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CHAPTER SIX:
The day before:
The young cloaked wizard resisted the urge to tug nervously at his robes. It would only draw attention. Instead he blew into his cold hands, obscuring his face in the process.
Finally he reached his destination. It was a shop for common foodstuffs and household supplies, a mundane place he had never entered in all his life. He quickly made his way to the safety of the tall shelves at the back of the store.
I can't believe I'm doing this. And for those gits! Then again, this wasn't really a mission of mercy, was it? He shouldn't fool himself. This was about survival and playing his cards right.
He didn't have to wait long. A couple of minutes passed, and a short, familiar figure carrying a mini-basket entered the store. Whistling merrily (something the boy had never seen it do), the house elf went along the shelves, picking items here and there.
As soon as it was level with him, the wizard grabbed the house elf by the neck and yanked it back into a corner.
The house elf's eyes bugged out as it got a good look at the narrow face within the confines of the hooded cloak. "You!" it squealed in fright. It squirmed and nearly got away. "Hel-!"
The boy clamped his hand over the small figure's mouth and gave it a good shake. "Shut your bloody trap, Dobby! If you want to save your precious Potter you better listen to me!"
Predictably, the house elf stopped struggling, though its eyes still boggled in fear.
"You find someone from that stupid Order, do you hear? You find them and tell them exactly what I'm going to tell you!" Draco Malfoy, the youngest Death Eater in recent history, hissed. "And you make sure they know who this comes from. If their side wins, I want them to remember I saved their sodding golden boy and his friends. Do you understand? Now listen."
Early the next morning:
Ron was up to his elbows in soap suds and dirty plates. His cleaning charm hadn't gone quite the way it was supposed to. I am such a berk. I should've asked Mum to let me off or traded chores with the twins or Ginny or something.
He couldn't believe he was stuck in the Burrow while Harry and Hermione were starting the search for the horcruxes. Not that he envied a night spent in a musty library, mind you. It was purely the company he was after.
He easily pictured them in his head - Hermione poring over some old thick tome, scribbling madly in the crinkly new parchment paper she liked so much, getting more absorbed as the minutes ticked by. Harry really trying to keep up with her but gradually getting twitchy, tapping his quill and what-not, before finally finding some excuse to take a break.
Ron gave his best mate half an hour, an hour at the outside. Not that he stood a better chance. If Ron were there, he and Harry would've gotten into at least one game of wizarding chess before returning to those books. No, when it came to books and research and sheer perseverance and cleverness, the girl of the trio ruled hands down.
Hermione. Since he was alone, Ron let the grin he always got these days at the mention of her name practically take over his face. She was maddening, that one. So smart and gutsy, because it took guts to be the way Hermione was - a teenage girl who believed unapologetically in the rules, who adored studying - but always breaking the rules for her boys.
The grin split wider as he remembered her blushing to almost Weasley-red at that, some committee head coming up to the Head Girl and asking if she'd let "her boys" exhibit a few Quidditch moves for the incoming first years.
"Why don't you ask them?" she asked loudly, waving in obvious embarrassment at the two Gryffindor players trailing a couple of feet behind her. At least, it was obvious to her friends.
Ron and Harry had traded quick conspiratorial grins.
"`Course we will," the redheaded Keeper affirmed, casually draping an arm around the astonished girl's shoulders. "Anything she says."
"We always do what she says," the famous team captain nodded sagely, putting his arm around her, too.
"Otherwise, she gets mad and trust me on this," Ron told the wide-eyed third year student, "you don't want to get her mad at you."
"Definitely not." Harry wagged his head at the horrifying possibilities. "She knows hundreds of curses," he confided. He glanced around. "From the restricted section."
"And she doesn't mind using them. That's probably how Harry's survived You-Know-Who for so long," Ron mused.
"Sometimes she tries them on us," Harry explained helpfully. "For practice."
They got away with about ten more seconds of that before the enraged Head Girl broke away and chased her friends around the grounds with her wand drawn.
That was a good day. Dumbledore had still been alive then, had seemed indestructible, actually. Ron sighed. Sometimes he wondered what it would've been like if he'd come to his senses earlier.
It would've been nice to just enjoy Hermione's company without You-Know-Who looming over everything. `Course, he'd always loomed but with Dumbledore there it felt safe, they knew they'd be okay somehow. When Ron thought of all the time he'd spent with Lavender, when he could've been taking long walks with Hermione, sneaking into empty classrooms and ducking into corners with her ...
There was that grin again. If anyone had asked him earlier, Ron would've probably said that snogging his best friend, who happened to be a girl, would be weird. It had been weird - for all of two seconds - and then those SPARKS! He could barely restrain his hands from going all over her when they were alone. About the only thing that stopped him half the time was the knowledge of how good Hermione was with hexes.
Heck, if she had any idea how often he wanked with her name drumming on his lips these days, she'd probably hex him anyway. But it's not like he could help it. She made him feel so -! Like the other day in the woods, when he couldn't get enough of her. He had wanted her so badly and he just couldn't stop himself. Before Hermione had grabbed his arms, the tips of his fingers had grazed the underside of her ...
Okay, not good to have these thoughts in the kitchen! You want your mum walking in on you like this?! Determinedly, Ron went back to washing the dishes the muggle way. He would never understand how Harry and Hermione could do these things without going bonkers at the sheer monotony -
Ron stilled at the sound of someone apparating. He eased his hands out of the sink and made sure his wand was within easy reaching distance. Just in case.
He was relieved when a familiar but exhausted-looking Remus Lupin walked into the kitchen. "Professor?"
There was no greeting, no preliminaries. Just - "Ron, I need to speak to your parents. Where are they?"
"Outside, sir," he replied, wiping his hands on a nearby towel. "Should I call them?"
Lupin shook his head. "No. Just continue what you were doing. I need to talk to them in private. But I will need to speak with you after," he said in a regretful tone. He was out the door before Ron could say another word.
Hang on, wasn't Lupin supposed to join Harry and Hermione at Grimmauld? Ron looked around quickly. Now where were those new Extendible Ears Fred and George were showing off last night? No way was he going to be left out of something that probably concerned his best mate and his girl.
At Grimmauld Place:
Harry would never be able to explain it. Somehow he shook off the binding spell, broke the seal on his room and made his way into the sitting room where he and Hermione had had dinner last night. He slumped into the couch that was still facing the fireplace.
The mental images came fast and sharp. Him and Hermione having dinner. Sharing a bottle of wine and joking around like good friends. Him catching her surprised mouth in a swift kiss. Then again, her body straining between him and armrest of the couch. And later, Hermione pleading as he stripped her. Touched her with force and without permission. Him!
What have I done? Harry buried his face in his hands. It didn't matter if he had been under some spell that had sent his blood boiling. He had betrayed her. Betrayed Ron.
But it was the last kiss he could not forget. That final sweet kiss taunted him, teased him with possibilities that would never be. I love her. He'd told her that last night, had said it in his dreams, but now, with the pin gone, Harry knew for certain that it was true. But that didn't stop me from hurting her, did it?
For the first time in his life, Harry Potter felt absolutely worthless. He realized he had been serious about fighting Lupin and Tonks last night. He had wanted to die. I've lost her. And once Ron finds out ...
There was a popping sound, and someone was grabbing him, hauling him to his feet, and Harry was looking into a pair of blazing blue eyes.
"Bastard!" Ron roared.
The dark-haired boy found himself flying at the end of his best mate's fist. He felt his lip split at the impact and blood trickle down his chin. The thought of fighting back didn't even cross his mind. Finally, someone was dishing out the treatment he deserved.
When he got his breath back, he picked himself up and slowly made his way to the friend he had betrayed.
Ron didn't let him down. As soon as he was within reach, the taller boy swung again, this time catching Harry square in his gut. "What did you DO?!" A blow accompanied each question.
"How could you do that to her?" Ron's shove made him stumble.
"Bloody Judas!" A familiar pain blossomed in his nose, and Harry knew that it was broken again.
"We said we'd protect her!" A particularly vicious blow sent him down again.
This time Ron didn't even let him get up. "Do you remember that?!" he screamed, punctuating his words with a flurry of swift kicks to the prone boy's stomach.
"We said we'd never let anything happen to her again!" Strangely, Ron sounded like he was near crying as he gave the boy who had been his best mate the worst beating of his life. "And YOU - !"
Dimly, Harry sensed other people coming into the room, trying to pull the enraged boy off of him. Clutching his stomach, he rolled and unsteadily got to his feet. His voice was thick as he tried to speak around the blood in his mouth. "Don't. I deserve this ..."
A completely cold voice brought them both to a halt. "This isn't about what you want." Hermione trained her lifeless eyes to Ron. "Or you."
"Hermione ..." Ron lifted a hand towards her.
The girl stared at the smudges of blood on his knuckles. "We need to wash those," she said in the same distant voice. She looked at the others who had arrived at the same time she had. "Professor, Tonks, can you take ...?"
Harry bowed his head. She can't even say my name. Somehow, it hurt more than all of Ron's blows put together.
"How did you get out?" Lupin asked in a grim tone as they escorted Harry back to his room. The older man glanced at Tonks, but she only shook her head. She'd been with Hermione.
"I don't know," the youth answered dully. "I remember wanting to know if she was okay, but I knew she wouldn't want to see me so I went downstairs."
Behind his back, the Auror and the former professor exchanged a significant look. It was starting already.