August 22nd, 1994

The Burrow

4:38 P.M.

Unable to help himself, Harry winced as, on the floor below them, Mrs. Weasley's thundering managed to get even louder. He, Ron, Hermione and Ginny were trudging dutifully up the stairs, doing their best to spare the twins the embarrassment of having their dressing down witnessed. Alas, no amount of distance was going to keep them from hearing – at the very least – snippets of Mrs. Weasley's rage as she shouted at them at the top of her lungs. "-wasting your time!" "Honestly!" "-think by now you'd have buckled down-" "-can't believe you're still-" Harry had found the twins' prank on Dudley to be wonderfully funny, but he would have been the first to tell them not to do it if this was the response they were going to get.

Noticing his reaction, Ginny chuckled. "Yeah. 'S not the first we've heard of that this summer." Harry raised an inquisitive eyebrow at her, prompting an ever so subtle blush. She covered it quickly, tripping over her words as she continued. "We've been hearing all sorts of things coming from their room–"

"Explosions and the like," Ron interrupted, drawing a look of ire from his sister. "Honestly thought they were trying to kill each other once or twice, but we never thought they were making things."

"Making things?" Harry echoed. "What, you mean 'Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes'? What's that about?"

Ginny sniggered slightly. "'S what they call 'em. All those confections of theirs. 'S their product line, y'see."

"Product line? So 'Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes'? That's their brand?"

"We just call 'em 'Wheezes'," Ron supplied, a crooked smile on his face. "Saves time."

"But yeah," Ginny answered his question for him. "Mum went snooping in their room a while back-"

"She was cleaning their room," Hermione corrected, ever the authoritarian defender.

Ginny rolled her eyes. "She was snooping in their room," the redhead reiterated. "Found all kinds of order forms and the like. We think they were planning on selling the stuff when they got back to Hogwarts."

Ron barked out a laugh. "Fat chance of that. Mum's got eagle eyes for the things now, she does."

"Will you lot quiet down!?" Percy popped his head out of his door to snap at them. "Bad enough, Mum yelling at those two like an overzealous prison warden! I don't need you lot thundering up and down the stairs while I'm trying to work!"

"We aren't thundering," Ron rolled his eyes. "Honestly, go back to your cauldron bottoms, Perce."

Percy pursed his lips angrily and shut his door with a mighty slam.

Hermione turned baleful eyes onto Ron who looked at her askance. "Wha'?" he asked defensively. "Do you wanna listen to his latest update on standardized cauldron thickness?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Honestly," she stressed, following close behind Ron and Harry as they entered his room. "You could stand to show a little interest in your brother's work, Ronald."

"Don't call me, Ronald," Ron snarked. "You sound like Mum."

"Think that was what she was going for," Ginny sniggered, hoisting herself up to sit atop Ron's dresser. She bounced her legs noisily against the dresser drawers, Percy's complaints about noise seemingly forgotten.

Hermione glared at her, but Harry spoke before she could. "Why are there four beds in here, Ron?"

Ron glanced at the fluffy, blanketed cots his mother had made up on his floor a little less than a month ago. He hardly noticed them anymore, he'd become so used to them. Ron shrugged. "The twins are bunking with us, on account of Bill and Charlie being in their room."

Ginny sniggered again. "Making it much harder to experiment on their products, that," she grinned mirthfully. "They tried testing some kinda potion in here a couple weeks ago-"

"He doesn't need to hear about that!" Ron snapped.

Ginny's grin widened. "Made all his hair fall out," she stage whispered to Harry, which earned her a grin. Ron groaned, running a hand down his face. He idly fingered an orange lock, as if confirming that his mane was still present and accounted for. It had taken a rapid hair growth potion to get him back to an acceptable length, something which the twins had very reluctantly agreed to pay for. That is, their father forced them to pay for it on pain of confiscating their brooms for the remainder of the summer.

"Yeah, Fred and George are right gits, what else is new?" Ron groused. "Never mind that. Oi, Harry! You heard from–OW! Bloody hell, woman!"

Hermione, who had elbowed Ron rather severely in the stomach, cut her eyes at Ginny with all the subtly of a raging bull, and Ron likewise clamped his mouth closed with all the subtlety of a charging rhinoceros. Ginny eyed the two of them, and Harry soon after, with some amount of trepidation, but seemed content to let the matter lie. It wasn't as if she didn't know that the 'Golden Trio' had secrets of their own that she was not privy too.

Harry, for his part, sent Hermione a thankful look, which she returned with a nod. There was something else there, though, in Harry's eyes. A question he could no more ask in front of Ginny than he could mention Sirius' name. It was a project he had requested his brilliant best friend take on over the summer. Something that wasn't entirely legal – by which he meant it was actively illegal – and something that Ginny would demand to be a part of at best. At worst, she would go straight to her parents, although Harry had a hard time painting Ginny as a snitch. Still, best to ere on the side of caution. He had waited all summer. He could wait just a few hours longer to ask Hermione about their oncoming extracurriculars.

August 22nd, 1994

The Burrow

6:17 P.M.

It ended up being just under two hours before Harry had a chance to bring the subject up with Hermione. The lot of the Weasleys had been roused from their sulking (Fred and George) and their rooms (Harry and co.) and their working (Percy) and brought outside to sit and eat a delicious looking meal which Mrs. Weasley had prepared. Bill and Charlie had put on a great show, jousting in the air with the tables. It had created a clatter loud enough to incite another bout of Percy's rage, but that had ended up coming just in time for Mrs. Weasley had called him down to eat just as he stuck his head out the window to scream, red faced, at his brothers.

"And no work at the table!" Mrs. Weasley had scolded him harshly, a sharp look in her eye. Percy had looked as if he had wanted to argue, but very fresh memories of the dressing down the twins had gotten kept him from muttering too loudly about 'very important Ministry work'.

Now they were all seated and halfway through the meal. Bill and Ginny had joined forces to argue against Mrs. Weasley cutting Bill's hair. "Mum, the bank doesn't care! It's the work they pay attention to." Percy was droning about the importance of his job and the wonder that was Mr. Crouch, and Mr. Weasley was once more proving how good a father he was by enduring the talk. "A truly wonderful man, I tell you." "Yes, he's a credit to the Department." Just next to the Golden Trio, the twins and Charlie were discussing the past Quidditch season animatedly, the lot of them bemoaning England's abysmal performance against Transylvania. "Three-ninety to ten!? Can you believe it!?" "Yeh, and Wales lost to Uganda, the poor blighters."

It was Ron, always the one to ignore the fact that their meddling could be overheard, who broke the ice between the three of them again. "So, have you heard from Sirius?" He had at least thought to lower his voice. Beside him, Hermione looked prepared to scold him as harshly as Mrs. Weasley had Percy, but her own curiosity saw her lean in to hear Harry's response as well.

Harry had a mouth full of potatoes just then, so he responded with an exuberant nod until he swallowed and elaborated further, "Gotten two letters from him. Huge birds, they were. Tropical, I think."

"Oh, that's nice," Hermione said, her tone very genuine. "A bit of sun would do him good after…well, you know." Her eyes scanned rapidly around the table, looking to see if anyone had heard her.

"Mum, 's not as bad as you say it is. Lots of girls like the long hair look!" Ginny cried.

They hadn't.

"Yeah, but never mind that," Harry responded, not all that eager to discuss Sirius at the moment. He'd like to think it was the public space that was making him change the subject, but he knew it was his own excitement. He peered very deliberately at Hermione. "How was your summer?"

Ron, who looked as if he'd only just remembered the assignment Harry had given Hermione at the end of the previous year, suddenly looked at their bushy haired friend with a look of palpable excitement. Hermione eyed the redhead warily, as if afraid he was going to loudly exclaim his excitement for all the table to hear. When it seemed that he was going to contain himself, Hermione said quietly, "Productive. And worrying."

"Worrying?" Harry repeated.

Hermione nodded, sending bushy hair flying as she did. She leaned in, her voice adopting a harsh whisper. "Do you know how dangerous this can be?" she hissed. "Botched transformations and mutations. Not to mention the legal ramifications if we're caught."

Ron seemed unperturbed by Hermione's announcement. "Come off it, Hermione," he scoffed. "If Scabbers could bloody well do it, I expect we can. Right, Harry?"

Harry made to agree with his best mate, but it was Fred's voice that cut in, saying, "And what was it Scabbers did, Ron? 'Cept sleep all day and eat more than his fill?"

"Expect that's what he wants to do, though, isn't it, Fred?" George continued, grinning. He nodded approvingly at Ron. "I dare say you'll be able to match Scabbers in those departments, Ron."

"'Specially the eating bit," Fred laughed. George joined.

Ron's face heated. "Shove off, you two!" he snapped. "It's a private conversation, innit?"

George gestured rudely in Ron's direction.

"George Weasley!" Mrs. Weasley exclaimed furiously.

The younger of the twins gave a mighty cringe as his mother launched into another stern lecture on 'being a proper gentleman' and 'table etiquette'. The conversation once more well away from them, the Golden Trio leaned closer together again.

"Ron's right, Hermione," Harry assured him. "I mean, you brewed a successful Polyjuice in second year! Course you can get us through this one."

Hermione worried at her lower lip. "There's more to it than there was to the Polyjuice," she insisted. "A lot of it is just up to chance, and if any of the steps are done wrong – not to mention you have to have a mind for Transfiguration –"

"Hermione," Harry laid his hand across hers. She looked up at him, the worry very evident in her eyes. "Come on, please."

"Oh, alright, alright fine!" Hermione snapped. "But it's asking for trouble!"

Ron snorted. "It's us, innit? What else is new?"

August 23rd, 1994

The Burrow

12:36 A.M.

The moon was high in the sky when the three of them snuck out of their respective rooms and into the night to meet. Not much more had been discussed at the table. Hermione had told them that they needed to meet outside around midnight to discuss the next part and that they were absolutely not to be caught.

"I don't want to be caught out after dark with you two. Who knows what Mrs. Weasley would say?"

They had all blushed at the implication, and the matter had been dropped.

Now Harry was waiting outside under the light of the full moon on his own. He didn't know where Hermione was at the moment, but he and Ron had decided that it was best if they snuck out separately. Less chance of Percy being woken by their 'thundering'. Or Mrs. Weasley for that matter.

Harry kicked idly at the gravel rocks beneath his feet. He was in the back garden, sat beneath an extremely leafy bush so as to block the kitchen's view of him. The full moon overhead gave him plenty of light to see by. Harry thought he spied a pair of gnomes wrestling by the gate on the far side of the garden. Wait…they weren't wrestling…

"Harry," Hermione hissed him out of his thoughts suddenly. She was crouched just beside him now where she had not been before. "Where's Ron?"

Harry blushed, tearing his eyes away from the 'wrestling' gnomes. "Uh – he…"

"I'm here," the redhead said, sliding into a seat beside them on the ground. "Longest five minutes of my life, that was. I miss anything?"

Hermione shook her head. She gave a small sort of groan as she fell out of her crouch and sat fully on the ground. "I just got here. Took me a minute to find them."

"Find what?" Harry asked, fully recovered from his blushing fit. He was glad that not much color showed up underneath the moon's cool light. Ron would have had a fit with the color of his face otherwise.

Hermione held out her hands. There were three small black, rectangular boxes sitting in them. "The first ingredient," Hermione explained. Sheepishly, she continued, "I hope your mum won't mind."

"Why would she mind?" Ron asked, swiping one of the boxes from her.

Harry did likewise, reaching out to take the wooden box. Popping it open, he saw that there were four leaves held within. The leaves were small with three pointed edges, and they had been cut very close so as to remove as much of their stem as possible.

Ron plucked one out of the box and held it up, examining it in the moonlight. "What're these?"

Hermione sighed heavily. "Honestly, Ron, don't you pay any attention in Herbology?"

Like Ron, Harry held one of the leaves up into the light and thought that, that was a bit harsh. He didn't recognize the little leaf either, and he doubted that he would be able to even in proper light.

"They're Mandrake leaves," Hermione explained, somewhat exasperated. Then she worried at her lip again, eyeing Ron speculatively. "Your mum…won't mind, will she? I mean, Mandrakes aren't – well they aren't cheap, are they?"

Ron examined the Mandrake leaf a bit more before promptly shrugging. "They're not very cheap, no," Ron conceded. "But she's hardly gonna notice a few missing leaves, is she?"

Hermione was clearly not as comfortable with Ron's response as Ron was. She continued to chew on her bottom lip as she eyed the three boxes of contraband leaves with no small amount of guilt. Harry knew Hermione well enough to know that one of her crises of conscience was coming up, so he rushed to distract her.

"Why do we need Mandrake leaves?" he asked her. If he sounded a bit dumber than usual, Hermione didn't notice. If anything, it made her launch into teacher mode all the quicker. Funny, that.

"They're the first step of the process. A Mandrake leaf," she indicated to the boxes, "a full moon," she gestured upwards at the full moon, "and a mouth."

"A mouth!?" Ron sputtered, earning panicked 'shhhhh's from his friends. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Hermione twitched her nose idly, seemingly debating how she wanted to continue. "Practical's better, I suppose," she muttered. Hermione brandished her wand commandingly. "Open wide."

"Wha'!?" Ron squawked indignantly.

"Open!" Hermione commanded, and – as her wand was pointed directly at his face just now – Ron obliged. "Right, now you'll have to forgive me. This is gonna be a bit gross."

Ron did not have the time to close his mouth and ask what she meant by that. No sooner had she finished her statement than Hermione had shoved her fingers into the ginger's mouth.

"Oh, be quiet, Ron!" she snapped, maneuvering the tip of her wand around inside Ron's mouth. The two fingers of her left hand were holding it open, allowing her unfettered access. "Honestly, do you think I'd be doing this if I didn't have to?"

Finally, after about a minute of holding the redhead's mouth open, Hermione withdrew with a sigh. "There," she said definitively. Her mouth curled slightly as she wiped her fingers on her shirt. "Brush your teeth better, Ron."

"The bloody hell was that about!?" Ron cried.

"Be quiet!" Hermione snapped. "If I go to Azkaban because you couldn't keep your bloody mouth shut –"

"Hermione!" Harry cried, reeling back. "Are you alright? You just – you just cursed!"

Hermione huffed indignantly. "Oh, hush! This is a very stressful situation, Harry!"

Ron rubbed absently at his jaw. The cleaning charms Hermione had scoured the inside of his mouth with had left an odd, tingly sensation on the lower side of his face. "You're the only one who's stressed about it," he complained. "Bloody mental…"

"Whatever," Hermione rolled her eyes. She raised her wand again. "Come on, once more."

"No!" Ron cried, scooting back on the gravel. He raised his hand defensively over his mouth. "Not until you explain what you're doing!"

Hermione rolled her eyes again. "I had to make sure your mouth was clean. If the leaf is contaminated –"

"The leaf!?" Ron cut her off. "What's the bloody leaf got to do with my mouth?"

"If you would open your mouth," Hermione growled, "I would show you."

Ron shared a panicked glance with Harry who only shrugged. He had no more of an idea of what was going on than Ron did. "I mean, it's Hermione, mate," he replied weakly. "She always knows best, yeah?"

It was Hermione's turn to be grateful for the poor light as she blushed faintly. Ron, meanwhile, ran a hand down his face in exasperation. "Yeah, fine," he grumbled, opening his mouth wide.

"Right," Hermione readied her wand as she plucked one of Ron's Mandrake leaves from the box. "Stay very still, now."

Ron obliged as Hermione slowly stuck the leaf into his mouth. Harry couldn't properly see what she was doing, but after a few seconds, Hermione pulled her hands out of Ron's mouth. "What'd you do?" he asked her.

Ron smacked his lips, the movement of his cheeks implying he was moving his tongue about. "Stuck it to the roof of my mouth, I think," he said. Then he winced slightly, pressing the palm of his hand into his cheek. "Agh! That's bloody uncomfortable, that is!"

"Don't mess with it!" Hermione snapped. "It has to remain intact the whole time, or it's useless!"

"So, you did stick it to the roof of his mouth?" Harry pressed. He gazed inquisitively at Ron who was still wearing a look of discomfort. "Why?"

Hermione shrugged. "I read a sticking charm made it easier long term," she replied.

"Makes what easier?" Harry asked.

"The first step of the process. Under the light of a full moon, a Mandrake leaf must be inserted into an uncontaminated mouth where it will remain."

"For how long?" Ron cried.

Hermione hesitated. Her eyes darted upward, briefly gazing at the moon. "Until…the next full moon?" she offered slowly.

"A month!?" Ron exclaimed.

"Shhhhhh!" Harry and Hermione both hissed at him.

"'Shhhhhhh' yourself," Ron stuck his tongue out at them. Then he pointed aggressively at his mouth. "I have to keep this thing in my mouth for a bloody month!? How am I gonna eat!?"

"Carefully," Hermione replied distractedly. She had plucked a handheld notebook from the depths of her pajamas somewhere and was currently flipping idly through its pages. How she could read it in the dim light of the moon, Harry didn't know, but she seemed to be doing well enough. Her finger settled on a page, and she said, "Soft foods mostly – Do not damage the leaf. If it's not completely intact at the end of the cycle, you have to start all over again. And there's enough danger of that already."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ron asked at the same time that Harry said, "We might have to do this more than once!?"

Hermione snapped her notebook closed with audible attitude and huffed mightily. "I told you a lot of this is just up to chance. We can't just brew a potion in the girl's lavatory and expect to completely alter our physiology!"

Harry ran a hand down his face, groaning. Hermione was right, of course, and he hadn't expected this to be easy. Still, it took a lot to get his bookish friend this strung out. Harry remembered that it had taken her five months of taking literally every class on offer last year before she looked as stressed as she did now. But then, he supposed that taking literally every class on offer wasn't also highly illegal like this was.

"What else do we need to do?" Harry asked her as calmly as he could. He knew Ron would continue to bluster his way through every new revelation, but he figured he could ease Hermione's burden just a touch if he presented a calm front.

Hermione flipped through several pages of her notebook again, landing finally on one that looked like a bulleted list. "Several things," she said in the same distracted tone. "The potion itself isn't that hard to make, but the ingredients aren't easy to come by. One of our hairs – that's not hard…the dew? Have to get that at Hogwarts –"

"Dew?" Ron mouthed at Harry who shrugged in response.

"– the chrysalises we can get at Diagon," Hermione continued to mutter to herself as if she hadn't heard them. Which, to be fair, she likely hadn't. When she next spoke it was louder, to better address the boys. "This bit's gonna be the hardest – well, not the hardest, it's all quite hard. Blimey, we shouldn't be doing this…"

"Hermione," Harry gently course corrected her.

"When the next full moon comes, we need to put the leaves and all the other ingredients into pure crystal phials." Hermione ran an annoyed hand through her bushy hair, brushing stray locks out of her face. "Which, frankly, none of us have the money for."

"Bugger," Harry cursed. Pure crystal potion phials were some of the most expensive on the market, unless you were buying the ones made of gemstones – but those were only for specialty potions. "We can't just use regular phials?"

Most potions could be enhanced by use of a crystal phial – almost any of the majority of potions, in fact, could get better results from cooling within a phial of pure crystal. But it was never strictly necessary. A Draught of Living Death placed into a plain glass phial would net a patient five days of unconsciousness while one cooled in a crystal phial might net them seven.

Hermione, though, shook her head. "Won't work," she told him definitively. "The potion requires a crystal phial. And…a clear night." She muttered the last bit, closing her notebook and hugging it to her chests as she did. Harry and Ron heard her plainly nonetheless and stared at her.

The both of them glanced up at the sky. It was…mostly clear by their usual standards, but there were plenty of clouds in the sky. They obscured large swaths of stars and drifted lazily through the sky, acting as if they were considering drifting to block their sight of the moon but weren't quite sure yet whether or not they would.

"You realize we live in England, yeah?" Ron asked her.

"And go to school in Scotland?" Harry pressed.

Hermione glared hotly at them. "I am not the one demanding we do this!" she snapped crossly, cutting her eyes somewhat viciously at Harry. The Boy-Who-Lived held his hands up in surrender.

"Bloody hell," Ron muttered, rubbing at his chin and cheeks with his hand. There was a still a grimace in his eyes, even if his mouth wasn't curling unpleasantly at the moment. "Know any weather forecast spells?"

"None that go out a month," Hermione sighed.

"That was rhetorical."

Hermione stuck her tongue out at him.

Harry ran a hand through his hair, exhaling as he did. "Where we gonna get crystal phials, then?"

Hermione winced, as if she had been expecting the question. Which, of course, she had. "Well, we can't buy them," she trailed off. "And no one is going to give us any…"

"Hermione Granger!" Ron's grin was infectious. "Are you advocating stealing? Stealing extremely expensive potion phials from someone?" He winked obviously at Harry. "We've finally rubbed off on her, we have."

Hermione's wand whipped towards the redhead, a pale orange light flying from its tip. Ron cried out in shock more than pain as he gripped the part of his thigh where her stinging hex had hit. "I am advocating nothing of the kind!" she snapped, her wand still pointed steadily at Ron's legs. "I only mean to say that…well, obviously we don't have the money to buy them. And…well, I'm sure that…Professor Snape has more phials than he strictly needs…" This last bit was said in a rushed whispery kind of voice so that Harry and Ron could barely understand it. But understand it, they did.

Ron snorted mightily. "Yeah. Right. Might as well just ask him if we can have them then, yeah? Oi! Calm down, you lunatic!" Ron cried as Hermione's wand tip glowed the same pale orange as before. He could just make out her narrowed eyes in the glow of spell light. A few seconds passed before Hermione cancelled the spell, and Ron let out a grateful breath. "Bloody hell, though. Stealing from Snape? Spending months with a bloody leaf in our mouths? Seems an awful lot of work, mate."

Harry sighed through his nose. "Guys, my dad did this," Harry said then, his gaze far away. "Sirius did this. My mum probably knew about it, at least eventually. I want to do this. I need to do this!"

Ron and Hermione shared a heavy glance and gave a heavy sigh. They had known that, of course – Harry had explained himself ad nauseum at the end of last year when he'd asked her to look into how the Animagus process worked. Still, it was a rare day that their friend actually asked for their help. Oh, they were always there for him, and he was always thankful. For Quirrell, for the Basilisk, for Sirius. They had been there, following along behind or drug painfully along by their ear – or leg, in Ron's case. But Harry so very rarely personally asked them to come along – to put themselves in danger for him. That he was doing it now…

"Yes, I know, Harry," Hermione sighed heavily. She opened her own case of Mandrake leaves, withdrew one and leveled her wand in Harry's direction. "I just wish you'd have chosen something that wasn't so uncomfortable."

"Didn't Sirius say he used to ride a motorcycle?" Ron wondered as Harry opened his mouth to Hermione's intrusion. "That'd be fun. Less work, too."

Harry closed his mouth just before Hermione began her work to wink at his best mate. "Who says I'm not thinking of that one too?"

Ron grinned.

"Honestly," Hermione clucked disapprovingly. She forced his mouth open, scouring the inside of it with a long series of deep cleaning charms. "You're dedicated to putting your life into as much danger as possible, aren't you?"

Harry grinned around Hermione's fingers.

August 25th

The Quidditch World Cup

10:12 A.M.

Two days later when the Weasley family and co. arrived at the field they would be camping in for the duration of the Quidditch World Cup, the rest of the Weasley family had begun to give the Golden Trio odd looks. Whether it was Ginny side-eyeing Hermione's sudden reluctance to talk or Mr. Weasley's quirked eyebrow whenever Harry mush-mouthed a word he was usually perfectly capable of saying or Percy's amazement at Ron's suddenly massively reduced appetite, the Weasleys had noticed something up with the three friends. They just didn't have the faintest idea what that could possibly be. Mrs. Weasley had thought the three of them were arguing – a fair assumption given the multiple half-hearted glares Ron and Hermione sent Harry on a daily basis – but they were just as close as ever. Arguably, they were even closer.

Still, they were acting downright odd. Harry had a permanent, giddy sort of smile on his face that was marred only by the occasional grimace of irritation or discomfort. Ron was taking great pains to breathe only through his nose and seemed like he was trying to keep the lower half of his face as still as possible. Even Hermione was acting odder, or so Ginny reported. It used to be that Hermione's smiles were all teeth – accented greatly by her two bucked front teeth that were so ubiquitous with her. Nowadays, she barely smiled at all, and when she did, they were small, reticent things like she had run out of laughter or something. The trio mostly talked only to themselves and, even then, in hushed whispers while barely moving their lips. More than once, they'd heard Hermione snap something along the lines of, "You'll damage it!" at Ron, but they didn't know what she was talking about. Alternatively, it wasn't uncommon to hear Harry complaining to Hermione, saying, "You've got to teach me that breath freshening charm, 'Mione. It's disgusting!" What could that possibly mean? Was Harry going around kissing someone!? Hermione!?

That was Ginny's primary conclusion anyway, but most of the rest of the family thought she was barking.

In fact, the only members of the family who seemed completely unfazed by the Golden Trio's new behavior were the twins and Bill, all three of which just thought it was them being weird. The twins were well used to Harry, Ron and Hermione retreating into their own friendship, and they didn't think it odd at all that they were doing it now. As for Bill, well, he remembered being fourteen. And he also remembered how nothing they did made sense even to them, let alone to the adults around them.

Still, the Trio's relative silence had made it somewhat difficult to put up the tent with both of the muggle-raised children unable to properly relay instructions to the excitable Mr. Weasley. Eventually, the two of them had just bypassed the older man and thrown it up themselves. Granted, it was mostly just Harry following Hermione's lead – he had never been camping before – but it still went a lot faster. Then Mr. Weasley had gotten hold of the matches, and the both of them gave up. There was no way they were going to manage to educate Mr. Weasley on how best to light a fire without the ability to speak properly, and neither of them wanted to see the disappointment in his eyes if they coopted his fun again.

Thankfully Charlie lost his patience not five minutes later and set the fire with a surreptitious stab of his wand. It was perfectly done to, timed just so that Mr. Weasley – in his ignorance – thought one of his dropped matches had ignited the thing. Harry, noticing this, laughed. "You were a Gryffindor?" he asked, somewhat incredulously.

Charlie shrugged in a self-congratulating manner. "I dated a Slytherin for about a year in fifth year," he winked at him.

"You wha'!?" Ron squawked. "You never told me that! Ow!"

Hermione had elbowed Ron in the side then, glaring fiercely at his mouth when he turned his angry glare onto her. Ron grimaced, but immediately quieted.

Charlie, noticing all this, chose very wisely to ignore it. "Yeah, and that's why, innit?" he said, pointing at Ron's still vaguely outraged face.

"Yeah, but they're snakes, aren't they?" Ron persisted. "All slimy and slithery? How you gonna date that?"

Ginny, whose arms were laden down with a fresh bit of firewood, rolled her eyes as she walked by. "Real mature, Ron."

Charlie laughed. "Ginny's right, Ron," he smirked. An impish look alighted in his eyes. "I promise the Slytherin girls are every bit as warm as the Gryffindor ones."

"Charlie," Mr. Weasley interrupted sternly, looking down the bridge of his nose at his older son.

The dragon-handler raised his hands in surrender. "I was talking about hugs," he protested. "Get your mind out of the gutter, pops."

The twins, Bill and Ginny roared with laughter, and even Mr. Weasley's lips twitched a bit as he tried to remain stern. He shook his head and turned around, muttering quietly so that no one could hear, "Glad your mother isn't here."

"Why'd you break up with her then, Charlie?" Ron jumped back into the conversation, having completely ignored the bit about Slytherins being warm.

Hermione took the chance to tug surreptitiously on Harry's sleeve. She hoisted the empty water bucket when he turned to look at her and jerked her head in the direction of the rest of the camp. He nodded.

"Mr. Weasley," Harry called out, attracting the man's attention. He gestured to himself and Hermione. "We're gonna get some water!"

Mr. Weasley nodded. "Right, be careful then!"

When they had left the tent well behind them, and they could be sure that no one would overhear them over the noise of the crowd, Harry leaned towards Hermione and asked, "How are you doing?"

It was easier to talk amongst themselves than with anyone else, they had discovered. The three of them knew each other so well. They knew how they all spoke, and likewise how each of them responded to other. They knew how their tongues moved when they were talking to each other. They knew what they could expect to say in response to anything that might come out of someone else's mouth.

Which is why Hermione had known to expect that kind of question from her empathetic friend and had her answer ready. "Horrible!" she exclaimed, throwing her hands into the air. "Ginny keeps saying things that are wrong, but I can't correct her because I don't know how long I'm going to rant or what I'm going to say when I do and – oh Merlin, I'm doing it now!"

Harry, likewise, had known to expect just this type of answer from Hermione, and he laughed uproariously at her miniature breakdown.

Hermione huffed. "How about you?"

They found the line for the nearest watering hole just under half a mile from the Weasley tent, which was good since there was a line that looked to be about that long for it. The two of them slipped quietly into place at the back of line, the bucket held by either of their hands between them. They swung it idly, like parents do a toddler.

Harry shrugged. "Never did much talking anyway, really." He scratched at the back of his neck, smiling crookedly. "The twins keep trying to talk shop. Quidditch, you know. You can only nod and shake your head so many times before they expect you to join the conversation and, you know…converse."

It was Hermione's turn to laugh now, something she did eagerly. "It's only been two days," she bemoaned. "How are we going to do this for a month?"

"A month if we're lucky," Harry corrected her, smiling lightly. He was pleased to see that the line was moving at a fairly respectable pace.

She groaned. "What are we going to do when we get to school?"

Harry shrugged, still smiling. "I guess little miss know-it-all will have to settle for not answering every question the Professors throw at her for a while."

"I do not answer every question."

"You try to."

"It's not my fault if no one else reads the course material."

"We do read the course material, 'Mione. We just don't read all of the course material in the first week."

"And that's my problem, why?"

Hermione placed the bucket beneath the spigot as Harry laughed, and he only finished laughing right around when the water reached the fill line. The both of them picked up the bucket in the same way they had carried it over, no longer swinging it about, although Harry did give Hermione a few minor panic attacks pretending like he would.

"You think Ron is still arguing with Charlie about the heresy of dating 'snakes'?" Harry asked.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Is water wet?"

August 26th, 1994

The Quidditch World Cup

2:17 A.M.

"Aggggghh, I've lost my wand!" Harry cried, patting down his pockets in a vein hope of feeling the wooden stick where it had not been before.

"Harry," Hermione hissed at him, the light at the end of her wand casting a pale, sickly light across her face. "Be careful! You'll damage –"

"Sod the leaf, Hermione! I don't have my wand!"

"You leave it back in the tent?" Ron suggested.

"How should I know?" Harry snapped in response. "I said I'd bloody well lost it, didn't I?"

"Oi! Easy there, mate, remember who your friends are!" Ron groused.

"Harry," Hermione laid a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "We'll find it, we will, but right now we have to go."

Harry let out a terrible groan, shaking his head violently as he did. She was right – blimey, why was Hermione always bloody right? In the distance, they could still hear the screams of Mr. Roberts' wife and the crying of his two little children. There was a heavy scent of smoke in the air, and the sky was still red with flame.

"Come on, let's go," Harry nodded, pulling the other two deeper into the thicket. They'd left the tree line a few hundred feet behind to better hide themselves from anyone peeking into the forest, but they were now trying to maintain a parallel line. With all the chaos of the night, it would not do to add even more to it by getting lost in the trees.

"Wands won't do us much good anyway," Ron groused, jogging beside him. "Can't risk casting too many spells with these bloody leaves in our mouth."

"Keep quiet about that," Hermione hissed. "There'll be Aurors around before too long!"

Harry snorted. "There haven't yet, have there?" He shook his head. "Poor Mr. Roberts. You see his wife?"

"Saw too much of her," Ron said somewhat queasily. "Bastards."

Hermione didn't bother correcting his language.

Sometime later they came across a group of Veela in a tight group, bound together by a circle of ardent admirers. It seemed even the threat of imminent death wasn't enough to overcome the allure of a Veela. Ron managed to shout, "My Animagus form! It's a nundu, it is!" before Harry and Hermione clawed him away from the alluring witches and back into the forest. From there they were alone, stumbling through the forest as quietly and carefully as they could. The lights at the end of Ron and Hermione's wands were as dim as they could be and still be seen by. Every time they passed over his face Harry patted his pockets in the vain hope that his wand had magicked itself back into its proper place. No such luck.

"Hermione, douse your light," Ron hissed even as he did just that. Hermione did as she was told, but she kept a tight grip on her wand, levelling it by her hip. She looked like a cobra prepared to strike. Up ahead, they could see natural light – and the sickly red unnatural light of the fires – through a break in the thicket. They strained their ears but heard nothing. Not even whispers. Ron clucked his tongue, turning to his friends. "What do you think?"

Harry deliberated for a moment and then shrugged. "There might be other people there," he said. "We can ask if any of them have seen Fred, George and Ginny."

"Or," Hermione whispered harshly, "there could be lot of black robed people who enjoy tormenting innocent people there!"

Ron shook his head. "Nah, I don't think so. We'd be hearing screaming or something right? Or like…maniacal laughter?"

"They aren't comic book villains, Ron!"

"What's a comic book?"

"Oh, never mind, let's just go!"

Ron crept forward first, crouched low to the ground with his wand beside his eye, pointed aggressively in the direction of the clearing. He took a single step out of the thicket, still obscuring most of his body in the brush. It was a circular clearing, not much bigger than the living room of the tent had been. There was a large oak tree in the middle. Overhead, the moon's light cast the entire thing in an eerie sort of glow, particularly when combined with the red glow of the distant fires.

"Careful, Weasley," an unfortunately familiar voice drawled from across the clearing. "Someone who actually knows how to use a wand might take that as a threat."

Ron hung his head in annoyance even as the other two stepped out of the brush and into the clearing. Harry snorted lightly. "That's not you, Malfoy."

"Can we find anywhere else to hide?" Hermione asked, looking distastefully at Malfoy. "I think I'd rather take my chances with the lunatics attacking camp."

From his place leaning against the sturdy girth of the oak tree, Malfoy laughed nastily. "Sure about that, Granger?" he smirked. "You?"

"What's that supposed to mean!?" Ron snapped, taking a step forward.

Malfoy rolled his eyes at him. "They're hunting Muggles, idiot." He leered at Hermione. "She's the next best thing, isn't she?"

"Whatever, Malfoy," Harry retorted. "Why aren't you out there, then? Mummy and Daddy tell you to hide in the woods while they get their sick thrills?"

Malfoy shrugged, unperturbed by Harry's goading. "If they did," he smiled, "it'd be more than your parents could tell you, eh?"

Harry went for his wand before he remembered it wasn't there. Hermione's hand latched tightly onto his arm regardless, her own muscle memory screaming at her to stop him. A less angry Harry might have had a problem with one of his friend's automatic responses to him being to stop him from assaulting someone. Just now, Harry only wished he had his wand.

"Come on, let's go," Hermione pulled on him. She sneered at Malfoy. "We'll find a rotten log to hide under, it'll be better company."

"Keep that big, bushy head down, Granger," Malfoy winked at her. "You too, Weasley. I expect your blood traitor family is next in line."

Ron's jaw tightened and his shoulders squared even as he tromped after Harry and Hermione.

"Tell me, Weasley!" Malfoy called. "That stupid sister of yours even know enough magic to keep her and her knickers on the ground!?"

"FUCK YOU, MALFOY!" Ron screamed, turning and levelling his wand.

"Expelliarmus!" Hermione cried, catching Ron's wand deftly in her hand. He turned to her angrily. "We have enough problems without you causing more! Let's go!"

She turned, followed quickly by Harry, and stomped into the woods amidst the howling laughter of the Malfoy heir. Ron had little choice, however wounded his pride was. He followed after them, cursing loudly as he did.

"You alright, mate?" Harry asked when he had caught up.

"No," Ron snapped churlishly. "Give me back my wand, Hermione."

Hermione looked as if she wanted to argue, but, seeing the look on his face, she passed it back over without comment. It was only when Ron opened his mouth and stuck his wand inside that she cried out a startled, "Ron!"

Ron said nothing. He only pulled his wand back out and fished his mandrake leaf off of his tongue where it had fallen. He discarded it angrily onto the ground. "It ripped when I was cursing Malfoy."

"Oh, Ron," Hermione sighed.