**This is my first fanfic ever! I tried to proofread for errors in the storyline and for grammatical/spelling errors and whatnot, so if theres anything wrong, sorry! Also, as we all know, J.K. Rowling owns all these amazing characters (except Ariel!) and the basic plotline. **
QUICK NOTE: I didn't like that Fred, Remus, Tonks, or Snape died, so I pretended like that didn't happen. I also changed the order of the horcrux destruction, threw in some lemons and angst, and all kinds of fun, different stuff. Hope you enjoy!
I had been on the go for almost 4 weeks. 4 weeks since I wiped my parent's minds and planted the idea in their mind that they had to move to Hawaii. It still hurt to think about. I worried daily that when I was finally able to go find them and reinstate their memories, they would be furious over what I had done, how I had gone out on my own so the evil Dark Lord wouldn't try to harm them in any way, so he couldn't come look for me in the home I was sure he knew I occupied. If (or when) he or his band of terrible death eaters went to search my house, they would find no traces of me or my family. I tried to stay positive by telling myself I had done the right thing.
Before I had decided to distance myself from everyone I knew and loved, I confided in Bambino, the headmaster of my magic school, Salem Witches Institute, in Massachusetts. He seemed to know something I didn't but he never let on any information that I thought was of any particular use. For my journey, he had given me a spell book containing every known spell in the wizarding world, which contained a large section on dark magic; a deluminator, which as far as I could tell only turned off lights; and an extra wand in the event mine was stolen, broken, or otherwise damaged. The book had actually come in handy, and the extra wand was nice to have, but I felt like the deluminator was merely taking up space in my bag.
I was looking forward to taking my search up into wine country. The Napa Valley had always looked so beautiful and peaceful, and the day I apparated there, the sight took my breath away. After hiking around a seemingly deserted valley for about an hour, I settled into a slightly wooded area by a crystal clear brook. I quickly put up protective enchantments and set up camp by the water. A few hours later I was relaxing in my tent and lazily flicking through the spell book, looking for a random spell to cast. It was fairly silent other than the trickling water outside in the brook, and I was startled when I heard faint voices. I instantly panicked, even though I was sure my protective enchantments were fool proof. I grabbed my wand and peeked out the tent flap. It was virtually pitch black, and even after my eyes adjusted to the dark, I couldn't sense any movement anywhere. It was then that I realized the voices were coming from INSIDE the tent. Had I started to go mad from being alone for so long? Had no human contact caused me to conjure up voices? To test my sanity, I decided I could at least try to look for the source of the noise. I walked around the tent listening to inanimate objects and feeling like a total nutcase. When I came to where I had laid my bag earlier, I picked it up to get a sweater out because the tent was getting a bit chilly. To my astonishment, the voices were inside! I held it up to my ear to hear better.
"We need to find the other horcruxes! It's been weeks Harry!" A female's voice. Horcruxes?
I quickly opened the bag and stuck my arm down in to search around. Never had I disliked the undetectable extension charm more than that exact moment. I felt around until I felt something warm and slender. I pulled the object out. It was my deluminator, and it was glowing! Nervously I clicked the button, and an orange ball of light rose up out of the top. It hovered in the air for a minute before floating in to the center of my chest. A strange feeling washed over me; a sense of need, somewhere, by someone, for me. Somehow I knew that if I disapparated, I would end up where these voices were and they would be able to tell me what was going on. I packed up my tent in record time, threw my bag on my shoulder, and braced myself for disapparation.
I let out a nervous breath. "Here goes nothing," I muttered. The familiar squeeze-through-a-tube feeling swept over me. After a few seconds I was dropped on the ground. I stood up and dusted myself off as I examined my surroundings; I seemed to be inside someone's tent. As I turned around, I was met with three wands in my face mere inches from my nose. Two boys and one girl, all looking about my age, stood wide eyed and silent at me. I loosened my grip on my wand and dropped it to the ground. I raised both of my hands up to show I came in peace.
The girl picked up my wand. One of the boys, a tall, lanky, redhead with piercing blue eyes spoke first. "Who are you?" I opened my mouth to answer, but before I could get any words out, the girl spoke. "How did you apparate into our tent? The protective enchantments were like steel! What could I..." She trailed off, looking slightly defeated. Her voice sounded familiar. She must have been who I heard talking about horcruxes. She ran a hand through her already slightly disheveled hair. The redhead spoke again, "Well, get on with it, explain how you got here!" He seemed on edge. "I'll be more than happy to explain everything I am aware of if you would lower your wands out of my face!" I said crossly. The trio looked at me in astonishment. The boy who hadn't spoken yet lowered his wand first. "An American witch! How splendid!" he exclaimed, looking at the others. "Harry, you can't just let your guard down because she's an American!" the girl sighed, but lowered her wand. She took her hand and pushed down the wand of the redhead. I thought carefully before I began explaining.
"Well um.. I didn't expect to apparate right into a tent, I thought I'd have a few minutes to gather my thoughts before I found you". The girl opened her mouth to ask a question but I held up my hand to stop her. "Please, let me finish." The girl closed her mouth and I began again. "First off, I'm sure your protective enchantments are fine. I've been using them myself the last 4 or 5 weeks while I've been nomading around North America. I haven't had any troubles yet. I don't know your names, or how you would be connected to me, but I have a deluminator..." I trailed off for a minute while I pulled the deluminator out of my bag, "..and about 5 minutes before I got here, I heard voices. Two mumbely ones, and then one very clear female one talking about horcruxes. I don't know what a horcrux is, but I know I've been brought here for a reason. When I heard the voice and realized it was coming from this, I clicked the button and a really bright orange ball of light floated up from it, hovered in the air for a minute, and went into my chest. That's when I knew I had to apparate here. So I did." I stopped for a minute to see their reaction so far.
The redhead spoke, "That's how I got back here after I left you two. I heard Hermione's voice from the delimunator and the light went into my chest and I just knew where to go!" "All right, so you were transported here via delimunator instructions, like he did" gesturing to the red head, "but that doesn't tell us anything important, like who you are," the girl, Hermione, said. "My name is Ariel McGregor," I stated. The boy who had not spoken much covered his mouth in surprise. "But Ariel McGregor is the Girl Who Lived!" he said in utter astonishment. "Yes; and that's me." The trio all had the same expression on their faces. Each of their mouth's had formed an O. The girl regained her composure first. She began speaking, "The Girl Who Lived! Do you know who he is?" She gestured to the dark haired, green eyed boy with glasses. I shook my head. "This... is Harry Potter." I switched my gaze to the boy, who was still open mouthed in shock. Now it was my turn to be surprised. "Harry Potter?" I took a step closer to him. "The Boy Who Lived?" He nodded. The movement of his head caused his bangs to move just enough for me to notice his lightning bolt scar above his right eye. "I have the same scar," I said simply. He continued to stare. I looked back to the girl. "What are your names?" I inquired. "I'm Hermione Granger, and this is Ron Weasley," the girl replied, touching the redhead on his shoulder.
Ron broke through the polite introductions. "How do we know you really are the Girl Who Lived? Show us your scar!" he demanded. I drew my hair back over shoulder and leaned my head to the right. "It's right here," I said, pointing to the lightning bolt on the left side of my neck, just under my ear. "Well, there it is," said Ron. Hermione suddenly seemed to regain the ability to move and flung herself at me. "Umm.. thanks?" I said, confused at the sudden positive display of emotions from the girl who was sizing me up suspiciously not 10 minutes ago. The words began spilling out of her, "Oh you have no idea what we've been through! We've been hunting for horcruxes for weeks and Harry and Ron are my best friends in the WORLD but they're so daft sometimes!" The boys gave her a look. "All the professors had always talked about how there was an American witch who had also lived through an attack from you-know-who and now here you are! Please stay with us, please!" I wasn't sure how Hermione had gotten all of those words out without breathing, but I didn't question it. It would be nice to have some companions to talk to, even if I didn't know what was going on. "I'll stay, if Ron and Harry don't mind, of course," I responded. She looked at them. Ron looked over at Harry, exchanging a silent agreement that I could stay. Ron nodded. Harry stepped closer to me and reached out a hand to place on my shoulder, "Of course you can stay, we need all the help we can get." He smiled warmly at me. "Great. But can someone please tell me what a horcrux is? I'd like to know what I'm helping you do, exactly." Harry began a long explanation about the dark lord, how he split his soul into several parts, and that the items his pieces of soul occupied were horcruxes. To destroy the horcruxes is to destroy Voldemort himself. After nearly an hour of questions and answers between the three of them and me, I understood what needed to be done, and I affirmed the fact that I would stay to help.
A week went by and things seemed to be going smoothly. I was getting to know Hermione, Ron, and Harry, and I found it easy to join their group, like I had known them as long as they had known each other. Since there was now an even number, the usual night watch the three of them kept up bumped itself from each person doing individual shifts, to going out to watch in teams to keep each other company.
Another week had gone by, and I was sitting on a rock by a nearby creek. I had leaned back against a huge tree and stretched my legs out. Despite the hard surfaces I leaned on, I had become quite comfortable watching the little creek move swiftly. Ron and Hermione were having another fight about something trivial, and I had snuck out of the tent to escape the tension. I had been alone for nearly half an hour, the flowing water was the only sound I had heard in that time. A crackling of branches close by caused me to suck in a sharp breath. I whipped around with my wand raised to see Harry approaching. I immediately dropped my wand and let out a relieved sigh. "You scared me Harry," I said, sitting back down. "Not my intention, I promise", he replied, coming to sit next to me. "Ron and Hermione still going at it?" I asked. He chuckled. "Yep. Had to get out of there. They need their alone time." I nodded in agreement. We sat for a minute, watching the water flow quickly over the rocks and branches jutting up from the bottom. "I wish Ron and Hermione would just kiss already," I stated, breaking the silence. Harry seemed to chew on the thought for a moment. "It's hard to just snog someone without anything leading up to it though," Harry replied. "You can't just run up to a girl and expect her to be receptive." He had turned his body toward mine. "Well it's not like Hermione wouldn't want it. I've only been around you three for a few weeks and it's not like I haven't noticed how they are around each other. It almost hurts to watch them. Ron needs to grow a pair and man up! Just do it, you know?" I said. "Well, look at this this way," Harry started. "Imagine if someone just ran up to you and gave you a snog. You'd be surprised, right? Startled a bit?" "Well yeah, but -" Harry held up his hand, as if to silence me. I closed my mouth. "Now, pretend you're Hermione, and I'm Ron. What if I came up to you and said I had something to tell you. Say I stood very close to you-" Harry moved closer to me, putting a hand on the tree to support his weight. "And then I told you that I thought you were beautiful, that you were the most brilliant witch that I ever knew-" He leaned in even closer, "That I had wanted to be more than friends for a long time, and would it be alright if I kissed you?" Harry was whispering by now. I swallowed loudly. I tried to concentrate on the fact that this was a hypothetical situation involving other people. I was keenly aware of Harry's proximity to me, and how he wet his lips with his tongue as he waited for me to say something. I wanted badly for him to actually kiss me in that moment, and then I stopped myself. Was I developing a thing for Harry Potter? Harry was still speaking, which brought me back to what was happening in the real world. "It's all about delivery," he said simply, at regular volume. He pushed himself up off the rock using the tree. He motioned for me to get up. "They're most likely done fighting by now. Let's head back." I stood and followed him back to camp, where Hermione and Ron were not talking to each other at all.