Chapter 37 Moving forward
Disclaimer: Just refer to the earlier chapters…I promise that nothing has changed.
Ginny turned out to be right as Ron was more than ready for dinner. They trudged to the Great Hall and back and soon hit their beds as they were really exhausted with the knowledge of the impending hardships.
Harry turned and tossed for a long time tormented with the thoughts of the vinculum potion. It was bad enough that he was stuck in the war against Voldemort and he had long since accepted it. He believed that he had truly become a child of fate but the situation was becoming very serious with all his friends caught in the crossfire. 'All his friends' he thought wryly….who would have imagined that one day he would consider Draco Malfoy a friend. And yet, he had measured up, Yeah he was quite alright he thought as finally sleep crept upon him.
The morning found the trio in the Great Hall discussing the lesson they had with Snape in the evening and Hermione unconsciously found her eyes wandering to the Slytherin table. Harry caught the look and grinned at her meaningfully, while nudging her to bring her attention back to the conversation.
Soon the day sped past with their regular classes and Hermione found herself commenting "It must be so boring for Draco to be stuck in the rooms by himself during the day" to Harry at lunchtime. Harry nodded and replied "Yes I can imagine…I am sure that in his place I would have gone stir crazy, perhaps he should just return to classes."
"You mean with the resorting and all?" Hermione whispered as Harry vigorously nodded and asked "Did he think about it all?". Hermione bit her lip and slowly shook her head in the negative "with everything that happened in between there was simply no time to discuss this" she confessed sadly.
"Yeah…if everything had gone according to plan he would have been back in the classes a long while ago. 'You-Know-Who' messed up the plans didn't he?" Harry said while playing on the word pun eliciting a surprised look from Hermione. "You and Ginny…when did you change so much" she asked in wonder. Harry laughed and retorted "probably at the same time you did. You do realize that you are in the process of change right? What with the God of pratness himself?" he teased.
Hermione laughed back and she turned to admonish Ron on his messy table manners. Soon they were done and it was time to finish the rest of the classes for the day. At the end of the day they once again found themselves walking down to the dungeons to find Draco opening the door with a smile on his face.
Harry and Ron were stunned and Ron said as much exclaiming "Hermione what did you do to him? He is actually smiling…never knew he could do that" he teased as Draco scowled. Harry was quick to comment on the scowl too as he said "Now that is the Draco we all know and love" as Draco jumped in with an indignant "hey!." "Even you guys are welcome after being alone for the whole day" he grumbled as they settled on the couch to wait for Snape to come.
Soon they heard the door open as Snape entered and headed to the couch. "I will ask the elves to deliver some snacks and then we can get to the lessons" he said without preamble and proceeded to order tea and cookies for everyone. Once everyone had started on the cookies and tea he addressed them saying "I thought we could try a wandless protego. It is very important that you learn to shield yourself effectively. Under normal circumstance I would have followed the school curriculum but now I am afraid we should just attempt to learn what could save our lives out there" he said simply before turning to Harry. " have you talked to ?" he asked.
"Yes sir, she has agreed to be my anchor" Harry affirmed as he asked "So when do we the do the ritual professor?".Snape looked thoughtful for a moment before answering "We will have to remove the bond that Draco has with me before getting into the ritual. Assuming that the headmaster is free I will endeavor to sever the bond tomorrow and provided that there are no lasting effects from it, we can do the anchoring ritual the day after. Does that sound acceptable to you all?" he questioned the teenagers.
They nodded as Harry muttered "the sooner the better…but what if you are summoned before then Sir?" he asked gravely. Snape nodded to himself looking thoughtful "It is a distinct possibility; I cannot deny that, purely because it has been a long time since the last summons. It is also important that you be aware that the vinculum potion will be completed from my side in the next two days. It would have been completed even earlier but then I have extended it to give us time to enact the counter which I will start brewing this evening after our session."
"Will you be able to finish the potion on time Sir?" Ron asked in a worried tone. "Don't worry the reason the Dark Lord's potion took a long time was that I took advantage of his ignorance and started brewing only two days earlier. We needed the time to research an antidote and this was a way that I could ensure we had time. For your sakes, I hope he summons me later than the day after and not before, and even if he does, I will come up with something. Anyway let us worry about that later and get onto our lesson shall we?" Snape said getting up.
The others followed Snape to the living where all the furniture had been banished to the side. Snape then addressed the trio "Draco has already tried the levitation charm but unfortunately we don't have the time to do that now. So let us go onto the shield charm. Please form a line so that you can try casting one after another. I will be on the other side and cast stinging hexes at you and you will attempt to shield yourself from it. Now get into position" he said in teacher mode, just without the anger which was really too mind boggling considering that this was Snape.
They fell into a line with Harry in front and Draco bringing up the rear. He stood with his wand extended and waited for Snape to give instructions. "Potter lay your wand down" Snape said and waited for Harry to put down his wand. "Now visualize your hand as an extension of your wand. Now close your eyes and concentrate on the magic pooled in your stomach and will it to move across your chest, your shoulders and into your arms" he instructed as Harry closed his eyes and followed the instructions.
"Tell me when you can feel the magic in your arms" he said and waited for Harry to nod signalling his readiness. "For now, you may call out the incantation softly and will the magic in your arms to burst out of your fingertips. Convince yourself that the opponent's hex cannot reach you. Imagine that you are in a cocoon and there is a sheath around you that is protecting you from the hexes. Alright? Now I am going to try and hit you with the stinging hex and you will shield" Snape called out as Harry opened his eyes and nodded to show that he was ready.
Snape shot the stinging hex just as Harry whispered "Protego" and pointed his hand at Snape. Nothing however happened as the stinging hex grazed his forearm bringing a reflex hiss of pain to his lips. He shook his hand to relax the muscles before taking the stance again "Can I try again Sir?" he asked his face screwed up in concentration.
Snape gave a short nod and assumed his stance. "Just give me a minute to get ready Sir" Harry requested. Snape kept silent as Harry closed his eyes and concentrated on the feel of the magic in his hand. He could feel the heaviness centred in his forearm and proceeded to imagine a sheath around himself. He thought of a warm cocoon and quickly nodded to Snape to cast again.
This time Harry was ready. He willed the magic to flow out of his hand and there was a collective gasp as a wisp of what looked like a blue light floated out of his hand and flattened itself over his body. The hex grazed off the sheath and even though the sheath was not strong enough to totally deflect the hex it definitely lessened the impact.
Harry let a small smile play on his face as Snape acknowledged the effort with a quick nod. "Good effort Potter but far from what we want. Now let the others have their turn." He said. Harry stepped aside to let Ron try his hand followed by the others. At the end of two hours of intense practice Harry and Draco had decent shields while Hermione and Ron had only wisps though all of them sported a great deal of grazes from the stinging hexes.
Snape got a salve for the grazes and immediately Draco took it from his hand and led Hermione softly to the couch. With tenderness that no one could believe Draco to be capable of; he applied the salve to the cuts on her arms. Harry grinned with a twinkle in his eye as Hermione blushed furiously and took the cream to tend to Draco in turn.
"How touching" Harry quipped as Draco glared. Harry laughed as he gestured to the cream in Hermione's hand "Mione I do believe we were your friends first…this is not fair" he said in a false whine as Ron also joined in the false complaint. Hermione laughed and beckoned him and Ron over as she fussed over them too.
"I do believe that all this saccharine is getting a bit much, no?" Snape drawled as the teenagers blushed and hurriedly got to their feet. "I would say that the three of you could get to dinner and go to your dorms as we dissolve my bond with Draco, but I doubt that you would listen. So instead of arguing over this, maybe you could summon your elf friend Potter and ask for some dinner to be delivered for us as I talk to Dumbledore over the floo. Now Potter if you will" he directed and made his way to the floo.
As Harry summoned Dobby and conveyed his request, Snape had asked Dumbledore to step through and in a few minutes Dumbledore had joined them. After going through the pleasantries, during which the food had got consumed, he gestured for Draco and Snape to step forward.
The other three stepped to the side giving them a wide berth. Dumbledore swished his wand and conjured a circle on the floor around which he started to incant runic structures. Harry took Hermione's hand as her heart started to race. The last time they did something like this she had an unconscious duo on her hands and this time also they were not sure of the results.
As Dumbledore continued his incantations the air became heavy with magic and soon they saw a thread of light exit from Draco's chest and hover in the air before entering the potions professor's chest. By this time both of them had sunk to their knees and were taking ragged breaths. There was a fine sheath of sweat on Draco's face and he was unusually pale. The only sound in the room was Ron's awed "blimey!"
As Dumbledore stopped his incantation and conjured a chair for himself, Hermione rushed to Draco's side as Harry went to Snape. "Get the strengthening potion from the cupboard in the dining room Potter" Snape gasped. Motioning for Ron to be at Snape's side Harry rushed to get the bottles. He handed one to Snape while he handed another to Hermione.
The wizards downed the potion and immediately the color in their faces became better. Soon they were sitting up straight. "Perhaps you both can order a bit of hot chocolate and retire to bed as we make our way out" Dumbledore suggested.
"Yes that seems to be a good idea" Snape agreed as he and Draco got to their feet. Hermione still had a hand on his arm to stabilize him although he no longer needed it. She quickly gave him a short hug and bade him good night and the trio made their way out of the dungeons .Dumbledore took the floo having also bid good night.
"So I take it that you and Miss Granger are a couple"? Snape enquired sipping on his hot chocolate. Draco took a sip from his mug and answered with a nod "yes I asked her. I hope you have no objections?" he enquired tentatively. A rare smile graced Snape's features "no Draco you made a wise choice. With her you can never go wrong" he said and then added as an afterthought "Now if I ever hear you repeat that, you will be scrubbing cauldrons for the rest of your life".
Draco laughed and got to his feet yawning "I guess I better get to bed. Are you going to work on the potion now?" he asked seriously not even wanting to think about the vinculum potion. It had been a good few hours without the potion hanging over their heads and it had been an enjoyable time but now it was back to haunt him. Snape nodded and Draco asked "So are we doing the ritual tomorrow?" his face becoming shadowed.
"Yes Draco better to do so at the earliest. But do not worry about it now. Let's take one step at a time. Once the ritual is done I also need you to think about getting back to classes. We will discuss that at breakfast but I do hope you have thought about resorting. However that is a discussion for later, now get to bed" he said making his way to his potions lab.
"The following day was going to be a tension filled one in a series of tension filled days" Draco thought when another thought hit him and brought a smile to his face "but the one redeeming thing right now in his life was Hermione". The very thought of her made him feel warm knowing that there was one soul out there who would fight for him, feel for him and dare he say? Love him.
Author notes: Thank you for sticking with me through the delays…I will definitely try to put up chapters regularly. In the meantime I invite you to check out another fic of mine called For Me which is more Harry centric. Thanks once again and needless to say, the more the reviews the more the chapters! Can't help it, it seems to be a law of nature in the fanfiction world.!