Title: Strange Bedfellows: A Comedy of Assumptions
Author: Mad Maudlin
Email: mekamorph@yahoo.com
Catergory: Humor, and a little romance
Keywords: Ron Weasley, Draco Malfoy, Hermione Granger, Harry Potter, slash, 5th year
Rating: PG-13.
Spoilers: Teensy ones for Book Four, microscopic one for Book Two
Summary: Murder, mayhem, madness and Malfoy! Harry and Hermione face down an unexpected conspiracy, a possible nefarious plot, wild rumors and much, much worse to save their best friend from a terrible fate...right?

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

In other words, they're not mine; talk to the nice Scottish lady.

A/N: WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! This fic contains SLASH (male-on-male) SITUATIONS! Boys kiss boys! Boys do a lot more than kiss boys! It's SLASH! If this is the sort of thing that might offend you, do not read any further! I have a right to speak freely, but you have a right not to listen. So exercise your "Back" button! Bill put 'em there for something...

Strange Bedfellows:

A Comedy of Assumptions

by Mad Maudlin

6 / Sometimes a Wand is Just a Wand

Harry took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, desperate to stay awake. From his podium, Professor Binns lectured at length about political developments in the International Federation of Wizards in the nineteenth century, the Turkish language, and what this all had to do with the Crimean War. Absolutely no one looked enthused. Even Hermione had stopped taking notes, and was looking through a very thick book she'd gotten from the library titled The Making and Breaking of Wands by Oliver Ollivander. She'd already interrogated their DADA professor about how wands could be turned against their owners, and kept sneaking concerned glances Ron's, which was sticking out of his pocket.

Suddenly Ron prodded him in the elbow with the end of his quill. Harry looked over, and noticed a large piece of parchment by his right hand. He took it and read:

Are you plotting to kill me?

Dipping his quill quickly into his inkwell, Harry scribbled back.

No! Why?

Ron sucked on the end of his quill for a moment. Then he began to scribble furiously. When he slid the paper back towards Harry, he had written:

1. Hermione keeps dragging you off and hiding.
2. You followed me to the library yesterday.
3. She's staring at me.
4. I heard Lavender tell Parvati you were, and that you'd hired Malfoy to do it.
5. Ernie Macmillan told me in the hall that you two were clandastin lovers and were buying eels from Crabbe and Goyle for some kind of weird sexy thing.
6. Colin Creevey told me in the hall that you are stalking me.
????

Harry massaged his temples for a moment. Then, choosing his words carefully, he wrote back.

1-3. Hermione is not herself right now. I can't tell you why or she'll kidnap Hedwig.
4. Lavender overheard a conversation out of context. Do you really think we'd need a hitwizard if we wanted to kill you? Which we don't.
5. This is Ernie. She's not my girlfriend.
6. Colin spends much of his free time in a poorly ventilated darkroom.
I don't care what you've heard, I swear to God we are not trying to kill you.

Ron looked doubtfully at the parchment, then wrote:

That's what she told me this morning, before I'd heard anything.

Harry read this, then drew a large question mark underneath it. Ron took the parchment back and wrote further.

When she pulled me aside while you were getting toast, she told me that we would always be friends and just friends and then she said "and don't think anything more about it" but she might've been talking to herself. Then she said, would I believe anything I heard, and I said no. So she said that no matter what she swore you weren't trying to kill me. Then she left.

Harry groaned softly. Binns kept up at full speed, but Dean looked up (he had been drawing on a sleeping Seamus) and frowned. Harry waved him off. Then, underneath Ron's paragraph, he wrote:

WE ARE NOT TRYING TO KILL YOU. EVEN A LITTLE BIT.
You're overrecting.

Ron scowled.

What about the closet?

Nothing happened in the closet.

That's not what Ernie says.

That's Ernie.

Ron shook his head, then wrote at the very bottom,

I believe you. Explain, though?

I can't right now. Hedwig's in danger. Maybe later when Hermione's herself.

Ron chewed his quill some more, then wrote two letters next to Harry's reply. OK.

Harry crumpled up the parchement and stuffed it in his bag. A few moments later, the bell rang, and everyone tried to bolt for the door before Binns could assign their homework ("Eighteen inch essay on the Congress of Berlin and its affect on the legal status of centaurs"). Once in the hall, most everyone headed straight for the Great Hall and lunch, except for Seamus (who had a picture of a grindylow making a rude gesture on his forehead and wanted to know why people were laughing) and Hermione (and, therefore, Harry). Hermione dragged him into a convenient nook hidden behind a tapestry, then shoved the wand book in his face.

"Look at this!" she said shrilly. "Just look!"

Harry took a deep breath to marshal his resources. "Hermione," he said, "It is very dark, and the page is pressed right against my glasses. I couldn't look it I wanted to."

"Oh. Sorry." At least she looked embarrassed when she finally lit her wand; they balanced the book across both their arms, and she pointed at the appropriate passage. "Read this. Go on."

Harry read:

The Sceptron Curse is one of the spells most strongly condemned by the Ministry of Magic and the international community at large, after the Unforgivable Curses. It strikes at the heart of a wizard's power, his wand, rendering it unresponsive and unpredictable at best; at worst, it allows the caster to take control of the affected wand, and even turn it against its rightful wielder. In Britain, being caught casting such a curse is punishable by not less than five and nor more than ten years in Azkaban, and a three-hundred-Galleon fine, in addition to any punishment accrued for crimes possibly committed via a cursed wand.

The Sceptron Curse is extremely difficult to work, and requires one to intimately handle the wand one wishes to curse. It works best if one's own wand is of a similar size and construction.

"What's this got to do with anything?" Harry asked.

"Crabbe said that Malfoy was complaining about the size of Ron's wand!" Hermione said triumphantly. "He must be trying to work this curse, but their wands are too different!"

"Are you sure? I mean, have you ever seen Malfoy's wand?"

"Well...no," she admitted. "But you have, right? I mean, it's been right up in your face enough times..."

"I'm usually a bit too preoccupied to notice the fine details, Herm."

She sighed. "Well, we know it has to be smaller than Ron's, because otherwise he wouldn't be complaining about the size. How big is Ron's, anyway?"

"You mean you don't remember?"

"I don't go around keeping track of everyone's wand sizes, Harry!"

"Well, neither do I! He showed it to us both at the beginning of third year, remember?"

"Yes, well, that was third year! And besides, you're his roommate, you must've seen it loads of times!"

"I don't know what you think goes on in our dormitory, but I don't go around examining everyone else's wands. That's weird."

"Well, how are we going to compare Ron's wand to Malfoy's if we don't know how long they are?"

"Well, we could ask..."

Hermione rolled her eyes. "What, just walk up and say, 'Excuse me, Malfoy, could we have a look at your wand?' You think he'd just whip it out for us?"

"Well, it's not like he hasn't before..." There was an odd noise that sounded vaguely like word snark. "Did you hear that?"

"Oh, it's probably just Peeves..." She frowned. "Okay, Harry, how long is your wand?"

"Eleven inches. Why?"

"I've seen you two together, so I know Ron's is longer than that...and it's longer than my wand, too, and mine's twelve and three-quarters."

The was another, much louder snark, and a thump. Harry stuck it head out of the nook and saw a very pale Colin Creevy passed out in the corridor. He groaned. "Hermione, we've been overheard again."

"Oh, pooh." She peered out. "We should probably be getting down to lunch anyway, though, so it's no big deal."

"What do we do with Colin, though?"

Hermione peered closely at him, took out her wand (which, to Harry, looked much closer to twelve and a half) and prodded him. "Ennervate." Colin's eyes snapped open, he looked at Hermione, and began to scramble crabwise across the floor, now making noises that sounded like nguh nguh nguh. Once he was about twelve feet away, he staggered to his feet and ran off, still blubbering.

Hermione stood up and frowned. "Colin's gone mad."

"Perhaps he's caught whatever Malfoy has." Harry got his bag out from behind the tapestry, and they headed down to the Great Hall together, arguing in hushed voices about the size and composition of Malfoy's wand.

Harry noticed that they got a lot of funny looks when they arrived, and he wondered what kinds of rumors were floating about now. Ron was seated at the end of the table, completely ignoring his food and seemingly engrossed in a piece of parchment. He had a funny look on his face, almost anticipatory. "Hullo, Ron," Harry said, sitting down.

Ron stuffed the parchment out of sight. "Oh, hello, Harry. Hello, Hermione. Where have you two been?"

"Oh, just around," Hermione said breezily, pouring herself some pumpkin juice.

Ron gave Harry a significant look before asking, "You missed something really good, you know. Colin Creevey came running through here a minute ago screaming about orgies and hermaphrodites. Madame Pomfrey made him go lie down."

Hermione and Harry shared a look. Slow realization began to dawn on him, of just what Colin had overheard, or might have thought he overhead. He banged his head on the table.

"Harry?" Ron asked, alarmed. "What's the matter?"

"Never mind him," Hermione said. "He's just being stupid."

"We're still not trying to murder you, Ron," Harry added, just in case that had come up as well.

Ron nodded, looking apprehensively at them both.

And that might have been the end of it, at least until Herbology, if Hermione hadn't begun to fidget. Badly. Harry tried to ignore her, but Ron was starting to notice, and he dreaded what might come out of her mouth if he were to ask what was wrong. He struck up a loud conversation about the Chudley Canons, trying to cover things up. However, neither of them could ignore it when Hermione started mumbling to herself, and when she began to arrange her peas in little geometric patters on her plate, one of them had to ask. "Er, Hermione?" Ron ventured around a mouthful of food. "Anything wrong?"

She looked up at him and blurted, "Ron, has Malfoy ever handled your wand?"

Ron's eyes bugged out, and he probably would have said something incredulous if he hadn't tried to gasp first. He began to choke violently on a half-masticated spring roll, coughing and spraying bit of things Harry didn't particularly want to identify all over the table. Hermione immediately leapt to her feet, went around the table, and wrapped her hands around Ron's middle. "Hold on, Ron, I know what I'm doing!" she shrieked.

"Hermione, I don't think he really needs the Heimlich Maneuver..." Harry said, glancing nervously at all the people watching. Professor McGonagall was bearing down on them with alarm in her eyes.

"Oh, hush up, Harry!" She positioned her hands, despite the flailing protests of Ron, who was turning purple. In a single great heave, she successfully dislodged the food, which sailed across the Hall, through Nearly-Headless Nick, and hit Lisa Turpin in the head with a highly disgusting little thwap-like noise. Unfortunately, Hermione's efforts unbalanced her badly, causing her to tip backwards onto the floor; and, because her arms were still locked around his ribcage, Ron came tumbling down on top of her, gasping. She made a funny squeaking noise, and he rolled off immediately, then pulled her to her feet with him.

"Are you both okay?" Harry asked, looked between two red faces.

"I'm fine," Ron said quickly. "Erm..." He looked down at Hermione, who was clutching his robes and looking into his face with bright eyes and a slight, rather goofy smile. Ron let go of her elbows and started plucking at her fingers. "Hermione? Could you let go now?"

"Okay," she said breathlessly, not moving. Harry saw McGonagall approaching, and since discretion is the better part of valor, he grabbed a fistful of bushy brown hair and tugged sharply. Hermione jumped, leapt away from Ron as though he were electrified, then glared at Harry and opened her mouth, as if to commence telling him off.

Luckily McGonagall reached them just then. "Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger, are you all right?"

"They're fine," Harry told her quickly. "They're just, er, startled."

"Yeah," Ron said quickly, "startled."

McGonagall frowned at them. "What exactly did you do, Miss Granger?"

"The-the Heimlich manuver, Professor. It's Muggle first aid."

"I see. I suppose you've forgotten all those Anti-Choking Charms that Professor Flitwick covered earlier this year?"

Hermione turned even brighter scarlet. "I didn't think about that," she said glumly.

McGonagall nodded. "Obviously. Nevertheless, you did react quickly and commendably...five points to Gryffindor."

Hermione grinned at McGonagall. "Thank you, Professor."

"And in the future, let's try not to be so dramatic, shall we?"

A/N 2: The Sceptron Curse is a product of my own diseased imaginings. The name "Oliver Ollivander" is one that I've heard before in fanfic, but can't specifically place; if it belongs to you and you want me to change it, drop me a line.

No offense intended to any actual hermaphrodites who are reading this, by the way.