I'm not J.K. Rowling. I'm some other person entirely, who isn't British or a woman or willing to inflict Harry/Ginny on a largely unsuspecting populace
Hermione's first thought was that if Ginny were here, standing beside Harry instead of her, they would be looking at a mirror image of themselves. Lily and James Potter, seeming very much alive, peered out from their portrait at their son with happiness and relief etched on their faces, although Lily's eyes (which were, as people had often remarked, the same shade of green as Harry's) possessed a longsuffering weariness. Aside from those distinctive (and, Hermione had always thought, quite attractive) eyes, Harry and James could have passed for twins as easily as Fred and George did. Although, now that Hermione examined James Potter's face more closely, there was something a little different about the nose…something not just everyone would pick up on.
Her second thought was that if Ginny were here, standing beside Harry instead of her, she wouldn't have been nearly as confused about her role in all of this as she was now. She still didn't understand why Harry had suddenly become romantically interested in her, after six years of friendship, with no prior indication that he'd harbored those sort of feelings for her. Hermione knew that he'd never had those sort of feelings for her because she had been searching for them, desperately, since their fourth year at Hogwarts. They simply hadn't been there: not when she had tried to get him to invite her to Slughorn's party last year, not when he was oblivious about Cho's jealousy in fifth year, not when Viktor Krum had confronted him with the fact that she "spoke of him very often". Harry wasn't interested in her. She had accepted that. She had even tried to move on and to find happiness with someone else.
But then Harry had kissed her. He told her he loved her. And everything else went out the window.
Her best guess was that he was lonely, lost and in desperate need of something or someone to hold onto. It's why she had suggested that they take Ginny along on the horcrux hunt. It was one of the reasons why she had been so hesitant to start a relationship with Harry right now. The fact that they were 'dating' (or 'together' or whatever other euphemism might apply to their unusual circumstances) made her more than a little terrified at the idea of meeting Harry's parents for the first time. Considering that they had died while their son was still a baby, Hermione had never anticipated meeting the Potters and certainly hadn't thought of ever talking to them as Harry's girlfriend. Perhaps irrationally, she felt a certain pressure to impress them.
Hermione examined Harry's face carefully, watching great joy war with deep sadness on his face. Right now, what he needed most was not necessarily a girlfriend, but the same supportive Hermione that he'd always had by his side. She smiled at him warmly. Perhaps she was the girl who was supposed to be standing beside him right now after all.
Harry and the magically captured images of his parents talked about everything and nothing all at once, as though they could squeeze a lifetime of important and mundane conversations into only a few minutes. James and Lily took in the events of Harry's life with wonder, ("Of course you made the Quidditch team in first year!" James had crowed. "The broomstick doesn't fly too far from the closet, after all."), grief (Lily had nearly wept over news of Dumbledore's death and James even got a little teary-eyed when he learned what had happened to Sirius) and an abiding sense of regret and longing.
"I can't imagine what that must have been like for you," Lily had remarked sorrowfully. "Growing up alone and unwanted, and then coming into our world and learning about all of this." Tears she had been fighting for what felt like hours began to spill over. "I'm so sorry you had to go through that."
Harry was a bit choked up himself. "It's not your fault. You couldn't have known what would happen."
James grimaced sheepishly. "Actually, Harry, we did."
Harry nodded in acquiescence. "Of course. You knew about the prophecy… and that Voldemort wanted to kill me…"
"There's more to it than that," Lily explained, that look of melancholy back in full force in her very expressive eyes. "I'm not quite sure you realize…"
At that moment, a light bulb burst above their heads, raining sparks down on them as a violent tremor shook the room. The four of them were thrown into pitch darkness, causing Hermione to relight her wand. "Maybe we should take this conversation someplace else," she suggested with just a hint of worry in her voice. "I don't know if it's safe here."
"I'm afraid it's here or nowhere," Lily continued, a sense of determination entering her voice. "The spell I used to create this portrait of us is localized. It's tied to the wards that have kept the cellar intact and undisturbed all of these years." The room shook slightly once again as she spoke. "Godric's Hollow wasn't designed to sustain this level of magic over such a long time. I don't think we have much of either left." Lily's eyes met Harry's. "What do you know about Voldemort's horcruxes?"
Harry blinked rapidly, seemingly taken aback by the quick change in topic. "Dumbledore told me about them, last year. He thinks Voldemort made seven of them; I know that he made at least five. I destroyed one at the end of my second year and another one just over a month ago. Two more were destroyed by Dumbledore and my first year Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. If there are seven of them, that leaves three and I know one of them is Ravenclaw's quill. Hermione and I haven't had any luck at getting our hands on that one, though."
Lily and James both looked impressed with Harry, at least until Hermione spoke. "We found the Animus Signatus potion that you gave to Regulus Black at Grimmauld Place, Mrs. Potter. We used it to discover that Ravenclaw's quill was a horcrux, but then it lost its magical potency. I thought it would be worthless until I noticed that it had begun to undergo flocculation. I mixed in some mandrake root with the floc to create a new substance which should serve the same purpose, although it will now require physical contact before it can positively identify a horcrux."
Lily and James turned their impressed look onto Hermione. Harry stared at her quizzically. "What?" Hermione demanded. "She said she wanted to know everything we knew about the horcruxes. That's everything."
"I don't think we've been properly introduced," James remarked in his best suave voice. "Harry, please tell me this is your girlfriend." The portrait image of Lily elbowed portrait James in the ribs. "Ow! What was that for?" he demanded. "I was only admiring her enormous…brain power."
Lily scoffed. "Since when have you ever admired a girl for her brain power?" As James smiled wickedly, she turned away from him with a pout. "We haven't the time to talk about Harry's love life and it's no business of ours even if she is his girlfriend," Lily reprimanded him sharply.
Hermione blushed furiously as Harry threw one arm around her. "Actually, she is," Harry explained, as nervousness entered his voice for the first time. Lily's scowl vanished and her face brightened immediately. The Potters seemed eager to learn anything they could about the son that they had never known. "We were both rather stupid about our own feelings for awhile, but it all seemed to work out in the end."
An embarrassed laugh escaped Hermione's lips. "Speak for yourself, Harry. I've felt this way about you for…" The ground shook beneath them again, so violently that Hermione felt her legs give out from underneath her. Harry caught her before she hit the ground, but had to brace himself against the wall, which now had a rather large crack in it.
Portrait Lily's expression was now all-business. "Listen to me, Harry. After Regulus came to me and told me about the horcruxes, James and I began searching for them ourselves. When a dagger that had belonged to Godric Gryffindor was stolen from one of James' relatives, we thought for sure that it was Voldemort who had taken it, and that he was making another horcrux. It took us months to track it down, but we finally got our hands on Gryffindor's dagger, just before we went into hiding with you."
Harry looked every bit as interested in this piece of information as Hermione was. "And was it a horcrux?" he asked anxiously.
"No, it wasn't," Lily explained sadly. "When we began to look for something related to the Hogwarts' founders, something of Gryffindor's in particular, we thought the dagger had to be it. Everything else of Gryffindor's was accounted for. What we didn't consider was just how perverse and twisted Voldemort's mind had become. He didn't merely want an object that had belonged to Gryffindor, he wanted…"
The floorboards above them let out a long, slow moan and part of the cellar ceiling collapsed, raining down debris on their heads. It was now Hermione who had to come to Harry's rescue, pushing him out of the way as a stray wooden beam came very close to striking him in the head. "Harry, we can't stay here!" she exclaimed worriedly.
Harry, however, made no attempt to move out of harm's way. In fact, his eyes had never left the portrait. "It was me, wasn't it?" Harry asked in a voice that was almost too soft to be heard. "Voldemort wanted me."
Lily nodded her head as tears flowed freely from her face. "Harry, I'm so sorry. Living horcruxes are…are rare, that's why we never even thought about…"
"I'm…" Harry began, a blank expression on his face revealing nothing of what had to be going on in his mind. Hermione's own thoughts were reeling in horror; she was torn between getting Harry and herself to safety and learning more from James and Lily. "I'm one of Voldemort's horcruxes."
James' expression was grim as he looked at Lily. "Tell him about the protection spell."
"Right, of course," Lily responded, shaking her head slightly as though to clear it. "I read about a spell that was used by a very powerful witch queen in ancient times to keep her son from being turned into a horcrux by his father. That was how ancient wizard kings used to maintain their dynasties, you know. They passed down pieces of their soul, from generation to generation, until…"
Another support beam fell behind them and made a rather large hole in the wooden staircase. "How about the short version, love?" James suggested.
"I knew I was going to die anyway," Lily informed them tearfully, "so to make sure that my death meant something, I sacrificed myself to create a magical barrier between the piece of Voldemort's soul that he thrust into you and your own spirit. Otherwise his soul, his essence, would have controlled you. In time, it would have destroyed your soul." Lily's eyes bored into Harry's. "When Voldemort realized what I had done, that's when he tried to kill you. But his magic couldn't harm you, because of the barrier. Listen to me, Harry: whatever happens, that barrier mustn't come down."
"It already has been," Harry confessed, his voice hollow. "When Voldemort came back, two years ago, he used my blood to make his new body. He…he destroyed the barrier."
"Two years ago," she repeated in an astonished whisper. James and Lily Potter shared a worried look. "Then it's already begun," she announced, a tone of defeat entering her voice for the first time. "You haven't much time."
A series of cracks and moans above them heightened Hermione's anxiety. "Harry, let's go!" she cried, grabbing Harry's arm tightly.
"What do you mean, I haven't much time?" Harry asked confusedly. "What's going to happen?"
"That's entirely up to you, Harry," James answered him. "You should go now."
"Are there anti-apparition wards set up here?" Hermione asked loudly, so she could be heard over the sounds of the house breaking apart around them.
"No," Lily replied. "Find others to help you, Harry. That's key." Her voice was nearly drowned out by the incessant groaning of the wall behind them. "Frank and Alice Longbottom were dear friends of ours; I'm sure they would be glad to help you in any way they could. And there was a Slytherin in our year who knew all about the horcruxes…"
"Snape," Harry guessed, his voice suddenly filled with contempt.
"No," James assured them. "It was…"
But before he could finish, the wall holding the portrait collapsed, splitting the picture in two, tearing the life-like images of James and Lily in twain. As a mountain of dirt, stone and plaster began to descend upon them, Hermione only had time enough to call out Harry's name before he disapparated in front of her. Completely unwilling to stay there now that Harry was out of harm's way, Hermione apparated away as well.
From outside Godric's Hollow, Hermione watched as the house seemingly destroyed itself from the inside out, an implosion brought on by magical instability. She let herself weep then, her emotions now too powerful and conflicting to ignore. She cried for the home and the family that Harry had never known. She cried for James and Lily, who had given their lives to allow their son a chance to have his own. But most of all, she cried for Harry and herself.
'It isn't fair,' Hermione thought bitterly. 'Not to either of us. Not now. Especially not now.' His life had already been filled with so many horrors and misfortunes, all of it courtesy of Lord Voldemort. Knowing that a part of that maniac's soul was somewhere inside Harry was almost too much for her to bear. For a moment, she allowed herself to curse the cruelty of fate for having done this to him, after he had endured so much and suffered so greatly.
But it was only for a moment. Hermione quickly wiped away her tears. She could not allow herself to give in to her emotions. Harry needed her. He needed calm, sensible Hermione, even if she wasn't entirely sure that that was who she was right now. He certainly didn't need 'emotional, weepy girlfriend Hermione' who fell apart at the idea that life with Harry wasn't all sunshine and roses.
Hermione thought of doing a 'point me' spell to find Harry, but quickly realized where he'd be once she saw a large grey headstone just outside the boundaries of the yard, resting underneath a spreading willow tree. A thin, dark figure knelt before the stone almost worshipfully, his head bowed and his body completely still. "Harry?" she called out, her voice cutting through what felt like oppressive silence.
For a few moments she wondered if he'd heard her, as she had spoken in what was barely a whisper. Harry did not move, choosing to stare at the names on the headstones in mute contemplation. 'James and Lily Potter,' it read simply, 'Beloved and missed by all who knew them.' At long last, he spoke. "I never even had a chance, did I?"
A cold breeze rolled slowly across the grassy field, blowing Hermione's hair back as she moved towards him. "Harry, I…I can't tell you how sorry I am." She immediately chided herself for how useless that must have sounded, coming from her.
Harry didn't seem to notice. "I never had a chance to beat him. How could I? He was here the whole time." Hermione placed the palm of her hand on Harry's shoulder. "That's why the occlumency lessons didn't work. It wasn't your fault, Hermione. How could you be expected to help me shut Voldemort out of my mind when he was already there, all of the time, watching and waiting…" His tone grew suddenly icier and more despondent. "He probably knows everything by now. There's no longer any point in trying to keep things from him."
"We can't think that way," Hermione said in a voice that was both mournful and determined. "Harry, we can't just give up. Think of what Dumbledore said…"
"Dumbledore must have known," Harry stated numbly, seemingly not caring that he had interrupted Hermione. "That's why he gave me the carpe diem potion."
"What?" Hermione asked in disbelief. "Why would you say that?"
Harry turned to face her for the first time, his face devoid of emotion. In truth, this worried Hermione more than if he had been wailing and screaming. 'He's shutting himself down,' she thought to herself. 'Turning his feelings off, so he won't have to deal with the pain.' "At Bill and Fleur's wedding, Luna said that carpe diem potion was sometimes used to treat multiple personality disorder."
Hermione frowned deeply. When had Harry spoken with Luna at the wedding? "She did?"
"Yeah," Harry confirmed, his voice low. "Of course, she also said it was good for treating wounds of the toad-toed findlewatt…"
"It makes sense, I suppose," Hermione mused aloud. "The potion makes certain personality traits and characteristics dominant over other ones; perhaps..." Harry had long since stopped listening to her. "Harry, talk to me. Let me in. Tell me what you're feeling."
Harry turned his head slightly to look at her. "You want to know what I'm feeling right now? Determination." He rose to his feet. "I'm going to kill Voldemort and end this."
Hermione couldn't quite hide her surprise. She had expected Harry to wallow in his own misery for a while. It was certainly what she had wanted to do upon first learning that Voldemort had made Harry into one of his horcruxes. He looked at her expectantly. "Will you help me?" he asked.
Her heart broke a little at the doubt in his eyes. Of course she would help him. She always had. "You know I will," Hermione agreed instantly.
"Good," Harry said as he began slowly walking away from the grave. "We should get started straight away. With everything we have at our disposal and how brilliant you are at research, this shouldn't take long." Hermione was pleasantly surprised at Harry's positive attitude and was just about to say so when he added, "I reckon the thing that would be most helpful is a spell that would destroy both Voldemort and me at the same time, but he may be expecting something like that. We should come up with all sorts of different ways to off us both, just in case."
"What?!" Hermione exclaimed in horror.
"We'll find and destroy the last horcrux and then Ravenclaw's quill first, of course," Harry amended, as though that might remove her objection to his plan of action.
"You're…you're talking about killing yourself," Hermione queried softly, her voice deliberately calm and even.
"Of course," Harry answered her with a nonchalant shrug. "I'm a horcrux. All of the horcruxes have to be destroyed in order for Voldemort to die. So I have to die, too. It's only logical, Hermione."
"Well, I don't accept that!" Hermione cried out, grief and anger equally evident in her voice. "There has to be some other way!"
"I suppose I could live to a ripe old age," Harry said, a tinge of bitterness entering his tone, "but then so would Voldemort. I'd still be alive, but thousands of people would die because of him. I don't think there's any real choice there."
"There's always a choice, Harry," Hermione countered, pushing herself in front of him to stop him from walking away from her. "You can choose to fight; to find some other way to defeat Voldemort; to live…"
"Don't you think I want to?!" Harry snapped, real emotion registering on his face for the first time. "I can't fight Voldemort, Hermione! All the times I've faced him, I've only been lucky. Head to head, without Dumbledore to help me, I don't stand a chance. Especially now." His voice began to tremble. "Hermione, I think I'm losing myself. The dreams, the bursts of wandless magic that I can't control, I think it's him, taking over. Without Mum's barrier or the potion, there's nothing to stop him anymore." Harry looked down at Hermione in sorrow. "That's why it all has to be done quickly. Otherwise, I'll end up like Professor Quirrell, a mindless slave to Lord Voldemort…"
"Professor Quirrell," Hermione thought aloud as the cogs in her brain spun around. "Of course!" she cried out excitedly. "Professor Quirrell was working on a way to transfer a part of his soul to another subject before he died. A way to keep some part of himself from being completely corrupted by Voldemort."
Harry looked skeptical. "Did it work?"
"Well…no," Hermione admitted. "But that doesn't mean that it won't. I get the feeling Quirrell was doing it for vanity's sake, rather than because he truly wanted to be free from Voldemort. Also, he was performing these experiments on mountain trolls. They weren't exactly ideal test subjects."
Harry shook his head dismissively. "I think we're just fooling ourselves, Hermione. I've been living on borrowed time ever since I was a baby." He turned to look back at his parents' grave, one last time. "If I have to die in order for it to be finished, then that's what I'll do."
"I can't stop you," Hermione informed him matter-of-factly. "But if you expect me to help you come up with a plan to kill yourself, you can think again. I won't do it."
"Aren't you listening to me, Hermione?" Harry yelled back at her. He stepped closer to her, his eyes blazing with fury. "It's not my life you're trying to save anymore, it's Voldemort's. Is that really what you want?"
"What I want is for you to care half as much about your own life as I do," Hermione replied hotly. "I am not going to watch you die, Harry James Potter! I've put my life on the line time and again to help you fight a basilisk, a dragon and any number of dark wizards, all because I can't bear the thought of my life without you. If, after all that, I have to help you fight yourself, too, then I suppose that's what I'll do," she finished pointedly.
"You heard what my parents said," Harry shot back at her. They were now standing so close together that their breath intermingled, forming a single vapor that shot into the cool night sky. "I haven't much time until he takes over. It could be months or weeks or even days." Harry gave Hermione a look of deep frustration. "If you were really smart, you'd be running away from me right now. Go back to school. Start concentrating on your life, instead of mine. I'm a lost cause, Hermione."
Hermione shook her head quickly. "No, you're not. Don't ever say that!" In that moment, she had something of an epiphany. Hermione Granger had been wearing two hats lately, playing both the best friend, the confidante and fellow adventurer that Harry had always had with him, and the girlfriend, the young woman who held Harry's heart in her hands, the one who loved him more than anything else in the world. She could no longer take turns loving him and being his best friend. It was time to do both.
"I've wasted so much time being afraid of you," she admitted, a sob escaping her throat as she spoke.
"Afraid of us. I was scared, Harry. Ever since the Department of Mysteries, I've been scared of what we could
become. When Dolohov's spell hit me…"
Storm clouds seemed to form in Harry's eyes at the memory. "Well, naturally, I was worried about how close I
had come to dying, at least at first. But then I got to thinking about what happened to you." Harry sent her a
questioning frown. "You panicked, Harry. You lost control of your emotions because you thought I was dead."
Hermione let out a soft sigh. "We were best friends then, as close as we've ever been. If we had been more
than friends, how much worse would it have been for you?" The look Harry gave her was all the answer she needed.
"So I decided to keep my distance from you and to put all of my 'more-than-friendly' feelings for you
aside. At least for the time being."
"You were right to do it," Harry told her flatly, although he nearly choked on the words as he said them.
"No, I wasn't," Hermione countered emphatically. "I was dying inside, all throughout last year. I was living a lie. I never felt so stupid. The 'brightest witch of her age' was reduced to total idiocy." She leaned in closer to him, so that she could almost whisper into his ear. "When you kissed me, you opened a door inside of me that I thought I had closed forever. It was exciting at first, but eventually all of those little nagging fears came back. I wondered how long it would last, or how quickly you'd get tired of me." Harry looked as though he might reassure her, but then tears that he had valiantly fought to hold back began running down his cheeks, almost in betrayal. "But I'm not afraid of you anymore, Harry. I can't be. I need you. I need you more than I could ever admit to myself." She caressed his face with the palm of her hand, wiping away his tears. "I'm in love with you, Harry Potter. Not half way. Not part of the time. Completely."
Harry looked at her as though he were seeing her for the first time. It was a look that made her head swim. "You're incredible. Do you know that?" he asked rhetorically, his voice quivering a little. "I find out I have Voldemort's soul inside of me and you still want to be with me."
"Oh, Harry," she whispered back to him as she kissed him gently. "Of course I do." Hermione brought her forehead to rest on Harry's. "Don't give in to him," she advised him softly. "Fight this with me. Let me help you. We'll find some other way, a way where you don't have to die. I promise."
Harry closed his eyes, seemingly deep in thought. "Alright," he conceded, his eyes opening slowly. "Alright, Hermione, you win. We'll do it your way." Hermione smiled widely and threw her arms around him, kissing him passionately all the while. "But…you have to promise…if anything goes wrong…I have to know that I can trust you to…"
"Harry," Hermione said authoritatively as she placed her index finger over his wet, swollen lips, "I think it's time to stop talking. Let's go home."
Harry nodded quickly and without another word they walked away from what remained of Godric's Hollow. They found Buckbeak in the woods exactly where they had left him, mounted the hippogriff in turn and flew off into the night sky. And, for the first time, Hermione wasn't afraid to fly.
***
Harry had just escorted Buckbeak into his old room (if by 'escorted' you meant cajoled, prodded and, after more
than a few painful scratches, bribed with dead ferrets) when he collapsed on Sirius' old bed in pure exhaustion. He
seemed to barely have the energy to slip out of his sweater and toss it onto the dresser. "What a day," Harry
remarked with a heavy sigh. "I don't think I've ever been this tired." He caught a glimpse of
Hermione out of the corner of his eye. "Hermione, are you coming to…?" His eyes widened noticeably when he
saw all of her, or at least more of her than he had ever seen before. Hermione Granger stood in front of Harry Potter
in nothing but her underwear. "Bed," he squeaked.
"Well," Hermione replied coyly, "I wasn't exactly planning on taking a stroll down Diagon Alley dressed like this."
"You're…you're not wearing your pajamas," Harry pointed out rather stupidly. "You're not wearing much of anything, really."
Hermione walked up to him slowly. "I was hoping you'd notice that." She sat next to him on the bed and gave him a look that said they were going to have a long, serious talk about the consequences of having sex. As she started to speak, however, Harry began kissing her. Quite a lot. And rather expertly, if she did say so herself. Her train of thought was quickly lost.
They didn't do much talking as the night went on. The point had become moot anyhow.
***
It had been well over a year since Ginny Weasley had been to Number Twelve Grimmauld Place. She remembered it as that
creepy old house Harry's godfather, Sirius Black, had owned and let the Order of the Phoenix use for its meetings.
When Headmistress McGonagall informed her that she believed Grimmauld was where Harry was staying, she had been
skeptical at first. 'Why would Harry go back there when he could stay at Hogwarts?' she had asked herself, but
had held her tongue around McGonagall. Hogwarts' new Headmistress had been unusually short with Ginny when
she'd interrupted her breakfast to give her the assignment of telling Harry where the next Order meeting would be.
She did not want to give the Headmistress cause to ask someone else to go.
'She probably just wanted an actual member of the Order to do it,' Ginny complained to herself. 'I dunno why they don't just let me join now. I'm going to when I'm of age anyway.'
McGonagall had insisted that she floo into a safe house only a few blocks away from Grimmauld Place as a precaution. Ginny grumbled about it under her breath, but complied anyway, finding herself in the fireplace of an abandoned building filled only with dust, cobwebs and a few pieces of furniture that nobody could possibly want. Briefly taking the time to clean herself off, and wishing that she could perform a cleaning charm away from Hogwarts without getting into trouble, she exited the building and soon made her way through the mostly muggle neighborhood to the old, bleak-looking house.
Ginny could barely contain her excitement at seeing Harry again. 'I wonder if he's missed me,' she wondered. 'Maybe he'll change his mind about letting me come along when he sees that McGonagall trusts me.' Swallowing her disgust, she rapped softly on the front door using the serpent-shaped knocker and waited to see who would answer. To her surprise, it was that dreadful old house elf that used to think up ways to make everyone miserable when she had stayed there over the summer before her fourth year. Ginny had hoped the wretched little creature would have croaked by now.
"The little pureblood girl comes back," Kreacher proclaimed with a wicked smile. "Perhaps she wants to practice throwing dung at Kreacher again…"
"Is Harry here?" Ginny demanded impatiently. If the wrinkly old house elf had not been barring the door, she would have barged in and seen for herself.
"Young Master Potter is here," Kreacher replied knowingly, "but he may not stay for long. It would be best for the blood traitor girl to speak to him now, before he goes away again."
Ginny eyed Kreacher suspiciously as he stepped back to allow her entrance. "Thank you," she said tersely and quickly bounded up the stairs. Once she was on the second floor, she took the time to straighten her robes and fix her hair in the broken remains of a nearby mirror. It was then that she heard Harry's voice.
"So, never with Krum, then?" she heard him ask curiously. 'How odd,' Ginny thought. 'He must be asking Hermione something about Viktor Krum. But what?' The former star Bulgarian seeker had become a bit of a curiosity at Hogwarts, as he always skulked about the castle with a brooding expression on his face, never speaking to anyone.
"Harry!" Hermione answered him with a teasing laugh. "I was barely fifteen! Honestly!"
As Ginny crept closer to the sound of their voices, Harry chuckled and said, "Well, he was a famous international Quidditch player. I wouldn't have thought less of you if you had." Through the thin walls of Grimmauld, she could hear him let out a playful snort. "Well, maybe just a little bit less."
"Git," Hermione retorted automatically.
"And…I suppose this means…" Harry began awkwardly. 'What are they talking about in there?' Ginny asked herself, her curiosity bringing her to within a hair's breadth of the door to Sirius' old bedroom. "You didn't sleep with Ron."
Ginny rolled her eyes. Were they really so hard up for things to talk about that they were having a conversation about Hermione's sex life? "No, I never did," she answered him, her voice so quiet that Ginny could barely hear what she was saying. "Now, what about you?"
"I never slept with Ron either," Harry replied cheekily. One of Ginny's brown eyes peered through a crack in the door. She could just make out Harry's form on Sirius' old bed. His hair was disheveled, he wasn't wearing his glasses and he was shirtless, which made her heart beat just a little faster. Ginny's fingers pressed lightly against the bedroom door, making it open slightly.
"I wasn't asking about you and Ron," Hermione pointed out irritably. "I was only wondering exactly how far you had gotten with…" Here the door swung open wide, giving Ginny the chance to see exactly what she had fervently hoped not to. Harry and Hermione were both lying in bed. They were acting especially friendly with each other. In fact, they were snuggling close together. And Ginny was pretty sure they were naked underneath those blankets. "Ginny!" Hermione cried out in surprise as she tore her eyes from Harry's for half a second to finally notice she was there.
"Not very far," Harry answered her, oblivious to Hermione's change in tone. "We only dated for two weeks, you know." As the seconds slowly ticked by, Harry's gaze finally followed Hermione's pointing index finger to find Ginny Weasley standing at the other end of the room, her mouth open in shock. "Oh." He winced. "Ginny, I…I didn't realize you were…" he began in a soothing tone of voice. Ginny bolted before he could finish.
Hot tears ran down Ginny Weasley's cheeks nearly as fast as she ran down the stairs. 'Stupid,' Ginny chided herself. 'Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. I should never have come here, I should never have seen this. Even if it had been happening all this time, under my nose, I should never have seen it!'
"Ginny, wait," Harry called after her from the top of the stairs. He had hastily thrown on his glasses, a pair of jeans, and an apologetic expression. "I…I didn't mean for you to find out this way."
"So you're not going to lie this time?" Ginny asked cattily. "I was expecting to hear about how occlumency works better when both participants are naked. Then I could pretend to believe you and make a joke about how glad I was that I didn't walk in on one of your occlumency lessons with Snape."
"I'm sorry this hurt you, Ginny," Harry told her gently as he began walking down the stairs.
"But you're not sorry that you slept with her," Ginny shot back coldly.
"No," Harry admitted with a sigh. "I'm not." As Ginny turned away from him with a frustrated growl, he asked her, "Why are you here, Ginny?"
Fumbling through the pockets of her Hogwarts robes, Ginny reached in and removed the piece of paper with which Headmistress McGonagall had entrusted her. "I was supposed to give you this. It's where the Order's having their next meeting." She laughed bitterly. "I guess it was stupid of me to think you might want to spend time with me. Not when you could be with Hermione."
"I didn't do anything wrong, you know," Harry chided her. "You're not my girlfriend anymore. We broke up, remember?"
Ginny spun around, her eyes flashing angrily. "We 'broke up' so that you could fight Voldemort, not so that you could shack up with Hermione and go gallivanting across England!" When Harry didn't reply, she went on. "And what about Ron? Wasn't he dating Hermione?" Harry looked pained. "What, did you both just forget about him?"
Harry looked at her sadly. "No, we didn't forget." He inched closer to her. "Everything's complicated right now, Ginny, and it looks like it might stay that way. If you can't accept the fact that Hermione and I are together now, I'm not going to let that be my problem."
Ginny shook her head as tears began falling freely. "This wasn't supposed to happen. We were supposed to get back together after it was over…after the end. After you beat Vol…Vol… You-Know-Who."
"I don't know what was supposed to happen," Harry said slowly and deliberately, "but this is what did happen." He looked down at his hands, as if gathering his courage. "I love her, Ginny."
"Well, isn't that perfect?" Ginny demanded furiously. "You love her and she loves you. Now you can fly off into the bloody sunset together. Except Hermione hates to fly, but I reckon you already know that."
"How long have you known?" Harry asked her simply.
"What?" Ginny scoffed. "That Hermione hates to fly? For ages, for as long as I've known her…"
"How long have you known that she was in love with me?"
Ginny glared at him defiantly. "Since fourth year. Why? What does it matter?" Harry was clearly taking the time to mull something over, which Ginny really didn't have the patience for right now. "She never loved you like I did, Harry. Hermione was obsessed with not ruining your friendship. She was always supportive of the two of us getting together." Her eyes grew stormy. "But I suppose she got selfish, living here with you, alone. You know, it wouldn't surprise me if she used a love potion on you."
"You don't know what you're talking about," Harry assured her, his voice even.
"Oh, don't I?" Ginny asked incredulously. "Have you looked at both of us lately? Who in their right mind would ever dump me for her?"
"You should probably stop talking, Ginny," Harry told her, his tone angry for the first time. "You're not doing yourself any good."
"You know what?" Ginny snapped back. "You're right. I'm out of here." Ginny grabbed the rumpled piece of paper she had come in with and darted toward Grimmauld's fireplace. McGonagall could find someone else to be her little messenger. She grabbed a handful of floo powder and read the address written on the piece of paper aloud. If they wouldn't let her join the Order, she would find out what they were up to the way she usually did: by spying. She was through playing by everyone else's rules.
As she disappeared in a puff of smoke, Ginny's mind raced. 'Why, Harry?' she thought to herself in a whine. 'Why Hermione and not me?' Everything she had done, from joining the Quidditch team to dating Michael Corner and Dean Thomas to taking Felix Felicis potion all throughout last year, had been for nothing. After chasing the boy of her dreams for so long, he had eluded her, unfairly choosing to be with someone else just as she had him in her grasp. Had Hermione used a love potion on Harry? Somehow she doubted it. Whatever else you might say about her, Hermione was a very moral witch. So what did she do to catch Harry's eye?
Before she could ponder the answer to that question, Ginny began looking around at her new surroundings. 'What an odd place for a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix,' she thought to herself. 'It looks like an old man's house. Smells like one, too. And so many magical knickknacks lying about. Wait, is that…?'
Ginny froze. Sleeping in an armchair in the corner of the living room was one Draco Malfoy, one of the most wanted wizards in England. 'What's he doing here?' A gleeful feeling came over her suddenly. Ginny Weasley had captured Draco Malfoy! She could hardly wait to tell Harry!
It only took a moment for her to remember that he had taken up with Hermione and that she was still furious with him. That information was still taking some time to sink in.
As she approached him, Malfoy's eyes began to blink open slowly. They widened considerably once he realized that he wasn't alone. "Bloody hell, Weaselbit! You nearly scared me to death."
"That isn't really how I was hoping to kill you," Ginny growled at him, more than willing to take out her current frustrations on scum like Draco.
Malfoy rubbed his eyes sleepily, ignoring her very serious threat of bodily harm. "I suppose Potter sent you with this week's supplies, then?" he asked in a bored tone of voice.
Ginny frowned. "What are you talking about? Does Harry know you're here?"
"Oh, come off it, Weasley, you're not that stupid," Draco replied skeptically. "You had to have come from Grimmauld, otherwise you'd have pustulant boils all over your skin, thanks to Granger's wards." Malfoy observed Ginny's blank face with amusement. "You really don't know, do you?"
"No," Ginny admitted reluctantly. There was a menacing gleam in her eye as she pointed her wand at him. "But I think you're going to tell me all about it. Now."
"You don't need to get violent, Weaselbit. I'll tell you." Draco Malfoy had that familiar superior smirk plastered on his face. "Something tells me your foul mood has more to do with Potter than me. What did he do, ditch you for the mudblood?" Draco laughed aloud at the anguished look on Ginny's face. "Cor, he did."
"Shut up and tell me what's going on!" she shrieked at him, almost stabbing Malfoy with her wand as she thrust it towards him.
"Potter and Granger left me here," Draco explained patiently, "I'm supposed to guard information about the Dark Lord's horcruxes. I dunno from who. Sneaks like you, I suppose." Malfoy grinned. "I'm not doing a very good job, am I?"
"What's a horcrux?" Ginny asked in confusion.
Draco laughed contemptuously. "They really didn't tell you anything, did they?" He raised a pale blonde eyebrow. "How would you like to know about something that could get you into a lot of trouble?"
As Draco Malfoy took the time to tell her everything he knew about Voldemort's horcruxes and Harry's search for them, three thoughts occurred to her. The first was that she was really and truly insulted that Harry had left her out of the loop on this, particularly considering what had happened to her in first year. The second was that she was even more insulted that Harry and Hermione had chosen to tell Luna Lovegood about the horcruxes while keeping her in the dark.
Her third and final thought was of a more personal nature. 'It was all because of Viktor Krum,' she realized. 'He was the reason Harry noticed Hermione was a girl. Then Harry saw Hermione with Krum at Bill and Fleur's wedding. That was when he started acting strangely around her.' Harry had become jealous and possessive; he had probably wanted to make sure that Hermione didn't end up with an oaf like Viktor Krum.
Ginny Weasley suddenly began looking at Draco Malfoy in an entirely different way. 'Two can play this game,' she thought to herself smugly. If Harry wanted to get Hermione away from Krum that badly, he'd be beside himself when he saw her with someone he hated. Draco Malfoy was that perfect someone. As Malfoy stopped talking, she grabbed him by his shirt collar and pulled him close to her. "Kiss me," she ordered him.
"What?" Draco replied, his expression puzzled. "I'm not going to kiss you, you pathetic blood traitor sl…" Whatever insult he was going to hurl at her was cut off by her lips on his. It didn't take long for him to start kissing her back.
***
Minerva McGonagall sat at a small, worn little table in a safe house in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by four
wizards who, up until a few months ago, she thought she had known quite well. Remus Lupin and Alastor Moody flanked her
on either side, with Kingsley Shacklebolt and Arthur Weasley sitting on each end. Together, the five of them had made
up an executive committee, a temporary leadership council designed to govern the Order in the wake of Dumbledore's
death. Unfortunately, no one had been able to agree on a more permanent arrangement, so the five of them were still
called upon to lead the Order at every meeting. It was a tiresome process, but one that had proven necessary.
As Sturgis Podmore spoke of his efforts to re-open diplomatic channels with the goblins, McGonagall rubbed the bridge of her nose gently. If the Order of the Phoenix had seen rockier times, she did not remember them. Lord Voldemort was slowly gaining ground across the country, as the Ministry and the Order reeled from numerous reverses, both in the field and in the mind of the wizarding public. Elphias Doge and Hestia Jones had been killed during a routine surveillance mission only the night before. Everyone had been shaken up by it. And then there was the matter of Harry Potter.
Harry sat near the back of the room, fidgeting restlessly and looking more than a little bit bored. She could hardly blame him, as she was somewhat bored herself. After the fight she had put up to get him into the meeting, however, she expected some form of gratitude.
Alastor Moody's magical eye roamed the room suspiciously, lingering for a few painstaking moments on Harry. Kingsley Shacklebolt and Mad-Eye Moody had strongly protested Harry's inclusion in this meeting, since he was still enrolled in school and therefore ineligible to be an official member of the Order. McGonagall and Lupin had been adamant that he be allowed to participate, given that many of the organization's members were interested in Harry's whereabouts and welfare. Perhaps he might even be asked to explain what exactly it was that he was doing to combat Lord Voldemort. Everyone was certainly curious about that.
What McGonagall and Lupin did not mention was that more than a few of their members wanted Harry not only to join the Order of the Phoenix, but to lead it as well. In truth, McGonagall was not sure how she felt about the matter herself. No one could ever really replace Dumbledore, after all, as she herself was discovering daily at Hogwarts. Still, Harry deserved the chance to prove himself. He'd certainly done so against Voldemort, time and again.
Or so she'd argued in front of the executive committee, at the very least. The motion had carried, as Arthur Weasley voted with Lupin and herself to allow Harry to attend this meeting. The lack of unanimity on the issue still unsettled her, however, and she hoped that Harry might do or say something to impress them during the course of the meeting. So far, he'd done little besides eye the front door longingly.
'You haven't done much more than that yourself,' Minerva reminded herself wryly. 'Give the boy time.' The only problem with giving Harry time was that she wasn't sure how much of it any of them had before Voldemort did something disastrous.
As dead silence filled the room, Minerva McGonagall realized that Sturgis Podmore had stopped speaking. As the chair of the executive committee for this meeting, she was expected to decide the next course of action. "Er…very good, Sturgis. It sounds as though significant progress is being made in reaching out to one of the most difficult and inaccessible creatures in the magical world. Speaking of which, I understand that Hagrid has a report prepared on his recent trip to the realms of the giants."
"Well," Hagrid said nervously as he stood without reaching his full height, hunching over to seem less intimidating, "i's not really much of a report. It's more like…news. Not really good news, either. So why doesn't somebody else go next, I'm sure there's somebody who has good, happy…"
"Rubeus," Lupin said as he leaned forward and looked Hagrid straight in the eye. "It's alright. We're not expecting miracles. Just tell us what you found out."
Hagrid let out a long sigh. "None o' the gurgs I talked ta wanted anything to do with the Order of the Phoenix," he declared unhappily. "They're all excited about joinin' up with You-Know-Who and his Alliance o' Magical Creatures, which I'm sure all of us know about by now." Here the half-giant shot a pointed glance at Harry.
Kingsley Shacklebolt frowned. "Is that all you discovered in your journey, Hagrid? You were gone for several months."
"Well," Hagrid hedged with a chuckle, "I did hear some rumors about an intelligent mountain troll tha's taken over a whole mess o' trolls in Rumania. Supposed to be organizin' 'em for the Death Eaters." Hagrid waved his massive right arm dismissively. "I've heard rumors about dragons hatchin' from flobberworm eggs before, too. Doesn't make it amount to nothin'."
From the back of the room, Harry Potter's eyebrows rose. His eyes grew wide. He appeared to be realizing something. "Professor McGonagall," he cried out. "Er, Headmistress," Harry corrected himself quickly.
McGonagall smiled thinly. "In a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix, Harry, you may refer to me as Minerva."
"With your permission, Headmistress," Harry went on urgently, "I'd like to investigate this rumor of an intelligent mountain troll on the Order's behalf."
Moody eyed him skeptically. "Do you really expect us to sign off on some half-baked mission halfway across the continent at a time like this, Mr. Potter? Death Eater activity is hot in Eastern Europe right now. Do you propose to fend off what could be a sizable army of dark wizards all by yourself, just to learn more about a troll?"
"No, sir," Harry answered politely. "I wasn't proposing to go alone. I was hoping that Hermione Granger would come with me." At that, the room began buzzing with chatter, as every member of the Order seemed to have something to say on the matter. Amid all the clamor, Harry's eyes found McGonagall's. "Trust me," Harry mouthed.
"Silence," McGonagall called out in her best classroom voice. "Remus," she began authoritatively, "would you be so kind as to accompany Harry on this mission?"
"I'd be glad to," Lupin replied with a small, wry smile.
"Very well, Mr. Potter," she continued, all the while ignoring Moody's grumblings of outrage, "if you feel the matter is urgent, Remus, Miss Granger and yourself may leave in the morning."
She didn't know why she had given in to him so easily on this, especially when the Order needed him here. Perhaps it was something in his eyes, something that reminded her of Dumbledore. McGonagall saw it gleaming there again and soon recognized it easily. It was hope.
The next chapter shall be called "Life Among the Mountain Trolls". Read on and enjoy!
ITL