Xenith

A/N: Oh yes, I'd like to dedicate this chapter to Kimmy, she's been one of my best reviewers from the very beginning and I'm sorry I couldn't go snowboarding!

Chapter One

Harry rolled over, his toned arms hanging over the side of his bed as he slept.

Terence watched him as he slept from the other side of the room, perched on his headboard.

Harry stretched his head back, exposing the exquisite lines of his long neck to the world.

/It would be so easy/ Terence thought to himself, running his fingers over his own neck. /So very easy./ Terence reached to his thigh, slipping the dagger from its sheath in one silent, effortless motion. He ran his finger down the cool steal, spotless and stunning in its terrifying perfection. He flicked his wrist, sending the weapon flying towards the sleeping boy with a next to silent hiss as it moved through the air.

The dagger buried itself deep in the soft bedding beside Harry's flawless neck.

Harry woke with a start, instantly awake, wand appearing in his hand, glasses perched on his lightly freckled nose.

"Good," Terence said. "You're awake. Get dressed, it's the first day of school."

---

Ginny was weeping.

She couldn't help it. She couldn't go back. There was no Ron and no Fred. Her brothers were gone, probably dead. And she had no-one . . . nothing.

Except for Harry.

There was always Harry. Always would be Harry. And he wanted to be with her. He'd said as much when they had parted at the conclusion of the previous year. Hadn't he?

"Ginny?" She heard her name being called from somewhere to her right. She looked. She was on the train. She couldn't remember having gotten onto the Hogwarts Express. Did she say goodbye to her mum and dad? And George, what about him?

"Ginny?" Hermione was calling her, moving through the fog of her brain, closer and closer to the forefront of her mind. "Gin, come and sit with Colin and I." Ginny didn't move. "Come-on." She felt Hermione take her hand and lead her down the narrow corridor towards their compartment.

They were in the compartment now, the door thumping closed behind them.

"Hullo, Gin," Colin said from his seat, an emotionless smile creasing his mouth for a moment before it dropped back to complete his blank stare.

"So, how was your summer?" Hermione addressed her.

Ginny shrugged. Her summer had been terrible. She hadn't had any contact with any of her friends from school, only the witches and wizards of the Order who kept dropping in the middle of the night to speak with her parents.

"Hard?" Hermione asked.

"Yes," Ginny nodded. "Hard."

"How's George?"

"He's working," Ginny answered. George had spent the majority of the summer locked in his bedroom before he disappeared to Dumbledore with Lee Jordan for a month.

"Yeah."

The rest of the trip was passed in silence.

---

Hermione stepped out of the black carriage and climbed the ancient granite stairs into Hogwarts.

She flowed with the rest of the Hogwarts student body into the Great Hall. She found her eyes scanning the heads of every student in the Hall, searching desperately for Harry.

He wasn't there. Of course he wasn't there.

Hermione took a seat near Ginny and Colin, leaving ample room on either side of her, for Harry and Ron.

/No./ She thought, looking up to the head table. /Not Ron. Only Harry./

"Hullo, Seamus, how was your---" Hermione started, but stopped as silence cut through the crowd of students.

The large double doors at the far end of the Hall hissed open, letting Terence Higgs and, none other than, Harry Potter sweep inside with an impressive stride, their cloaks flowing behind them.

Harry looked self conscience as he followed in Terence's grand wake. He caught sight of Hermione and Ginny as they moved through the hall. He could feel his heart lighten ever so slightly as his eyes fell upon the ginger head of Ginny Weasley. Harry watched as Ginny's gaze rose, her large chocolate eyes catching his.

He slid into the seat beside her, her hand immediacy seeking out his beneath the tabletop. She squeezed his hand tightly. Harry squeezed back, a huge part of him extremely relieved to have her hand back in his. At that moment Harry wanted nothing more than to have her lips against his and to hold her in his arms and never let go.

"Look, Harry," Ginny said softly, nodding towards the head table.

Harry's eyes moved off of Ginny to the front of the hall in time to see Terence take up the empty seat beside Professor Snape. "Figg's gone," Ginny added.

Professor McGonagall entered through a side door and moved to the center of the hall carrying a rickety three-legged stool and the ancient Hogwarts Sorting Hat, twenty or so new students in her wake.

"Even less than last year . . ." Hermione trailed off softly. Fewer and fewer new students were showing up every year, their parents thinking it was safer to keep their children at home with them rather than send them to Dumbledore's cursed school.

"Who are those two in the back?" Ginny asked with the slightest of nods.

"When I call your name," McGonagall announced to the shaking first years and the two straight-backed sixteen year-olds. "Step forward and take a seat. The hat shall announce where you will be spending the remainder of your time here. When you have been assigned to a house you are to go and join your classmates." There were nods from the assembled students. "Beal, Alan," the first year made his way to the Sorting Hat.

"Hufflepuff!"

---

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