Official Fine Print: Nope. Not mine. The brainchildren of the mighty pen of JK Rowling. Just playing with them.
Fixing Harry
Chapter 11
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Subject: Harry James Potter
Interview Meeting Date: Monday July 21, 1998
Interview #: N/A
Observations: N/A
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All things Harry are starting to come to a less than pretty head at the moment, at least in my neck of the woods.
Let me rephrase that. Forces seem to be converging about him now. And the downright interesting thing is exactly what those forces are. Most I can observe; I'm perfectly positioned to see at least one layer of the flurry of memos flapping and zooming their way through the halls of the Ministry bearing his name in the subject line. Others aren't quite so clear, but I'm starting to get a bead on them, and to be honest those are the ones spooking me out a bit. Just when I think I understand what's going on where he's concerned, the ground shifts and I see that there is yet another facet to consider.
For example, this morning brought a meeting of the Unimind in Scrimgeour's conference room. I stuck out like a salmon in a lemming parade in that crowd; definitely swimming upstream against the inevitable. My invitation was unambiguous enough that there was precious little I could do about it, and the fact that I was requested on my own without Clement to hide behind made me suspect I was being handed the rope for my own noose. I may have tied the knot today but I am useful to them yet; no one's managed that final shove off the edge of the Hangman's platform so far. I wouldn't put it past them to be drawing lots for the privilege right now though.
Percy Weasley, our first speaker, was obsessed with the thought that Harry was possessed. I think I was thorough and yet professional in debunking the theory that even the infamous Dark Lord could possess someone from beyond the grave, because a) HE'S DEAD and b) although we don't like to talk about his little immortality plan because it scares the pants off the lot of us, given the number of "objects" he made and the flawed nature of what he started out with, what was left to be doing the possessing with, hmm? Possession was right out; you needed an actual soul for that. His one apparent goal was not to die, ever, there was no evidence yet he'd bothered with a contingency plan. Haunt, maybe. And there wasn't any sign of Harry being haunted, thank goodness. Except by these ghouls.
Artemis Grollinghard, Scrimgeour's personal secretary, revealed both that she thinks he's cursed, and I'm completely incompetent because I haven't identified or reversed it yet. (Upon asking innocently for her supposition of what ails him so that I can jump right on it, she smiled venomously and replied `I believe that's your job Hawktalon. And Morgause knows with the things you've played around with you'd think you could spot a dark curse when you see one. Even if it wasn't your own for a change.' Nice, hunh? Like I'd need anything as complicated as a dark arts curse to fix her superior arse. Wait `til she sees what comes out in her hairbrush tonight. There can't be a wig around as bad as that weird sort of still-cone-shaped-from-her-hat look, anyway.)
Dolores Umbridge (yes, she still has an advisory position in the Minister's office as well as her thinly covered job as merciless Centaur harasser) believes he was a nasty little liar at school and nothing's changed since. "Give that boy the slightest bit of attention and there's nothing he won't do to keep it," she said primly. "I know him very well; I spent a great deal of time with him at Hogwarts. I think you'll find he's completely delusional. He's faking it; he's not even that powerful."
I ached to point out that it was a very pretty delusion she'd managed to apply to his wand hand, but thankfully leaving some stuff unsaid becomes slightly easier as you get older and more mature. I've got a much wider range of self-applicable muffling and silencing charms than I did when I was Harry's age, ones even I can't gag an insult through. I just don't use them enough. She was the one I really would have liked to have a go at, too. He'd been a kid when she'd done that to him. A stubborn kid, who probably could have gotten out of the worst of it if he told someone or asked for help; but a kid none the less. She was just a cold-hearted evil hag who got a sick thrill off of dominating people and playing games. There's one in every office regardless of occupation, but the last place you should ever find one is a school.
Tobias Smeggall, Scrimgeour's long-time right-hand man, was the one that struck me cold, piqued my interest and set my something's-more-off-than-usual radar spinning all in one. He's a right toad, Tobias, and well named - although as always one is simply forced to wonder whether he is living up to the inevitable childhood taunts of Smeghead or if he was indeed born that way and oblivious. My vote in this particular case would be the latter. He's the perfect foil for Scrimgeour, obsequious on the one hand and brutally efficient with the other one that the rest of us got the business end of.
In my humble opinion, he spoke far too convincingly of Harry's instability for it not to be an unhealthy obsession of his own, and I began to wonder exactly how much of Scrimgeour's reservation about Harry was his, and how much Smeggall's influence. Harry's supposed immaturity, both physically and mentally, to deal with his own purported level of magic had led Smeggall to the "natural" conclusion that he was harboring some of You-Know-Who's as well. This apparently gave him carte blanche to dissect what little the Ministry knew about him at some length. Some simply incredible length for such scant information, and so much of it was wrong. Eyes were glazing over around Scrimgeour's conference table left and right. They might be unified in their dislike of Harry, but they were all way more interested in their own opinions why he was a menace than Smeggall's.
He was endlessly fascinated with Harry's ability to speak and understand parseltongue for some reason, and was certain that it had enabled Voldemort to curse Harry to carry on with his own evil power and without our awareness. `Cause when you've hated someone for years and you're facing them for what all indications point to as the final time, your first instinct is always to hand over all your own abilities. I had to believe (given Snape's description of what was going on; and he was at least there) Voldemort never had a single smidgeon of a thought he was going to lose that night.
I tried not to raise my hand, really I did.
"Um, excuse me, but a curse is a curse, regardless of the language it's applied in." I refrained from pointing out the magic 101 fact that incantations were simply applied focusers, and not entirely dependent on language. Eons of experience have probably brought us down to the most evocative and efficient languages for different spells, and they do range, but that's what makes wandless magic like Albus Dumbledore's and Harry's so very cool; they're both proof that magic has no cultural or language barriers because it can function and exist without either.
Smeggall's irritation was immediately obvious. "And is parseltongue amongst your many…talents, Mrs. Hawktalon?"
"No," I said. "But I once removed one of Vold…"
"Hnnnnng!"
"You-Know-Who's curses from Rothgart Beagler, and he swore that Vol, hmm, the unh, Dark Guy hissed it at him when he made his wand movement so that Rothgart wouldn't have time to recognize it and counter it. Once we figured out what it was, it came off just like it would have if it had been incanted in the usual way. It only makes sense, if you think about it, and that would be a parselmouth's only real advantage in using it in battle, other than actually enlisting the aid of a snake, like Nag…."
"Haaaaah!"
Oh, come on. It was bad enough to be sitting around in the office of the Minister with a bunch of chicken wizards still too superstitious to say a dead man's name, but his pet? That was just silly.
"Nagini." I finished. Rothgart Beagler had been a good Auror back in the day and worked for Scrimgeour until one of Voldemort's Death Eaters had finished the job he'd started. I was hoping the Minister would remember the incident and tell old Smeghead to move on.
He did indeed remember the incident, and his eyes bored into me thoughtfully while he hand-motioned Tobias on to the next order of business. They were uncomfortable to be the focus of; those eyes. They furthered the lion impression of his tawny hair, and made me feel very squirrelly. Or whatever it was lions hunted. Wildebeastie, then.
The next order of business, it turned out, was the main point of the meeting. Having aired their various opinions and fears about Harry, they were now ready to discuss What To Do about him.
"Carry on with what we're doing," I said confidently. "There have been no major incidents with his magic, and his hands are starting to heal now that the effect of the burning yew of Vol… Know Who's wand has been identified and dealt with. He's healing and getting stronger every day."
Oops. Step too far there, Elspeth. They aren't really concerned with his health and well-being, are they?
"Exactly," pointed out Smeggall smarmily.
"The stronger Harry is physically, the more successfully he can cope with controlling the magic he had to develop to fight Vol, him, in the first place. It just makes sense."
"And the better he can control it, the better he can make use of it as well. This is surely an indicator that it is time to act, Minister," the Smegster prevailed upon Scrimgeour. "Before he does."
"Harry has done nothing to warrant the Ministry's removal of his wand, let alone additional steps," I declared, as evenly as I could. I was hoping that a reminder of the wand, along with no demand for it back, would be seen as a sort of compromise.
"It is our duty to use our position to protect the people, Mrs. Hawktalon. It is not the Ministry of Magic's way to say "sorry" after the fact when disaster is avoidable," spouted our Minister.
"That would be a recent development," I said, before I could shut my big flapping yap.
Scrimgeour's yellow eyes flashed. "You're right there. There will never be another Voldemort as long as I am Minister."
"You're jousting a windmill then, Minister," I told him. "Harry Potter has no interest whatsoever in becoming another Voldemort. Of that much I can unequivocally assure you."
"We have all seen the results of Mr. Potter's magic run amok…"
"A little spilt pumpkin soup never really hurt anyone. There's no question he has a lot to keep under control, but my recent observations have all been quite…" I thought of the fireworks that had erupted at Snape's name. Uneventful didn't fit, and interesting was too ambiguous. "positive."
I was positive he was trying, anyway.
"But don't you admit, Ms. Hawktalon," Smeggall suggested insidiously, "that Mr. Potter himself might in fact be more comfortable without the uncertain burden of all that? It was developed, as you say, in response to his need to conquer the Dark Lord. His enemy is most certainly bodiless once more; the autopsy was quite conclusive on at least that point anyway, so the power is no longer needed. He could be… cut back to average magical levels and never have need of it again."
"First of all, he wasn't just Harry's enemy. He was the enemy of anyone with a heart or soul themselves, be it Wizard or Muggle. And secondly, what exactly, Mr. Smeggall, are average magical levels? How are they determined? Who determines them? And average for whom?"
"Really, Elspeth, that's hardly your area of expertise, is it?" asked Artemis sweetly. "Why don't you just leave that to the Minister and his Advisors."
How about because I wouldn't trust the Minister and his Advisors with regulating the magic of a flesh eating slug?
"Because it sounds like you are intent on violating the basic human right of a Wizard to not have his magic experimented on without his consent when he's done nothing wrong to warrant it. Exactly how would you relieve Harry of his excess magic once you decided just how much that was, Mr. Smeggall?" I asked as calmly as I could. "There's no known safe spell for limiting a wizard's magic that I know of."
"New discoveries are being made every day," Smeggall pointed out, "And old methods are made new and improved. I am sure we can find the right one for Mr. Potter."
"It should be easily monitored, lasting and complete," Artemis offered.
"We should look into it's efficacy on offspring," Umbridge reflected, "although Potter's a half blood after all. He's unlikely to produce anything worth worrying about. He's a freak of nature himself."
Until this point Percy had been mercifully quiet. My head was still spinning from Umbridge's beastly take on things so it took me a moment after he began speaking to realize she had perhaps gone a step too far even for him.
"That erm, seems… Really… I can back properly limiting the abuse of power by Wizards like Potter to avoid another You Know Who problem, but I have to say that attempting to engineer the degree of magic in future generations is… dangerous. What if there hadn't been a Potter to take on You know Who? It's the personality that is deficient in his case, not the extent of magic itself."
"That's completely illogical," Smeggall snapped at him, and he visibly recoiled. "Now that Potter has removed You Know Who, we can start fresh. Neuter Potter and monitor all newborns. Resolve the problem completely for once and there will be peace at last. Grindelwald, Dumbledore, the Dark Lord… Potter is the last one left. Too long have we been wasting the resources of our community with these magical anomalies. Limit their range of magic to the average wizards' and there will be an end to wars and the murder of innocents. Perhaps wizards might even at long last rebuild their numbers and regain the place in this world we lost to separation!"
It was completely mad. He was completely mad. And I saw Scrimgeour's eyes assessing him. Did he agree? That was an awfully complete speech for what started out as a retort; it smacked of practiced campaigning. Did he think Smeggall was considering challenging him? It was exactly the sort of speech that would have once upon a time had me on my feet, shrieking out my opinion of it. I sat now, sick to my stomach but going nowhere, because it was Harry they were talking about, and it could just as well be Emily, or my grandchild one day. They were blithely discussing playing with a power themselves far greater than Voldemort's had ever been. The balance of magic has existed as long as magic itself. For every Grindelwald there has been a Dumbledore. We have lacked for nothing if we only use our magic for what it was intended.
They had to be stopped, but to be stopped we had to know what they were up to first, and that meant shutting my mouth and soaking in every word until I was cast out for the spy I would proudly be.
But I'd need a long, hot shower when this meeting was through.
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Harry was at that point having a significantly better day than Elspeth. This was in great part due to the fact that it was ten o'clock in the morning and he was still happily sprawled across a bed he wasn't sure he ever wanted to leave. Happily sprawled, as in content, pleased, satiated to the point of utter bonelessness. Hermione curled neatly as a cat beside him, fast asleep; deliciously delicate and soft and every bit as buck naked beneath the sheets as he was, and Ron's `So you're basing all of this on three kisses? What if you shag each other and hate each other in the morning? What then?' was now reduced to the punch line of a private joke they repeated constantly in soft, heated voices.
"Twelve hundred odd kisses and four shags later, and I still don't hate you yet," she'd told him earlier this morning. "You'll just have to keep trying."
And so he had. Kept trying, that was. And here he lay, staring at the ceiling and wishing all the magic that still pulsed so restlessly in him was enough to stop the earth from turning and time from passing and change from happening because he'd never, ever in all his life known happiness remotely close to this. Now, at this moment, he wouldn't change any of it (well, except obviously the Voldemort bit, that went without saying.) This was all his missing Christmases, all his ignored birthdays wrapped up in one lovely package that didn't require a bow (not that she wouldn't look lovely with one) and kept on asking to be unwrapped again and again. Brilliant. There was just no other word for it.
For the first time in ages Harry didn't feel like sinking behind his eyelids and looking for oblivion the moment he wasn't actively involved in doing something. It had been forever since he'd known any kind of peace, especially the kind that stretches like a cat in the sun on your chest and warms you without asking for anything in return. It felt good, and he tried to soak it up and enjoy it without worrying if it would last or if it was at anyone else's expense. Ron had accepted them with rare grace and he and Hermione were in consequence doing their very best to be circumspect and completely normal in the common areas of the flat.
Or they had been, until yesterday, when they'd been just sitting innocently on opposite ends of the sofa not even looking at one another (much) and Ron had abruptly hurled his Quidditch magazine at Harry. "Oh for crying out loud will you just snog her already? You've more than likely shagged her at least twice by my reckoning, that's further in two days then we went in a year. Just do it. I'm over it. It feels weirder to have you not touching her now than the other way round."
Hermione had crawled across the sofa and into his lap with a wide and victorious grin and the happiness that had been so tentatively making its way from his heart to his head had surged forward and reached its destination at last. They'd snogged then, with elaborate (and quite fun) slurping and plunging sound effects, and called each other Herm Herm and Har Har until all three of them were laughing so hard it hurt and Hedwig flew off to the other room, ashamed to be seen with them.
Harry wasn't a complete idiot; he knew that all three of them had an uphill road to travel. Ron would get sick of them again or go over all lonely and morose. Harry would likely continue with his fair share of prickly leave-me-alone moments with less space than ever in which to be left alone, and he and Ron together were a lot to ask any girl to cope with, especially one as structured as Hermione. Still, it felt possible, at least, and he felt hopeful.
The one real stumbling point was his sense of living in limbo; each time he and Hermione tried to plan anything beyond the next day or two the whole thing seemed to get hopelessly muddled. There were too many `what ifs'. Like, what if Scrimgeour decided to follow up on one of his threats of protective custody or what Elspeth had been talking about, some sort of limitation on his magic? What would he do then? Harry'd thought he'd just do a runner for the Muggle world before, try and leave magic behind. But now there was her to consider as well, and he'd not been able to get the idea of anyone stripping children of their magic out of his head either. Once the thought of children had come into it at all the only thought that followed in Harry's mind was to try and undo all that had been wrong with his own childhood. He yearned to make a safe haven, to banish fear entirely and feather it with all the things he'd never really known; love, acceptance, belonging somewhere. It was a pipe dream and he knew each child was different; but he couldn't help the feeling of wanting to fix some wrong, make something whole again. If his kid's worst nightmare was having Harry Potter for a father, he'd consider it all a whopping success.
Hermione had made excuses to avoid returning home to her parents and was doing her level best to keep them from turning into lies; she was exploring her options for employment or further education (or both if she could manage it) in the magical world now. There was only so long she could do that before having to make a decision, however, and Harry felt strangely anxious to do the right thing by her. It was one of those times he desperately wished for a father figure in his life, and one of the few issues for which Remus Lupin wouldn't do as substitute. Remus and Tonks had been "seeing each other" for over a year now, and seemed unable (at least on Lupin's part) to take the final step. They were teased mercilessly and more than just a little sensitive about it by now; if Harry went to Lupin for advice over this he'd likely get his head bitten off.
He rolled toward her now and felt his own motion start her arm, weighted with the relaxation of sleep, slide across him. He loved it, couldn't get over how bloody marvelous it felt to be held, touched, and stroked. Even fast asleep the slip of her fingers over his skin moved him. There seemed to be some enormous, under-stimulated nerve center in his brain that had suddenly burst to life, neurons firing on all cylinders. He watched her do nothing more than breathe the steady, even breath of slumber with the absolute raptness he'd heretofore reserved for the snitch once spotted in a Quidditch game.
He'd been such an idiot; what was Quidditch compared to this?
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Subject: Harry James Potter
Interview Date: Monday July 21, 1998
Interview #: 5
Observations: Subject Can't Seem to Wipe the Grin Off His Face - Methinks This is A
Excellent Sign that Well, You Know, Yes, Anyway. Good for Him.
Because the rest of Being Harry Potter is shite about now.
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The afternoon proved marginally better than the start of the day. I had convinced Clement to convince Percy Weasley to let me take Harry out of the confines of the Ministry again (under the guise that I was testing his ability to control his magic amongst the general public.) I was given an annoying and insulting list of conditions, one of which was that I was not to take him into predominantly Muggle areas due to the complications of cleanup. Clearly he had no faith in either of us, but as he had nothing concrete to base his refusal on either, we were free.
It was a pleasure to be able to take him away from the gray confines of the Ministry today; he was walking on air, a far cry from the limping wizard with the permanent storm cloud hovering over his head he'd been when I'd first met him not so long ago. Happy Harry is a joy to behold, really. I don't think he'd had much practice at it, and he seemed completely incapable of shielding his exuberance from anyone. It was sort of like walking an excited puppy down the halls of the Ministry.
We decided on Diagon Alley as being a decidedly not `predominantly Muggle area'. I thought a spot of window shopping first would hopefully serve to wear him down a bit, and wandering would make eavesdropping more unlikely. We could save the heavy stuff for the end. I asked Tom at the Leaky Cauldron if we couldn't have one of the back rooms to ourselves for twenty minute or so on the way back and he readily agreed. The Ministry was an excellent tipper.
Hogwarts book lists being out for the first years at least, there were a fair number of children among the shoppers thronging the walks. There was no hiding Harry today. His good mood translated itself into actual conversation and the occasional smile, which while greatly unlike him recently, certainly left him wide open to recognition. That; and the odd buckled bandages still on his hands, easily recognizable even from a distance. He assured me they were healing; just as well, because they were a dead give away. At least his only covert observers for this outing so far seemed to be over-awed kids, either pointing and whispering or standing frozen while he passed, cheerfully oblivious.
"I take it Ron took it okay?" I asked him.
I could almost see the entire flow of the conversation in those eyes of his; flecks of regret, anger, relief and depthless fondness momentarily colored the green like a stirred potion, and were gone.
"I never want to have to do anything like that again," he said.
"Play your cards right," I told him, "and you never will."
"How can you say that?" he asked, and a deaf person could have heard the empathy in his voice; Harry's saving people thing obviously translated to happiness as well. "Haven't you ever… I mean have you ever thought about… Don't you need anyone anymore?"
It was deeply felt and gracelessly asked, and almost unbearably sweet under the circumstances.
"I don't have an answer for you, Harry. That bit's still unwritten. If there's another out there, wizard or muggle, who can make me feel the way Almerick did, I haven't met him. Yet."
"I know it won't be the same," he said. "But I hope you do. You deserve it."
I'd hardly given him much to go on in that department, but you could tell his wish was sincere.
"Thanks," I told him. "So you and Hermione broke it up and you're on the market, then?"
He grinned shyly and shoulder-butted me; he was such a funny creature, half boy still and half gorgeous young man. He was utterly unaware of the effect. Happiness suited him. Hermione was a lucky witch. Or not - it couldn't be easy after all. But it I'd been twenty years younger I'd have risked it.
We stopped at the Magical Menagerie and Harry bought owl treats and a small cloth gnome stuffed with kneezle-knip for Hermione's cat (he informed me they'd found him sleeping in a corner of the ceiling once after playing with it; apparently it made him so excited he floated.) I gave their selection of owls a once-over preparatory to Emily's pre-Hogwart's visit for a familiar. She'd informed me she wanted a snowy owl like Harry's, but they weren't common or commonly cheap. There were some very pretty tawnys and Scops and an imposing Great Horned that gave the impression that we were all of us beneath his notice. There was a sweet little Burrowing I considered (although they were hardly the best messengers) until it made its disconcerting imitation of a rattle snake. Thank you, no. Harry told me that Hagrid had bought him Hedwig for a birthday gift at Eeylops Owl Emporium, so we wandered off in that general direction.
It was halfway there we came across a most curious young woman making her way up the street toward us whilst simultaneously reading a book and catching and releasing a small, roundish object on a string.
"Luna?"
Harry seemed to notice her as she passed, and she raised her eyes from the book before her at the sound of his voice and broke into a dreamy grin. The round object; a muggle yo-yo, was caught and stilled.
"Hullo, Harry. I haven't seen you in ages, although I knew I wouldn't and patience would win out in the end. How are you? Ginny said you were a right miserable sod but you look wonderful to me." And she kissed him in a very friendly - but strictly friendly - way, on the cheek.
Harry introduced her as Luna Lovegood, and I remembered Hermione mentioning that she was the daughter of the publisher of the Quibbler. Fortune smiled again; it certainly couldn't hurt for Harry to renew his acquaintance with her now.
I wondered if he would mention anything about Hermione to her in relation to the Ginny comment but he did not. I was proud of him, or hoped that I would be, and that he would cope with that issue as head-on and honestly as he had her with her brother. They chatted briefly; it appeared that Luna was in London for the next week or so with her father while he tracked down some information for a very important Quibbler exclusive. I wondered what exotic magical creature had invaded the London Zoo without the Muggles' notice. Harry invited her to visit them at the flat anytime, which struck me as something of a mistake, Luna seemed exactly the sort to do just that, and while I could tell he was fond of her and she seemed quite nice in a blunt, idiot savant sort of way, given his new living circumstances that might not have been the best decision.
Live and learn, my young friend.
"She's always had a bit of a thing for Ron," he said as we moved on in opposite directions. He explained about a Slytherin psych-out song that backfired after a match or two, and how Luna was often to be heard walking the halls of Hogwarts humming, whistling or outright singing "Weasley is My King."
Sounded promising to me.
Eeylops proved indeed to have one Snowy owl, a young male but old enough to be almost entirely white, with fewer markings than Hedwig. He had large, perfectly round amber eyes that took us in calmly, and he fluttered to Harry's shoulder without even being coaxed.
"She'd love him," I said ruefully, eyeing his price tag.
"You only go to Hogwarts once," he pointed out. "For the first time anyway. Nothing says `I love you and I want to hear all about your room mate issues and what a snitch that Mrs. Norris is' like an owl."
"For that much I should get her an Eagle owl or something."
"Nah," he scoffed. "Nasty, superior things. I knew one once. Belonged to a Malfoy," he added almost nonchalantly, but staring directly at me in a very meaningful way.
"An owl to suit its owner then," I said. "Look! It's time for our beer."
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The back rooms of the Leaky Cauldron are many - there always seems to be one; or one more, when you need one. Magic does have its uses.
Tom brought us our drinks. He nodded and grinned with enthusiasm at Harry, offered us both a wide variety of things we didn't want and then left without offense. A rare man, Tom.
"So, Harry. Magically speaking, how're things?"
"Erm," said Harry. "Okay."
"Feeling well… in control?"
"Yeah," he said. "Okay."
"Because Scrimgeour has an aide, named Smeggall."
He looked at me disbelievingly.
"And he wants you neutered."
There was a moment's less-than-shocked silence.
"Bloody hell," said Harry. "I've only just really figured out what they're for."
He was joking; we both knew it. If he hadn't been so happy to begin with, I never would have shot him down quite that way. That's what friends are for. And I definitely liked him more than the description "investigation subject" allowed.
"Never mind," I told him. "I think Hermione would have something to say about that now, and I doubt ten Scrimgeours could put her off. But I thought you ought to know. There was a meeting of the Minister's Aides this morning. It wasn't pretty, and that was how they were leaning. I don't think they know what exactly it is they're doing, and I'm fairly certain that they're not entirely sure how to do it, but the time to begin your counter offensive is now."
"Right," he said. "Well, at least I know where to find Luna. The question is how do we say it? No one will care if it's just me, how can we suggest that it's their own children they need to look out for?"
His happiness was definitely deflating some, but nothing compared to the spiral of despair such a confirmation would have made a week ago. He seemed resolved to fight now, and not afraid.
"They will care if it's you, Harry. Honestly. And I think you and Hermione should talk to Mr. Lovegood and see just how far he's willing to go. The Quibbler'll just seem weirder than ever if he starts rattling swords over an issue Scrimgeour hasn't made a move on either way, but there are probably subtle ways to start insinuating the idea into people's minds so when the Minister does makes his move you can respond quickly."
"Right," said Harry reluctantly, and sighed.
There was so much more I wanted to say about how I felt about this happening at all, let alone to him, and yet none of it would change anything. My mind landed on a question that had been forming on a totally other front, in the hope of making headway somewhere.
"Harry? When you started to disappear that time, what made you want to go, and what held you back? Do you remember it enough to say?"
He switched gears with me and looked thoughtful, stroking the neck of his butterbeer bottle.
"I felt this… sort of rush of shame, and sadness, when the thought came to me that Hermione was just pitying me when she kissed me. I got cold and then dizzy, I remember thinking how much stupider I'd feel passing out on her. Then I just sort of started to fade. I heard a voice calling me, but it was more than just calling." He struggled a moment. "It was like a portkey, if a voice could be a portkey. It wasn't just me wanting; it wanted me as well. It wanted me enough to make me go. But," he stopped again, looked at me and blushed. "Hermione want me too. I could hear it in her voice. They were both calling, but hers was a bit panicked and real and afraid. The other was… I don't know how to say it."
Don't fail me, now Harry!
"Try. It could be important."
He eyed me dubiously. "Do you think it was real somehow? I thought it was just my imagination."
"Perhaps it was. I'd still like to know more about how it sounded."
Because your imagination can't really take you anyplace, but your magic could. Or anothers'. There were spells like that, and a very old one was rising from the depths of my own memory, told in my mother's voice.
There was once a jealous witch who placed a spell of her own devising on her husband the day that they were married. The parameters were simple; if he were ever to know true happiness with another, he would be drawn through space and time to her presence to answer to her. Years past and always he remained faithful. They had a large family, six boys and the seventh child a girl. The girl was the joy of her fathers' heart and they were very close. Eventually the children grew and married and went off to start families of their own. At last it was the daughters' chance and she duly married in her turn, a young wizard with whom she was deeply in love. Several months after the daughters' wedding, the witch was busy in her greenhouse tending to her magical plants when her husband suddenly appeared through thin air and dropped to her feet. All the jealousy long buried from the time when they were first wed rushed back to her, and she plunged a garden stake through his heart, feeling her own heart pierced that he had betrayed her. Returning to the house she found her daughter sobbing in the hall, afraid because her father had disappeared in thin air. She couldn't understand it, she told her mother. She'd come to tell them that she and her beloved were to be parents in the spring and upon hearing the news her father had simply faded away.
It had all the hallmarks of an old wives tale, but then witches were old wives. And there were variations reported on the same spell; two enemies who had used something like it in battle. What if Harry were being drawn somewhere? But where? And by whom? And if his despair were the trigger, who might know him well enough to sense what would drive him there? Questions were flooding me now.
"It sounded…" Harry seemed to be thinking fiercely, forcing himself to remember. "Cold. Wanting. I remember it really wanting me to come to where it was. Unhappy, I think. I got the sense of something waiting. Not for me, so much as just…waiting. But Hermione… when she called me she seemed so afraid. The voice wanted me, but she sounded like she needed me to stay."
Interesting. It could be coincidence, or imagination. I could be entirely wrong. Only it wasn't impossible, and I still felt sure that he harbored a curse. It bore more looking into at the very least.
Another converging force… or a red herring? Only time would tell, but I wanted to be there at least one step ahead of time, just in case.
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