Unofficial Portkey Archive

Disclaimer: I do not own anything of the 'Harry Potter' universe, nor do I make any claim to the lyric bits that I use to enhance the story.

A/N: I know, it's been a while, but I have some very good excuses. I've been recovering from LASIK eye surgery (Yay! Goodbye to glasses!) so my time in front of the computer has been extremely limited while my eyes heal. That, and I've had a bit of a block going on, as I've only been writing this chapter a bit at a time, trying to decide exactly how I want the characters to react to what's going on with Hermione. I'd also like to address what I wrote in the last chapter. Many people seemed to be quite distressed that I used some 'religious' verbiage in describing the exorcism ritual I had Hermione perform. I'm truly sorry if I offended anyone, it certainly wasn't intended. 'Lesson Learned…' In the future, I'll be sure to refrain from mentioning God, Holy, Heaven and Hell… oops, I guess I'll have to mention Hell, unless I have Ron spouting off, "Bloody 'You-Know-Where!'"

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Chapter 31: The Ties That Bind

I was with you, you were alone,
now I'm standing here.
Wisdom came only after you'd gone,
now I'm starting all over, with a tear in my eye.
I just never thought you'd disappear.

Time heals all, so they say, I don't know.
Sometimes nothing's clear.
Maybe someday Ill understand,
but I know for a start,
theres a place in my heart that is yours,
and it wont disappear.

Excerpt from the song, 'I Still Love You,' by the band, R.E.O. Speedwagon.

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Harry was stirred from his sleep by the rumble of distant thunder echoing over the sound of the sheeting rain that was hammering against a nearby window. He silently thanked the thunder for waking him from what he thought must have been a very bad dream, the details of which were buried deeply in his clouded mind and becoming more obscure with each passing moment. The first thing he noticed was that his scar was throbbing painfully, giving him a near blinding headache that further clouded his thoughts. The second thing that struck him was that he was very, very hungry.

He tried to remember what he was doing before he fell asleep, but he just felt so tired and drained that he didn't ponder on it for long. The bed he was laying on was comfortable, and while the room was warm, it wasn't uncomfortably so. He rolled on his side, hoping to go back to sleep, but another hunger pang hit, convincing him to leave the bed and seek out some food.

He finally opened his eyes and blinked, trying to rid them of the itchiness that he felt there. He scanned the dark room he was in, and soon realized that he was laying in the bedroom that Ron and he shared when they were staying at Grimmauld Place a few years before. He blindly reached to his left, searching for the nightstand and his glasses that he hoped were resting there. After fitting his spectacles on the bridge of his nose, he looked at the other bed and was surprised to find Ron lying there, and very surprised to find that Ron wasn't alone in the bed.

He saw that his view of Ron was partially obscured by a slight figure with very long, golden-blonde hair that seemed to shroud both of their upper bodies. He felt somewhat embarrassed for them, as the sheets had slipped from over their torsos, leaving absolutely no doubt that both Ron and the girl that was draped over him were quite naked, at least from the waist up. He immediately recognized that the girl was Luna. He briefly wondered when they had become so intimate.

Harry's stomach began rumbling loudly. He decided to leave them alone to grab a midnight snack, and made his way silently to the door. Before he shut the door behind him, he looked back in and smiled, realizing that Ron wasn't emitting his usual obnoxious snores. Maybe Luna was a positive influence on him after all.

He walked down the hall towards the stairs and noticed that the joints of his limbs were rather sore, as if he hadn't used them in a while. As he reached the second floor, he saw in the dim light, Kotone sleeping on the floor against the closed library door.

Harry heard Kotone sigh as he lifted her up from the floor, not failing to notice the dim light coming from under the library door. As soon as he had her cradled against his chest, her white hair flowed around his neck with a gentle, but firm pressure, and her tail snaked gracefully around his arm. As he carried her to the master bedroom, he noticed that she was wearing her porcelain mask over her lower face. After laying the girl on his bed, he tried to remove the mask from her, but it wouldn't budge. It didn't seem to disturb her breathing, so he decided to leave it on her.

After covering Kotone with a light sheet, he left the room while debating with himself on whether to head to his original destination to get something to eat, or to see what Hermione was doing, as it was obvious to him that she was in the library. Given the late hour, he figured that she either was researching something, or fell asleep while researching something. Either way, she needed to get to bed, just as he intended to do once his early morning raid of the coldbox was accomplished.

Harry eased the library door open and looked around. The few ever-lit candles that were set into a holder on the nearby reading desk dimly illuminated the room. Sure enough, he spotted Hermione sitting in an overstuffed chair next to the cold fireplace. She was leaning forward and had her head bowed, with her feet pulled up onto the cushion and a large tome resting open on her legs.

As he approached her, he thought she was asleep until he looked more closely. Her eyes were unmoving, fixed at some random point on the page, clearly not really reading. She didn't appear to notice him enter the room, as she was just sitting there wearing this lost expression. Her lips were slightly moving, as if whispering words that only she could hear. He looked at her worriedly for a few moments, and then cleared his throat.

Her eyes snapped up from the book in her lap. As she looked at him, he noticed a brief flash of panic in her eyes that was instantly replaced with fearful apprehension.

"Harry?" she asked in a somewhat nervous tone.

Harry just stared at her for a few seconds, wondering why she was so upset. He smiled and took a step towards her, but then froze when she cowered back into the chair and pulling her knees even closer to herself, squeezing the book protectively against her chest. His smile disappeared when he noticed the wand in Hermione's hand that was pointed directly at him.

"Harry?" she asked again in a strained, breaking voice.

Confused, Harry turned around to look behind him, thinking that she saw someone sneaking up on him or something. He turned back and looked at her, saying, "Hermione, what's wrong?"

Hearing him say her name, which was something the 'possessed' Harry hadn't done, was enough for her to know that he was back. "Harry!" she cried out in relief as she let the book slide from her arms to land noisily on the floor. She then practically launched herself from the chair and nearly tackled him to the floor, almost knocking the wind out of him. As she hugged him tightly, she said against his shoulder, "I was so worried! I almost lost you!"

Harry just smiled amusedly against the mass of hair that was covering his face and said, "Lost me? What are you on about?"

Hermione lifted her head from his shoulder to look at his face, "Don't you remember anything that's happened over the last few days?"

His amused smile faded into a thoughtful frown. Now that she mentioned it, he didn't even know what he was doing in Grimmauld Place, or even how he got there.

Seeing the confused look on his face, she continued, "Don't you remember? When Malfoy handed you the locket…"

'The locket! The locket from the room we couldn't see!' The fog in his mind cleared immediately. He remembered coming here from Hogwarts with Ron, Luna and Kotone when Hermione discovered Malfoy in the house. He remembered the room that only Malfoy could even see, and him coming from the room dangling the locket from it's chain. He had immediately recognized it as the real horcrux.

After a brief struggle to free himself from Hermione, he jumped back and said anxiously, "The locket! Where is it? Did anyone else touch it?"

Hermione looked solicitous as she dug her hand into her pocket and withdrew the now soulless locket. She let the locket dangle from the chain as she held it out to him. He reached for it, but then hesitated. Something happened when he touched the locket before… in fact, touching the locket was the last thing he could remember doing.

"It's alright now," said Hermione, noticing his hesitation, "The soul fragment is gone. I… it was destroyed. It's just an ordinary locket now, see?"

She took the locket and opened it easily, revealing a very old picture of a decidedly less-than-plain looking young woman with very thin, scraggly hair whose eyes seemed to look in different directions. Harry thought he recognized the face from his trip into the pensieve with Dumbledore. If it wasn't Merope Gaunt, then it was unmistakably a picture of someone in that family's line.

Harry looked excitedly at Hermione, "How did the…"

"How are you feeling now, Harry?" asked Hermione, expertly avoiding the question she knew he was asking. She knew that she would have to tell him eventually, but she wasn't up to relating to him her newly discovered aptitude for questionable magic, the extent of which even she didn't fully understand.

"Well, I feel okay now, I guess. When I woke up, I was in a bit of a daze, but when you mentioned Malfoy and the locket… hey, where is he anyway? If Ron and Luna are… um… sleeping, you're here, and I put Kotone into bed myself, where is the ferret?"

Hermione spent the rest of the early morning explaining to Harry what had happened from the time he touched the locket until she got to the point in the story where she used an exorcism ritual to banish the locket's soul fragment from him, leaving out many of the specific details about exactly how she could perform that ritual, and she left out the part about her actually banishing the fragment to the Netherworld. She didn't mention the foul, hateful things he said to her while under the influence of the horcrux, nor did she say what the type of magic she used to destroy the soul fragment. She just stated that it was in one of the books that Kotone had and left it at that. She didn't feel that she was lying, she was just omitting some of the specifics, unsure of how Harry would look at her if he knew the entire truth, for she was finding it difficult enough facing herself in the mirror.

Hours passed while Harry listened intently to the entire tale, and when Hermione finished, he let out a breath and said, "It's gone? Another horcrux is really gone?"

Hermione gave what she hoped looked like a genuine smile and nodded.

"That's the diary, the ring, and the locket down… we know where the wand is, if it even is a horcrux. We're pretty sure that Nagini is with Voldemort, and we have no idea where Hufflepuff's cup could be, only that it would likely be in a place that held significance in Voldemort's past… places where he discovered something about himself, or… wait a minute…"

Harry's brow furrowed in thought, seemingly trying to remember something. "Important places… somewhere that would represent an important milestone in his life, specifically his life in the magical world…"

Harry looked at Hermione and asked, "What about you? What are your most important memories about the Wizarding world?"

Hermione thought for a moment, following what Harry was getting at. Voldemort used the cave where he terrorized his fellow orphans, that was where first realized that he was 'special.' The ring was stored at the house of his ancestors, a veritable shack, but important to him because he was the last heir of the Slytherin line. If the wand in Ollivander's really belonged to Rowena Ravenclaw, and it was one of his horcruxes, then that would certainly qualify as being an important point in his life… getting his first wand, proving to himself and the world that he was truly a wizard… someone 'special.' They had no idea about the origins of the diary, save that it was given to Ginny by Lucius Malfoy, and they certainly couldn't ask the elder ferret where he got it.

As Hermione considered her own experiences, she suggested, "Well, getting my Hogwarts letter certainly caused a lot of excitement in my family…"

"I know what you mean," said Harry. His expression hardened at the memory of the flock of owls delivering hundreds of letters to Privet Drive and his uncle's manic response to them, "It caused quite the stir with my family, too, but Dumbledore personally handed Tom his letter at the orphanage, and that doesn't exist anymore. It was demolished decades ago, I looked it up in the London architectural registry. I figure the cave and locket would have been the symbol for his youth, anyway… a muggle orphanage wouldn't be a place he'd want to house something that is supposed to extol his 'specialness.' It has to be somewhere else."

"Well, the thing that impresses me every year is the trip from Hogsmeade in the carriages to Hogwarts, the first view of the distant lights in the majestic towers, framed by the nighttime autumn sky..."

"The boats," Harry whispered to himself, as if coming to some realization, "going across the lake in the first year… in the boats on the lake… the very first view of Hogwarts. Not from the carriages, but from the boats on the lake… that's the most impressive view I've ever seen. It was awe-inspiring… I was scared out of my mind, true… but I was excited, too. Seeing the lights from the towers reflected off the shimmering water…"

Hermione sighed, "You're right. The view of the castle from the boats is amazing, the most brilliant sight I've ever seen, but do you honestly think Voldemort would hide a horcrux in one of the Hogwarts boats?"

"Not in a boat… in the lake! At the bottom of the lake! He wanted Hogwarts to be a hiding place for one of his horcruxes, and if he couldn't get into the castle to place it because of Dumbledore, the lake would be the perfect place!"

Harry brushed past Hermione, hurried out of the room and headed down the hall towards the master bedroom where he had placed Kotone. Hermione curiously followed after him, listening as he explained.

"When we were at the Leaky Cauldron after the attack on the orphanage, Kotone showed me memories of different places. Supposedly, they were my memories, but I couldn't recall ever being in those places in those particular situations. In one memory, I saw myself looking at the wand in Ollivander's shop. I saw another place that looked like a park of some sort, and there was a huge fountain there." Harry had to suppress a grimace as he remembered seeing Hermione lying dead in that fountain. "When I saw it, I had the feeling that I'd seen it before somewhere… I want to see it again, to be sure. If I saw what could be a horcrux in the wand shop, maybe what I saw in that park is a clue to another."

Harry entered the bedroom and knelt down by the bed. Kotone was curled up under the sheet, moving around fitfully, as if she were having some sort of unpleasant dream. Harry gently brushed away a patch of her white hair that was partially covering her face. The hair seemed to gently wrap around his fingers as he moved it aside, and she seemed to quiet at his touch. Her pale face, what he could see of it above the mask, seemed unusually taut and drawn, and even through the sheet, he could see that her slight frame was even thinner than was usual for her. He didn't notice when he carried her in, but now that he thought about it, she seemed much lighter than when he tried to carry her to Hogwarts when she was hurt.

He hated to wake the girl, but he was hoping that she had the key that he needed to find the missing last horcrux. In his zeal to discover its' hiding place, he forgot that she was still just a little girl, and looking at her sleeping, he discovered that he didn't have the heart to wake her. As he looked down at Kotone, he sighed and then whispered to Hermione, "I guess it'll keep until she wakes."

As Harry led Hermione out of the bedroom, neither one of them saw the small smile that appeared on the painted lips of Kotone's mask.

Once they were away from the door, Harry's stomach let out a loud, complaining growl, reminding him of exactly how hungry he was. Even with the pouring rain outside, they could see the sky beginning to lighten. He started towards the stairs, saying, "I think Ron and Luna will be up soon. Let's head to the kitchen, I'll make us all some breakfast and you can tell me all about what's in those books."

Harry didn't fail to notice the fleeting look of panic that crossed Hermione's face when he mentioned the books. She didn't lift her gaze from the carpet runner, she just nodded and followed him, looking as though she were about to be ill. He wondered why she was so skittish, but figured that she was still out of sorts from casting the Fidelis, dealing with the Death Eater attack and the run-in with Snape and Narcissa Malfoy, not to mention having to cope with him and his encounter with the horcrux. He knew she had a lot on her plate recently, Merlin knows they all did, but even given that, he felt that something wasn't quite right… something had changed.

Harry frowned as he descended the stairs to the first floor, although he was careful not to let Hermione see it. He could hear her hesitant footsteps behind him as he crossed the now portrait-less entrance hall on the way to the kitchen. He made a mental note to ask about that later. He knew that she was keeping something from him, but he had no idea what it could be.

The idea that she felt it was something to protect him from, or keep him ignorant of, was starting to grate on his nerves. He had assumed that the notion of them keeping things from each other was a thing of the past. Given the disastrous outcome of the previous school year, it was more important than ever to trust each other implicitly. After all, if he couldn't rely on her and Ron, then who could he rely on? They needed each other, now more than ever. They were another step closer to their goal, and he thought it a shame for things to fall apart at this point in the game.

By the time he finished filling the last plate, he was thoroughly annoyed with Hermione's dour mood. He placed a plate in front of her and then sat down with his own. As he ate, he kept an eye on her as she morosely guided a sausage around the pile of scrambled eggs on her plate.

He had just about had enough of her 'moodiness,' "Hermione, what in Merlin's name are you so upset about? You're acting as if you didn't want me to wake up or something. Is it because I interrupted your studying?"

Hermione didn't look up from her plate as she replied, "No, of course not… it's… it's…"

"It's because she's embarrassed about being a Necromancer," came a chilly voice from the doorway to the hall.

Even before Harry turned around, he knew the voice belonged to Luna, but it shocked him to hear none of the usual etherealness… her words were laced with unbridled venom that came across clearly as she spoke. When he did look at the doorway, he saw Luna, wearing Ron's undershirt that, not surprisingly, reached all the way down to her knees. He saw the small blonde girl being roughly pulled back away from the doorway by Ron, who had a mortified look on his face, presumably dismayed at what Luna had just said.

Harry heard Ron scolding Luna in a whispered hiss. He couldn't hear what he was saying, but he seemed very upset with her. Harry turned back to Hermione, who was still silently examining the food on her plate, and asked, "What does she mean about you being a Necromancer?"

This was what Hermione wanted to avoid, even though she knew it was an impossibility to keep what she was and what she had done from Harry. In a small, shaky voice she answered, "Luna meant what she said. I'm… I'm a Necromancer… or more accurately, Necromancy is the circle of magic in which I'm most proficient. That's how I was able to expel the soul fragment from you."

Again, she avoided saying exactly what happened to the soul fragment.

Hermione waited for Harry to say something as she stared at her plate, being afraid to look up to meet the glare that was probably on his face. As the seconds passed, she became increasingly sure that his silence meant that he was ashamed of her… probably mortified at what she was. When she finally couldn't stand the silence anymore, she chanced a quick glance at his face, and found that the expression he was wearing wasn't at all what she expected. He didn't look angry or afraid, or even disappointed. He looked as if he had no idea what she was talking about.

Without lifting her gaze from her plate, she said with an uncharacteristic whine in her voice, "Harry… I'm a Necromancer! At least, that's what Kotone's book describes me as. Proficient in the darkest sphere of magic! I supposedly can control souls and speak with the dead… I can curse someone, and I don't just mean throwing a damaging spell… I mean that I can actually, permanently… literally… put a curse on someone's life! It's Death magic, Harry! Even the unforgivables are Necromantic in nature, so chances are I'd be particularly adept at casting those! What on Earth are you laughing about!"

Sure enough, Harry was trying unsuccessfully to stifle a chuckle. Is that what she was so upset about? He wasn't entirely sure why having an aptitude for Necromancy was such a bad thing. He was certain that by the way she was acting that it was something much direr than that.

"Hermione, there isn't a class that we've had that you haven't been adept at… not counting Divination and flying, but even Dumbledore didn't hold much stock in Divination, and I truly believe that your problem with flying is a slight lack of confidence. Why wouldn't you excel at Necromancy? I would've thought you'd be excited about learning a new branch of magic!"

Harry saw the appalled look on Hermione's face as she glanced up from her plate for the first time, looking at him as if he had just called her a Death Eater. He had always thought that they might have to learn more about 'dark' magic to make it through the final battle with Voldemort, fighting fire with fire, so to speak, or at least to know what they were up against. Although it was frightening at the time, the fake Moody had a valid point by showing them the Unforgivables back in fourth year. So if she had a natural propensity for the dark arts, then that could only help them in the long run. After all, Hermione would be the last person he would ever expect to go 'dark,' given her devout concern about the treatment of house-elves and other magical creatures. He knew that being 'dark' just wasn't in her nature, especially seeing how this particular revelation was causing her so much distress. Knowing about Dark magic and being 'Dark' are two entirely different things. Why couldn't she see that fact for herself?

Harry, however, did notice the way that Luna proclaimed what Hermione was. With a brief glance back at the doorway, he asked her, "Why is Luna so upset with you? Don't tell me she's angry about your being a Necromancer."

"Harry!" scolded Hermione in a whisper as she worriedly glanced at the doorway, "Luna's mother died because she was experimenting with Necromancy! I can't blame her for being upset with what I am!"

"And what exactly are you, Hermione?" asked Harry with a definite edge to his voice, "A big, scary, evil Necromancer? Does this mean you're going to run off and join up with Voldemort?"

Hermione's eyes widened in surprise as she squeaked out, "Of course not! How could you even suggest…" she suddenly stopped and narrowed her eyes at him, "Oh, stop it, Harry. I know what you're trying to do. I just can't help but dwell on my preconceived notions on Necromancy. All I've ever heard about it concerned dark wizards. I know I'm not going to wake up tomorrow and start plotting to take over the world with my hordes of undead soldiers, but I can't help but to worry that this will… change me somehow."

Harry wore an unreadable expression as he said, "Believe it or not, I know how you feel. Do you remember back in second year when everyone thought I was some dark wizard because I'm a parselmouth?" Harry's expression remained neutral as he continued, "Listen, you're incredibly bright, focused, and you have a tendency to be a bit straight-laced at times, but also know that sometimes rules need to be bent for the greater good. You're level-headed, have a healthy respect for authority, and can be a bit… um… intense… now and again… whether or not the situation calls for it."

At this, Hermione opened her mouth to defend herself, but paused when Harry raised his hand in a placating manner and continued, "You're also the most caring, compassionate and kind-hearted soul I've ever had the fortune to meet. The day you seriously entertain thoughts of becoming the next 'Dark Lady' will be the day I'll eat my Firebolt! You just don't have that ability."

Again, Hermione opened her mouth, but after a moment, all that came out was a resigned sigh as a small smile of relief briefly appeared on her lips. She was obviously afraid of what Harry's reaction would be to her magical proclivity, but seeing his understanding attitude did wonders for her outlook. She figured that Harry might not know exactly what was so wrong about Necromancy, but hearing him downplay that fact gave her hope that she wouldn't involuntarily change.

As the fleeting smile that appeared on Hermione's face faded, she returned her gaze to her plate and said, "I saw it. The bit of Voldemort's soul that was transferred to you when you were a baby. I was able to expel the fragment from the horcrux, but the other one… it's been with you for so long, it… it seemed rooted to you, somehow… it's still there, inside of you."

Harry's face fell as he replied, "You can see it?"

"It's a certain state of mind I can put myself into while using Soul Magic, sort of like how Kotone grabs your focus while she's using legillimency."

"Is there anything that you can do about it?"

"I can try… I mean I think I can, but…" Hermione hesitated before she continued, "but I don't know if you'd want me to try just yet."

Harry looked incredulously at her as he said, "Why would you think I'd want to keep a bit of Voldemort inside of me?"

"Well, I think you may have need of it, at least until you're ready to face him. Think about it… I know that the soul bit is enabling the 'connection' between you and Voldemort, and I believe that it's the reason he could 'possess' you back at the Ministry, but he doesn't seem to want to use that lately. To him, it's a double edged sword… true, he can force thoughts on you, but you can also read his thoughts when his guard is down, but that's not really the reason you might want to keep it for a while longer."

Again, Hermione paused, apparently debating whether or not to share what she was thinking, but soon realized that she couldn't back away at that point. She gave him an apologetic look as she continued, "I believe that the fragment is what makes you a Parselmouth. We still have Nagini to deal with, but if you're really sure you don't want the connection, and want to risk losing the Parseltongue, then you know that I'll certainly try. I just wanted to make sure you knew what it may take from you."

Harry remained silent as he thought about what she had just told him. He looked back up to Hermione and saw her pushing the food around her plate once again.

"There's something else, isn't there."

Hermione briefly glanced at him and gave a quick nod. Several moments passed in silence before she lifted her head and spoke, "You know how that elixir Ginny used broke that connection we had? The time limit is up, so it can't do any more damage to us than it's already done. I've had the chance to study the elixir's formula, and I think I've found out exactly what it's done to each of us. It explains why Ginny ended up in the infirmary, and how it's been affecting you and me."

Hermione looked extremely uncomfortable as she tried to explain, "I need to ask you a question, and I need you to be honest." She waited for Harry to nod before she asked, "When was the last time you've had any sexual thoughts?"

Whatever question Harry had expected to hear, that definitely wasn't it. He saw the serious, if somewhat embarrassed, look she was giving him and knew that she wasn't joking in the least. After a few moments of thought, the only instance he could think of happened just in the past week.

With a slight flush growing on his cheeks, he admitted, "Back at Privet Drive… when I saw you in… you know…"

Hermione briefly averted her eyes as her own cheeks took on a pinkish hue, but she continued without hesitation, "Alright, do you agree that anyone would have had sexual thoughts in that situation?"

"Of course, unless they were poofters," he answered honestly.

"When was the last time before that?"

At this question, Harry took pause. He spent a long minute thinking, but couldn't come up with one instance in recent memory that he had felt randy.

Hermione took his silence as an answer, and then asked him a question he'd never have expected from his best female friend, "When was the last time that you've masturbated?"

Harry's eyes widened and his jaw slackened, so much so that he resembled a garden gnome who had just been 'spun an' chucked' over a garden hedge. His blush deepened, as did hers, but the realization had hit him nonetheless.

With a hint of incredulity, he answered, "Ages… over a year, at least… maybe two."

"Harry, you'll be seventeen in a few days. Would you say that the lack of masturbatory habits is 'normal' behavior for a pubescent teenager?"

Speechless with embarrassment, he just shook his head.

"That brings us back to the elixir. It's original function is two-fold. First, to repress the 'good' memories while amplifying 'bad' memories between lovers, and second, to suppress sexual urges in a pair of suitors, making it impossible to have a physical attraction, much less a relationship, with the other person in the formula. In essence, it isolates and compresses the normal hormonal urges in a pair of lovers and stores them until the ritual is activated. Now, partly because you're not a pureblood, and partly because there's no familial connection between Ginny and yourself, the sexual urges were indeed concentrated and suppressed, just as they were supposed to be, but when the trigger for the elixir occurred, namely, the kiss we shared, all of the suppressed sexual energy that had built up inside of us were transferred to Ginny."

Harry said nothing as he listened. Seeing that he seemed to understand what she was saying, Hermione continued the explanation, "Now, if she were your biological mother, the eroticism of the emotions that were transferred would have been converted into familial affection and shared between the both of you, strengthening the parent-child bond. With that strong of a bond, the child would do anything that the parent wished, including breaking off the relationship with the 'unclean' girlfriend. I suspect that those erotic emotions have been 'leaking' into Ginny since the second time she exposed us to the elixir, and when we kissed, the flood of hormonal sexual energy must have overwhelmed her."

Having gotten over his initial embarrassment, Harry asked, "So, what can be done about all of this? I mean, is there any way to get back what we had?"

Both Harry and Hermione seemed to momentarily lose focus as they each thought back upon how they felt towards each other… before the insidious elixir interfered with their lives.

Hermione was the first to break out of her thoughts as she answered, "I was getting to that. There is a way for us to repair the soul bond we shared, but that can only be done once the forced bond with Ginny is broken."

"Alright, so how are we going to break that bond?"

"We can't," said Hermione sadly, "Ginny is the only one who can break that bond. If she refuses, we'll never get back what we… almost had."

At that point, Ron reappeared in the doorway, sans Luna, looking rather sheepish as he approached the table and said, "Hey, how are you feeling today? You gave us a right scare there for a while."

"I'm doing alright… just getting a little tired of spending so much time on my back and oblivious to the world, you know?" Harry said with a sigh, "How about you? Hermione told me about what happened to you."

Ron's hand absently went for his stomach as he answered, "One of the blighters hit the door in front of me with a Reducto, sent a mess of wood into my gut, but I'm doing much better now, but I think I'm going to have a bit of a scar on my belly."

Ron briefly glanced over his shoulder towards the receiving hall, and then asked Harry, "Say, could you open the Floo for us? Luna needs to get home to check in with her father, and I might as well head out with… er… to pick up some more groceries… we're running a bit low."

Hermione briefly explained to Harry how the Floo at Grimmauld was keyed to only him, since it was reset when the ownership transferred, and told him how to set the Floo to allow who he wanted to be able to travel. After she finished, Harry stood and gave a slight smile as he noticed her pick up her fork and began shoveling food into her mouth.

He followed Ron to the study on the second floor where Luna was waiting with an oddly subdued look about her. Once Harry had adjusted the permissions on the Floo connection, he watched as Ron followed Luna into the crackling green Floo fire and disappeared.

He turned towards the door, intending to return to the kitchen to finish his now-cold breakfast when he saw Kotone standing in the doorway, leaning sleepily against the jamb. He then noticed that the painted red lips on her ceramic half-mask displayed a distressed frown. He was about to ask her what was wrong when he was surprised by the sound of her soft, delicate voice through the mask."

"Brother Lion, I do not feel very well…"

Before Harry could move, Kotone slid down the jamb, her tiny frame collapsing onto the floor in a heap.