By: PepperjackCandy
Rating: PG13 (up to "second base" explicit, beyond that implied)
Disclaimer: It's J.K. Rowling's world. I just play in it.
Warning: This will be a slash story (Harry/Draco) eventually, though romantically-slashy, rather than erotically-slashy. Hence the PG-13 rating.
For some unknown reason, I've been imagining Cristi Ellen Harris http://www.geocities.com/TelevisionCity/Studio/1210/images/harris4.gif) as Seventh Year Hermione. Just thought I'd let you know.
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Harry, Hermione, Ron, Neville and Ginny had retreated to Harry, Ron, Neville and Seamus's room. Seamus was in the library and, hopefully, wouldn't be back until after they'd finished talking. At any rate, they put a ward outside the door so they'd have plenty of warning that Seamus was coming if he did return before they were done.
Ginny began. She sat next to Neville, and took his hand in hers. "It was my first year here at Hogwarts. You all remember," she looked from Neville, to Ron, to Hermione, and back to Neville again.
"That was the year the Heir of Slytherin kidnapped you." Ron said in a tone that indicated he remembered his baby sister's disappearance all too well.
"Well, 'kidnapped' isn't exactly the word I'd use." Ginny took a deep breath. "I think that 'possessed' is more appropriate."
Ron, Hermione and Neville gasped. Neville's grasp on Ginny's hand tightened, and he reached an arm around her shoulders reassuringly.
"You see, it started when I found a diary among my school books. The diary of a former Hogwarts student named Tom Riddle. I started writing in it myself, and it started answering me."
"Answering you?" Hermione asked.
Ginny nodded. "Tom Riddle had left a . . . piece of himself in it, so when I told it about how lonely I was, the book offered to be my friend. It listened to me when I told him how I missed my Mum and Dad, when I talked about how afraid I was that someone," she glanced up at Harry, "I idolized would never notice me, when I talked about how my brothers," she met Ron's eyes briefly, then looked back down, "talked down to me."
"I never knew." Ron said apologetically.
"I never meant for you to know." Ginny responded. "Eventually, I started doing things, without being aware of it. I woke up one day covered in rooster feathers. And another time with my hands covered in paint."
"Then . . . he decided to capture Harry. So he made me leave the note that I'd been kidnapped and let Harry find me. Harry rescued me." She directed a tearful smile at Harry then. "And he kept my secret."
"And the two of you have been the only people who've known this, for five years now?" Ron asked.
"Not exactly. Professor Dumbledore knows. And Mum and Dad. They figured it'd be better if no one else knew what, exactly, had happened."
Harry knew of someone else who knew - Lucius Malfoy - but he wasn't about to open that particular can of worms.
Ron seemed on the verge of saying something else, probably something reproachful about how their parents could have kept a secret like that for five years, but instead he crossed to his sister and gathered her up in his arms and held her as tears streamed down both their faces.
At this, Harry, Hermione and Neville also burst into tears, and the five of them sat, silently crying, for a long time.
Finally, Hermione dabbed her eyes and said, "Well, the Whomping Willow sap isn't collecting itself. We'd better get going."
"Just a second." Harry said as he stood and pulled his invisibility cloak and the Marauders' Map from his trunk.
"What's that?" Neville asked, indicating the cloak.
"Umm. . . My invisibility cloak?" Harry said hopefully.
"Right." Neville sighed. "Lots has been going on around here that I didn't know about, hasn't it?"
Harry, Ron and Hermione nodded silently.
"That's what I thought."
After everyone had washed the traces of their tears from their faces, they left Ron and Ginny in the common room and, taking the invisibility cloak, the Marauders' Map, their wands, and a couple of jars for the sap, they headed out. On the way by, Neville spoke to the fat lady.
"You were mistaken." He said softly. "They explained everything, and the secret they were keeping isn't what you thought at all."
"So?" She asked, leaning forward avidly, "what *was* the secret?"
"Never you mind." He admonished her. "If I told you, it wouldn't be a secret, would it?"
It was just barely early enough for them to be out of their rooms, so they didn't bother with the invisibility cloak on the way out. They headed for the statue of a faun that marked the top of the stairs that led to the passage blocked by the Whomping Willow, and, making sure that no one was coming, pushed it gently aside.
"There you go, Mr. Tumnus," Hermione whispered, patting it gently after they finished moving it.
"Huh?" Neville asked.
"Muggle book. Never mind." She whispered back as they headed into the tunnel, tripping the switch that'd move the statue back.
They lit their wands and headed out.
About quarter of an hour later, they arrived at the base of the Whomping Willow. The tree had settled during the four years since they'd last been down to that section of the grounds, and now a good section of trunk extended down into the tunnel.
Hermione pointed her wand at the trunk and quickly whispered the words that would puncture a hole in the bark, and put first one, then the other, jar in the path of the sap that flowed out.
After healing the wound in the bark of the tree, she quickly stoppered up the jars and handed one to Neville. Then the trio made their way back up the tunnel. They checked the Marauders' Map to see where Filch was, and confident that no one was in the hallway, moved the switch that would move the statue out. After they were out, they pushed the statue back into place and, just to be on the safe side, Harry threw the invisibility cloak over the three of them.
"You sure this works?" Neville asked. "I can still see out."
"Don't worry." Harry said. "I've done this lots of times, and the only person who could ever see me was . . ." He almost said 'Mad-Eye Moody,' but that just reminded him of all he went through in his fourth year at Hogwarts. Instead, he finished up with, "I've never had anyone tell me that they could see my disembodied face floating down the corridor. Now let's go before Filch catches us."
They returned to the Gryffindor common room and celebrated, quietly, their victory. "Now I'm going to put a stasis spell on this one." Hermione indicated her jar. "Just in case." She shared a grin with an embarrassed Neville.
On this note, Ginny crossed to her boyfriend and kissed his embarrassment away.
"Oh, and by the way," Hermione said to Ron, "what, exactly, did Neville mean about you not being able to get anywhere with me because of Harry?"
"Well, I'm off to bed," Harry announced, seeing that he wasn't needed there anymore. I guess that by morning Ron and Hermione will finally be a couple. He grinned as he started up the stairs for his room and fell into his bed, immediately sound asleep.
~ ~ ~
Harry was just walking into the prefects' bathroom, to get ready for the final trip to Hogsmeade of his sixth year at Hogwarts. He and Ron and Hermione were going to meet Fred and George, who had just made their millionth Galleon at their joke shop, and were taking Harry and his friends out on the village, as it were. After, all, Fred, or was it George?, had written in the invitation, we wouldn't even be *in* this business if you hadn't given us the stake to start it out with.
Harry knew that they'd've found the money somehow, but he, Ron and Hermione did need a break, after the past year's brush with Death-Eaters, and so they accepted gratefully.
He pushed the door open, just as Draco had reached for the handle, and so Draco ended up losing his balance, hitting the floor with a thud.
Harry had offered his hand, but Draco has simply said, "Sod off, Potter."
"Fine. Drop dead, Malfoy." Harry responded rolling his eyes.
He watched as Draco opened the door and left the room, only instead of the hallway that really existed outside the prefects' bathroom door, Draco had walked straight into Voldemort's, red, burning eyes.
~ ~ ~
Harry awoke with a start and a yell. And his scar was hurting.