and the sound was so bitter, Harry felt himself soften a little. "I couldn't do it." He pulled up the sleeve of his robe, revealed the place on his arm where the Dark Mark had been. There was nothing but a ghastly scar. "My father's prestige ensured that I wouldn't be killed. They cut it off of me."
Hermione was determined not to cry. She felt her eyes well with tears of sympathy, and felt her hatred toward Draco seep out. "Harry."
Harry looked over at Hermione. "What?"
"Shouldn't we help him? They may not have killed him, but they will if they ever find him again."
"I don't need your help." Draco said, anger flashing into his eyes. "And if they do kill me, rest assured, I'll take plenty of them down with me." He sighed, looked at the ground. "I didn't like the old man, but I didn't want him dead, either. Even when I was pointing a wand at his chest, he was offering to help me. To hide me from them, give me a new life, a new identity."
"And you let Snape kill him." Ron spat. "That makes you as guilty as him."
Draco met Ron's eyes. "You think you're so blameless, Weasley? You spent all year chasing ass instead of listening to Potter every time he tried to tell you what was going on."
Ron growled, low in his throat. Harry recognized the sound as dangerous, stepped in between the other men. "Calm down." He looked at Ron. "Dumbledore didn't think he was evil. Even at the last. That should mean he deserves a chance." Harry turned to Draco. "And because I have such respect to Dumbledore, I'll offer you the same he did. Our help. Protection, if you will. If you'd rather, a chance to make amends for what you did. A chance to help make his death justified." Harry held out a hand, much in the same way Draco had on their first day at Hogwarts. Not as children, but as men, on an equal playing field. A chance to bridge a gap that had grown far wider than either had realized. A gap filled with jealousy and hatred, and misunderstandings, and circumstances that had been set in motion before either of them had ever been born.
To everyone's surprise, including Draco's, he reached out and grasped the hand Harry offered. "For Dumbledore."
Hermione reached out, laid her hand on theirs. "For Dumbledore." She looked over at Ron, lifted an eyebrow in the way she had that made him realize he didn't have a choice no matter what. Grudgingly, he put his hand over hers.
"For Dumbledore."
And there, in Ollivander's, on a hot August afternoon, only two months after they all should have graduated from Hogwarts, the four people who had spent most of their seven years there as enemies, joined together for something greater than any of them individually. The chance to right old wrongs, to reunite the wizarding world. To fix what had been shattered years before when Tom Marvolo Riddle had taken his first breath and known, even then, that he was destined for evil.
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I hope you all enjoyed this first chapter. I had originally intended for it to be longer than this, but this seemed like a good ending point. More up soon. I promise. BTW, this is H/HR R/L, and D/G. There may even be some L/J in it as well. We'll just have to wait and see.
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