Fallout

"You can say I told you."

"I told you so."

"Tonks!"

"He said I could say it."

"That doesn't mean you have to," Hermione huffed.

Tonks rolled her eyes. "It didn't hurt him. Harry doesn't care what I say, do you, Harry?"

"No," he mumbled, barely listening to their conversation as he paced back and forth across the Viaduct in the bright sunshine.

This was awful. Terrible. Rotten. And whatever other synonyms he could come up with. He'd just outed a friend's secret, forcing that same friend as well as the only father figure he had left to answer questions from the government. He dreaded to think of the purpose of the tribunal. Umbridge had already seen to it that werewolves could barely find employment. What more could they do?

"I have to stop this," he said aloud.

Hermione seized that and ran with it, following his pacing. "That's exactly what you should do. Make it clear they went against your wishes and you don't support this at all. You could do another interview in the Quibbler, and we could start a letter-writing campaign—it's clearly going to be unpopular. How they think they can get away with this—"

"They already did," interjected Tonks. "It's a done deal. They're not going to rescind it if you change your mind."

"But if enough people protest, they'll be forced to," argued Hermione. "Politicians live and breathe by public opinion."

Tonks, who'd been reclining on the balustrade, sat up, swinging her legs down. "The public is scared, Hermione. I may have been a kid the last time Voldemort was in power, but I remember what it was like. You don't. People want a strong leader, and sadly some are more than willing to give up some of their rights to ensure that. Scrimgeour's very popular at the moment. Not to mention, this won't negatively affect the majority of the population. So they have to carry around a piece of paper. Big deal. Everyone's looking out for number one now."

Her hands on her hips, Hermione approached the Auror. "Why don't you care more? You do realize this will affect you more than most, being a Metamorphmagus." Tonks shrugged.

"She's right," Ron said. Harry, thinking he agreed with Hermione, received a surprise at his next words. "It's a terrible idea, Hermione. Harry's going to look like a giant prat if he starts whining about something he approved not a week ago. Sorry, mate."

"No, don't be," said Harry. He tilted his head toward the sun, closing his eyes and basking in the soothing warmth on his face. A refrain of stupid, stupid, stupid echoed around his aching head. "I screwed up. I was stupid to trust the Ministry, but I did, and now I have to own up to my mistakes."

"I wondered when he would start this," Hermione said to Ron.

"I'm surprised it took this long," he replied.

"What are you talking about?" Harry asked, looking from one to the other.

Tonks spoke up. "I believe they're referencing your tendency to lay all the blame for anything bad on yourself. Now you're going to explain exactly why you think it's so."

"Well, I" Harry faced the three, feeling trapped. Arms crossed, Ron stood near Hermione to one side. She gazed at Harry steadily. Some feet away Tonks still draped herself on the balustrade, one leg hanging languidly while she wore a knowing smirk. "Well, that's just—if I hadn't—they never—"

"It's not, you did, and they would."

Harry blinked. "How did you know what I was going to say?" Tonks' smirk broadened, and she lifted one shoulder in a subtle shrug. A tendril of amusement wound its way through the gloom fogging Harry's mind.

Hermione cleared her throat with a rather pointed look toward both of them. "The point is you hadn't any idea they would take it this far, so you can't say it's your fault."

"But they did," Harry argued. "With my name attached."

To his surprise Ron barked out a laugh. "Getting a big head, mate. I think you're overestimating your pull. The Ministry will do what it wants, and they would have found some other way to do it without you. Like Tonks said, it's already done."

"Harry, they played you, plain and simple," added Tonks.

"You would know," Ron muttered under his breath, although everyone heard clearly enough.

A hush fell over the group, broken only by the distant chirp of a bird, hopeful for the new spring. Harry stared at his friend, who avoided his gaze and scuffed his worn shoes. Hermione, too, stared at him, her brown eyes round. Tonks herself seemed unaffected, the slight flush in her cheeks as she studied her fingernails the only evidence she'd heard the slight.

Harry's immediate reaction was to defend her, to proclaim what happened between them was the business of no one else. But the words died in his throat, suddenly wondering why he was always rising to the defense of one who was willing to drop him by the wayside.

As it happened, Tonks was the one to speak first. "Since that's been taken care of," she began, leaving no clues as to what she referenced, "the only question remaining is where you go from here, Harry."

No shit, he thought to himself with some sense of dry humor. "You think I should fire back," he said to Hermione.

"You have to stand up to them."

"Ron, you think I shouldn't do a thing." Ron nodded. "And what do you think, Tonks?"

She turned the question over for a moment. "I think it's your life and your choice to get involved with the Ministry and your decision where you go from here. If it were me, I'd like to think I would take it in stride and move on, but chances are I would run my mouth and find myself out of a job. But I won't tell you what to do."

Not any longer, huh? Harry nodded, resuming the pacing he didn't remember stopping. He spoke to the air, trusting everyone could hear him. "Ron's right. It's my mistake. If anyone asks me—and I expect the owls will be busy—I'll tell them how I feel, but that's it. Consider it a lesson learned— never trust bloody politicians, and read everything."

"Good on you." Tonks jumped off the balustrade, one trainer slipping when she landed before righting herself. "Must go, mates. Duty calls and all."

"Are you allowed back to work?" Harry asked.

She snorted. "Pfft. Beaky says I'm 'making progress toward honesty', but she won't tell me what that means. No, just my normal duties."

Ron, looking confused at the reference, spoke up. "Since Malfoy's gone, why do they still have you guarding Hogwarts?"

Harry answered, "Because Malfoy was proof Hogwarts is threatened."

Tonks held one finger to her nose, pointing at Harry. "Right you are, and so I'm off. Don't worry too much, Harry, this will blow over like anything else." She nudged him when she left, sharing a grin until their gazes passed.

Harry leaned over the balustrade, looking out at the Scottish landscape. Majestic and permanent, it had a calming effect. This wasn't the end of the world. It wasn't his first mistake, nor his worst. Nor the last, he suspected. Time to move on.

"Harry." Ron stood beside him.

"Yeah?"

"You shouldn't let her walk all over you."

Harry turned. "Who, Tonks? I don't."

"Then why was she the first person you thought of?" Ron let that hang for a beat. "You did the entire time you were together, and you still do. How come you act like nothing has changed when it has?"

"We're still friends," Harry said, a feeble defense.

"And who decided that? Who decided everything?"

Harry didn't think Ron expected an answer, and that was good, for the longer they went, the more he realized that while he had one, he didn't want to admit it.

As predicted, Harry was soon swamped with mail, the enclosed opinions varying wildly. He wrote a strongly worded letter to Sanjay (helped in large part by Hermione) revoking his partnership with the Ministry in no uncertain terms, and he also wrote to Remus. To his chagrin, Remus' letter on the day of the Ministry announcement was purely coincidental, making no mention of the new legislation, and his reply to Harry's letter was blameless.

It is almost a relief that the Ministry's long-standing prejudice against werewolves issolidified, out in the open as opposed to occasionally hidden behind a facade of emptypromises and carefully worded legislation by people such as Dolores Umbridge, Remuswrote, but I fear it will drive more and more into Fenrir Greyback's leadership andVoldemort's camp, making my task that much more difficult and dangerous.

Cue the guilt.

As it turned out, not unexpectedly, Eric remained the major reminder of what Harry continued to insist was his mistake. The Slytherin refused all Harry's attempts at apology and went out of his way to avoid him, culminating in Harry cornering him with the help of the Marauder's Map after dinner.

Hermione, who accompanied him while Ron and Lavender disappeared to what Harry assumed was their thorough investigation of Hogwarts' broom closets, shuffled uncomfortably in the cold corridor near the Slytherin dungeons. "Harry, I don't think this is—"

"There they are," he interrupted.

Eric, Daphne, and Tracey Davis rounded a corner, the girls laughing at something while Eric scowled. Tracey was the first to spot the Gryffindors.

"What are you doing so far from home, Granger?" she jeered. "Pulled your nose out of a book and found yourself lost?"

"Shut up, Tracey," Eric ordered. He nodded at Hermione as he passed, pointedly ignoring Harry.

"Granger."

"Eric, wait," Hermione called reluctantly after Harry sent her a pleading look. "Please?"

He stopped, shoulders tensed, and waited for a moment before waving for the girls to go on.

"What?"

"Come on, Eric," Harry said quickly. "I didn't know they were going to do this."

"Oh, you didn't know. That changes everything."

"You can't blame Harry for this. They would have done it without him."

Eric laughed harshly. "Don't you get it? Everyone is going to know about me now. They'll know I'm a—I'm a monster. I don't care what you meant—you're a part of it."

"You're not a monster," Harry and Hermione said at the same time.

"You don't know anything about it!" he snapped, a vein bulging in his neck. "You don't know what it's like, so quit trying and piss off."

He strode in the direction of the entrance to the Slytherin dormitory, hands clenching repeatedly. Hermione bit her lip.

"Just go, Harry. I'll talk to him. Go," she repeated firmly when he tried to protest.

Harry watched her run after Eric, laying a hand on his arm to halt his exit. He stopped, so there was that. Harry mused on their odd friendship as he trudged back to his own dormitory. What a strange pair, the Slytherin werewolf son of a Death Eater and the Gryffindor Muggleborn. However unlikely, Hermione seemed to have some sort of rapport with him, and perhaps she could get through to him where Harry couldn't.

However, when she returned, a good amount of time after Harry, she simply told him to give Eric space.

"By forcing the issue, you're making it into a bigger deal than it is," she advised. "Just let it go."

Easy for her to say, Harry thought petulantly, but it was good advice and so he resolved to try to do just that.

"Bansal."

Sanjay Bansal nearly jumped out of his suit, still impeccably pressed even after a very long day, as someone slipped inside the lift right before the doors closed.

"Auror Tonks," he greeted her as the lift began to move. "You startled me."

"Did I?"

She didn't seem inclined to offer any apologies, so Sanjay was rather offended, but he brushed it away. They knew each other only well enough to greet in public, after all. "It's quite alright, I'm sure. Aren't you on permanent assignment in Scotland?"

"Yes. I only came in to take care of my registration."

"Ah, that makes you one of the first. Well done! How did you find the process?"

"As painless as buying a wand." She flashed him a sour smile and waved a small crimson booklet in his direction. "According to the bloke who registered me, I quite possibly may be the only Ministry employee with dual classification."

"Dual?" he echoed, puzzled. "Class A for Ministry of Magic employee, naturally, plus your existing security clearance, but what aha." The light bulb flashed when she raised one lime-colored eyebrow at him. "Class C, of course. Well, ah, you see, it's simply a formality. One can't expect special privileges simply because one works for the Ministry."

"Of course."

"Naturally, we trust our employees."

Tonks laughed. "That's the second dumbest thing I've heard all month."

"I beg your pardon?" Instead of responding she pulled her wand and aimed it at the control panel, making the lift stop with a lurch. "Now hang on a minute, you can't do that!"

"Strange, cos I just did." The Auror took a step closer. "Now let's talk about the dumbest thing I've heard all month. Want to guess what that is?" She waved her registration booklet again. "This is going to backfire on you so badly you'll wish you never pulled your head far enough out of Scrimgeour's arse to think of it."

Sanjay pulled himself up with a noise of outrage. "Auror Tonks, I must insist you—"

"Oh shut up, would you? I'm not here to complain about the registration. I go running my mouth too much and I'll be labeled as a subversive, get my employment terminated, and wind up under surveillance by my own former coworkers, who are not nearly as good as I am at that task, by the way. As it is, I'm probably on a list already."

Sanjay was glad for the dark tone of his skin, hoping his flush couldn't be seen. How did she know that? Her own fault for mixing in with that Order of the Phoenix lot last year.

"No, I'm here to talk about Harry Potter." She shook her head, letting a wry smile slip out. "I have to hand it to you, Bansal. You played him like a trumpet, earning his trust, letting him think he was doing something against Voldemort." Sanjay sputtered, and she rolled her eyes. "Grow up. It's just a name. Not even his real name—I mean, who would name a baby Voldemort? Anyway, my point is, you shouldn't have messed with Harry."

"Are you threatening me, Tonks?" Sanjay asked, not bothering to hide his scorn. He was Junior Assistant to the Minister of Magic himself.

"Of course not. I'm not that daft. Think of this as merely a friendly warning. You took advantage of someone who was only trying to do good, and that will come back to bite you in your perfectly starched Y-fronts. It's karma, innit?"

"I did no such thing," he protested stiffly, straightening his tie. "Potter's a good chap and I mean him no ill will. It's certainly disagreeable he no longer wishes to support the Ministry in its efforts against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, but one cannot let a falling out stand in the way of progress. I was always upfront with him, and it was his choice to work with us."

Leaning against one wall of the lift in an indolent pose Sanjay found as intolerable as anything she'd said, Tonks scoffed. "In order to become a lackey, did you have to go to some sort of school where you had self-righteous bullshit shoved down your throat so you can regurgitate it at will?"

"You must be one of the crassest people I've ever had to misfortune to encounter," he replied with as much dignity as he could muster.

"Thank you."

"That was not a compliment."

"Of course it was."

"You are an infuriating creature," he snapped, irked out of his normal composure. "Why do you care about Harry Potter so much?"

She shrugged. "I've known Harry for years. His godfather was my cousin, you know. I'm—quite fond of him."

He thought she was going to say something else, and Sanjay glanced at her sharply.

She didn't notice his scrutiny. "It's not as if he'll get the opportunity to tell you off himself. Don't worry, we'll all fall into line like good sheep and get our registrations and wave them around anytime someone barks at us, but mark my words, Bansal, you'll get yours someday."

She restarted the lift, apparently finished with her rant. They rode in silence, and it wasn't until the doors opened again that Sanjay deigned to speak to her again.

"I'm surprised. I wouldn't have supposed Potter to be the vengeful type."

Already halfway out, Tonks turned. "Harry? He isn't." Then her lips curled in a rather unpleasant smile. "But I wasn't talking about him."

Try Harry did, but when he found himself in the Shrieking Shack late one night getting whacked repeatedly by Burke's wooden rapier, he suspected he wasn't trying hard enough.

"Pay. Attention. And. Focus. Boy!" Burke challenged, hitting him with each word. Harry lashed out subconsciously on the last, blocking Burke's thrust with his own sword. "Ah, there you go," Burke said with grudging approval, finally ceasing his attack and stepping back. "You can do it, I see, so why do you dither?"

Harry's head ached. His arms ached, his torso ached, his hands ached. He ached. He stretched, rolling the sore muscles of his shoulder and back. "I have a lot on my mind."

"It must be very important to distract you from the task of staying alive." Burke's voice dripped with sarcasm.

"I'm sorry, okay? It's just—never mind. You don't care."

"No, I don't. The only thing I care about in this dingy room is teaching you what I know, and the only thing you should be concerned with in my presence is learning. That's it. I'm not here to be your friend or confidant or mentor. You begged me to work with you, so I am. Now focus and learn, damn it."

"Yes, sir," Harry retorted with no small amount of his own sarcasm.

If Burke's training hadn't been useful, Harry would have been more than happy to call an end to their sessions, for the elderly man was irascible and unpleasant company, but the fact remained that it was useful. Between Burke and Dumbledore, Harry had begun to develop a more intuitive understanding of magic, aware of every single action and thought when he touched his wand. He pulled the rapier up into a proper stance, waiting for Burke to copy. Focus. Focus focus focus. Burke and the sword, not Eric's understandable angst or how good Tonks looked in the tight trousers she wore yesterday or the seamless manner in which his Quidditch team flew together or Dennis Creevey disarming Luna—no. Focus.

For a moment Burke settled into a defensive position, but just as Harry struck he stepped aside and shook his head. "Your head is still somewhere else. And here I was thinking you were ready to return to wands. Okay, shut up and listen, boy, because I'm going to give you one chance. I am fully aware you are a teenager and as such require a certain amount of what's the word 'angst' to survive, and Merlin knows you have more than enough to get on with. Whatever it is, it stays out there." He pointed at the door. "If you half-arse your way through this, you'll half-arse it later when it matters, and then this entire venture would end up being a waste of my time. Time these creaky old bones would rather be in bed. I don't care if you got bitten by a werewolf on your way here, if your Auror girlie let you touch her tits for the first time—"

Harry coughed, almost choking. Now there was something he'd never expected to hear out of Burke's mouth.

"—or if the Dark Lord himself waits outside the door to strike you down, you give me all of your attention or I will walk away without one single guilty thought on my conscience. Understood, boy?"

Harry scowled. "I hate it when you call me that."

"Good. Channel that frustration and let's see if you're even remotely worth my time." Burke drew up his rapier, cocking it slightly. "You may leave after you've beaten me. I expect we'll be here all night."

Harry's mouth curled in a grim smile. He'd see about that. Use his frustration? He had plenty.

As much as he didn't want to admit it, Burke's advice helped. Harry woke up the next morning refreshed and ready to move on. Their duel the previous night had drained him of all his aggravation, and he was eager to start anew.

"Good morning!" he greeted Parvati as he sat next to her at the table for breakfast.

She raised her eyebrows. "Someone overdosed on his cheering charm this morning."

He laughed, nudging her playfully. "Am I not allowed to be in a good mood?"

"I wouldn't say not allowed, exactly." She sidestepped the question, exchanging an amused glance with Katie Bell as one passed jam to the other. "Simply unexpected. I'm not complaining. It's— well, it looks good on you."

"Good. I'll try to keep it that way, then."

He grinned at her, and Parvati's smile widened.

His cheerful disposition continued for the rest of the day. McGonagall gave him ten points for first giving Ron a bushy mustache that rivaled Uncle Vernon's and then removing it, leaving Ron's face as smooth as a baby's, and Snape found nothing to quibble about in Harry's essay on lethifolds, instead glowering at him for having the gall to be right. By dinner he felt nothing could ruin the day, though he cautiously warned himself that was generally the moment when something did.

"Well done, everyone," he told his assembled Quidditch team after a brief practice. "I think that it's for today. We can't get any better than we are now."

"Quit, Harry, you're making us blush," quipped Demelza.

"Are you letting us go in time for dinner?" Jimmy asked with mock amazement. "Quick, run before he changes his mind!"

Harry laughed; they liked to tease him about his dictatorial ways, but he and Katie knew he was nothing compared to Oliver Wood.

Ron, Lavender, and Parvati had watched the practice from the stands and walked back with Harry. Several yards in front of them were Ginny, Ritchie, and Jimmy, and Ron gave the trio a long look before deciding they were harmless.

"Cho and a few other Ravenclaws came to watch you," he remarked to Harry, who shrugged.

"Good."

"Good? They're spying!"

"We've nothing to hide. I'm not Oliver with his squiggly diagrams nor Angelina with her trick plays. Let Cho see how good we are. Maybe she'll be intimidated."

"You used to go out with her, right?" Parvati asked.

He shrugged again. "For about five minutes, last year. We don't even talk now."

"Not at all?" Lavender raised her eyebrows. "You must not have liked her very much to begin with, then."

"I don't know. I fancied her enough, I suppose." Mystified, Harry glanced at Ron, who appeared just as confused, but then Lavender whispered in Ron's ear and he was soon otherwise occupied.

The couple slowed, heads bent intimately, until Harry and Parvati were walking by themselves. He looked back, struck by a pang of jealousy.

"Sorry about her," Parvati said out of nowhere. "I don't know why she said that."

"Yeah, that was weird," Harry admitted, drawing a smile. "There wasn't much between Cho and I, honestly. Ron and Hermione had more between them than we did, and they never even kissed."

"Oh." Parvati fell quiet, looking at her hands until they reached the castle. "Tell me the truth, Harry: does Ron still fancy Hermione?"

Out of respect, he took time to think about it instead of immediately denying it. "No, I think both of them have moved on. I honestly do. At one point I thought they were sure to get together, but I think that's passed."

"Good," Parvati said strongly before blushing. "I mean, I wouldn't have cared before if they dated, but now Lavender really likes Ron, and she's my best friend. I don't want to see her hurt. That— yeah."

He had an inkling of what she abruptly cut off, and he searched for something to say in place of awkward silence. "Ron's my best mate, too. They seem to be working. And speaking of our best mates, where "

They were alone, the aforementioned couple having made a disappearance worthy of silent apparition. Parvati giggled. "Ron's such a hypocrite, always giving Ginny grief about Dean and running off with Lavender in the next moment to you know."

"Yeah," Harry agreed. "You're a good friend, you know that? Not just for caring about Lavender, but other people, too. Like forgiving me when I muck things up over and over."

"What?" She looked at him with brown eyes full of surprise. When had they stopped walking?

"Harry, what do you mean?"

He ran a hand through his hair. "You really are. The Yule Ball, when we dated—I've taken advantage of you over and over, and you still seem to care for some reason. It's remarkable."

She was very close. "Of course I care about you, Harry."

"You do?"

So close. "And you've never taken advantage of me. I've always known exactly where I stand with you."

"You have?"

Mere inches. "And it's okay with me, it truly is."

The kiss wasn't entirely a surprise, given her increasing proximity, but the feeling behind it, the look she gave him after—nothing was like the shy girl he remembered from last fall. As she said, she knew how he felt, and she didn't care that it didn't match with her own feelings. She wanted him. Unlike some people.

She was leaning in again for another kiss, and for a moment Harry wavered. It didn't matter that she wasn't tall enough and her hair wasn't pink enough and her eyes weren't gray enough and her skin wasn't warm enough and her perfume wasn't citrus enough and Parvati wasn't Tonks enough. It didn't matter.

Yet it did, utterly and completely.

"I can't," he said, turning his face so her lips brushed his cheek again. "I'm sorry."

She didn't move away. "Are you sure? I—I want this."

"I can't hook up with you if I'm not into it. Not again. You deserve better than that."

"Why don't you let me decide what I deserve?" she said, devoid of rancor but not quite of hurt, although she clearly tried to hide it.

"No, it's not right. I'm so sorry, Parvati. I wish it were different, I do." He ran a hand through his hair, wishing he could change his feelings for the sweet, uncomplicated girl in front of him.

She sighed heavily, placing a reassuring hand on his chest. "Don't worry about it, Harry. Please don't. I took a chance and it didn't work out. You have nothing to be sorry for."

"You're far too nice for me."

"Rather," she agreed.

He chuckled. "How can you make a joke?"

"Some of us don't mope around every time we get disappointed," she shot back playfully.

Harry held his hands up in surrender. "Point taken, and I stand by what I said: far too nice. Shall we go to dinner now, I suppose?"

"Yes. And Harry? Let's pretend this never happened, yeah?"

Somewhat embarrassed, neither had anything to say, and so the laugh that rang out around the next corner was clearly audible as well as being clearly recognizable to Harry. Without thinking about it, he sped up, turning into the corridor to find the person he knew to be there. The person with her, however, was a surprise.

Tonks reclined against a wall, apparently laughing at something Eric Rosier had said. He leaned on one arm that rested next to her head. It was a harmless pose but intimate enough that Harry unwittingly frowned.

"Potter," Eric drawled with a smirk. He jerked a nod at Parvati.

Harry automatically kept walking, hoping his face wasn't flushing as much as it felt. By the onceover Tonks gave him, it was. He met her eyes as they passed, and though pleasantries were exchanged, he couldn't have said of what those consisted. All he knew was that her eyes were appropriately green today, a green that reflected the emotion that flashed briefly but strongly while she returned his gaze.

Jealous. She was jealous.

Confusion assaulted Harry with every step. How could she choose not to be with him and demonstrate jealousy over another girl at the same time? How was that fair to anyone? He couldn't figure out for the life of him what made her tick, and he was nearly tired of trying.

"I'll catch up with you," he told Parvati suddenly, reeling around without waiting for an answer.

Tonks and Eric had departed the corridor they'd previously occupied, and it took him a moment to find the Auror, alone, strolling in the direction from where Harry and Parvati had come.

"Tonks! Hey, wait up."

She hesitated noticeably before pivoting on her heel, wearing a seemingly carefree smile.

"Wotcher, Harry. Do you need something?"

"Do I need something?" he echoed. "I can't simply say hi?"

"Sure you can, but you just saw me."

"Right." He hated feeling awkward with her. "Um, I didn't know you and Eric were friendly."

"We talked a few times at Christmas and such, and I happened to run into him just now. He's funny." Harry nodded, not even sure why he'd chased her down. Tonks noticed his reluctance to speak and misinterpreted it. "Don't feel like you have to talk to me every time we see each other, Harry, especially if you have someone waiting on you."

His eyes snapped up at that, missing her gaze but not her inflection. "You're jealous," he accused.

"Of what?" she said quickly and rather snidely.

'Of who' was the expected response, and the change reinforced his belief she knew exactly who and what. "Never mind," he snapped. "I have to go. See you later."

"Harry?" Her voice met his back. "Are you angry with me?"

"Why would I be angry?" he replied without stopping.

His question required a response no more than hers had, and both knew it.

What was wrong with her? And for that matter, what was wrong with him, that he continued to let it get to him? To let her get to him. He shook his head. He had a girl with more than her share of desirable attributes who wanted to be with him, yet he spent his time hung up on someone who didn't know what she wanted. What kind of idiot took his already complicated life and made it that much more so? The kind looking at me in the mirror, he mused.

To his surprise, Parvati remained exactly where he had left her, wearing the expression of one for whom the proverbial light bulb had just gone off. "It's her!" she gasped when Harry was close.

"Who? What? Er, who?"

"The Auror. Tonks. She's the one you've been after all this time. Merlin's beard! I can't believe I didn't see it until now." Her eyes grew impossibly wide.

"Oh" Harry's lungs deflated like balloons stuck with pins, sighing in a long hiss. "Well, yes. She's the one."

Parvati was on the verge of explosion. "A secret romance? How delicious!" she squealed, thankfully muted, before dropping into a frown. "But—you and I, just now—what "

Harry studied her, but only for a moment. She was, as he'd informed her, a very good friend.

"Come with me."

Sitting cross-legged in a secluded passageway behind a tapestry, Harry told Parvati nearly the entire story of his relationship with Tonks, leaving out only her reason for breaking up with him. That was her private business.

"And despite everything, when we're together, I think—I know our feelings haven't changed. It makes me want to hit my head against a wall," he finished, smacking his fist on the stone ground for emphasis. "It's just one big sodding mess, isn't it?"

"And then some. Blimey," Parvati said. "What a bitch."

Harry blinked. "What?"

"Who made her the relationship dictator, that she can say when you're together and when you aren't without so much as a by-your-leave? You said she still cares for you—"

"She does," he murmured, more to himself than Parvati.

"But all she does is jerk you around and send mixed signals. What a bitch."

"Hey!" he protested. "Wait a second."

She shook her head, sending her long hair twirling. "And you keep defending her. I wish I could inspire that kind of devotion in someone."

Harry's face warmed. "It's only—you don't understand. Sometimes when we're together, it's like the rest of the world doesn't exist. She can make me forget about everything just by smiling. Her laugh—Merlin, it's so loud and uninhibited, but there's not another sound like it in the world. You only know the bad parts; there's no way I could ever properly describe the good. She drives me crazy, in every meaning of the word." Feeling like he'd revealed pieces of himself previously hidden from the outside world, Harry made himself stop.

When Parvati's voice broke the silence, it was soft, tentative. "You love her, don't you?"

He nodded, trusting her to pick up the gesture despite the dim light.

"Then that just makes it worse." Her voice grew stronger, fueled by what he was startled to recognize was righteous indignation. "Because I know—and remember this is coming from someone who was trying to snog you not half an hour ago—that if I had that from you—from anyone—it would break my heart to throw it away like that. If she can't see what you have, if she can't see that dragging it out like this is only making it worse, than perhaps she's right. She doesn't deserve you at all."

Now would have been the point for Harry to jump in and protest, but he found himself unable. Mixed in with Parvati's impassioned words were that of another, of Harry himself, bitter and furious, standing in a fuzzy replica of the Shrieking Shack while figures around faded and materialized according to the whims of his dream. That night, tossing and turning in sleep while his mind feverishly worked overtime, he had definitely been angry with Tonks.

Which made Parvati's next sentence all the more stark in contrast. Pushing herself to a standing position, she gazed down at his still-seated form with something like sadness on her face. "And the most amazing part is that you aren't angry with her, not even a little bit."

Harry and Parvati managed to catch a late dinner before the Great Hall closed for the night. Ron had once proposed open dining hours, allowing students to come and go for meals at their leisure. Hermione had been appalled at the increase that would cause in the workload of the Hogwarts' house-elves, and she wasn't mollified one bit when Harry told Ron that if he was hungry at an odd time, he could always sneak into the kitchen and get food straight from the source.

Harry didn't know what he ate that night. The act was mechanical, more muscle memory than need for sustenance. Of far more interest were his conversations with Tonks and Parvati, eating away at him until he was full not of food but of restless aggravation. He needed to get it out, and there was only one place for that.

There was, as it always had been, only one person.

He didn't know what he said to Parvati nor the path he took to get there, but by the time he stood in front of Tonks' door to her quarters, the latent anger that he'd been suppressing for more than a month came boiling to the surface.

Tonks opened the door, furrowing her brow when she saw who it was. "Harry, what are—"

He stepped inside, forcing her to move aside, and then everything came tumbling out. "You know what? I lied. I am angry. I am so angry because I can't be angry at you. I can't forget about you. And Merlin knows I have tried, I've tried until I'm blue in the face."

Eyes widening, she tried to speak, but once started, he refused to stop.

"But you? You don't get to be angry. You broke up with me," he snapped, pointing a finger. "You were the one who walked away, and I'm stuck here trying to get over you, which is pretty damn impossible because despite everything, I'm still in love with you!"

At that fervent, unplanned, so very important declaration, Tonks jerked as if she'd been struck, one hand twitching toward him involuntarily as some noise escaped her mouth, cut off just as quickly. If there were more than two people in the universe at that moment, Harry didn't know. He moved closer, his heart pounding so fiercely it hurt.

His mouth had never been drier. "And and and that's the first time I've ever said that aloud to you. That's the first time I've said that to anyone, which is a big deal. And—and I think I'm going to stop talking now."

"Okay," Tonks mumbled, unable to shake the expression of one who'd been slapped.

They continued to stare at each other, chests heaving in unison, until an unknown third party cleared his or her throat. Harry twitched so hard his hand reached for his wand, and even Tonks, whose quarters they occupied, jumped.

"Hello, Harry," Andromeda Tonks said from the sofa, looking nearly as uncomfortable as he felt.

"Oh, hello," he responded automatically, his voice a somewhat higher pitch than normal. "You have company. I didn't realize."

"Mum came for tea," Tonks said stupidly.

"Indeed I did," the woman in question said through thinned lips. "Harry, I would offer you some, but I don't expect you want to stay."

"No, I think I will I'll just leave you I should go."

"Lovely to see you, dear," she called.

"You as well." Tonks hadn't budged, and he faced her once again. "Well, now you know, so—so that's good."

"Yeah, that's good," she echoed.

"So I'll just" He waved his hands at the door in some complicated manner intended to indicate departure.

"Harry?" She took a step closer, then two, an odd caricature of some formal dance. One hand lifted, drifting over his shoulder mere inches away before dropping. "I'll see you later, right?"

He nodded and left.

When later came, Harry knew the bearer of the footsteps behind him without looking. "How'd you know where I was?"

Tonks sat next to him on the edge of the Astronomy Tower. "Tracking spell."

His neck popped when he turned to look at her, stiff from sitting in the night air too long. "Really?"

"No," she said with a credible facsimile of a laugh. "I just knew."

The occasional scuff as Tonks swung her legs or the distant call of some far-off animal provided the only sound. Now that everything was out, Harry didn't know where to begin again.

Best to start with something safe. "Why was your mother here?"

"Checking up on me." She snorted at the look he gave her. "She won't admit it, of course. 'Can't a mother simply want to spend time with her daughter?' " Harry sniggered; as always, Tonks' impressions went well beyond the voice. "No, Mum. No, you can't, not when it's the first time you've visited in the nine months I've been stationed in Scotland." Tonks flicked her eyes in a sidelong glance at Harry. "She read me the riot act after you left, by the way. She doesn't know anything about—us, but after what you said seems I'm not in anyone's good graces at the moment."

"Why is she worried about you?" he asked, furrowing his brow in concern.

"I'm sure it's nothing," she deflected with a careless wave of her hand into the night. "Mostly I reckon she wanted to warn me my cat's about to be homeless. She worked late a few nights ago and came home to find he'd torn up the corner of her favorite Oriental. Jabba gets tetchy when he's hungry." She laughed again, a hollow sound foreign to her lips. Then, out of nowhere: "She thinks I'm unhappy."

"Are you?" Harry asked carefully, edging closer. She jerked her shoulders in an overly elaborate shrug, pursing her lips as if to stop the reply from slipping out. "I think you are." He seized her hand when the words rushed out, sudden and urgent. "I think we've both been unhappy since we broke up. That's why we're still drawn to one another, that's why we have to remind ourselves we're broken up when we're around each other. We're seeking that that thing we used to have, that we can only find in each other. We had it, and you threw it away."

"I—" she began to snap, yanking her hand away, before switching gears. "I lied. Earlier. I was jealous. Am. I am jealous. I know I don't have the right—"

"No, you don't."

"I know, I'm sor–"

"Just—just stop, okay?" Harry burst out, jumping down onto the walkway. He was too on edge to literally be standing there. "I can't stand you like this. This regretful, self-loathing kind of person is not you. You should be loud and in my face and cocky and never, ever apologetic. Seeing you like this, it just makes me even angrier. I wish I could get over you. I truly do. But you, Dora, you came into my life and all but demanded that I fall for you."

"I didn't—"

"I know you didn't mean for it to happen, but it did. It's what you do—you insist the world loves you and fuck off if they don't. I look at you and I wonder why everyone isn't in love with you because I can't see how it's possible not to." He gave a humorless little laugh. "And you knew the entire time. You knew I was falling for you, and perhaps you didn't mean to encourage me, but you sure as hell didn't stop me."

"You weren't the only one who was falling, Harry," she said softly, pulling her knees up to her chest. "And you're not the only one who can't get over us."

He stared at her back, not sure whether he wanted to yell at her or take her in his arms and kiss her until he ran out of air. "You confuse the hell out of me."

A sniff that could have been a laugh or a cry. "I confuse the hell out of me."

"I believe you. You must be confused because you say you care about me, you give me all the signals, and then you end it out of nowhere." His voice growing stronger, he wished she would turn around to face him. "That's a shit reason to break up with someone. You don't get to decide you're not good enough for me. That's up to me. You might have issues, but I know you're still the person I want at my side. You need me as much as I need you, and I don't know why you can't see that." He paused for breath, realizing how hard his heart was beating. All the hurt he'd held inside bubbled to the surface. "Why would you want to be alone? I've tried it, and it's terrible. I'm tired of respecting your wishes, Dora. I love you, and I won't stop just because you tell me to."

At that she did whirl around, coming entirely too close to toppling off the wall when she did. Harry grasped her arms, but she shook him free, jumping down to face him. Close. Very close. "I did what I thought was best for us," she countered, stabbing him in the chest with a finger. "For you."

"What was best?" he fired back. "Why do you get to decide, all on your own, what's best? Isn't that what everything I've done this year has been about—being able to decide what's best for myself?

That's bullshit. You don't get to make yourself feel better by claiming it was 'for the best'."

"Feel better?" she cried, throwing her hands in the air. "Merlin's pants, what makes you assume I feel better in the slightest?"

"Then tell me what you feel," Harry demanded. "I'm sorry, you'll have to spell it out for me because not even Dumbledore could figure out your signals."

She prevaricated, walking back and forth and twisting her hands, but when Harry caught a glimpse of her face in the scant light, it was taut with beautiful anguish that was more of an answer than any of her flimsy words. "I—I don't know, Harry! You can't force me to I don't know. When we're apart, I think about you all the time, and when we're together, I"

"What?" he insisted, stepping so close he could smell the scent of her shampoo. "What?"

She spun away again, backing off until she could lean against the wall, chin against her chest. When she flipped her head up, that stubborn pose he knew so well shining through for a brief moment, he knew what her answer would be. "When we're together, I forget to think about anyone else."

Harry was there in an instant, only the barest of centimeters and a bit of clothing separating their bodies. His hands grew minds of their own, unable to stop touching her as they traced her jaw, her cheekbones, her nose, her chin, the contours of her throat, her ribcage, the backs of his fingertips brushing against the sides of her breasts. Up and down her arms until she claimed his fingers in her own, pulling him closer until he had her hands held against the rough stone wall next to her head.

"Harry," she breathed, looking up with eyes dark and shining and round. "Are you going to kiss me now?"

Inhaling deeply, Harry leaned forward, burying his face in her sweet-smelling hair, her breath hot and quick against his neck. She was here, Tonks was in his arms finally finally again, and all he had to do was make the move. Removing one of his hands from hers, he held it over her chest, feeling the thud of her heart against his palm. She caught her breath when his lips ghosted from ear to cheek to jaw, but just as the corners of their mouths brushed—so soft, so warm, so good, so right— he pulled away.

"No," he said in more of a groan than a word. "Merlin, I want to so badly because I still remember what it feels like to kiss you, and you'd let me, but I can't. Not yet. You have to want me, too. You were the one who broke us up. You have to want this as much as I do."

For a second he thought she would mutter a curse and go for it anyway. When her shoulders twitched with a tiny sigh, he wasn't sure whether to be disappointed or relieved. Still, they remained close, their cheeks touching. Finally a soft pressure on his chest made him step back.

"This isn't the end for us," he told her in a low voice that rang with passion. "Call me a fool, but I know it's not."

Amazingly, her lips turned up in a wistful smile. "Is it I who must woo you now?"

He shook his head, returning the smile. "No, you just have to trust me."

"I do." Tonks ducked her head, but he lifted her chin. Tilting it to one side as she gazed at him, she reached up to brush his fringe out of his face, locks of her own hair tumbling into her eyes at the same time. "Don't give up on me, Harry."

It was with new eyes that Harry walked through the corridors of Hogwarts (not literally, though he wished it so; sometimes having glasses was an enormous pain in the rear). As if Tonks' admittance that she still harbored feelings for him had severed his last bit of uncertainty, Harry was able to look only to the future, redoubling his efforts to better himself in all arenas. Although he told himself he'd been doing that all along, it had merely been an exterior facade to hide the doubts that plagued his mind; now, however, every single particle of his being was focused on the ultimate task of defeating Voldemort.

That Parvati appeared to harbor no ill will and was in fact closer to Harry than ever, that Eric returned to study group (albeit speaking only to Hermione and Daphne), and that Tonks let her hands discreetly brush Harry's when they passed each other in the halls were mere bonuses. Bonuses that only heightened his newfound positive outlook, and bonuses that didn't go entirely unnoticed, if in the strangest of ways.

"Harry?"

He turned at the sound of his name after leaving Slughorn's classroom to see Luna fighting her way through the crowd toward him. "Hey, Luna."

"Harry, I need to tell you something," she said quietly, unusually serious.

"Okay" Frowning, Harry followed the Ravenclaw until they were able to step away from the flow of students into a nearby alcove. "What's up?"

"It's about your friend Tonks. She's perfectly nice, I'm sure, but I've noticed something strange when you're around her. The Wrackspurts go crazy when you're together," she explained earnestly.

"It can be quite beautiful, actually, the way they interact, but it worries me there are so many. I'm sure you've heard of the Rotfang Conspiracy."

"Sure," he replied, having no idea what it was.

"So you know to be careful around Aurors, then, particularly since you were working with the Minister. She may be using the Wrackspurts to distract you, and I would hate it so if you developed gum disease. It's said to be painful."

Harry blinked several times. "Yeah, of course. I'll—I'll watch out for it."

"Good." She gave him a pleasant smile before skipping away.

He chuckled to himself. He loved Luna despite, or perhaps because of, all her oddities.

Harry slid to a stop behind some cover, Ron half a step behind him. Harry peeked around the edge only to dart back instantly; a jet of light flew by so closely that if it had been fire, he would have been singed.

"Two of them, two of us," he mused. "I think we can make it."

Ron grunted in agreement. "Shall we go out with wands blazing?"

"No, I have something else in mind." Quickly Harry outlined his plan. When he finished, Ron nodded.

"That's why you're the leader."

"I'm not—"

"Yeah, you are. Admit it and let's get on with this. On three?"

Raising one finger, Harry silently cast a spell on himself before giving Ron the go-ahead. At three, both boys launched a barrage of spells both over and around their makeshift cover. After a few seconds Harry nudged Ron with his foot, and Ron took over for Harry's side, shooting spells from all over.

Under his best disillusionment charm, Harry crept out into the open, torn between moving slow to give the charm its best chance at working and moving quickly to save time. He made his way to the edge of the room, pleased to see that Ron kept Padma Patil and Luca Caruso very busy. Neither appeared to have noticed Harry's escape.

He edged past the two defenders and spotted his goal: an old quaffle, resting on a pedestal on the opposite wall. Once Padma glanced his way, but though she narrowed her eyes, Ron's spells regained her attention. Moving closer and closer, he paused once more and glanced back. Luca was down, disarmed, and so only Ron and Padma remained.

Harry winced; no, only Padma remained. There went Ron's wand. When no subsequent spells followed, she spun around with widened eyes, bringing her wand to bear. Throwing caution to the wind, Harry dove for the quaffle, a spell slicing through the space he had just vacated not a moment later. Landing in a long slide, he slashed the air directly at Padma. Expelliarmus! he shouted in his mind.

The spell from unexpected quarters caught Padma by surprise, and her shield was too late, shattering instantly. Harry caught her wand triumphantly and stood, quaffle in hand, as the rest of the DA stepped away from the walls of the room and clapped.

"Alright, alright," he said modestly, removing the disillusionment charm and tossing Padma's wand back to her. "So you see, no matter your numbers you can't always win head-on. Sometimes you have to be creative. And you have to trust each other. I knew Ron had my back."

Ron ducked his head, grinning, and the DA burst into excited chatter, still on a high from the night's exercise. Harry thought it one of his better ideas; the group was split in two, with the goal to be the capture the quaffle on the other side. Once disarmed, that person was out of the game. The Room of Requirement had played its role splendidly, enlarging in size and providing various objects to use as obstacles and cover.

Only three people didn't join the discussion: Hermione, Eric, and Daphne stood to one side, the former looking rather anxious. Hermione, still acting as a buffer between the two, had talked Harry into inviting the two Slytherins, arguing that Remus had taken Eric under his wing for a reason. If he remained angry and all but friendless, the chances of him taking up with someone like Fenrir Greyback only increased.

"What did you think?" Harry asked on his approach. Both had acquitted themselves well, although it took a stern look from Harry for the rest of the group to grudgingly accept their presence.

"Where'd you learn all this shit?" Daphne asked. "Sorry I slapped you, by the way."

Not one to mince words, that girl. He shrugged it away. "Here and there."

"Did you use this to fight You-Know-Who the night Cedric Diggory died?"

"Some," he answered stiffly.

"Not bad, Potter," Eric admitted with a condescending smile. "Not bad, although I don't know what good you expect to come of it."

Harry watched them leave, turning Eric's comment over in his head. Good? He didn't expect good to come of it. What he expected was to prevent the bad, and wasn't that just as well?

Harry bent his head and twisted his wrist just so, physically leaning closer to Dumbledore's desk as he increased his concentration on Slytherin's ring, so focused on it that everything else faded to black.

"Do you see it, Harry?" The Headmaster's voice penetrated Harry's self-imposed cloud of deliberation.

"Yes!" The instant he lifted his gaze, the red aura around the ring dissipated, but Harry didn't care. He'd done it. "A field of red, just as you described." He pushed his glasses up his nose and brushed away a bead of sweat that threatened to plunge from his brow. "Does it get easier?"

Dumbledore chuckled, returning the former horcrux to a locked drawer in his desk Harry knew also contained a diary with a large hole. "Yes, as with all magic, revealing and tracking spells get easier with practice. That is why we began with something you already knew to have been a vessel of dark magic."

"You really have to lure it out, don't you?" Harry ruminated.

Dumbledore nodded. "As the original magic grows older and weaker, the traces will disintegrate. As well, dark magic is by nature often desirous of secrecy."

"Do they ever disappear completely?"

Dumbledore took a moment to answer. "It depends on the strength of the spell. Something so strong and so very much against the laws of nature as a horcrux would leave such traces that will never go away. This is all merely conjecture, of course; little study has been done on the matter of horcruxes, and we must be thankful for that."

Too right, Harry thought to himself. He wished he'd never heard of them. Actually, if he were in the habit of wishing things, he wished Tom Riddle had never heard of them.

"Harry," Dumbledore began, with a shifting tone of voice that made Harry sit up and pay attention.

"Your progress at tracing dark magic comes at a pivotal time. I believe I am very close to discovering the location of another horcrux."

Harry sat ramrod straight now. "You are? Where?"

"Shall you try a guess?" A twinkle fluttered in the Headmaster's wise azure eyes. "What do we know of Tom's childhood before attending Hogwarts?"

"He was born and raised in an orphanage, but he hated that place," Harry thought aloud, encouraged by a slight nod. "I don't think he ever went anywhere else before Hogwarts."

"Never?"

"No, not unless—trips. They took a trip to to the sea! Where he did something to those kids, right?"

Dumbledore beamed. "Very good. Mrs. Cole told me two children were never the same upon return from a trip to the seashore. It is my hypothesis it was this place therein Tom first learned he could control magic enough to affect others."

I can make them hurt if I want to.

"You've found it?" Harry asked eagerly. "And I can go with you?"

"I am almost certain I have, and yes, you may accompany me. I shall ask only two things of you at that time: that you do not hesitate to use whatever magic you feel necessary, and that you follow my requests without reluctance, no matter what. Do you promise?"

It was phrased oddly—almost as if the Headmaster was sure Harry would falter—but there was no way he was going to miss this. "Yes, sir."

"Good. I will not hide the fact that this will be dangerous."

Harry's excitement almost couldn't be dampened, but when he caught a glimpse of the blackened tips of Dumbledore's hand, a sobering thought occurred. "That's when you hurt your arm, right? When you found the last horcrux? Don't you think it's time to tell me?"

Dumbledore gazed at Harry with an odd expression before sighing. "Very well." He withdrew the ring from his desk and placed it on his desk once more. "It was my own foolishness, to be sure. The ring was ingeniously hidden and highly protected. Upon finding it, I thought myself clever enough to have breached its defenses that I did not consider there would be further safeguards. In my eagerness I acted too hastily. The ring itself was cursed, and it was apparent the moment I placed it on my finger. Thankfully I acted quickly enough after that, or we would not be having this conversation."

"You're okay now, though?" Harry asked, switching his gaze between the deadened hand and the deadly ring.

Dumbledore shook his robe over the hand, hiding it away, as he had developed the habit of doing. "I returned to Hogwarts immediately and Professor Snape was able to trap it in my hand at that time."

He considered the ring again. "You must understand, Harry, the sentient nature of a horcrux. Beyond whatever protections someone else may put in place, the piece of soul secured within will defend itself. They are, after all, parts of Voldemort himself. As you saw in the Chamber of Secrets, he transfers some of his memories and powers to them."

The world seemed to stop. Harry faced not the Headmaster but his own life, laid out in front of him like a children's picture book.

'Unless I'm much mistaken, he transferred some of his own powers to you the night he gave youthat scar.'

'Voldemort put a bit of himself in me?'

'The curse that failed to kill you seems to have forged some kind of connection between you andthe Dark Lord.'

His scar pounded. Was it his imagination, or was it slightly off from the beating of his heart, as if it throbbed to the pulse of another? High, maniacal laughter echoed in his ears. Only when he pulled himself together did he realize what he was actually hearing was his name, repeated over and over by a grave and concerned Headmaster.

He would know. Harry had learned since last year that Dumbledore was not infallible, but he would know this. But even as the idea presented itself, his courage failed him and Harry gladly let it fall away. If one didn't ask a question, one couldn't receive an answer.

Some questions were better left unasked.

"I'm sorry, sir," he said automatically. "I—" Haven't been myself lately? He suppressed a crazed urge to laugh. "I haven't been sleeping well and lost my concentration."

Those sharp eyes hadn't yet dulled with age or curse, and Dumbledore and Harry knew each other well enough to know what was left unsaid. Nevertheless, all Dumbledore said was, "Yes, I fear I have kept you far too long. It is past time you returned to your dormitory."

It was with some relief, whether real or imagined, that Harry seized on Dumbledore's evasion of the unasked question. Perhaps Harry was wrong. What had they been talking about before he let his imagination get the best of him? Oh, right, the danger of hunting a horcrux. "Should we have help finding the horcrux?" he blurted. Dumbledore frowned slightly. "I mean, it's dangerous, and I know that you're you, sir, but it's better to be on the side of caution when it comes to this."

"You believe more than the two of us should go?" Harry nodded. "Interesting. Tell me how you would do it."

Dumbledore had been leaving more and more decisions up to Harry lately, or at least considering his opinion, and Harry found he liked it. He took a moment to toss it around in his head. "Bill Weasley, Remus Lupin, and Tonks," he said slowly. "Bill is a cursebreaker, Remus has experience with dark magic, and Tonks is someone I trust innately. They could help. Tonks could take a message to them; it's safer than a letter."

"You do recall my words about limiting knowledge of the horcruxes when we began this journey, correct? Spreading awareness of a secret weakens it, much like a secret-keeper letting others in on the Fidelius Charm."

"I remember, Professor, and I understand, but I think there's a risk of guarding secrets too closely."

He couldn't help adding, "It's something you and I have always seen differently."

For a moment they considered each other. Then Dumbledore folded his hands, lowering his chin in a nod. Surprising Harry, Fawkes made a low trill on his perch. "Very well, Harry. Think on this for a few days, and tell me your decision."

At first Harry left rather pleased, buoyed by the fact that Dumbledore was letting him make more and more choices. Then, like a persistent raincloud, his unwanted thoughts about his connection with Voldemort made a sudden return.

An odd sight greeted Harry in the first floor girls' lavatory a few days later. Tonks perched on a tap (one which held special significance, although she was unaware) with her legs crossed, chatting animatedly with a ghost wearing an old-fashioned Hogwarts uniform in Ravenclaw colors.

The ghost gasped when Harry entered and swooped to his side. "Harry!" she exclaimed in a soft, simpering voice before pouting. "It's been ever so long since you came to see me."

"Do you make a habit of visiting girls' toilets?" Tonks asked in an amused tone.

"Er, hello, Myrtle," he said, trying to avoid walking through her. Myrtle had always paid much attention to Harry, to his discomfort.

Tonks glanced around. "It's an odd place for a date, but I'm here as requested, on time and with my broomstick. Want to tell me what's going on?"

"You'll see. First I need you to get down from the sink."

"Oh, you're here to meet her," said Myrtle, looking from one to the other. "No one ever comes to visit Myrtle anymore, not since he left."

"Who?" Tonks asked, but neither was listening.

Myrtle sidled up to Harry again, so close he got a chill. "Will I have to come find you in the baths again, Harry Potter?"

At this Tonks fell into a fit of coughing. "People only use my bathroom when they're up to something. Never mind poor Myrtle. It's only her home. Yes, fill it up with nasty bits of smoke."

"It's not as if you can smell it, can you?" Tonks snarked.

As always, her state of death was a touchy subject, and with a wail and a splash, Myrtle disappeared into the U-bends once again.

"Forgot how sensitive she is," Tonks remarked. "You've been here before? Harry?"

He was off in his head again—was it his head?—and forgot what was going on around him. He blinked, the bathroom returning to focus, but before he could speak Tonks stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him. The hug was both warm and brief.

Though the initiator, she appeared as nonplussed as he felt. "You looked like you could use a hug,"

she said quickly. "I mean, unless you want me to call Myrtle back. She seems more than willing."

"You have no idea," he said. "But, um, you asked—yeah, I've been here before. We made the Polyjuice Potion in here second year." Not sure what had just happened, he turned his attention to examining the tap that had a snake scratched on one side.

"Clever hiding spot. Always out of order, you know, that's why we took fag breaks here when I was in school. Hey, that tap doesn't work"

Tonks gaped when Harry leaned down, rasping, "Open," at the engraved tap in a hissing language. The sink began to move and slide, revealing a pipe large enough for a person.

"Merlin's family jewels," she mumbled faintly. "Was that Parseltongue?" He nodded. "Blimey. I knew you could speak it, but blimey. I'm not sure if I'm creeped out or turned on."

"I'm not sure which I want you to be," he confessed, and both laughed.

Tonks peered inside with undisguised interest. "Where does it go?"

"You'll have to find out for yourself. Grab the broom."

With that Harry jumped inside the pipe, knowing she would be right behind him. Tonks couldn't resist a challenge. He heard the sound of her body behind him as they slid down the dark, damp passage. Upon leaving four years earlier, he had no intention of ever returning, but that just showed how much he knew.

Harry sprang to his feet and moved out of the way when the pipe leveled out and emptied into a tunnel, just in time for Tonks to land in a somersault behind him. He gave her a hand up before wiping the slime off his hands and trousers.

"Ring-a-ding-ding," Tonks drawled, looking around their damp surroundings. "This place is swanky, baby. You bring all the skirts here?"

"You'll never know," he teased. "Come on, there's something we need."

Leaving her broom by the entrance, they lit their wands and set off, trying not to step on the numerous animal bones that littered the earthen floor of the tunnel. It seemed smaller to Harry, but he supposed it was merely his perception as he'd been smaller the last time. It came flooding back, that early adventure that held so much more significance now. At the time, all he cared about was saving his best friend's sister. He'd no idea what evil lay ahead. Not the vicious monster with the fatal gaze, no; the true evil had been cleverly concealed inside an ink-stained diary with yellowed pages.

Would it have changed anything, if he'd known what the memory of Tom Riddle truly was? No, he decided, he would have thrown himself headfirst into saving Ginny and worried about anything else later, no matter the cost. He would do it again. That was where Harry was at his best, after all, not fumbling through political intrigues or even romantic dealings with the object of his affection. Harry was at home, could act on and trust mere instinct, when danger loomed.

Either sensing his mind was elsewhere or content to leave him to his thoughts, Tonks didn't say much as Harry led them unerringly through the maze of tunnels. She did stop in her tracks the first time they came upon an enormous snake skin, still intact though brittle, and Harry had to drag her away. Finally they reached a solid wall on which two serpents were engraved, their eyes glittering green in an unnervingly realistic manner.

"Open," Harry hissed again, and the snakes obliged, slithering apart before the wall split in two down the middle and opened. He stepped inside first, gesturing with his arm. "Welcome to the Chamber of Secrets."

It was much as he remembered, and entirely different. Elaborately carved pillars ran the length of the dark chamber, with puddles of water covering parts of the floor, and a statue of Salazar Slytherin towered over the end. Yet, without the terrible fear, of the basilisk and Tom Riddle, for Ginny and himself, the chamber seemed to lack something. Not that he was complaining.

Ignorant of his introspection, Tonks focused entirely on the rotting corpse of the basilisk at the far end. She swore under her breath as she approached. The body was nearly entirely decomposed, a few bits of skin and muscle still dangling from the broad bones resting exactly where Harry had slayed it, torso twisted and head upside down.

"You fought this?" she said faintly. "Ickle twelve-year-old Harry, versus this thing?"

"Well, uh yeah," he replied, rubbing the back of his neck.

She whistled. "Not bad, Potter. No wonder Ginny was convinced you were her one true love. Very knight in shining armor."

"I just did what anyone would have done," he defended himself before noticing her mocking smile.

"Oh, shut up."

She grinned. "Did you bring me here just to show off?"

"Smartass. Dumbledore thinks he's found another horcrux. Yeah, I know, good news. It made me think we ought to have a backup method, in case the sword of Gryffindor well, just in case. Never hurts, right?"

"Not at all. Good thinking." Tonks moved closer and peered in the slightly open mouthful of teeth.

"We should be able to just—" She swiped her wand through the air, slicing through a few of the teeth.

They broke off and landed at her feet, far too close for Harry's comfort. If one so much as grazed her skin He darted forward and grabbed her arms, pulling her backward. "Careful! If one scratched you I don't have any phoenix tears handy."

"There you go again," she said, dropping her voice. "Rescuing the damsel in distress."

He was still holding her. He didn't know why, nor why she made no move away. It was his turn to talk, wasn't it? "If it's you"

"I'm not complaining." Her voice was low enough to be almost seductive.

Slowly dripping water from some unseen place provided the soundtrack. Tonks twisted her head around to gaze at Harry with eyes as bright and blue as a clear sky, leaving far too easy access to her neck, begging to be kissed. Just lean in, he told himself.

No. If she wanted him, she had to make that choice herself. Clearing his throat, Harry gently released her, and they set out gathering the basilisk fangs, kneeling next to the skeleton's mouth while they removed the teeth, placing them in a conjured bag and being very careful not to touch the still-sharp tips.

Harry told Tonks about Dumbledore's offer and his dilemma. "What do you think?" he asked her. She hesitated in a way that still struck him as odd, for the old Tonks never withheld her advice, wanted or not, so he added, "This is me asking you."

That earned a smile, as good a reward as any. "Cheeky bugger. Hmm. It is difficult to ask people to potentially risk their lives without knowing why."

"Exactly," Harry agreed emphatically. "Dumbledore has made that mistake. I don't want to repeat it."

"But on the other hand, the minute you let someone in on such a dangerous secret as this, you put that person at risk as well." Harry tilted his head, not quite understanding, so she elaborated.

"Knowledge, Harry. They become a source of information."

"Oh. That is a problem. But if it's someone you trust—what?"

She was shaking her head, turquoise ringlets bouncing. "That doesn't matter. The first thing we learned during undercover training is that everybody talks."

"But—"

"Everybody talks, Harry." She turned to face him, hands on her knees. "What you have to decide is if it's worth the risk. You can't protect everyone, and you don't hold their lives in your hands. Only they do."

Harry concentrated on the fang he was severing, using his wand to slice through the very top before pulling it away and sliding it in the bag. "You either trust someone or you don't," he decided. "My parents trusted the wrong person because they wanted to protect Sirius. They thought no one would expect Pettigrew. They were right; no one expected Pettigrew, not to do what he did. If they'd let Sirius make that decision, they might still be alive."

Tonks didn't respond. What she did do was reach out and squeeze his shoulder, running her hand down his arm before dropping away, leaving him with goose pimples.

"So will you give Bill and Remus a message from me?"

"Of course. Write whatever you want, and I'm your—messenger." She cleared her throat, making him wonder what she'd meant to say.

"And you, of course," he added, realizing he'd left her out this entire time.

"Me?"

He took his time glancing around the cavern. "I don't see anyone else, do you?"

"Oh. Okay. Yeah." She seemed to be having a hard time concealing a smile.

"I meant what I said on the Astronomy Tower, you know." He sought to hold her eyes. "No matter what happens between us, you're still the one I want by my side."

Her eyes brightened, eyebrows inching up just perceptibly, and she jerked her head in a nod several times. "That's good," she said.

Their conversation occupied most of the time it took to gather the basilisk fangs, and they didn't linger. This place had too many near-experiences for Harry to be comfortable in it. Ginny nearly died, he nearly died, Voldemort nearly returned two years early. However, the first horcrux had been destroyed, so it wasn't all bad. He scuffed his shoe at a large black stain on the floor when he passed.

Tonks was quiet on the return trip just as she'd been on the first, and though it took him a minute to notice, still caught up in his memories of the place, when he did he found it curious. However, the silence seemed neither pressing nor awkward; rather, it resembled those times at which he'd felt most at ease with Tonks because of the simple fact that nothing needed to be said. If anything, he would've guessed she was content enough not to clutter their time together with meaningless conversation for the sake of noise. One didn't have to speak to talk.

He had just helped Tonks climb through the pile of rocks caused by that idiot Professor Lockhart and Ron's faulty, spellotaped wand when she muttered something barely audible that was, as best he could make out, "Oh, bugger this."

Then Tonks released his hand, dropped the bag of venomous fangs with a clatter, seized the front of his shirt with two fists, pulled him close, and kissed him soundly.

Harry might as well have never been kissed before, if this was what he held up in comparison. Nothing was real but the woman in his arms. Apologetic? Regretful? Tentative? Never. This was the Tonks he had fallen for, her kiss hot and demanding and more than he knew a kiss could be. Air was no longer a necessity but something to be ignored, for they were starved of far greater things than oxygen.

One hand on her waist and the other in her hair, Harry pulled her closer, a fruitless effort as they were already as close as close could be. Warmth radiated from her mouth through his, spreading to all parts of his being as Tonks finally made up her mind. Thank Merlin she never did things halfway. She kissed him like she meant it, and she did.

When it was over, Harry only then realized she had him pressed against the damp, rocky wall in a way that should have been uncomfortable but wasn't. Something blazed fiercely in her now-gray eyes, eyes that hovered mere inches from his own as she maintained her tight grip like a drowning person clutched a flotation device. Nothing was said. Nothing needed to be said. Then Tonks laughed, an airy, delighted sound, and Harry joined her.

Perhaps they were drowning, and perhaps they were keeping each other afloat.