Harry Potter & the Price of Mercy

by: NecessaryEvil

Chapter One: Yadda yadda yadda.

Disclaimer: Cummon, you've all read the books, you know they aint mine.

A/N: I was previously know as Alec6427 and known for writing Carpe Diem: Second Year Revision. I am currently without password for that account due to a series of unfortunate events that prevent the retrieved password from reaching the email address its attached to. So for now I am halting Carpe Diem and working on this here till I can get back into there. Capiche?

The ride from the train station to Privet drive was spent in silence, as Harry's relatives the Dursleys were still left in fear after their last experience with Harry almost a year before. Harry was content with this as it gave him time to think about everything that had happened to him over the last year, to sort it out and store it in the back of his mind for further reflection to be done later in the summer.

As they pulled up to Number 4 Privet drive Harry watched his Uncle Vernon visibly working up the nerve to do what he had done so easily just a few short years before, give Harry a harsh command, "Never invite your wizarding friends to pick you up again, just you go to them, fly for all I care. Just keep them away from us," Harry grinned widely and nodded once and walked up to his room.

***

Harry's first few days back at Privet Drive were dull as a post, his relatives were scared shitless of him so he didn't have to do any chores and he assumed his friends were still settling in back home and that's why he hadn't received any owls yet. He spent most of his time looking through old Defense Against the Dark Arts school books to see if he had missed or forgotten any useful spells.

On the last day of the first week of the Summer Break, Harry finally heard the tell-tale rap on his window that told him that he was receiving a letter. He opened the window and a sleek black owl about the size of Pigwidgeon fluttered in gracefully and carefully leaned the letter against a book on his desk, clipped the string with his beak and flew out the window silently.

Harry looked at the envelope in confusion; he didn't recognize the owl, the envelope, or the handwriting on the front saying: Harry Potter.

Harry opened the envelope and read:

Harry Potter,

I know that you don't know me very well, and I suppose your experiences with me have been…..uncomfortable to say the least, but I beg of you, please tell me what happened that night, what happened to my friend Cedric in that Third Task. You are the only one who can tell me what really happened.

I beg of you,

-Cho Chang of Ravenclaw

Harry couldn't help but smile at the turn around that the letter he held in his hand showed him, not even half a year earlier he had been uncomfortably asking Cho to the Yule Ball and now she was the one that was uncomfortable asking him something, but as he remembered what she had asked Harry sighed as his mood sunk lower than Dudley's old clothes hung. Yet another retelling of the story to give, he hoped very much that this was the last time, because this time he had to go a bit further back to explain the circumstances to satisfaction.

Harry took his time searching through his memory to two events which he was about to relay to a total stranger, one that had happened less than a month before in a spooky graveyard, when Wormtail had killed Cedric and Harry had battled Voldemort and one that had occurred about a year before that in the Shrieking Shack, when he had found out that Sirius Black was innocent and Peter Pettigrew who was thought to be dead was the real killer of his parents.

*****

After the initial letter in which Harry had related the two events without any alterations, he and Cho began exchanging letters on a regular basis. Him telling her about some of his adventures, his life with the Dursleys, and sometimes his dreams, her telling him about her parents, her friends, and about this summer training program her mother was going to drag her off to at the end of the month.

Three days away from said end of the month Hedwig came back from her trip to Cho with two letters, Harry pocketed the letter that was obviously from Cho and opened the other. Harry smiled as he saw that it was signed Snuffles, but then frowned in confusion when he read the rest:

Harry,

Thought you could use some training.

-Snuffles

Harry read and reread the letter a few times, but then looked at the clock and saw it was near midnight and began to put the letter down, just as it was about to leave his hand the clock changed to say 12:00 and Harry felt a familiar tug behind his naval and groaned as he was pulled into the letter. 'Damn portkeys' he thought.

***