Disclaimer: If I owned these characters, I'd be a millionaire by now & I'd be cranking out books 5, 6 & 7 a heck of a lot faster so my fans wouldn't be going gradually INSANE!!! Ehem. Right—sorry.
A/N Please let me know what you think. I still think the characters are a bit bland—especially Harry. I'm *so* horrible at writing that guy man! *sigh* By the way do you guys think I should bring Krum into the picture in Bulgaria? Stir some things up maybe? Let me know what you think. Anyways, on to the chapter!
*~*Preparing to Transform and Hermione's Confession*~*
"Do we have to become Animagi," Ron whined in the common room later that week. He had an innate distrust of Animagi ever since he found out that his pet rat Scabbers was really an evil wizard who had been responsible for the death of his best friend's parents. He eyed his gigantic volume of The Animagi's Guide: Transformation and Beyond with weariness.
"Ron, just think about it," Hermione replied. "It'll be just like the Marauders—you can have a secret weapon to use in times of trouble. And only Harry and I will know about it."
Ron looked at Hermione and the twinkle in her eyes. We've definitely been a bad influence on her, he though. "You know, the Hermione from first year would never have said something like that."
"Well, the Hermione of first year didn't have the future of the wizarding world on her shoulders. Ron, do you realize if we accomplish this, we could get rid of You-Know-Who permanently? If we do this, we could all be safe for once and for all."
"Right," Ron turned back to his book with new vigor and continued to read the warnings on the dangerousness of the transformation. "So, we can pick any animal we want to become right?"
"Well, I'm trying to find more information about the Cave of Virtue. Finding it with animal eyes is one thing, but I think we should pick animal bodies that can help us once we're inside too. So far I've found very little literature on the subject," she shuffled in her large chair and exchanged "The Bulgarian Mountains: A Magical Perspective" for the copy of "Legendary Chambers" sitting on the table beside her. "The most I've found so far is that we must cross the lava of the mountain, which is really an inactive Volcano."
"Well, that's easy," Ron said. "We can use the brooms. We'll just fly over."
"No, we can't use them because our magic doesn't work in the Cave of Virtue," she said. "I don't know how, but in that cave, we're as good as muggles. We'll have to think of another way across."
"Supposing we do find another way. What's next?"
"Well, according to 'Legendary Chambers' the Cave has never been breeched successfully. What lies beyond it has remained a mystery all these years, so—"
"So what you're trying to say is, you don't know, right?"
"Well," she huffed, "it's not like I don't know. It's just that—"
"You can't find it in one of your books?" He finished. "None of your sacred volumes can tell you the answer and it's driving you crazy, isn't it?"
She glared at Ron and promptly plopped her books on the table beside her and stood up. "You just worry about reading that book and learning how to transform without killing yourself! Let me worry about the 'sacred books!'" With that she stormed out of the common room.
Ron shrugged as he guessed she was heading back down to the library to burry her head in some more legends. He let his eyes wonder out to the calm Saturday rustle in the breeze and sighed. If I don't have some fun soon, he thought, I'm going to spontaneously combust. It's not fair! Harry's out there practicing Quidditch and I'm stuck in here with "A Wizard's Guide to Deception" in my lap! No sooner had the thought been entertained than he violently pushed it out of his mind. Harry had been through things he could only imagine and it was only fair that he had a little fun now and then. He looked back to the oversized volume in his lap and took a deep breath as he returned his attention to the warnings on the results of improper practice of the Animagus transformation.
"'Improper execution of the transformation could result in serious injury or death.' Whoa! How are we ever supposed to get this by Christmas break?"
**
Ron and Hermione spent the whole of October practicing Animagus transformation. They decided to start small and work their way up. The key to this type of transformation was fact that they were turning a living thing into another living thing. It wasn't like the porcupines-turn-pin-cushions they had worked on in class. They started out with insects and practiced turning a fly into a bee and a bee into an ant. Their first subjects weren't lucky enough to have survived the transformation and by the end of the first day they had a pile of bee-ants and fly-bees kicking and buzzing sporadically. The sight of a half-transformed insect was enough to fuel Ron's determination to get it right and for the whole month he studied furiously from the book he had come to regard as a 3rd companion. He was beginning to understand Hermione's attachment to her "Hogwarts: A History." Not to say that he enjoyed reading the rather laborious 750 page How-To guide. He simply had it with him so much that he began to feel almost naked without it and found himself—much to Hermione and Harry's amusement and his own horror—quoting it on several occasions. By Halloween he had had enough. It was time for a break.
"Hermione Granger, I forbid you to spend one more minute in the library today," he announced over breakfast that Sunday morning. "It's Halloween, it's a Sunday and you haven't had fun in over a month."
"Ron, to me the library is fun!"
"All right, fine. I haven't had fun in over a month. Same difference. Now, you Harry and I are going to spend an afternoon sitting around discussing mindless things, playing Exploding Snap and Chess and I don't want to hear one word about the library, Animagi or the Simurgh, am I understood?"
Harry laughed as he watched the horrified look on Hermione's face. "What am I to do then," she asked rather confused.
"Well, have fun of course!" Ron turned to Harry and rolled his eyes. "You do remember fun, don't you?"
"Honestly!" she huffed.
"Look, Mione, you and Ron have been working on this all month. You're a lot closer to mastering it than you think, and Ron's starting to get the hang of the insects."
"Hey!" Ron playfully threw a bread roll at Harry in offence.
"Ehem, as I was saying," the roll the side of his head knocking his glasses slightly askew and he left them that way hoping to illicit a smile from Hermione with his silliness. "You two should take a break. Just one day of relaxation, I promise. Tomorrow you can go back to slave driving and your stuffy library." He swatted a second piece of bread coming from her direction, which knocked his glasses completely off his face, and into the oatmeal he was trying to eat.
"Fine, but it better be worth it," she turned to Ron with a challenging look in her eyes.
**
They spent the entire morning out-of-doors. After spending an entire month cooped up in the common room and library Ron wouldn't hear of spending any more time inside. Bundled up in their cloaks and gloves to guard against the fall chill they went to visit Hagrid's hut to elp him deal with the latest stock of contraband creatures he had gotten his hands on. It was lunchtime before the last of the Ki-Rin—a frightening beast with the head of a dragon and the scaly body of a horse—were back in their cages quietly munching on feed.
Back in the Great Hall, the threesome sat contentedly eating their lunch. Harry had missed Ron and Hermione's company over the passed month. It seemed every time he wanted to relax and joke around Ron had his nose buried in a book. Harry had been used to that from Hermione, but he and Ron had always been able to enjoy a little down time in the common rooms in the evenings. The passed month had been a bit boring for him. It wasn't as though he was ungrateful—he understood and appreciated that they were doing all this for him, but he just wished that they could have more days like this—days when things would be like they were before Voldemort's resurrection.
"Even then it wasn't normal," he muttered to himself.
Ron looked up from his meal. "Eh?"
"Nothing," he replied. He thought about the sacrifice his friends were making for him and the difficulties involved in the task. Suddenly he had a stroke of genius. He wouldn't allow them to do this by themselves, but he couldn't let them know he was going to help. He couldn't let anyone know.
"I can't believe you'll be flying all the way to Grad Sofiya from the south of Bulgaria!" He said nonchalantly. Hermione suddenly dropped her spoon and splashed soup all over the table. With shaking hands she cleaned up the mess and reached for another spoon. "You all right Hermione?"
"Of course I am," she snapped. "I just lost my grip on the spoon, that's all."
"She's lost it on more things than that spoon, I'll wager," Ron whispered to Harry.
"I heard that!"
"Don't be cross Hermione! I was only joking."
Harry decided to continue if nothing else but to stop the impending argument that threatened to ruin the great day they'd been having. "The most I've ever flown was around the Quidditch fields. I've never actually done any long distance flying. You must be really excited!"
Again there was a clatter as Hermione dropped her goblet spilling the content everywhere. She looked deathly pale and muttered something about needing a nap and ran off towards the Gryffindor Tower.
"What on earth was that about," Ron asked dumbfounded.
"Your guess is as good as mine, Ron."
**
Ron climbed the stairs up the girls dormitory and paused behind the closed door of the 5th years' room. What am I doing here? He thought. Maybe I should go back and ask Ginny to talk to her. I really shouldn't be here. Losing his nerve, he decided the best thing to do would be to stay out of Hermione's way as long as she was upset. He turned and took a step out to walk back to the common room when the door behind him swung open.
"Oh," he heard a feminine voice draw a breath in surprise. He spun around to find Hermione, hair wildly spread out as if she'd been tearing away at it with hexes. She had regained some of her color but she still looked somewhat pale.
"Er—hi," he said. "I…uh…"
"Hi."
"Are you all right?"
"I think so." Hermione looked down and couldn't face him as she said this. He knew instantly that she wasn't all right. Instinctively he drew his arms around her waist and before either of them knew what was going on they were holding each other. He could smell the soft fragrance of her hair and feel the warmth of her body. Suddenly it became painfully clear that they were in an embrace. It seemed that she too had realized the situation and they awkwardly pulled away from each other.
"Mione, what's wrong," there was a pleading tone in his voice that she couldn't deny.
She turned back into the room and sad down on her bed. He followed her and sat across from her on what he assumed to be her trunk. "I—I'm worried," she finally said.
"Why," he prodded.
"It's just, well," she cast her eyes down again, unable to look him in the eye. "I couldn't find anything in those books. I've been looking all months and I can't find anything to help us once we pass the lava." She bit her lip and prepared herself for the laughing and teasing that she was certain would follow.
"Is that all?" His voice was so full of kindness that she was taken aback by it. "Hermione, you can't find what isn't known. Maybe no one's gotten passed the lava before. I mean, the feather's still there for a reason, don't you think?"
"Yeah, you're right." She continued to look down and didn't move from her place on the bed.
"That's not all that's bothering you, is it?"
"Of course it is," she said. She quickly got up and started shoving him towards the door. "Now, if you don't mind I'd like to straighten up a few things before I come back down. You and Harry play some chess or something and I'll be down in a minute."
"Hermione," Ron probed. "What is it? You can tell me. It can't be any worse than not being able to find something in the library, can it?"
She paused in the doorway and bit her lip again.
"Can it?" he asked again.
"I'm—I'mafraidofflying," she mumbled.
"You're what?"
"I'm afraid to fly, ok? I'm terrified."
Ron had to bite his tongue to suppress the laughter. She was confiding in him and he didn't want to embarrass or upset her.
"How can you be afraid to fly? You spent all of first year learning how to do it."
"Yeah but I never went very far—or very high for that matter. We're going to have to fly halfway across the country of Bulgaria and we're going to have to do it high enough to not be seen. I, I just can't. I don't know what I'm going to do. All month I've kept myself busy worrying about the Cave and transforming so I didn't have to think about it, but today…"
"Today you had nothing to distract you."
She nodded. Her face was hot and she knew she was blushing from embarrassment. Ron was an excellent flyer who was very good at Quidditch, and Harry was the youngest seeker in a century. She hated not being good at something and it made it even worse that her two best friends excelled at it. "I read some books, you know, on pointers and how to deal with the fear and stuff," Hermione said in an uncharacteristically small voice.
"Hermione," Ron said amused. "You don't learn to get over a fear by reading a book. Even you should know that! You just gotta do it. You gotta get out there and fly."
"I know, I just. I don't know."
"Ok, listen. I'll help you ok? You're helping me with this transformation thing, so I'll help you with the flying thing, deal?"
"Ok. Thanks Ron."
"Don't mention it. Now, let's get downstairs before Harry starts getting any ideas," a flash of mischief danced in Ron's eyes and Hermione and Ron made their way back to the common room.
(A/N: Ok, it got pretty cheesy & fluffy in the end. What do you guys think? Should I rewrite it? Make it a wee bit less sappy? If you think this part is fluffy just wait until I post the next section—it's the flying lessons. Ron will finally get to hold his arms around Hermione; they'll have a close call, and raise a few suspicions while they're at it. ;) It'll be incredibly cheesy—just thought I'd warn you!)
