Chapter IX
December brought a poignant chill that pervaded Harry. His relationship with Fleur had thawed from its brief awkwardness but Harry found himself unsatisfied with just returning to normalcy. He watched Fleur during the course of the day, sometimes aware of himself staring and sometimes not. He watched when she was eating meals up at the staff table, when she was demonstrating the spells to enraptured students at the Dueling Club, and when she was learning the spells from Dumbledore's notebooks that Harry was teaching her.
Fleur's brow would furrow and her eyes tighten whenever she was having difficulties with a spell. It was an uncharacteristically cute expression that Harry had never seen before. In fact, he had never seen Fleur struggle with anything before. Dumbledore's spells were abstruse enough to give even her pause.
The time that Harry spent with her was bittersweet; there was nothing that he looked forward to more but every moment he spent in her presence was a reminder of his feelings which, if he wasn't careful, would begin to grow to a frightening climax and threaten to make him do something utterly foolhardy.
He knew that he was acting stilted around Fleur, forcing himself to check and balance his every reaction to ensure that he wasn't showing any of what he was feeling, and that his behavior was bothering her, but Harry had decided it was better than the alternative. Better for her to pick up on some lingering discomfort than to realize what he was truly thinking.
(Fleur was engaged. Fleur was engaged to his best friend's brother.)
His growing uncertainty about what to do with Fleur was rivaled only with his uncertainty about Ginny. He had liked their date, enjoyed himself far more than he had expected, but the feelings he had for her were nothing like what he felt for Fleur.
Could he, in good conscience, offer up only a fragment of himself to Ginny? No, he thought. It would be unfair to both of them if he were to 'settle' for her. Unfair to him because he suspected that his feelings would settle into a troublesome resentment. And unfair to her because Harry had always believed that people deserved someone who would devote themselves entirely to that person.
He was not unaware of the irony of that belief.
However, there was no way that he could tell all of that to Ginny. He wouldn't have any plausible reason for telling her that he wasn't interested in further dates that wouldn't hurt her feelings.
It was unfortunate, then, that Ginny noticed him avoiding her and decided to do something about it. One day, Harry saw her waiting outside of his last class. Her head was down, and she was looking as nonchalant and nonthreatening as possible. Harry's first thought was that he might be able to get past her without her noticing but he gave up on that almost immediately. There were limits to his rudeness. Ron would be furious with him if he was that blatant about avoiding Ginny.
"I'll meet you back at the tower," Harry said as he broke off from Ron and Hermione. They looked back at him as he walked over to Ginny. Ron's glance lingered.
The hallway cleared of the last students before either of them said anything. Ginny seemed to grasp as well as he did that this wouldn't be a conversation they wanted to have in the middle of a crowd.
"It's been a while so I thought I'd try to track you down," Ginny said. There was a halting uncertainty about her, as if she wasn't sure how to approach him, that nearly made Harry cringe with guilt.
"Yeah, sorry about that, I've been…busy. Dueling Club and schoolwork and everything," Harry said.
"I get that. I imagine it could be overwhelming. That's why I thought you might enjoy a break. There's this new restaurant that opened up at the far end of Hogsmeade and everyone I talked to about it said that it's really good. I figured that, if you weren't doing anything, we could try it out next weekend. See if all of the excitement is justified."
To ask someone who had all but obviously been avoiding her out on a date. Well, Harry had to give Ginny credit for courage.
"Ginny, I had a great time on our last date…"
The look on her face told him that she knew what his words would be before he even said them.
"Harry, I'm not that fragile. You're not going to make me cry if you just tell me that you don't want to go out again," Ginny said.
"It's just that I really did enjoy our date. But with everything going on right now, with Voldemort, it seems like a bad idea. Especially after what happened to Katie. It's too dangerous for us to be seen together. It would put a massive target on your back."
"A target like the kind every single Weasley has on their back?"
"No. A different kind. A worse kind," Harry said. He could see Ginny was about to interrupt so he forged on. "I could never forgive myself if something happened to you because of me. It's not something I'm willing to risk. When the war is over, when Voldemort's gone…we can figure things out then."
"No more dates then," Ginny said.
"For now," Harry said.
Ginny nodded like she had just had something confirmed for her that she had been suspecting for days. "No dates then. We'll just have to go to Slughorn's party together as friends. Better than going stag, right?"
Courageous and clever, Harry amended. They couldn't date but they could still spend time together as friends. Harry couldn't very well argue that he couldn't have friends because of Voldemort.
"I wasn't sure about going to Slughorn's party," Harry said, knowing well that he didn't have much of a choice in the matter if he was going to retain his position as one of Slughorn's favorites. He got too many benefits from that to not at least make an appearance.
"If you don't go then I'll end up going without anyone to talk to," Ginny said, as if that settled the matter.
"Ron's going to be there," Harry said.
"If you don't go then I'll end up going without anyone to talk to," Ginny said.
Amused despite himself, Harry said, "Alright. We'll go to Slughorn's party together. As friends."
"Good. Now you can fill me in on everything that's going on in your life while you walk me back to the tower," Ginny said.
Harry was left with the feeling that Ginny had gotten exactly what she wanted out of that particular interaction. He hadn't lost exactly, if one could consider that conversation a battle, but he had been soundly outmaneuvered. Ginny was clever and persistent and if she had enjoyed the date as much as he had (and didn't have the complicating factors that were plaguing him), she wouldn't give up anytime soon.
The time it took to reach the tower passed at an enjoyable trot. Ginny was an eager conversationalist and they moved from topic to topic with the same easy facility as they had on their date. Harry was left with the distinct impression that, no matter what else happened, he would enjoy being friends with Ginny.
She was a master of talking, giving as much as she gave, talking as much as she listened, and managing to prod Harry only to talk about things he didn't mind talking about, backing down whenever she sensed she was verging on something uncomfortable or dangerous.
Talking to Ginny was like being lulled to a conversational zen, and Harry thought that if he wasn't paying attention he wouldn't even be sure what she could get him to say. It lacked the perspicacity and intensity of his verbal duels with Fleur but had a more subdued enjoyment to it regardless.
"Now, Slughorn's party is in a week and I'll be wearing red so I expect you to wear something that won't clash horribly," Ginny said when they were nearing the tower.
"We're matching now?" Harry asked.
"We can't be standing next to each other the entire night and clash. Of course you have to pick something out that matches."
"What's the difference between this and a real date again?"
"I'll leave that to your imagination," Ginny said. "Now, I've got Potions in fifteen minutes so I'll be off."
"You weren't coming back to the tower?" Harry asked.
Ginny was already walking away. "Nope," she called back cheerfully.
Well played, Weasley, Harry thought.
The common room was crowded and loud, full of students complaining about the classes they had just gotten out of, complaining about how much homework they had been given, and complaining about Snape (which seemed like it would fall under the first category but which Harry and Ron had unilaterally decided warranted a category of its own).
Harry settled into his usual spot across from Ron and Hermione in the corner of the room, halfheartedly making a first move with Ron's chess set.
Ron made his move and then, with forced casualness, asked, "What did Ginny want?"
"She asked me to go to Slughorn's party with her. As a friend," Harry said. He made a more focused move, hoping that if he actually put in some effort Ron would be too engrossed to interrogate him.
"Sounds like fun," Ron said, beginning one of his more practiced moves which Harry still wasn't able to counter. The gap between their chess abilities was like the gap between Dumbledore's ability and his own. Harry was starting to despair about whether there was anything he was good at. Quidditch, he supposed.
"Yeah, she told she's wearing red and that I had better match," Harry said.
"And you're just going as friends?" Hermione asked.
Harry could only shrug in response. Ron seemed satisfied with that information and proceeded to utterly destroy Harry, despite his best efforts. Hermione was reading through a recondite volume titled, Genesis and Structure of Kissin's Transfiguration. The common room grew louder.
Harry was content with the fact that some things could stay the same.
The decorations for Slughorn's Christmas party were impressive. Red and green flames wove through patterns of shapes, from mistletoe to gingerbread houses, and the flames were housed in elaborate Christmas tree shaped sconces. House elves wandered around the room, levitating golden trays overflowing with exotic dishes (most of which Harry couldn't even name) and the occasional mug of eggnog or bursting mince pie.
No matter how many of Slughorn's parties he went to, Harry doubted that he would ever attain real comfort with them. They were too stylized, too artificial; it seemed as if every guest had an affectation or two in an attempt to differentiate themselves from the rest of the multitude. Eccentricity wasn't looked down on at wizarding parties. In fact, Harry had noticed that the most popular guests were often the oddest.
After watching one woman walk past with a talking black owl on one shoulder (who seemed quite displeased with the quality of the refreshments available) and a purring tropical parakeet on the other, Harry decided that he would never label Dumbledore as eccentric ever again. He was clearly a moderate in the wizarding world.
Ron and Hermione, who were standing next to him at the party seemed equally entranced by the strange woman. Hermione, ever the more polite of the trio, smacked them on the shoulders when she came back to their senses, hissing at them about the impoliteness of staring. Ron ignored her and Harry's attention was drawn by Ginny's entrance.
She was, true to her word, wearing a flattering red dress that terminated at an angle midway between her knees and her ankles. The dress was complimented by the long braid that her hair was pulled into, which ended at the point the back of her dress began, giving a sense of premeditation to the outfit, as if it the entire look had been designed well in advance for one night in particular.
It looked good on her, Harry thought.
"Harry…" Ron said, in a vague attempt to be threatening.
Ginny came up to the trio and gave Harry a light hug in greeting. "At least you can take instructions," she said, gesturing to his simple black dress robes. They didn't clash but Harry wouldn't say they looked as if they were matching either. Though that part had been intentional.
"I couldn't let you down on a night as important as this," Harry said.
"Slughorn's party?" Hermione asked skeptically.
"They're the event of the season," Ginny said.
"Only the best and brightest are invited," Harry added.
"That's why I never understood why Ron gets invited," Ginny said. She seemed to delight in her brother's angry flushing.
"Do you want a drink?" Harry asked. It wasn't a date but he supposed that was still an appropriate, and safe, question to ask. Ginny accepted and Harry went to find his way through the confining press of elaborately made-up witches and wizards toward where he remembered the drinks being.
After apologizing to a wizard with lurid purple hair for bumping into him, Harry caught a glimpse of the long bar that was, somewhat uncharacteristically for a Slughorn party, devoid of the usual bottles.
A pair of pleasant witches were behind the counter making exotic drinks for the guests. Harry got in line and asked for a glass of pumpkin juice when it was his turn. He didn't think Ron or Hermione would appreciate him trying to force alcohol on Ginny. For that matter, it could give her the wrong impression.
On his way back to Ginny, Harry was accosted by the last man he wanted to see.
"Harry! Just the man I wanted to see," Slughorn said. His face was already a jovial scarlet and he had a half-empty glass of Firewhisky in his hand.
"Hello, Professor," Harry said, as pleasantly as he could.
"I was just telling a few of my friends about your absolutely prodigious potions skills. They're quite interested in meeting you. They've heard a great deal about you of course, but third-hand stories can't quite compare with the perspective that a professor can give, let alone the man himself. They're a somewhat uptight lot, as Potions Masters can tend to be, but I'm sure with your skills you'll have them thawed out in no time. These are absolutely the sort of people you should get to know. They could be very helpful to you later on. It's all about the people you know, m'boy. Never let someone slip past you without making sure that they'll remember your name, that's the key. That's the key to it all! And talent of course."
"I'm not sure I can right now, Professor. I promised Ginny that I'd get her a drink," Harry said. He held out of the glass of juice as if it could shield him from Slughorn's onslaught.
"Ginevra, you say? Wonderful girl! An excellent choice. She made quite the splash at the last party. Let's bring her along as well. She doesn't quite have our flair for the more subtle arts of potioneering, alas, but she can hold her own and I'm sure she can be trusted not to make a fool of herself."
"I think she and I were planning on…"
"I'm afraid they already promised to show me around to a few of the charming guests that they met last time," Fleur said, coming up behind Harry and putting a possessive hand on his shoulder. Harry didn't think he had ever been so glad to see her before.
"Is that so? Well, nothing to be done in that case. I'll track you down later then," Slughorn said, his cheer undimmed. His eyes squinted at the mass of guests for a moment before picking out his next victim and he was gone with as little warning as he arrived.
"I'm going to make a shrine to you," Harry said.
"After what I just saved you from I don't know that a simple shrine will cut it," Fleur said.
Rather than her usual dress, Fleur was wearing a sharply cut set of white dress robes with a deep blue winding its way along the cuffs and edges. Harry knew he shouldn't be disappointed that she wasn't wearing something less stiff and formal but he much preferred seeing Fleur in a dress.
"I didn't think that you were coming," Harry said.
With a careless shrug, Fleur said, "A last minute change of plans. I decided that I couldn't leave you here to fend for yourself without any help. Who knows what you'd end up agreeing to without me here to guide you? I can't, in good conscience, have you causing an international incident if there was any way that I could prevent it."
"You think that I could cause an international incident at Slughorn's Christmas party?" Harry asked.
"Of course. You have such a way with words, after all," Fleur said. She noticed the drink in his hand. "I leave you alone for half-an-hour and you start drinking pumpkin juice? Clearly we haven't been spending enough time together recently if you're able to disappoint me this badly."
"It's for Ginny. I thought it might send the wrong signal if I got her something stronger," Harry said.
"You're here with Ginny? I thought that you had been avoiding her for the last week. After your wonderful date," Fleur said. Harry couldn't tell if she was mocking him or not but he was leaning toward a yes. It did look rather odd for him to have spoken to her about well the date went and then summarily avoid Ginny at every possible opportunity.
"We came as friends. She's probably wondering where I am right now. I went to get the drink a while ago," Harry said.
"We wouldn't want to keep your lady waiting," Fleur said.
Definitely mocking him, Harry thought. The sad thing was he couldn't even pick out what specifically she was mocking him for. There were too many options.
Harry forged a path back to where he had last seen Ginny, shielding the juice from the inevitable callous jostling and offhanded elbows that were endemic at crowded Christmas parties. His reflexes, carefully cultivated over years of quidditch practices, were pushed to their limits to ensure none of the juice was spilled.
Fleur followed in his wake with considerable amusement, watching him duck and weave his way through the more inconsiderately drunken guests. She had a smile and a kind word for every one of them. If she had it her way Harry suspected that he would be running an obstacle course with the juice in hand.
Not for the first time, Harry wondered why Slughorn insisted on hosting all of his parties in the same room. It was fine for smaller affairs, like the usual Slughorn party, but for a Christmas party it was practically torture.
Harry was able, miraculously, to reach Ginny with a full glass of juice. She took it from him with a perplexed expression and a glance behind him at Fleur.
"I ran into Slughorn on the way back. He wanted us to come meet some of his Potions Master friends but Fleur rescued me," Harry said.
"I wouldn't have minded meeting some Potions Masters. It might have been interesting," Ginny said.
"A bunch of drunken old men," Fleur said, one hand gesturing dismissively in the direction they had seen Slughorn leave.
"Where did Ron and Hermione go?" Harry asked.
"Hermione saw some witch that she had been talking to last time and dragged Ron along to introduce him. I expect that they'll start talking about something way over his head and he'll stand there like an idiot trying not to show how bored he is," Ginny said.
Standing in between Fleur and Ginny was like being a sea wall for a tsunami, Harry thought. And a particularly inadequate sea wall at that. He could only cast around in his head for a topic, any topic, which would somehow be appropriate with both of them around.
Before he could come up with something, Fleur had already engaged Ginny. "So you and Harry are here as friends?" she asked, with false politeness. She adopted the tone of a mildly bored socialite.
"Slughorn's party isn't exactly anyone's idea of a great venue for a date," Ginny said.
"Still, after how well Harry said that your first date went I was expecting you two to come as more than friends," Fleur said.
Ginny was clearly at a loss for words so Harry took pity on her. "It's not exactly the time to start up a public relationship. Not with Voldemort still out there."
"True enough," Fleur said. Her tone settled back down to normal.
"I think I see Monsieur Lucard over there. I'm going to go say hello. Find me when you're done," Ginny said to Harry. She swept away and Harry followed her departure until he was sure that she was out of sight. Then he turned to Fleur.
"That was childish and uncalled for," he said.
"I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just confused and I was hoping that Ginny could help with that. None of this makes very much sense to me. First you come and tell me that you had an excellent date with Ginny, then you spend the next week avoiding her, and finally I come here to keep you company and find out that you've agreed to go with Ginny. As friends. You'll have to make some kind of sense of this for me because I just can't figure it out."
"It's like I said. I don't want to start any relationship now because that would put a target on their back. It's just common sense," Harry said.
Fleur looked markedly unimpressed. "When you want to give me the real answer that's fine. But don't lie to me, Harry. Or at least not so poorly. I suppose I should leave you now to go chasing off after Ginny."
If he had to pick between Ginny and Fleur it wasn't even close. "You don't have to do that. She's probably having a good time going around talking to people. She's liked it every other time she came to one of Slughorn's parties," Harry said. He knew he had an obligation to Ginny but surely that didn't mean he wasn't allowed to spend any time with Fleur. After all, he and Ginny had only gone as friends.
Besides, Fleur's smile when he said that was worth Ginny's inevitable annoyance.
"If I'm sticking around then I'm not doing it without a drink in hand," Fleur said. She gestured for Harry to lead the way back into the buzzing mass of guests in the direction of the bar.
"You just want to see me get elbowed in the face," Harry said.
"At least you won't spill your drink this time," Fleur said.
Once at the bar, Fleur ordered for both of them. It was a drink that Harry had never heard of before, and, once he saw it, he was somewhat less than enthused about drinking it.
The drink, a Blind Merlin, was a pearlescent shocking green in a tall glass, garnished with a purple fruit that Harry was positive wasn't grown naturally. Fleur seemed pleased with hers, taking small pulls of it with a slothful smile, so Harry took a small sip of his own.
It…wasn't bad. There was a strong undercurrent of some strong liquor that Harry wasn't familiar with but that was drowned out by a tangy fruity blend. The aftertaste wasn't entirely pleasant but it was better than Harry had been expecting.
"A bit of a departure from our usual wine. What do you think?" Fleur asked. She eyed her own drink with noticeable appreciation.
"It's not bad. A bit fruity though," Harry said.
"Does that offend your masculinity?"
"I spend all my time getting bossed around by women. I think most people would say I gave up on my masculinity a long time ago," Harry said.
"And you're the better for it," Fleur said. She patted the lapel of his dress robe in an absent arrhythmic pattern, as one would a favored pet. It was a thoughtless contact, done more sardonically than anything, but Harry caught himself wishing that she wouldn't stop.
Merlin, he was pathetic.
"I think I'm going to start holding group duels in the Dueling Club soon," Fleur said. "Probably pair up a younger student and an older student to start. Teach them some teamwork, how to compensate for a partner's weaknesses. They've got the rest of the basics down already."
Harry agreed. In his mind they had been spending too long just working on spellwork already. In the kind of duel that Hogwarts students would be in variety mattered less than ensuring you didn't die. Knowing how to work well as a team was far more valuable than a few more spells in their arsenal.
"But why a younger student with an older student? Don't you think that'll just frustrate both of them?" Harry asked.
"It's supposed to. You're not going to be fighting alongside someone talented in every duel. Sometimes you'll even be alongside someone who can't duel at all. They need to be at least familiar with every situation they're likely to find themselves in. If they can't handle it in training conditions then there's no chance that they'll be able to hand it in a real fight."
"Not a bad idea," Harry said.
Fleur made a vague gesture, as if to indicate that that went unsaid.
A rapid shuffling at the entrance to the room forestalled any need for a response. Some guests were pedaling away from the entrance, condescension and disgust on their faces, while others remained looking on curiously. Harry and Fleur stood and made their way toward the disturbance.
It wasn't an easy task to slide through the accumulating crowd but Harry managed to bludgeon a path for them until they were close to the front.
Filch, looking entirely too pleased with himself, was holding Malfoy in a vice-grip near the entrance to the doorway, speaking in loud tones to an annoyed Slughorn. At least, Harry thought that for Slughorn that it was an annoyed expression. Given that at his parties Slughorn usually looked as if his excessive cheerfulness was going to blow him up like a balloon and sent him wafting through the night sky, the bland expression on his face probably indicated some level of irritation.
"…and he was skulking around outside without an invitation. Detentions for him, don't you think Professor? Hanging around where he's not wanted. Trying to sneak in," Filch said.
With a look back at the crowd that was watching him, Slughorn said, "Now, now, we should be celebrating Christmas, not worrying about dishing out detentions, Argus. If Mr. Malfoy is interested in attending our small gathering then, by all means, he should be able to join us. You're as welcome as any," Slughorn said, directing the last to Malfoy, self-congratulation suffused in every word. The only person impressed with Slughorn's generosity was Slughorn.
"Malfoy wouldn't be hanging around outside of this because he wanted into the party," Harry said.
"Then why would he be down here right now?" Fleur asked.
"I'm not sure but I'd love to find out," Harry said.
Malfoy finally seemed to register Slughorn's words. He opened his mouth to say something (something that Harry doubted would be a polite acceptance) but a hard pale hand came down on his shoulder.
Snape loomed over Malfoy, an angry sneer (one of the most foreboding sneers in Snape's arsenal, according to Fred and George) marring his already unpleasant countenance.
"I'm afraid I have to disagree with you entirely, Professor," Snape said. "Christmas does not excuse behavior unfitting of a Hogwarts student. As his Head of House I will be administering the proper punishment to Mr. Malfoy for disturbing an event that he was expressly not invited to."
With that Snape's hand went from roughly grasping Malfoy's shoulder to steering him with force toward the exit. Filch stumbled out of the way as the pair left with what seemed like undue celerity. Harry made a move to follow them but Fleur restrained him.
"There are too many eyes on the door right now. If they see you leaving after Malfoy and Snape everyone in the room will know that you're following them and it'll eventually get back to one of them. If Malfoy really is planning something then you don't want him to be leery of you."
"It's a little late for that," Harry said, but he didn't make any move to follow them again. The moment was already lost. He had no idea where Snape had taken Malfoy. Likely they were back in Snape's office where Harry had no chance of getting in undetected. Whatever they were talking about was beyond his ability to learn.
"Just don't think about it. That's why Dumbledore, the professors, and the Order are here," Fleur said.
"And the Ministry?"
"Would that actually make you feel any better?"
"Yeah. Warm bodies to throw in front of a spell."
"Don't be crude, Harry," Fleur said.
"Nobody in the Order has mentioned anything about Malfoy to you, have they?" Harry asked.
"No. I haven't actually been to any of the major Order meetings yet. Most of the work I do gets reported directly to Dumbledore. My work intersects only marginally with the other operations that the Order is running," Fleur said.
Disappointing, but Harry hadn't exactly expected Fleur to have wormed her way into the heart of the Order after only weeks of involvement.
"Finish your drinks and stop worrying about Malfoy. You're being an idiot if you think that he can fool Dumbledore," Fleur said.
"Now you're sounding like Hermione," Harry said. He did as she requested anyway. The Blind Merlin was leading Harry to a pleasant fuzziness which made it quite easy to shunt Malfoy from his thoughts.
Harry knew that he had to watch how much he drank; he was teetering at the edge of a precipice as things were. The slightest slip, a longing glance, an ill-chosen word, and his thoughts and feelings for Fleur would be revealed in a single terrible moment. It was difficult enough to hide his most consuming obsession when he was in full possession of himself. Harry didn't need the added difficulty that the Merlin would provide.
Though it would be rude not to finish his drink, Harry thought, putting the Blind Merlin down to a quarter of the glass.
"I've been thinking a lot about our dueling recently," Fleur said.
"Fleur, is this going to turn into you gloating about how often you're able to beat me again?" Harry asked.
"A true winner doesn't feel any need to brag about her victory. Her superiority is evident to all without the need for something as juvenile as boasting."
"You know that talking about not bragging is pretty much the same thing as bragging, right?" Harry finished the rest of his drink. If he was going to have to sit and listen to Fleur pedantically go on about her dueling superiority then he would need something to keep him sane.
"I was thinking that your dueling style is too easily countered. It's all brute force. There's no finesse. You use no transfiguration, hardly any charms, and your typical strategy is to use power or speed to bully your opponent into submission. There's no cleverness to how you fight."
"If it works…"
"But it won't work against everyone. That's exactly what I'm saying," Fleur said.
Harry rapped his fingers against his empty glass, producing an unharmonious pinging sound, while he considered what Fleur was saying. It was true that he didn't have a lot of variety in his dueling. It was hard to integrate Charms into your arsenal unless you were intimately familiar with them and Transfiguration was frankly beyond him in a fast-paced duel. He relied on the spells he did because they were what he knew.
"What're you suggesting then?" Harry asked. "Remedial lessons?"
"I can't have you getting yourself blown up because you can't cast a half-decent transfiguration. It would reflect poorly on me as a teacher," Fleur said.
"I thought we agreed that I was the one teaching you?" Harry said.
"We can agree on that when you can take me in a fair fight," Fleur said. She filched his empty glass from his hand, her face having been scrunched with displeasure at the foul sounds assaulting her ears, and she held it against her own empty glass in a mockery of a lover's embrace.
"I'll go get us another," Fleur said.
"None for me. I have to find Ginny after you're done manhandling my pride," Harry said.
"Don't get boring now, Harry," Fleur said. She strutted to the bar and Harry took the opportunity to search the crowd for Ginny's distinctive hair.
The closest he came was glimpse of Ron staring forlornly at the glass of water in his hand as Hermione and an older wizard jabbered enthusiastically about some arcane topic or another. Ron would have to get used to it if he was serious about Hermione, Harry thought. It wasn't as if she was going to conveniently lose interest in the things that bored him as soon as they started dating.
Fleur came back with a topped-off Blind Merlin for herself and a glass of pumpkin juice for him.
"How kind of you," Harry said.
"You do like juice, don't you?" Fleur asked, a rakish smile only partially concealed by the glass she was holding to her mouth.
Harry shook his head, then said, "I've thought about your offer and decided to accept it. Remedial lessons couldn't hurt." They would be a perfect opportunity to spend more time with her. "Besides, they can't be nearly as bad as Snape's were."
"You had remedial lessons with Snape? You poor boy. Tell me everything," Fleur said.
Harry spun the somewhat tedious history of his Occlumency lessons with Snape into a embellished tale in which he, heroically, fended off Snape's vile attempts to gaze into the most private recesses of his mind while at the same time learning to launch his own forays against Snape. The tale ended with his valiant sortie into the foulest swamps of Snape's repressed memories where Harry encountered memories too profane to trouble her delicate sensibilities.
Fleur made the required expressions and gestures that a good listener should; she smiled appreciatively at his derogatory descriptions of Snape's appearance, gasped in horror as the lank tendrils of Snape's Legilimency ensnared him, and let out an exaggerated cheer of her own at the conclusion of his story.
"I can't help but feel that you left all of the good parts of your story," Fleur said.
"Such as?"
"What memories you had that were so private that you were willing to do anything to protect them. And what you saw in Snape's mind that was so personal you won't tell me."
Harry considered what to say in response, and he had evidently paused too long because Fleur said, "I'm not asking you to tell me. If it's as personal as it sounds then it makes sense that you'd want to keep it to yourself. It was just something I noticed."
"It's private," Harry said, thankful for her willingness to let it go.
"Or maybe it's not private," Fleur said, as if musing to herself. "Maybe it's just something you don't want to corrupt an innocent damsel such as myself with. Perhaps the minds of Harry Potter and Severus Snape are crawling with the sort of lewd fantasies that would make even the stoutest hearts quail."
"Innocent damsel?"
"Yes, an innocent damsel you filthy pervert," Fleur said. An older, impeccably dressed wizard started as he walked by, giving Harry a suspicious glance. It looked for a moment like he was going to say something but on seeing Fleur's amused expression he just shook his head and kept moving by.
"Do you want to get us thrown out of the party?" Harry asked.
"It wouldn't be the worst thing to ever happen to us," Fleur said. While true, that wasn't really the point. "And you never really answered my question. How about it Harry? What racy dreams were you so keen to keep the good professor from?"
Two could play at that game. "They were about you of course," Harry said.
"Oh. Do tell."
"Well, the best one was about the Tri-Wizard Tournament. It was just after the second task, when I pulled your sister out of the lake, and you were so grateful that you gave me…a reward," Harry said. He was proud of how he managed to keep a straight face through it all. Half-way in he had thought that he would either reveal his amusement or the fact that the very idea of being with Fleur so intimately was affecting him strongly.
Fleur, playing the part of a coquette to perfection, batted her eyelashes teasingly at Harry. "And what kind of reward was that? Was it something…nice?"
A faint blush caressed Harry's cheeks. Damn it.
The shadow of a victorious, predatory smirk settled on Fleur.
"Very nice," Harry said, trying to compose himself.
"I love doing nice things for people. Why don't you describe it so that I know what you like? You know, for future reference," Fleur said.
"We went back to the Beauxbatons' carriage…"
"Go on."
"And you showed me a good time." Harry's cringe was severe and involuntary. Could he sound any more juvenile? So much for playing a game of innuendo.
"I showed you around the carriage?"
"No."
"I don't understand then. A good time…oh." A shy maiden-like expression drifted onto Fleur's face, as if she had suddenly come to a surprising, but flattering, realization. She was a good actor, Harry thought. Too good. If he didn't know the game that they were playing it would be easy to be taken in.
As it was, he knew that she was toying with him but he still wanted to give in. To pretend it was real. He craved it like nothing else.
Fleur brushed a silken hand's through Harry's hair. It was a light touch, but he found himself leaning into it ever so slightly, reluctant to let the pleasant contact fade.
"I let you have me, didn't I?" Her voice was nothing more than a whisper. Her hand settled on Harry's cheek, stroking him with regular, indolent touches.
It took all of Harry's willpower to pull away. It was one thing to use words, but to touch him like that was just cheating. "All right, Fleur. You win."
Her hand traced one last delightful pattern on his cheek and then she pulled it away, her innocent charade dropped in favor of a triumphant turn of face.
"Did you really think that you could win that, Harry?" she asked.
The euphoria of the moment, of being touched so gently, and with so much feeling, was gone; it left behind only the crushing realization that Fleur would never touch him with so much genuine feeling, would never whisper to him delightful things in the dark of night, would never be what she had pretended to be.
Harry thought that just for a moment his bitterness, his jealousy toward Bill, was perfectly justified.
"I thought I'd give it a shot," Harry said. He was aware that the joviality he tried to force didn't shine through, buried by so many mixed feelings.
Fleur looked at him, then looked away. "I can't fault your boldness. But it's getting late. I think I'm going to turn in for the night. You should find Ginny. Bring her a drink or something, apologize. Just be a good date."
"We're not dating," Harry said.
"Of course not," Fleur said. He thought her smile seemed a bit sad but then she had turned away was gone, swallowed the relentless push and pull of merrymakers and dour bureaucrats.
Time passed and Harry stood still. He could still feel a shadow of Fleur's caresses on his cheek; the memory of her words was setting his mind aflame and he replayed it in his head over and over, as if to burn it indelibly into the very fiber of his being.
Fleur would never touch him like that but at least now he could pretend.
Eventually he had to let the moment go, consign it to the back of his mind, so that he could fulfill obligations that he couldn't care less about. Even the prospect of Ginny's anger and disappointment if he were to just leave seemed hollow compared to the crushing loneliness that was threatening to bury him.
In the end Harry got a drink and rejoined Ginny more because of what he thought Fleur would say if he didn't than because of what Ginny would say.
The rest of the evening was a tedious blur, creeping along at an agonizing pace that was only tolerable because Harry realized how little it mattered. He played nice with the obsequious Ministry officials and was respectful with the arrogant socialites but none of them were able to scratch beneath the thinnest veneer of civility. Even Ginny didn't seem to notice, so caught up in the thrill of being introduced to the flood of pseudo-important people.
Harry realized in the course of the night that there was a certain type of person who attended a party held by Slughorn. They were in the middling stage of their career; important enough to be invited but not so important that the prospect of future promotions or success couldn't still be dangled in front of them. The older, truly successful individuals had no interest in attending a party thrown by a social-climbing Hogwarts professor. It gave the entire affair a mildly incestuous feel, like a sea of minnows looking for approval from one another.
"I think I'm ready to go now," Harry said, interrupting a self-important spiel by some pinched wizard in a drab gray pair of dress robes.
"We're both very tired," Ginny said to the offended wizard before she took Harry by the arm and removed him forcibly to the outskirts of the crowd.
"That was incredibly rude," she said.
"I'm tired, bored, and we're never going to see any of these people again," Harry said.
"That's still no excuse to be rude," Ginny said.
"You're right. I'm sorry. I'm just going to head back to the tower now. It's been a long day and I hate parties like this," Harry said.
Ginny was unappeased by his insincere apology but made no complaints as he brushed past her toward the exit.
There wasn't a lot he could say in defence of his behavior other than his utter apathy toward whatever the random guests thought of him. Even his attitude toward Ginny's opinion of him was blasé at best.
(Fleur was engaged. Fleur was engaged to his best friend's brother.)
There reached a point, Harry thought, when the truth ceased to matter to feeling; when facts could be taken, assimilated, and then casually thrown out in the face of a prodigious onslaught of emotion.
How could he continue to hide what he was feeling? Fleur wasn't oblivious. She had seen his reaction. She knew what it meant. If things didn't change between them then it was only because he was a coward and she was too kind to point out his infatuation.
Then again, it wasn't as if boldness would change anything about his situation. He could spend as much time talking to Fleur about his feelings as he wanted; Fleur was going to marry Bill. They were happy together and whatever she felt toward him, it clearly wasn't what she was feeling toward Bill.
The boy's dormitory was quiet when Harry entered. The curtains around Neville's bed were drawn, a light snoring peeking out through the gaps, but Ron was still at Slughorn's party and Seamus and Dean were nowhere to be found.
Harry got into bed, not bothering to change or perform his nightly ablutions. Sleep was elusive.
When he finally dreamed, it was of a silver haired girl waiting at the bank of an endless lake.
As Harry had predicted, nothing changed between him and Fleur in the days before Christmas holidays. They continued to meet to practice dueling (in fact the meetings became longer and more frequent as Fleur tried to drill him on the rudiments of applying transfiguration and charms in dueling). He continued to hide, to the best of his abilities, his feelings toward her, and she carried on with her pretense of ignorance.
His duels with Fleur had become exercises in futility more than anything else. He found himself unable to focus on anything but her, the basics that she was trying to teach him slipping from his mind as soon as they found purchase. To his surprise, Fleur was lenient with his mistakes, drilling him slowly and patiently until she was sure that he had grasped what she was focusing on.
Harry put that down to the spells that he was continuing to teach her from Dumbledore's notebooks. They were approaching the point where she would know as many of the spells as he did. Then he would have to decide whether he continued teaching her only the spells he knew or if he took it a step farther and gave her access to the notebooks themselves. Dumbledore would never approve of such a step but Harry found himself caring less and less about what anyone but Fleur thought.
A sense of growing isolation and alienation began to overtake Harry the longer his situation persisted, as if no matter how hard he tried nothing could right his problem. There wasn't a single option that he, or even Fleur, could take that wouldn't hurt someone. However, as things stood, it seemed like he was the only one in pain.
His sense of isolation wasn't helped by the fact that Ron and Hermione had begun spending nearly all of their free time together, and only a portion of that was spent in the common room or in the library. Harry wasn't sure where they were going when they wanted to be alone but it left him without fulfilling contact with anyone at Hogwarts.
Any other time he would have been glad for Ron and Hermione, pleased that they were finally acting on their feelings (something he only longed he could do), but it seemed to him that they had acted on their feelings at the most inopportune moment for him. He was feeling withdrawn not only from others but from himself and his closest friends were too caught up in each other to even notice. It was petty to resent them for their happiness but Harry caught himself doing so regardless.
Dealing with other people became a chore. Harry frequently used the invisibility cloak and hidden passages just to avoid fraternizing with the other students. The enthusiasm and reverence with which the younger students had been treating him since the start of the year had evolved from being vaguely annoying to something utterly intolerable.
The only consolation he had was the Dueling Club. There he could ignore Fleur, ignore Ron and Hermione, and work past the awe his students held him in by pushing them to their limits, trying to instill in them the same skills that had kept him alive through his trials.
There were odd looks from the younger students when he began pushing them harder at club meetings, advocating that they work on the skills he was drilling even during their free time, but Harry rejoiced in the freedom he felt while teaching. He even went so far as to invite a few small groups of the less talented (but highly enthusiastic) students to practice with him during their free time.
The less time Harry had to spend thinking about Fleur or his friends the happier he found himself. Teaching was something to lose himself in; it reminded him of nothing and could absorb his full attention for however long he was doing it. It was the perfect remedy for his situation. Sometimes he wondered if that was why any of the professors had started.
Between schoolwork, dueling with Fleur, the Dueling Club, and helping out struggling students, Harry was invariably exhausted by the time he went to bed each night. Exhaustion was good though. He dreamed about her less when he was exhausted.
Harry was beginning to think that he would be able to make it until Christmas break without anything else to disturb the delicate ecosystem that he had created for himself when Ron and Hermione asked, in strained and uncomfortable tones, if they could speak to him. Harry suspected what they had to say, and wasn't looking forward to it, but he wasn't willing to be a bad friend either. He acquiesced and let them lead him to a secluded corner of the library where it was unlikely that anyone would overhear them.
"What's this about?" Harry asked. If nothing else, he could get some amusement from watching them squirm. If there was one thing Ron and Hermione undeniably had in common it was that they hated broaching personal topics.
"Ron and I have been spending a lot of time together. Talking," Hermione corrected when she realized what it sounded like she was implying.
When he realized that her mortification was going to prevent her from going any further, Ron took over. "Hermione and I like each other. We're going to date and we wanted to let you know and to tell you that this doesn't change anything and that we're still best mates and we're not going to exclude you and that we didn't want you to be uncomfortable spending time with us or anything." There was a pause in the torrent of words before Ron, who had begun to blush, said, "I think that's everything."
"Wow, this came out of nowhere," Harry said. He shook his head like the news had physically stunned him.
Hermione put a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. "We didn't want to hide it from you but we had some things to work out before we decided to make it official. We're sorry for keeping secrets, Harry."
"Yeah, we won't ever sneak around again. I was against it, didn't want you wondering where we were, but she overruled me," Ron said. Hermione looked as if she was going to take offence but then visibly mastered herself and turned back to Harry.
"And here I thought you two were sneaking off together to go study in library. How naive of me," Harry said. He tried to sound as melodramatically glum as possible.
"You...this whole time?" Hermione asked.
"You're two of the least subtle people I know. I'd be surprised if half of Gryffindor didn't know about you two already," Harry said.
"Why didn't you say anything?" Ron asked. Hermione seemed guilty but Ron was responding with an offhand inquisitiveness, as if when Harry's knowledge of their relationship began was a matter of historical curiosity and nothing else.
"I figured that the two of you would tell me when there was something to say. Besides, it would be hypocritical of me to berate you for hiding things from me when I've done the same in the past. I trusted you two to tell me when you were ready," Harry said.
It was all true, to an extent. He had kept secrets in the past and he did trust them to tell him. However, it omitted the fact that Harry wasn't sure that he could have kept his anger from revealing itself if he had been the one to confront them. His sense of abandonment, the crushing loneliness he had been struggling with for weeks, would have risen to the surface if he had had to be proactive.
It was far easier to put on a façade when it was an encounter you were preparing for, rather than one you initiated, Harry thought.
"You don't seem bothered," Hermione said.
"I figured there was something up since the train ride to school. I was basically just waiting for the two of you to get together. Honestly, I'm a little surprised that it took this long. I guess you are both pretty stubborn and oblivious though," Harry said, ignoring their simultaneous cries of disagreement.
"This wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be," Ron said.
"Did you think that I was going to be difficult?" Harry asked.
"We thought that you were going to be surprised," Hermione said.
"I wonder if we were as obvious about the Polyjuice Potion second year as you two were sneaking around," Harry mused.
"Somebody would have caught us if we were," Hermione said.
"Which just means that we've gotten worse about sneaking around," Ron said.
There was still one question that Harry had about their relationship.
"So, what exactly happened on the train?"
This time they both went scarlet, looked at each other, and blushed even deeper. Hermione shook her head hurriedly in a wordless refusal and Ron just looked as if he was recalling the most tragic incident of his entire life.
Being the good friend that he was, Harry didn't press any further. They would tell him one day. Probably.
"Does this mean that you two are going to be gushing over each other from here on out?" Harry asked. The idea of Hermione feeding Ron at breakfast, or of him reciting bad poetry to her made Harry nauseous.
Ron's snort and Hermione's rolled eyes told him that he had nothing to worry about.
"I wouldn't worry, Harry. It'll be like nothing's changed," Hermione said.
"We'll just be sneaking off poorly every once in a while," Ron said.
"Or not," Hermione said. She gave Ron a look and he cringed.
"I'm not worried," Harry said.
Ron, burgeoning with relief at the end of an awkward conversation, tapped Harry on the shoulder and started expounding the virtues of the Chudley Cannon's new seeker, who was apparently exponentially better than their last one ("Not that that's saying much," Ron said.). Hermione smiled with evident indulgence as Ron used his hands to mime the exact moves that their new seeker was capable of and Harry felt a tinge of relief, like the pressure on him had, just for a moment, been alleviated, and he could breathe again.
Ron and Hermione were good friends, he thought.
When Christmas break came, Harry was still losing himself in teaching and work; still trying, ineffectually, to break the hold that Fleur had over him, still being given only scraps of attention by Ron and Hermione, who, although they did their best, were still more interested in exploring their new relationship than in spending time playing chess or studying with him.
Ron had told Harry before break that he was going to come to the Burrow for Christmas and that his parents had arranged for them to use McGonagall's floo to get home.
For once, Harry was eager to leave Hogwarts behind. Things were too complicated there. He could enjoy a Christmas at the Burrow. Things would be more normal. Hermione would be going home so it would be a casual Christmas with Ron and the Weasleys. No new relationships or unrequited loves to bother him. Things might be a little uncomfortable with Ginny but he could handle that much.
McGonagall's office was locked and there was nobody inside when Harry arrived. He was early, but he had half expected that Ron and Ginny would have been there waiting as well.
Since everything was packed already Harry had no choice but to wait outside McGonagall's office in the austere, drafty hallway that adjoined it to the rest of the second floor. McGonagall had eschewed the typical portraits and suits of armor that adorned the rest of Hogwarts; the hallway to her office was bare except for variations on the Gryffindor crest placed at meticulously spaced intervals.
Harry thought it would be quite intimidating for a Slytherin to be walking to her office. Almost like being on death row.
For lack of anything better to do, Harry studied the Gryffindor crests in intimate detail. Each one was slightly different, the minute discrepancies of hundreds of years of history, but the essential details were the same in every one. Harry was struck, while observing one of the noticeably older crests, by a sense of an overwhelming history. How many students had walked where he was walking? How many Gryffindors dreading punishment at the hands of their head of house? Professor McGonagall, and all the students in Gryffindor, were nothing more than the phantoms of the past given form, walking where they had walked, eating where they had eaten, learning where they had learned.
It was humbling to be the bearer of such an immense history. So humbling that Harry was almost glad when Ginny arrived. Almost.
She started on seeing him, but regained her composure in no time, making it seem as if she had merely missed a step. With a curt greeting she took up a position by the side of McGonagall's office, leaning against the cold stone wall with her eyes firmly oriented toward the ground.
They hadn't spoken since Slughorn's party. It would perhaps be more accurate to say that Harry hadn't apologized to Ginny since Slughorn's party. He knew she was owed one, given how awfully he had behaved, but he was more of the line of thought that was glad Ginny was upset with him. Her anger was easier to deal with than her attempts to flirt with him, or get him to go on dates with her. Anger was a much simpler emotion to deal with than infatuation or love.
Harry looked up at the crest again, as if he could find there an answer to his dilemma inscribed by some long-dead Gryffindor. The roaring lion faced him impassively. There was no wisdom to be found there.
"Ron's late," Ginny said.
"He's probably saying goodbye to Hermione," Harry said.
"They're dating now, right?"
"Yes."
They were quiet again. Harry liked the quiet. It was easier to maintain than a conversation. And he had plenty of practice with ignoring the awkwardness.
Ron trundled down the hallway a few minutes later, looking glum, a hastily packed suitcase that was only half-zipped waddling after him on wooden legs. The animation was too good to have been down by Ron. Hermione's handiwork, no doubt.
"Ready to go?" Harry asked.
"We have to wait. I don't have a key," Ron said.
"McGonagall is usually more punctual than this," Harry said.
Ginny looked at him strangely and said, "We're not waiting for McGonagall."
Harry had an unpleasant suspicion of who they were waiting on, but before he could ask, Fleur walked around the bend of hallway, a trio of suitcases in a phalanx formation trailing proudly behind her, each one packed to the bursting point. Of course.
"I didn't know you were coming for Christmas," Harry said.
Fleur looked as surprised as he felt. "I didn't know you were coming either. You never mentioned it," she said.
"I thought you were going back to France," Harry said.
"I thought you were going to stay at Hogwarts," Fleur said.
"I think you two need to work on your communication," Ginny said. She gestured for Fleur to unlock McGonagall's office.
Harry supposed that it made sense for Fleur to come along. It wasn't as if McGonagall was going to entrust the key to her office to a gaggle of students. And if Bill was going to be at the Burrow for Christmas, Fleur would want to be there as well.
Fleur and Bill. There wasn't any escaping that particular truth, was there?
"Alright, Harry?" Fleur asked. Everyone else had moved into the office but Harry was still standing outside, staring at Gryffindor's crest like it had betrayed him.
"Coming," Harry said. He picked up his suitcase and entered McGonagall's office.
It was far less austere than the hallway outside, boasting three bookshelves stocked with treatises thick enough to give Hermione a moment's pause, a glass case holding over a dozen gleaming trophies, both House Cups and Quidditch Cups, and a dark red oak desk that dominated the center of the room. Neatly organized stacks of paper, a few expensive quills, and an ornate inkwell were the desk's only accoutrements.
In the back of the office was a large fireplace, spacious enough for a tall man to stand in and wide enough that it seemed like it would be able to hold several people. A steady fire was burning in it, giving off heat that washed away the draft of the hallway as soon as one entered the room. There was an artificial appearance to the flames, not even variance in their highs and lows, and Harry suspected that the fire was less than mundane in nature.
The office was exactly what Harry had expected. Organized, proud, and functional.
"Ready to go?" Fleur asked. She received affirmatives from Ron and Ginny and passed out pinches of Floo powder to each of them. Her fingertips brushed Harry's palm as she was giving him his share and his fingers shuddered.
"The Burrow," Ginny said, tossing her powder in the fire and stepping through once it turned a magnificent green. Ron followed shortly after.
"I had thought you would be tired of the Burrow," Harry said to Fleur.
"Certain people can make even the most trying places something special," Fleur said, with a delicate smile. She stepped into the green flames and was gone.
Harry waited a minute, contemplating whether or not he could just change his mind and stay at Hogwarts for Christmas without mortally offending the Weasleys. When he decided that it was out of the question, Harry took reluctant steps toward the fire, fed it his floo powder, and reappeared at the Burrow.
