Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger walked down the hall after dinner together, following the crowd of Hogwarts students. All three were quiet; it had been a long day, and Harry, at least, was looking forward to his bed.
"Got any homework?" Ron asked, trying to make conversation. Harry and Hermione both shook their heads. "Want to play some chess?" His heart wasn't really in the suggestion, and he looked almost relieved when they both declined. The trio lapsed into silence; Hermione brought a book out of her bag, Ron yawned, and Harry idly watched the paintings move as they walked by.
He didn't see Draco Malfoy leaning against a wall, watching him with cold gray eyes, a cruel smile curving across his face. Draco ran a hand through his hair, ending with a tug to the ponytail holding back his longish white-blond hair, and then turned on his bootheel down the passage that led to the kitchens, his black cloak flaring out behind him.
§§§
Harry, standing still, as a silver dragon breathed red fire at him, while Hermione's voice shouted, "Fight it, Harry!" Flicker.
Hermione, wearing an elaborate medieval outfit and a very large red stone on a gold chain around her neck. The stone had some gold working on it, but he couldn't see it clearly. Flicker.
Himself, Ron, his head breaking the surface of a lake, a grin on his face, holding the same red stone by its gold chain. He could see the working now: a triangle upside-down inside another triangle, the first one's corners touching the other's edges. Flicker.
Harry, standing still, as a silver dragon breathed red fire at him, while Hermione's voice shouted, "Fight it, Harry!" Flicker.
Hermione, wearing an elaborate medieval outfit and a very large red stone on a gold chain around her neck. The stone had some gold working on it, but he couldn't see it clearly. Flicker.
Himself, Ron, his head breaking the surface of a lake, a grin on his face, holding the same red stone by its gold chain. He could see the working now: a triangle upside-down inside another triangle, the first one's corners touching the other's edges. Flicker.
Harry, standing still, as a silver dragon breathed red fire at him…
The dream faded as Ron awoke. He was by now convinced that it was not an ordinary dream; it had the wrong feeling, for one, not as hazy as a regular dream. For another, he had been seeing the same things every night for a week. He knew it by heart now; he only wished he knew what it meant. Scrubbing a hand through his red hair, he got out of bed, dressed, and went down to breakfast.
He joined Harry and Hermione at the Gryffindor table. "Good morning," he greeted them.
" 'Morning," Hermione said, and Harry echoed a few moments later. Ron helped himself to some toast and began to slather butter on it.
"Cornelius Fudge is a grandfather," Hermione announced, reading from her Daily Prophet. " 'Lucinda May, born yesterday to his daughter Susan.' "
"Oh, boy," Harry said sarcastically. Harry didn't like Fudge much. The Minister's behavior after Cedric had died two years ago, and his actions and inaction since, had not impressed Harry—or Dumbledore, and Harry set great store by Dumbledore's opinions. Hermione rolled her eyes and kept reading. Harry turned to Ron. "Hagrid owled this morning. He wants us to visit him for supper tonight."
"Okay," said Ron.
Harry took out a quill and wrote their reply, drinking pumpkin juice. Ron had inhaled his toast, and so asked Hermione for the crossword page from the paper—it had become a hobby. He pulled out his quill and checked his watch; Good. He had a solid twenty minutes before they had to go to Transfiguration.
§§§
Divination was the last class of the day. Ron followed Harry up the rope ladder and into the dim, perfumed room where the air always seemed twice as heavy. He sat down in a soft, peach-colored armchair. Ron could always say that one good thing about Divination: the class was boring and teacher irritating, but the chairs were comfy. "Man, it's hot in here," Harry said, slumping in his seat.
"Today," said Professor Trelawny in her dreamy voice, "we shall continue with our advanced Crystal Viewing. One person from each table, please come up and receive your balls." Ron's eyebrow quirked at that, but he didn't make a crack over it. "Again, use Chapter 12 of Unfogging the Future. I will be available if you need help interpreting your viewings."
Ron looked at Harry, but he seemed tired, so Ron fetched their crystal ball. Ron had never seen anything in it, and neither had Harry, except a lot of white mist. Still, Ron made some effort to peer into it—and—and—there was something there. Ron gasped and leaned in closer. Harry, standing still, as a silver dragon breathed red fire at him…What the—! How—? What is my dream doing in the crystal ball?!?
Unfortunately, Ron's pondering was cut short by Harry sliding to the floor in a dead faint.
"Harry!" he exclaimed, jumping up to see what was the matter. Lavender and Parvati came nearly as quickly, asking what had happened. Harry's face was flushed and sweaty; he was conscious again, but his eyes had a foggy look to them.
Professor Trelawny pushed through to Harry's side. She put a hand to his forehead, gasped, "He's burning up," and immediately Apparated with Harry to the infirmary.
§§§
Ron and Hermione anxiously hurried up to the hospital wing, long strides taking the stairs two at a time. Now that Hermione thought about it, Harry had been rather droopy all day, but she thought that he was just tired. There's nothing going around Hogwarts; what could he have? It must be bad if he fainted! Oh, Harry, please be okay. They burst through the door at the same time, startling Madame Pomfrey, who was ladling out a silvery-purple liquid from a cauldron into a glass.
"Where's Harry?" Hermione gasped.
"What's wrong with him?" asked Ron at the same time.
The nurse looked seriously at them. "Sit down, please. We must talk."
Hermione went cold. Oh no. "When can we see him?" she asked quietly.
"Soon. First, I must tell you some things."
Ron and Hermione sat and exchanged scared looks. Madame Pomfrey sounded unusually grim. "When Sibyl brought him up—no, I'll just tell you. Harry has been poisoned."
Hermione's breath caught. Poisoned. No. "There's an antidote, right? You've given it to him, haven't you?" She sounded slightly hysterical to her ears.
Madame Pomfrey took a deep breath. "There is an antidote, but no, we haven't given it to him yet. The poison that was used—scarletfire—is very powerful, therefore the ingredients of the antidote must be very powerful. The three main ingredients are phoenix tears, mandrake root—" Well, that's not so bad, Hermione thought "—and Elixir of Life, a product of the Sorcerer's Stone."
Hermione forgot to breathe. She heard that last sentence, over and over, inside her mind, and remembered a passage she had shown Ron and Harry in their first year:
There have been many reports of the Sorcerer's Stone over the centuries, but the only Stone currently in existence belongs to Mr. Nicholas Flamel.
And that Stone had been destroyed five years ago.
Ron jumped up as a pressing sensation in her chest reminded Hermione to take breath. Madame Pomfrey sensed their panic. "Now, now. I can promise that everything possible is being done to save Harry's life. Professor Dumbledore is reading over his old alchemy notes and will attempt to make another Stone as soon as possible. Professor Snape is searching for a substitute ingredient in case the Headmaster is unsuccessful. Meanwhile, I will be giving Harry this potion every hour to slow the effects of the poison. He will live at least another three weeks, and that is enough time to save him." She picked up the glass. "Would you like to see him now?" They nodded, and followed her into a cubicle.
Hermione recalled what she knew about scarletfire. It coursed through the veins and heated the blood; that was why Professor Trelawny had thought that he had a fever. Eventually the blood would boil and the victim would die. The potion the nurse was giving him probably had a cooling effect.
Harry was lying on top of the white sheets, stripped to the waist. His skin was pink and damp, and his hair stuck to his forehead. His eyes opened sleepily at their approach. Madame Pomfrey made him sit up and drink, and soon some of the color went out of his cheeks, and he looked less drowsy. "Hi, guys," he said with a wan smile.
"Hey, Harry," Ron said, sounding grave.
"Did she tell you?" Harry asked. Hermione's lower lip trembled. "I guess so."
"Harry—" Ron started.
"Look, it's all right." Harry interrupted. "Dumbledore's going to everything he can, and I know that if anyone can cure me, it's him." His eyes were filled with trust and admiration. "It's going to be fine."
Ron and Hermione exchanged looks, not sharing Harry's absolute faith in the Headmaster. Ron then said, "Oh, hey, I brought you something." He pulled Harry's photo album out of his bag. "I thought it might help, you know…"
"Thanks, Ron." Harry flipped though the book, his eyes shining.
"All right, that's enough, you two. Out," Madame Pomfrey commanded.
Hermione leaned down and kissed Harry's cheek. It was too warm; another reminder. "Fight it, Harry," she said fiercely, and left.
§§§
Ron and Hermione were back in the Gryffindor common room, next to a window away from the commotion. Hermione was pacing briskly, muttering to herself, angrily wiping tears off her face with her sleeve every so often. Ron could hear snatches of her murmuring; "what're we going to do" came through a lot. He was sitting in a chair, knees drawn up to his chin. Ron was not wondering what they were going to do. He was thinking of what Hermione had said, down there in the hospital wing.
"Fight it, Harry." Exactly what she was yelling in my dream. And there it was in the crystal ball—is it the future? Was it the future? What about the rest? Ron thumped his knee with his fist. What does this mean? I need help.
"Hermione?" he said. She stopped and looked at him. "I…think that I need to tell you something."
"What?" she asked skeptically. Ron knew she was wondering what could be so important that he need to tell her now, of all times. He suddenly felt unsure.
"I've been having…dreams," he said quickly. "For a week now, I've been having the same dream over and over. And then right before Harry fainted in Divination, I saw the same things in the crystal ball. And what you said to Harry down there—'Fight it, Harry'—that was what you said in the dream." Ron looked up, seeing how she had taken this information. Hermione looked puzzled.
"What? Let me straighten this out." She knuckled her forehead. "You've been having the same dream for a week." Ron nodded. "You saw the dream in the crystal ball today." He nodded again. "And I said the same thing in the dream that I just said to Harry? Ron, this is important." He sighed with relief. Hermione was taking this seriously. "Did anything else happen in the dream?"
"Yeah, tons. Let me see…First, there was a silver dragon breathing this bright red fire at Harry, and that was when you yelled, "Fight it, Harry!" Then it changed, and there was just you standing there, in this medieval outfit wearing a necklace with a ruby on it and some gold decoration on the ruby. Then it changed again, and there was me, coming out of a lake or something, holding the necklace. I could see the decoration now—here, let me draw it." He took a quill and quickly sketched the two triangles, and handed it to Hermione.
She gasped. "Ron, are you sure it was a ruby?"
"Well, it looked like a ruby…" he started, but Hermione had run off. She returned with a volume of The Wizard's World Book Encyclopedia. Flipping to a page, she set it down before Ron. "Did it look like that?"
"Yes, that's it exactly," Ron said, glancing at the picture.
"Then it wasn't a ruby, Ron. It's a Sorcerer's Stone."
Ron's mouth fell open. "What!?"
"That Sorcerer's Stone was lost six hundred years ago. It belonged to—well, don't you listen in History?"
"Yes!" said Ron defensively.
"Don't you remember the Damodreds?"
"Sort of. We studied them last year, right?"
Hermione snorted. "Try last month, Ron. Anyway, the Damodreds were an old and very wealthy wizard family. One member of that family, Lord Jeffrey Damodred, was a very ostentatious man." Hermione gestured. "Feasts, palaces…he liked everyone to know just how rich he was. And so he had that necklace made for his wife Clarissa." She laughed. "Can you imagine? Wearing a Sorcerer's Stone as jewelry?!"
"You said it was lost," prompted Ron.
"Yes." She shrugged. "Lord Jeffrey had many enemies, and a few banded together and took him down. Destroyed his houses, killed his family and servants…" Hermione bit her lip. "But the necklace was never found."
"So let's go find it," he said determinedly.
Hermione gave him a sad look. "Ron," she said gently, "we don't know if that's what it meant—"
"What else could it mean?" Ron exploded. "I have a dream for a week before this happens, then I see it in the crystal ball—you know I've never seen anything in it before. This must be something really important to be shown to me. It couldn't be a lie if it was so important. And a part of it has come true already. What else could it mean, Hermione? You and I are going to find the Sorcerer's Stone."
Hermione looked stunned. Then her eyes narrowed. "All right, if we are going to find the Sorcerer's Stone, where to you suggest we look?"
Ron tilted his head. "Was there a lake close to Lord Jeffrey's manor?"
"Yeah. It's famous. A mile deep and a mile wide, perfectly circular, lined with white marble. No one knows how it was made."
"Then let's start there," Ron said.
"Ron, I'm sure that people have been through that lake a hundred times, if not looking for the Stone specifically. It's an interesting place. Why should we be able to find something that they couldn't?"
"They didn't know it was there," Ron said, tapping his head.
"Then let's tell Dumbledore, or someone. Maybe they'll believe us. Why do we have to go?"
"Because Harry would do it," Ron said with steel in his voice. "Harry would do it, for either of us. He would, and he could, too. That's the kind of friend Harry is. Are you going to do the same for him?"
Hermione looked at him a long moment. Then she nodded. "All right, all right. Let's do it."
§§§
Note: Thanks for the reviews, people: Sarah Backx (actually, it didn't; I was waiting anxiously for a real review, sorry), Tessie, Sabrina Myst, muggle genius, Ven Mi Reflejo (my, your name is hard to type), Rosmerta (I imagine a lot of siblings of Muggle-born wizards feel that way), Lavender, starrydreamer, Sara Cassidy, Chocolate Frog, VolleyballKrazy (I imagine that subconsciously he never forgot, and McGonagall's appearance triggered those memories), Anne, 1960 DeSoto, Crystal Music, metal mouth (don't we all wish it were a sign…I'll probably do Colin…and 2nd year), PJ Babington, roz, Mladybug3 (that would be tough), Melanie McDonald & Lottie Dot, Hermione L. Granger (R-O-N! Who do we love? RON! The toenail clippers part is my favorite too.), Rachel, and Sarah Weasley (even though all you said was "Huh?" What were you confused about?).
The Other Note: Hmm…what brownie point question should I ask this time? Oh, yes. What book inspired me to name this story after a poison? Six thousand and two points if you can tell me.