DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fan fiction using characters, themes and settings from J. K. Rowling's trademarked 'Harry Potter' series. I do not claim ownership of anything except the plot of the story which is for entertainment only and is not a part of the series. I am not in any way profiting financially from the creation and publication of this story. Lastly I am grateful to her; if not for her, my story would not have been realised.

Dominating the Half-Blood Prince

Chapter 1

We were out of breath, both panting from the strenuous activity that I've been putting us through for the past couple of weeks, the harsh training that I've scheduled us for in preparation of the oncoming battles up ahead. I've already mastered it in the spare time that I have allocated for myself, and now sought to spread my knowledge to my pupil; Non-verbal, wand-less magic and occlumency. Two very powerful fields, with a need for an extensive reservoir of magic, and both mandatory if we were to ever succeed in the mission Dumbledore set out for us. With our bond however, the reserve of magic was no hurdle for us.

Our bond; something I still recall clearly as if it had happened yesterday and always makes smile ever so fondly at.

Murmurs, whispers of people cautioned to 'Quiet down lest you wake them up!' drifted in my ear and I could do no more than groan my approval. I felt tired, stiff and sore all over and just wanted to rest a bit more to heal aforementioned aches. Unfortunately, that did not bode well with the crowd that was making theirs paths towards the bed, more like rushing after hearing my guttural sounds. As soon as I heard them stop by the bedside, I slowly rubbed my eyes and sat up, peering at them with half hooded lids. I wondered what the commotion was about until recent events came to mind and with wide eyes, I scanned the crowd before me. Opening my mouth and in the process of formulating words, I was hastily cut off with words of reassurance.

"Relax Hermione, it's over now."

"Harry and Ron are just fine, you can go look for yourself."

My eyes met those of Fred and George. I smiled at them, thankful that they understood my need to squelch the fears, doubts forming and to appease my nerves. They smiled back in kind. They offered their hands and I placed both in theirs, allowing them to smoothly ease me down the bedside and guide me towards the beds of both of my friends.

Palms sweaty, I gripped their hands tightly, knuckles beginning to turn white from both the pressure and the nerves. The squeezed back gently and affectionately, trying to instill a sense of calm and security. Once their messy manes came into view and I saw that they were simply resting, deduced by ones rise and fall of the chest and the others snoring, all worry and nervousness dissipated. As I sat by Harry's bedside, the first thing that came to mind was-

"We made it. We actually made it.''

Though I muttered it under my breath, the occupant of the bed before me stirred and groggily woke up; he silently agreed with me wholeheartedly.

The crowd before huddled at my bed, scooted closer to both boy's beds but their uncontrollable need to make noise and impede us from relaxing awarded them a furious glare from the local healer, having just heeded them from speaking loudly for the umpteenth time and a boot out of the hospital wing. They grumbled as they parted, they were just excited to see that we were okay. The door creaked as it was closing and finally all that was heard were muffled footsteps growing further and further apart. Not that I paid much attention to it, my thoughts were whirling on what could have happened and before I even realized it, as he was getting to sit up, I flung myself at Harry and held him tightly. The news I had uttered brought about a sense of elation as well as an onslaught of tears. As Harry gently soothed me in my sobbing state, my moaning and hiccoughs piercing the silence and echoing throughout the wing, I guiltily admitted to myself that I would missed the boy-who-lived more fiercely had death befallen him, unfortunately, more so than the boy with the fiery red hair that lay unsuspectingly on the bed parallel to us.

"Hermione!"

I snapped back to reality and looked at my pupil over. He was still the same boy he was when we were 12, just as headstrong, loyal and determined to see things through until the end. At the same time though I can see a sort of desperation clawing at him, the one that started forming when Sirius died, eating him to the bones and I'm not talking about the one that has him looking as haggard as I, with sunken cheekbones and ribs poking out as of late. The toll of the war, both literally and figuratively, were starting to suffocate us.

"Hermione!" he snapped again, "I don't know what I'm doing wrong. It's not working!"

Harry has been having trouble with wand-less magic. It's not that he can't perform it but his spells are weak and he is easily distracted which loosens his hold on whatever he is conjuring. This is precisely why I am also teaching him occlumency. Occlumency not only disallows intruders from pervading the mind, what Harry needs to close his link to Voldemort, but with the clearance of the mind, he is sharpened to all forms of intrusion and maintain focus on what needs to be done. When mastered, multiple spells can be casted simultaneously, all just as strongly as if they were all cast singularly.

"You have to clear your mind, I've told you countless times. Without it, you're being obstructed from performing even the most menial of tasks." I sighed, "We'll call it a day. I want you to practice on clearing your mind before we continue this again." I walked up to him and I can see he was struggling, an internal battle of whether to lash out, defy me or obey, his bitter energy pouring out. When I got to him, I put my arms around him and embraced him, rubbing soothing and relaxing patterns on his back. "I realize that you're frustrated Harry, just as I was when I first commenced, but don't beat yourself up for it. You'll only make the barrier between you and achieving this goal stronger. You have to let it go." I whispered in his ear. "I realize this is time sensitive, but nothing will come out of it, being the way you are now." He sighed and he slumped his shoulders, and then embraced me in return, "I know you'll get it Harry, you will, you just need more faith in you." I stepped back and brushed his hair out of his face, emerald eyes peered into mine, "Take it easy for a bit, well practice occlumency together when I get back." He nodded and started walking towards the tent. I walked in the other direction and headed for the stream we encountered; taking advantage of a resource we didn't have much of a luxury for on this trip.

The clearing I had chosen for us was nice. Immensely populated with luscious greens and surrounded by trees, it reminded me of Hogwarts, its lake and its ageless beauty. How I missed it vastly and that thought brought me back to my earlier musings of our first year.

The morning after, we were free to leave the hospital wing and so we made our way to the great hall 30 minutes before breakfast was to start so that we can greet our housemates, but more importantly we left so that we had less time being bedridden at the wing. However, a couple of steps later we came to a full stop, Harry grabbed my hand and told Ron to directed himself to the great hall, he had something to talk to me about concerning a book. Though not without looking oddly at Harry, he scampered excitedly to the Great Hall, impatient to stuff his mouth to his heart's content without the impending criticism he knew he was going to get from his bushy haired friend.

As he was out of sight, Harry led me to the opposite direction and led us to the Library. As we made our way to the back, hidden from the general populace, I couldn't hold myself back any longer.

"Harry what is this about, and why can't Ron have any part of it? Are you alright?" I asked. 20 questions were on the tip of my tongue, having yet to surface; I struggled to quell the need.

"I don't know how to come about this and I hope it doesn't come out as...well it will sound a bit weird." he said all the while pacing back and forth. He looked at me and then shifted his gaze, never looking at something for more than a few seconds. He kept his nervous twitch for a while longer until I put a reassuring hand on his shoulder and made him take a seat to stop that maddening pacing.

"I swear, if I didn't stop you any sooner you would have burned a hole right through the library leading to the lower floor." I chuckled.Now that would have been impressive. If Hogwarts didn't have a secret passage, it would have then.

He looked at me tentatively, and I could see it in his eyes he wasn't too sure where to start, nor was he too keen on commencing and would prefer forgetting the whole matter altogether. However, it was also painfully obvious that this matter was very important to him.

"Harry, I-"

"Hermione, do-"

We had such perfect timing.

"What's on your mind?" I asked.

"Well, umm...what do you know about magical bonds?"

I thought about it, but nothing came up, safe for wizarding matrimonial oaths. I couldn't mask my distaste for that and it was clear to him what my train of thought came up to. He chuckled and I could see he was stifling a laugh, but I had to make sure.

"If you mean marriage, then Harry as much as I l-"

He guffawed at that. What was a nervous bundle before was now clutching his sides. I could see tears forming in the sides of his eyes, and I would join him too if marriage wasn't such a grandiose thing.

"Ha ha- hooo-" he wheezed out, "you're too much! I wasn't alluding to marriage. I can promise you that much at least. Don't you think we're too young for this conversation?" he laughed, "Unless, well, I never knew you wanted me that way, if you did then all you had to do was ask. " He winked at me though his eyes were still crinkled and twinkling.

"Well how was I to know? It's the only one I can think of!" I huffed and glared at him, he just kept on chuckling.

"Just because it's the only one you can think of doesn't signify that it's the only one there is. Besides, I thought you had enough common sense to realize that."

While it was true, I certainly didn't deem to dignify that with an answer. "While I'm happy that you seem in higher spirits, I'd appreciate it if you'd stop laughing at my expense."

He stopped at that. "Fine," but his eyes were still laughing, "Just know that I'm not letting you off the hook for that." I stuck my tongue out. Childish? Perhaps. But I didn't care.

"Hermione, I dragged you here to make you an offer."

"And this is somehow related to magical bonds I imagine?"

"Precisely. When you had asked Ron and I to look through the library for Nicholas Flammel, I went to the restricted section like you suggested. I came up on a book called 'The Practice and Art of Soul Mating' by Margaret Strauss. I didn't think much about it at the time but then when I came across familiar literature and glossed through it, I decided to peruse the restricted section again and read the book thoroughly." I sat there listening to him eagerly and maybe slightly amused. It wasn't a regular occurrence that my friend was even remotely interested in what a book had to offer. Maybe he's changed. Maybe pigs fly. "I found a section in the book mentioning the establishment of a family bond. Particularly the nucleus family. So in other words, this bond alters the type of relationship you had, and forms that of the central part of the family, for example; Father, Mother, Brother and Sister."

At this point it was obvious what he was alluding to and I couldn't help but feel excitement bubble in my chest. I thought more about Harry as an extension of my family through the end of our year. Having him voice out the same opinion just made me feel that much more convinced about him.

"Hermione it goes without saying that you're a brilliant witch and I wish I had noticed sooner. I was unjustifiably cruel to you at the beginning of the year and I will always regret it. I know intrinsically how it feels to be in the sort of position you were. However, despite all that, you became my friend and it has been the best experience I've ever had in my life." I couldn't help but smile at that. It was nice to know that I could make an impact on someone in my life who wasn't a teacher. "Hermione, I've never had someone to fall on, who believed in me and in the past month, entrust me with their lives. I want to know if you'd-"

"Yes!"

"No, wait. Hermione I need you to give this some thought. I'm happy but this isn't the sort of thing you can call back on if ever something goes wrong, this is serious."

"And so was Lord Voldemort. I stuck by you. You should know better by now what you signify to me." I chided. "I want you to be my brother, and the sooner at that, the better."

He considered it, I saw the scrutinizing look he usually made after debating something, and then he turned and offered me a wide smile. "Consider it done! Meet me at the common room at midnight. We'll hide under my cloak and do the ritual by the great lake."

"You have the instructions on you?"

"Yeah, I couldn't carry the whole book without triggering something. Besides, it would also have looked suspicious if no one checked it out of the library and it was gone. They could have accio'ed it and then we would be without ritual."

"Which means?"

"I ripped the pages ou-" I glared at him. "What?"

"Books are bonded for a reason. To stay in the bind, not so that anyone and everyone can rip out its sheets." I said, looking at him pointedly. Book usurper.

"Ah come off it! How else was I going to get its contents? I can't bloody memorize it like you can. Actually, no one in school can memorize and dictate things like you can. That's an accomplishment in itself if ever there was one."

"There was always a copying spell." I said still slightly cross but I couldn't help the smile that unfurled itself. He had his way with words that couldn't make me upset with him for more than two minutes.

"Well thank goodness we established that, but now I have the sheet and we will make do with what we have." Just then our stomachs growled in protest. It presented itself rather powerfully to remind us at the lack of content within it. We both looked at each other and couldn't help the snigger that erupted. I couldn't help but be reminded of Ron. Harry got up and offered me a hand which I accepted and propped me up. We held hands till our arrival at the great hall.

Safe to say that the bond went well, too well in fact. Harry is now my brother, however there was a hitch to it that we hadn't anticipated. The book didn't specify that there would be a power exchange, more like an equalizer. Not only are we now blood kin, we also share the same traits. The spell allows that who has more power, recreate it, and pass it onto the other. So, not only do I share Harry's half-blood status, his power and magical reservoir have also been duplicated onto me and I have also acquired the skill to speak Parseltongue. I have also had the fortune of passing onto him my near eidetic memory. There is nothing now that the other can't do. We are now essentially each other's equal.

I slipped out of the water once I was done, and with a wave of my hand over my body, I cast a silent drying spell and conjured some clothes on.

How far we've come, I thought to myself, from pointless wand waving, to mastering advanced magic seldom adults can perform, and achieving results in weeks' time, where it has taken them years to master. And, I thought darkly to myself, from being pre-teens who sought to rid this world of evil by themselves, who cared not for the aid of others, are now in a position where they have no choice to do it by themselves and are in desperate need for help from the outside. How twisted our roles are.

I left the clearing and headed back to the tent. Well, I spoke for myself. Harry still needs some perfecting.

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