Liberation of Fate

Chapter I

"Hermione, how'd you -"

"Shh!"

Ron looked up from his parchment, tip of his pigeon feather quill resting between his lips, to see Hermione had twisted in the seat beside him, her gaze – and her attention – turned away from his last-minute Herbology essay. Ron frowned slightly, normally, after she got over her initial faze of disappointment, Hermione hovered over his shoulder as he worked, eagerly pointing out his mistakes as he wrote but this evening, she clearly hadn't been paying the slightest bit of attention to him or his essay on the properties of Wiggentree.

He leaned forward from his seat, reaching for his mug of hot chocolate and peering around Hermione to see what had captured her attention.

"You are such a liar, Potter!"

Ron shifted his body forward so that he was perched at the edge of the sofa and took a swig of his drink. Sitting in the large leather armchair, half-tucked underneath the staircase that led to the boy's dormitory, was Katie Bell, dressed casually in a simple pair of dark denim jeans that hugged her legs as they curled underneath her and a baggy grey woollen jumper. Her light brown hair was pulled back into a messy, haphazard ponytail with a few loose wisps falling around her face as she looked up at the smiling figure of Harry Potter who was perched on the arm of the chair.

"I'm not! I'm not!" Laughed Harry, holding his hands up in a show of innocence. He was dressed in a loose pair of light grey tracksuit trousers and a matching hoody which looked at least two sizes to big for Harry's lean frame. His jet black hair was damp, swept backwards and out of his face and somehow looking even darker than it usually did. "I swear, this thing must have been the size of an Elephant. Talking to us like we've just popped round for tea."

"Oh, it was not."

Katie was shaking her head in disagreement, her ponytail swaying vigorously behind her as a smile lit up the delicate features of her face despite her disagreement.

"There is!" Harry continued to argue. Ron watched him turn his gaze away from Katie, scan the common room briefly before Ron found himself looking directly into the bright green eyes of his best friend, whose face lit up at finding him. "Ron! Ron will tell you, how big is Aragog?"

Ron didn't even try to hide the shudder than ran down his spine at the mention of the terror that lurked in the Forbidden Forest and he couldn't help the involuntarily look out of the small, arch-shaped window that sat midway up the stone wall to his left, looking out at the blanket of treetops that stretched out far into the distance. Just knowing that that thing and its family was living only a handful miles into that tree line made Ron incredibly uneasy.

"Too big." Answered Ron, closing his eyes and shaking his head at the memory of Aragog's long, spindly legs extending out of it's hollow before it's large, hairy body rose out of the ground as it stepped forward into the moonlight, dirt raining down off of its body like a waterfall. "Much, much too big."

Hermione had swung her attention back to Ron and was giving him a very peculiar look and trying – and failing – to look nonchalant, like she hadn't just been caught with her hand in the biscuit tin.

"But roughly? The size of an Elephant you reckon?"

"Harry, I've tried very, very, hard for the last four years to forget about everything to do with that night," said Ron. "But yes, he was the size of an Elephant...a dirty, eight-legged, multiple eyed Elephant."

Katie was now looking between him and Harry sceptically. Still disbelieving. She gave him one last look before turning her attention back to Harry.

"Ok, ok so if, if, there are actually Acromantula in the forest. Where did they come from? They normally live in tropical climates, don't they? And I'm not sure if you've noticed, Potter, but Scotland isn't exactly tropical."

The rest of their conversation was reduced to a muffle as a group of second-year boys came bundling through the Fat Lady's portrait hole and into the common room and Ron leant back into the sofa with the intent on finishing his essay when he noticed Hermione doing that thing with her eyebrows.

That thing that usually meant that he had either said something stupid or missed something entirely.

"What?"

Hermione's eyes where wide and darting back and forth.

"What?"

Her eyes took on an irritated look and continued to dart back and forth.

"Are you ok, Hermione?"

She huffed and rolled her eyes before saying, her voice barely above a whisper.

"They're looking awfully friendly."

"Who?"

"Harry and Katie!"

"Are they?" said Ron, feigning a stretch over the back of the sofa and craning his neck around Hermione to see Harry and Katie, still deep in a conversation that seemed to be filled with more laughing than it did talking. "I guess...but they've always been mates...I guess you just notice it more because the twins, Alicia and Angelina aren't around?"

Ron watched as a frown knitted Hermione's eyebrows together, she chanced another look back at the two of them before turning back to Ron.

"Neville said he found them sitting together on the Express…"

"So? Blimey, Hermione, who else was he going to sit with? We were at the prefect meeting and Ginny said she was going to see Dean."

Hermione looked at him for a moment before shrugging her shoulders slightly and offering a small sigh.

"I know, I know. I just, I was so worried about him over the summer and then he arrived at the Burrow and he seemed so…"

"Well?"

"Yes, well. And I kept thinking that at some point over the summer it would be like it was last summer but it just never happened."

Ron couldn't disagree with her. His mother had spent most of the first four weeks of the summer holidays hounding Professor Dumbledore about letting Harry come to the Burrow and Ron had spent most of that four weeks mentally preparing himself for the same angry, moody Harry that arrived at Grimmauld place the year before. Only for that Harry to never appear.

"I heard my Mum and Dad talking just before we left for school, my Mum thinks Harry really grew up over the summer. That he's really came into his own." Said Ron, remembering the night shortly before they had left for Hogwarts when he had gone to get a glass of water and overheard the tail-end of his parents conversation about Harry. "But I actually think he did that last year, you know, when everybody thought he was lying and he had to defend himself against pretty much everybody and that bit -, err, horrible women was here and he spent all year teaching us. I think that's really when he came into his own."

Hermione's big brown eyes had taken a distinctively watery look as she nodded in silent agreement – which in itself was something that Ron was having to quell the urge to fist pump about in celebration.

"Still, I thought after Sirius' passed…"

"Maybe he just -" Ron paused, trying to find the right wording, as he placed his roll of parchment and quill down on the coffee table in front of him and turned his attention back to Hermione, homework now forgotten. "Processed it better than he did Cedric's death?"

It sounded stupid to say it out loud. To suggest that Harry would cope any easier with the death of his Godfather but the difference in Harry in the two summers was like night and day. Last year Harry had been so angry, so resentful about being kept in the dark that when he'd arrived at Grimmauld Place, Ron wasn't ashamed to admit, he found his best friend rather intimidating in his explosive rage. And yet, this summer, Harry had been anything but, instead, he'd been pleasant and jovial all summer. He pitched in with the chores like he always did but then when they were done, he'd disappear inside up to Fred and Georges old room, fetch a book out of his trunk and spend hours upon hours pouring himself over the pages, scribbling little notations in the margins of the page before emerging in the late afternoon, fetching his broom from the broom shed and decimating them all at a quick pick me up game of Quidditch.

It was quite the shift from previous summers, where Harry had seemed perfectly content to just spend the afternoon lounging in the garden, playing Quidditch and swimming in the pond. Ron thought Harry managed to get through more books than Hermione this past summer, which was almost unthinkable.

"You know, Bill told me that when he was watching Harry before he came to our house, that Harry would spend hours and hours at night swishing a small stick he'd picked up at the park near the Muggles around in his bedroom. Bill said you could see his silhouette from across the street. I thought that sounded mental, you know, to be honest, I still thought that when he first did it in my room over the summer."

"You never said he did that?"

Ron shrugged his shoulders again.

"Didn't wanna embarrass him. Seemed a bit of an odd thing to do but I think he was practising what he was reading from all those books. The wand movements. He obviously couldn't do magic over the summer but he could still learn, couldn't he? That's what I think he was doing...teaching himself magic like he did for the tournament and Dumbledore's army."

They lapsed into silence. Hermione busy chewing her bottom lip as the sounds of Katie Bells snorting laughter just about rose above the rowdy second years who now seemed to be engaged in a particularly vicious game of exploding snap.

"And he hasn't said anything to you about the you-know-what?"

"No. Not a word. I swear."

Ron knew where Hermione stood on the whole Prophecy situation. She was utterly convinced that Harry had heard or knew the content of that little misty orb they'd tried to liberate from the Department of Mysteries. She'd been convinced of that fact even before Harry had arrived at the Burrow and, after a few days, she'd only seemed to double down on that particular theory.

She cast another glance at Harry and Katie.

"And he's never mentioned anything about that?"

Her eyes darted back again toward Harry and Katie, accompanied by the raising of her eyebrows.

"We do talk about things other than girls, you know."

Hermione's eyebrows raised even higher. The disbelief clear on her face.

"You share a room with Seamus Finnegan and Dean Thomas."

It was a fair point. The girls of their year – and even the girls a year either side – were the undisputed top topic of their dorm room and certainly had been for a number of years for Seamus and Dean – though thankfully, Dean seemed to have the good sense to keep his budding romance with Ginny to himself. It had taken the rest of them a little while to catch up but it was now an almost nightly topic of conversation, especially since Neville had let slip that he'd spent the summer writing to Hannah Abbott. Of course, the realisation that Neville Longbottom was having more success with girls than he was, was the source of much amusement to Seamus and Dean.

Somehow, despite the frequency of the topic, Harry always seemed to on the fringes on the conversation, rarely offering an opinion and, to be fair, rarely being asked for one. Silently observing.

"Harry never really says anything. Just keeps quiet really, unless, you know, it's to poke fun at me or something."

Hermione looked at him sceptically, her brown eyes staring at him rather intensely.

"Well, I think he fancies her. He hasn't spoken to a girl like that since -" she paused. "Actually, he never spoke to Cho like that at all."

Ron leaned forward again to look past Hermione back at Harry and Katie, who at that moment had leaned up and smacked Harry on the shoulder in mock outrage. He couldn't blame Harry. Katie was a good looking girl. Easily the best looking seventh year Gryffindor. He could see why Harry would be interested and Katie certainly didn't seem to find his presence offensive.

"Well fair play to him. As long as he's happy."

Hermione rolled her eyes at him again before leaning forward and snatching the parchment from the table and muttering what sounded distinctly like 'boys' under her breath.

"Ok, ok so if, if, there are actually Acromantula in the forest. Where did they come from? They normally live in tropical climates right? And I'm not sure if you've noticed, Potter, but Scotland isn't exactly tropical."

"Well how am I supposed to know?" said Harry, conveniently leaving out Hagrid's dabbling in the magical creatures black market. "All I know is one minute he's speaking to us and the next we're running for our lives as hundreds of his children are trying to eat us. Honestly, we'd be dead if it wasn't for that Ford Anglia."

"Ok to far, Potter. I can just about get my head around a colony of Acromantula living deep in the forest – seems like the type of mad thing Dumbledore would allow – but you cannot tell me there is a rogue Ford Anglia just driving itself around the forest!"

It did sound utterly unbelievable, Harry agreed, but that didn't make it any less true.

"I swear on Hedwig's life!"

"Oh get on. First off, how does it fill up with petrol? It can't just run forever, it's a bloody car!"

"Of course it can. It's -"

"Don't say it!"

"Magic."

Katie dissolved into giggles and every now and then a very unladylike snort would punctuate her giggles. Every time she let loose a snort, Harry couldn't help but smile, it was such an inelegant sound coming from such a petite women.

"You're such a dick," she said with a smile, tucking a strand of loose hair behind her ear as she looked up at him. "I'm not even going to ask how a Ford – wait, is that the car you and Ron flew to Hogwarts?"

"Ask me no questions, Ms Bell, and I will tell you know lies."

She stared at him open-mouthed for a few seconds.

"How you haven't been expelled I'll never know. And that was just your second year!"

Harry looked down at her from his seat on the arm of the chair she was sitting on. Her face was flush, her blush spreading across the bridge of her small button nose and across her defined cheekbones, sitting beneath her bright blue eyes that were looking him directly in the eye.

"Well actually, that was more like just the first half of second year."

She snorted again and shook her head, ponytail swinging behind her head before she sank back into the plush leather of the armchair, twisting to face him. If she was struggling with Aragog and Mr Weasleys self-aware car, she would find the fifty-foot Basilisk slithering through the piping system incomprehensible.

"Your unbelievable Potter. I should have known you'd be trouble the minute you managed to wrangle your way onto the Quidditch team in your first year."

Puffing himself up like a peacock, Harry poked himself in the chest with his thumb.

"Youngest seeker in a century, I'll have you know."

Katie lurched forward and, with surprising strength, hit him square on the upper arm almost causing Harry to topple sideways off the chair. His arm shot out and he gripped the top of the chair to keep himself steady before pulling himself back upright only to see Katie with her hand over her mouth, trying desperately to stifle her laughter.

"Thanks for the help, Katie. I'll remember that when I've organised Quidditch try-outs!" Harry pulled the frame of his glasses down his nose so they rested just above the tip of his nose. Dipping his imaginary quill into his imaginary inkpot before saying, "not a team player," as he scribbled across his invisible notepad, looking at Katie over the rim of his circular glasses.

"Oh like that is it? What happened to," Katie cleared her throat before dropping her voice lower, putting on an exaggeratedly well-spoken English accent, all traces of her natural Irish lilt vanishing. "Don't be stupid, you don't need to try out, I've watched you play for five years…"

"No respect for authority either," Harry said as ran a hand through his hair, still damp from his earlier shower.

Katie, however, ignored his latest retort and instead shifted closer to the arm of the chair, looking up at him with those bright blue eyes.

"Here I was thinking you spent your time looking for the snitch but actually you've just been watching little old me."

Harry felt his face flush at the implication as much as the husky edge that her voice had taken. He looked at her, unable to keep his mouth from working wordlessly, as he desperately thought of a retort. The look of triumph that lit up her face was eerily similar to the look Ron got when he inevitably bested him at chess. Still, Harry was enjoying the back and forth with Katie – something that had become somewhat of a regular occurrence – too much to let her win.

Harry sucked air in through his teeth, adopting what he hoped was a pitying look.

"Oh, I wasn't watching you, Katie…" said Harry with a mocking sadness to his voice. "It's George I've been watching all these years."

"Oh," said Katie, leaning back, her hand moving over her heart. "You must have been devastated when he got together with Angelina."

"I've just tried to keep myself busy, to focus on other things."

"Like Cho Chang?"

Harry blinked at the sudden use of his ex-girlfriends name. Katie was looking at him with a look of the utmost innocence. She'd played her trump card masterfully and Harry tried desperately to think of something embarrassing that he'd seen or heard of Katie doing but he couldn't think of anything, couldn't even think of a bad word that somebody had even said about her.

"Well, you've got me there. Not my finest hour."

Katie celebrated her victory much like she celebrated a goal in Quidditch, arms raised above her head, fists clenched and her eyes closed, like she was imaging the cheer of the crowd. Harry watched this silent celebration until she opened her eyes, the faintest of smiles gracing her pale pink lips.

They lapsed into silence. Harry looked around the common room which suddenly seemed a lot fuller than it had done when he'd initially come down from his dorm room and started speaking to Katie. Hermione was pointing out something to Ron on his essay on the nearest sofa to the chair he was sharing with Katie, Ron nodding his head slowly as he reached for the quill he'd tucked behind his ear, a group of seconds years where engaged in a rowdy game of exploding snap near the window perch whilst the seats in front of the two fireplaces in the common room where occupied by Ginny, Dean, Seamus and a girl he vaguely knew as Demelza and a group of seventh years respectfully.

Harry was beginning to feel a little bit awkward sitting on the arm of Katie's chair. He'd not thought anything of plonking himself down but now they'd stopped talking, he felt a little silly just sitting there. He suddenly became very aware of his arms. What the hell did he do with his arms? Did he cross them? Did he just keep them as they are, hanging limply by his sides? Or did he just fold them in his lap and remain where he was?

The back of his neck suddenly felt incredibly warm.

"Do you have any idea when you're going to hold the try-outs then?"

Harry's attention snapped back to Katie and suddenly where his arms were didn't seem that important.

"I've been struggling to find a date. I wasn't quite expecting sixth year to be quite so intense."

It wasn't a lie. They were barely two weeks into term and already there so-called 'free periods' were dominated by homework that tended to creep into their evenings as well. Between the increased workload and his time spent with Dumbledore, Harry was finding time a little bit hard to come by. Still, as Dumbledore had been clear to assert in his first few lessons, Harry was to find time to live his life.

Which, Harry had often thought, as he trudged to Dumbeldore's office at the crack of dawn or back from his office late in the evening, was easy for a man of one hundred and fifteen to say.

"Well you better hop to it, Captain. Otherwise you'll never be able to look Wood or Ang in the eye again knowing you didn't keep up the tradition of mental captains."

Harry slipped off the arm of the chair, stretching and enjoying the popping sensation that rippled up his back as he did so. Harry checked the gold watch on his wrist – a birthday gift from Mr and Mrs Weasley. It wasn't particularly late – a little after half-past nine – but he had an early morning appointment with Dumbledore and if the last two weeks had taught him anything, it was if he didn't get enough sleep, Professor Dumbeldores lessons seemed just that little bit harder.

"I think I'll hit the hay. Double potions tomorrow," said Harry, to which Katie made a face that said exactly how she felt about the prospect of double potions.

"Good night captain."

Harry gave her a small smile before grabbing the bannister of the staircase that sat behind the chair he'd been sharing with Katie, swinging himself around and walking up the stone steps, pausing only briefly to offer a quick wave goodnight to Ron and Hermione before continuing on his way to the sixth year boys dorm room.

The last lingering thought he had as he entered the – somehow already messy dorm room – was that he quite liked it when Katie called him Captain.