Foreword: I wasn't terribly impressed by last chapter. In fact, I sorta hated it… I wasn't pleased with it at all. Everything seemed too rushed, which is not what I like to do. I'm awfully sorry about that, everyone who actually reads the foreword.
Disclaimer: No… I don't own the rights to Harry Potter, or any of the characters, settings, spells, or other magical things. The only thing I happen to own is an appetite for writing.
"Licorice?" Dumbledore said, extending a hand towards the two students. After a moment, he changed his mind, and held out his other hand. "Or perhaps you would fancy a lemon drop, instead."
"I'm sorry, Professor, but I'm… not supposed to eat candy. My mum and dad said it's horrid for the teeth." Hermione blushed six shades of red at the mention of her parents, forgetting that the Headmaster was not an elitist man.
"Ah yes! Your parents are what the muggles call 'dentists' are they not?" Dumbledore clapped his hands together enthusiastically, and leaned in towards the pupils in front of his desk.
The girl shifted in her seat, and uncomfortably said, "Er… yes, but Professor-"
"Ah! Yes, I quite see your point, Miss Granger. I'll get down to the point of just why I asked for you two to be here." Quickly shifting to complete business, Dumbledore popped the lemon drop into his mouth, and said, "As I'm sure both of you know, the front page of the Daily Prophet was… quite a sordid story-"
"P-Professor, we can explain! Honest!" Harry said with a start, stuck in a state of disbelief, as he had expected total support from the Headmaster, rather than a reprimand over a falsified story.
"You did not allow me to finish, Harry… You can't honestly think that such a thing would go unnoticed in this school, do you? There are portraits all over… and all have means to report to me, my dear boy. Besides… I trust that two of my favorite pupils wouldn't do something so rash, and irresponsible." He paused momentarily and then amended his statement and cast a glance towards Hermione with a mirthful grin tucked behind his beard, "Well… at least one of you wouldn't do something so rash and irresponsible."
"H-Hey…" It had taken Harry a moment to figure out what Dumbledore had meant, after observing that both Hermione and the Headmaster were fighting back laughter as hard as they could, albeit failing quite miserably.
Hermione reached over across the gap between their chairs, and gently placed her hand on his knee, patting it. "He was just joking, Harry… Don't get all worked up over it."
"Uh, but!" He protested, tensing noticeably, before letting out a sigh, "Oh-kay." He visibly relaxed, slouching in the thickly padded chairs Dumbledore provided the two with.
Hermione didn't remove her hand, but simply left it where it was, though Dumbledore couldn't be sure if she had simply forgotten about it, or if he should read into it at all. Instead, he filed the information in the back of his head, and pressed forward with the reason he had brought the pair into his office in the first place. "Such gossip is intolerable, and I'm quite sure that the both of you do not appreciate her interference into your personal lives."
"Let's just say she had best avoid any dark alleyways…" Hermione growled, distain flashing in her brown eyes. She finally removed her hand from Harry, in order to fold her arms angrily.
Dumbledore's eyes flashed with amusement behind his silver framed glasses. "Then I'm sure you don't object with my decision to ban her from Hogwarts' grounds, effective immediately."
Breathing out a massive sigh of relief, Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, gratefully said, "Professor, you have no idea how much this takes off of my shoulders… That's one huge distraction gone… Now I just have to deal with the whole surviving thing…"
"You'll be fine, Harry… You always are. Give yourself a little bit of credit now and again." Hermione smiled as encouragingly as possible, hoping to lift him out of the usual slump he entered whenever the Triwizard Tournament was mentioned.
"Before an old man forgets, I would like to say that Dobby was quite thankful that you remembered him, and also sends his salutations to 'Harry Potter and his kindly friend Miss Granger'." Eyes twinkling, the old man with a crooked nose smiled at his quirky visit to the kitchens, "It is a good thing to see him enjoying his freedom so fully."
"That's excellent news!" Hermione squealed, sweeping her hair behind her.
Harry also smiled brightly for a time, but eventually, the look tapered off, and he asked, "Professor… You're… not going to punish me for not appearing at the Yule Ball?"
"Harry, my boy, I believe that you were tending to much more important things at the time," Dumbledore glanced around his desk for a moment, distracted as he looked for another lemon drop. After extracting one from the jar of candy, he popped it into his mouth and muttered, "Awfully addicting buggers…" He looked back at Harry and said, "You seemed to be in no condition to go, from what Minerva told me. And Miss Granger's presence, while very much yearned for, was not mandatory… If I'm not mistaken, you managed to keep quite the eye on Harry."
The powerful, yet soft-spoken wizard, winked at Hermione, who immediately stared into her lap, to hide her encroaching blush.
"Friendship is such a beautiful thing… It is far better to cooperate, and to get along, rather than spend time arguing… Something I admit that the two of you have managed to master over the years." He paused and looked pointedly from Harry to Hermione, switching his gaze every few seconds. "However, I do believe that there is a certain person among you who is still having trouble grasping that crucial concept."
The two nodded, understanding that he meant Ron, and waited for Professor Dumbledore to dismiss them.
"Are you sure you wouldn't enjoy a lemon drop?"
"Erm… Yes, perhaps I will have one, after all…" Hermione slowly reached forward and plucked the marble sized, yellow candy from Dumbledore's outstretched hand. "I-I can always brush my teeth again later," she added hastily, as if trying to appease the ideals of her parents.
"Ah, very good, Miss Granger! It's good to be hygienic, but sometimes it's perfectly acceptable to indulge." Dumbledore flashed the two an amiable smile and gestured with his hands, "Feel free to stop in any time you'd like. You may go now."
Hermione glanced sideways at Harry, and leaned towards him, whispering, "Harry… Tell him about your dream… Now is the perfect opportunity, Harry."
"I had forgotten about that… Thanks, Hermione." Harry cleared his throat, and began to speak, but saw, from his peripheral vision, his friend stand up from her chair and begin to leave. "Profes- Er… Hermione? Where are you going?"
"Oh, I figured you wouldn't want me here whilst you discussed this with Professor Dumbledore." She said it as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Um… Well, do you think you could, you know…?" Harry motioned towards her seat with his shoulder, and gestured with his head.
Dumbledore folded his hands in front of him and sagely said, "I believe Harry wishes for you to stay, Miss Granger, as he so succinctly and clearly put it."
The brunette shrugged and sat back down, placing the lemon drop she had received from Dumbledore into her mouth. As she waited quietly, she worked the hard candy around her tongue, savoring the tart sweetness of the lemon sphere.
"Well, Professor, last night, I er… sort of had a dream…"
"Sort of?" Dumbledore said, listening intently, clearly in Red Alert mode.
"That's the strange thing, Professor. It wasn't exactly like a dream. This felt too…" Struggling for words, Harry thought of what to say for a moment, before grimly continuing with the story, "too real. It was like I was actually experiencing it."
"What, may I ask, did these visions portray?" Dumbledore had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, and gravely said, "Did they affect you in any way?"
Harry nodded, and stammered, but couldn't manage to get a response out. The magnitude of what he experienced was overwhelming. How could he be expected to summarize it into a few sentences in a few seconds? That was almost unfair…
Fed up with Harry's hesitance, Hermione answered instead, "His scar, Professor… Harry said that his scar was hurting very badly, like fire on his skin."
"I-It felt like… Voldemort was happy. He was… He was happy about something." His voice was dangerously faint, as he paled at the memory of the nightmare. "It was sickening…"
Hermione moved towards, him and knelt next to his chair, placing a loose hug around him, gently rubbing his back, "It's all right, Harry… Everything's okay. You're safe here, remember?"
"Y-Yeah… Thanks, Hermione." Harry mentally chastised himself for allowing himself to show such weakness over such a trivial thing as a dream. 'She must think I'm completely incapable of doing anything, at this point.
"This is most disturbing." Dumbledore's face was set like stone, carved into a stern, grave bust of an elderly man. "Harry, it is with the utmost of urgency that I implore you to always inform me of any such dreams that you have. It is times like these, in your darkest hours, when friends become the bastions of hope and fortitude, as Miss Granger has."
Hermione waited until Harry had calmed down, before letting go of him. As a friend, it was her job to protect Harry, the person. Harry, the Boy-Who-Lived needed no such protecting, as he was quite skilled with magic, but just Harry, the fourteen year old boy, who had lost his parents, who had no friends growing up, who had to deal with being thrust into fame, was the person that Hermione cared deeply for.
Harry nodded, and said, "I will, Professor… but don't hold it against me if I hope I never experience another one of those nightmares again."
"It would be better for you if you didn't, Harry… I also hope that you are never subject to such a thing again…" The bespectacled old man's face softened, with a smile from under his beard, "Just as I, foolishly, hoped that you would manage to stay out of trouble this year."
"Well, you know me… I have a nose for all sorts of trouble… just like dad did…" Harry smiled proudly as he thought of James Potter, his personal hero. Though Harry was thoroughly sad that he didn't have the opportunity to know his parents, he also knew that his father would not have wanted Harry to wallow over it. And so, he had resolved, many years ago, to remember his parents with pride.
"Yes… Yes, James had quite the knack…" Wistful in appearance, Dumbledore nodded lightly. Snapped out of his reveries by the chime of a clock, the renowned wizard said, "Ah! Look at the time… It would be best for the two of you to take your lunches now. I'll be issuing a speech about your current… predicament."
Hermione stared into her lap, and slowly said, "Er… Professor?"
"Yes, Miss Granger?"
"Would it be quite all right if I had… just one more lemon drop?"
Smiling, the old man plucked a lemon drop from his candy jar, and said, "You could very well spoil your lunch at this rate." Dumbledore extended a palm and glanced around for a moment, "However, I'm sure that just one more would tide you over for the walk to the Great Hall."
"Thank you, Professor!" Elated, Hermione received the lemon drop, and happily let it loll on her tongue.
Harry could only smile. He never would have guessed that Hermione would take such a liking to the bittersweet taste of a lemon drop…
But then again, Hermione was full of surprises.
Author's Notes: I tried my best with this chapter, as I always do. In retrospect, I hope that I'll be more satisfied with my work from here on out. Also, let it be noted that I like Dumbledore a lot. I don't like to portray him as a manipulative jerk, so I'll be keeping him in a good light, most likely.