(GoF) CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE: Know That I'm Here
When Ellie descended the girls' staircase twenty minutes later, having showered and changed into a set of sweats warm enough to withstand the cold and snow, her heart started to pound all over again. Would he feel differently now that the glitz and glam of the ball was over? Would he have used those twenty minutes of separation to psych himself out of everything he'd finally let himself give in to?
No, she thought with a relieved smile when she met his gaze. He was standing between George and Ginny by the fireplace, face still lit up in an impossibly happy smile. It's for real this time.
She jogged up to him at that, climbing onto his back without warning and kissing him on the cheek from behind. As he laughed and turned to kiss her back, George and Ginny exchanged amused expressions.
"Y'know," said Ginny, "we've all been waiting for this for a long time and all, but… it's still sort of… gross."
George laughed, shoving his sister playfully as Ellie returned to the ground to scowl at her pseudo-sister. "Ignore her," he advised Ellie and Fred. "She's just mad her Prince Harry hasn't come to realize his feelings for her yet."
Ginny shoved George hard at that, and Fred laughed as he took Ellie's hand and guided her toward the back window of the common room. They summoned their brooms and, with one last wave to their band mates, headed up to the roof.
It was still snowing, though not quite as severely as before. Fred pulled out a stack of thick blankets from beneath his cloak, laying them out on the flat roof for them to curl on. Before she could lower herself down, he performed several spells on them for "added cushion."
It worked quite nicely, she discovered as she settled onto them; not only were they comfortable, but they even felt like they'd just been pulled out of a dryer—toasty warm.
"I think you're a more skilled wizard than you realize," she told him as he laid down beside her and extended an arm for her to curl up against his chest. "I would have no idea where to start with that sort of thing."
"Well, I am two years your senior," he pointed out, though he sounded fairly pleased with himself. "Thanks, though. I like to reckon I'm skilled enough to protect you, should… y'know… certain things happen."
She sighed, propping her chin up on his chest and gazing down into his nervous eyes. "Stop worrying about it. We already learned he's a liar, Fred."
"Not entirely. He had the photograph, didn't he? And he knew the truth about you—about your shield."
She rolled her eyes. "Everyone knows the truth about my shield, thanks to Rita Skeeter. Doesn't mean anything."
But he didn't quite seem to believe her.
"What am I going to have to do to distract you from these concerns?" she asked in her best attempt at seduction, biting her lip coyly. She slinked the rest of her body over him so that she was straddling him, then leaned her face tauntingly close to him.
To her amazement, it worked; she could see the concern and fear drain from his eyes, replaced instead by a rather dazed, loving, longing sort of gaze that made her feel quite special, indeed.
"Not fair," he murmured softly as he took her face in his hands and kissed her.
But he didn't seem to mind.
Ellie and Fred spent the rest of the night alternating between kissing, talking, laughing, and, of course, speculating about whether or not Aleks' threats were valid. They managed to get a few hours of shuteye in before dawn, but both seemed to wake back up when the sun did.
She felt his eyes on hers as her own fluttered open.
"Well?" he asked her impatiently.
She blinked, confused by his question, as she yawned and stretched herself awake. "Well, what?"
"Well, have you changed your mind?"
She rolled her eyes. "Very funny."
He allowed her a small smile, though her heart gave a sad lurch when she realized that he hadn't been entirely joking. "I'm not sure I'll fully believe it for at least a few more days," he admitted.
She sighed. "I know. I get it. But, Fred, it's real this time. And as long as neither of us allows stupid obstacles like Aleks to get in our way, it'll stay that way."
Fred frowned, considering this for a moment. "What was it he said back there? Enjoy your freedom while it lasts? What d'you reckon that meant?"
"Nothing. He just wanted the last word. Typical fragile male ego."
He laughed, but his heart wasn't in it. "I think he was talking about the Imperius Curse. Whoever he works for—if they're really so interested in you—I reckon that'd be their only way to utilize your powers to their advantage."
It was a thought that had crossed her mind before—the very reason she'd asked Moody to help her with it. She hadn't ever gotten very good at resisting it, though.
But she knew someone who was.
"Hang on. You want me to what?"
"To teach me to get better at resisting the Imperius Curse," Ellie repeated to Harry. They were at breakfast with him, George, Ron, and Hermione—the latter two of which seemed to be completely unwilling to speak to each other or look each other in the eye.
Not unlike the way Cedric Diggory was avoiding Ellie's eye from across the hall. But that particular obstacle would have to wait.
"I wouldn't exactly call myself an expert," said Harry, frowning. "You sure you want my help?"
"Moody kinda freaks me out," Ellie admitted. "I think I might have better luck with you."
"Why the sudden interest, though?" asked Hermione curiously.
"Yeah," said George. "Worried your new boyfriend's gonna try and brainwash you?"
Ellie threw a breakfast pastry at George's head as Fred explained with a sigh, "Would that that were all she had to worry about."
Harry glanced curiously at Ellie at that. Despite her announcement to the girls in her suite (plus Ginny) that Aleks had blackmailed her into her relationship with Cedric and pretending she'd had a summer romance with him, she hadn't told the masses from there. She wouldn't exactly have minded embarrassing him in a big and public way, but she was afraid that too much of an outburst might cause him to make a similar one about her father or, worse, about how Dumbledore had helped her be with her father that summer.
"Let's just say I want to be sure no one's able to use my abilities to their advantage," Ellie told him shortly. "Are you in, or not?"
"'Course I am," said Harry quickly. "Room of Requirement, tomorrow evening?"
"See you there."
To Ellie's relief, practicing with Harry proved much more enjoyable—and more effective—than practicing with Professor Moody had.
Unfortunately, bringing Fred seemed to have been a mistake.
"Give her a break," he said as Harry attempted to delve into Ellie's mind for the third time in a row. The first, he had been entirely successful; the second, she had managed to fight him off in a matter of minutes. Each time certainly wore her out to some degree, but she was nowhere near in need of a break.
"I'm fine," Ellie said through gritted teeth. "Ignore him."
Fred frowned as Harry pointed his wand back at Ellie and uttered the Unforgivable Curse for the third time.
It was strange, feeling Harry's voice inside her head. It almost made this harder, in a way. His voice was soothing—calming. Let me in, he murmured to her. Don't fight me. You know me. You love me.
But this time, she had enough awareness of reality that she was able to recall just how bad it would be if she did let him in—at least, how bad it would be if she let the wrong person in.
Finally, she was able to overpower him.
"Not bad," Harry said appreciatively. "Think that was less than a minute that time."
"I don't like this," grumbled Fred. "And since when were you so gung-ho about performing Unforgivable Curses, anyway, Harry?"
Harry glanced at Ellie, looking amused. "I wasn't exactly planning on brainwashing her into hurting anyone, Fred. This is all for her sake, isn't it?"
But that didn't seem to make Fred feel any better. "Right. Very noble of you."
Ellie sighed. She didn't know where exactly this was coming from, but she knew better than to have their first couples' fight in front of Harry. "Harry, d'you mind leaving us the room? We can try again tomorrow."
Harry nodded, still looking rather amused, before heading out of the room entirely.
"Okay," said Ellie to Fred. "What's going on?"
He ran a hand through his hair—an act she had always found rather sexy and was pleased to be able to finally enjoy properly—before taking a seat on a nearby table. "I'm sorry. I know I'm being a prat. It's just, does he have to be so helpful? I don't much enjoy the thought of your ex being that deep inside your head."
She had gathered that his complaints were a mixture of concern for her safety and jealousy, but she was still a bit surprised to find that he was jealous of Harry, of all people. "C'mon, Fred—surely you know you haven't got anything to worry about. It's Harry."
"Yeah, Harry—the bloke you dated for nearly a year, and lived with for an entire summer."
"Well, yeah, but…" She bit her lip, trying to find a way to put what felt so obvious to her into words. "It's not like it is with you. It never was. Why do you think we broke up in the first place?"
"Well, I was under the impression it had to do with the whole your not telling him your dad was an escaped convict thing."
She laughed grimly. "It wasn't that—not really. He would have forgiven me for that eventually. It was the bit where I'd told you about Sirius—you and not him. Remember?"
She had, of course, already told Fred this—shortly before the kiss that changed the course of their entire relationship. "Yeah—I know." He frowned. "It's just… that was his reaction to something you did. You never actually consciously chose to…"
"To break up with him," she finished for him. She sighed, taking a seat next to him on the table and curling her legs up so that they were draped across his lap. "Look, Fred… The truth is, even when I was the happiest with Harry—the most in love with him—you were always there, in the back of my mind. I never thought it was an option—not from the way you had acted around me, the things you had said—but it was still there. Eventually, it would have bubbled to the surface—whether because you finally manned up and did something about it, or because I finally realized I wasn't being fair to Harry."
He let out a weak laugh at that, though his eyes remained sad. He lifted a hand to cup her cheek. "We could have had so much longer," he said softly. "I graduate so soon."
It was the first time in a long time either of them had mentioned his graduation—and certainly the first time since they had started dating. She did her best not to stiffen, but it wasn't easy. "Not that soon. Over a year."
He nodded, but she saw in his eyes the same thing she felt in her heart: that a year wasn't enough, and that any time spent apart would be far too much.
The morning of New Years Eve, Ellie exited through the portrait hole with the twins only to stop short when she saw who was waiting on the other side: Cedric Diggory.
"Cedric," greeted Lavender enthusiastically from just behind them when she spotted him. If she was cross with him for having left her at the Yule Ball after the first song, she gave no indication of it. "What a lovely surprise!"
Ellie half-hoped that he was there to see Lavender, as Lavender appeared to assume, but it became readily apparent from the way he was staring her down that he was there for none other than her.
"Hey," she said as gently as she could to Fred, peeling her gaze away from Cedric's to look him in the eye. "Can I catch up with you at breakfast?"
She could tell from Fred's expression that he wasn't thrilled, but all he did was set his jaw and give her a short nod and a kiss on the cheek before departing.
"Guess that stuck, then," said Cedric dryly as he watched the twins and a grumpy-looking Lavender head off. "Have to admit, I'm a little surprised."
She didn't much care for that comment, but she chose to rise above it. "Look, Ced—I'm really sorry."
If anything, he only looked more annoyed by hearing her apology; clearly it wasn't what he had come for. "Can we… go somewhere?"
She nodded at that, deciding that it was the least she could do, given everything, and followed him to the nearest empty classroom. Her mind flashed back to the many instances he'd pulled her into similar rooms when they were dating, but she found no sadness or regret in her memories. She had always wanted those trysts to be with Fred, not Cedric—and now they finally could.
"Look," said Cedric, closing the door behind him. She wished he hadn't done that—she trusted him, but she didn't like the thought of the rumours that might spread if the wrong person saw it happen. "I've done some asking around. Talked to Aleks myself. The whole situation—it's really messed up, Ellie."
She gave a dry laugh at that. "Yeah—I agree."
"I wanted to be mad at you—was mad at you—but I don't think I can anymore. You did what you had to do—what he made you do."
"Well… good." She blinked, unsure of what else she could say. It was good, wasn't it?
"It's just," he pushed, "I can't help wondering… what if he hadn't forced you? What if you'd gone to Fred off the bat, and then realized it was me you wanted all along?"
Was this really where his mind had gone? Had she not been clear with him before? "No, Ced—that's not what I—"
"He hurt you," Cedric interrupted. "So much. I saw it in your eyes every time I looked at you back then. And then, as we started dating… I saw it less and less. I did make you happy, Ellie. You just didn't get the chance to realize it because you were being manipulated."
She glanced at the closed door, silently willing it to reopen again. Was this really happening? "Ced, you're not getting it. I love Fred. I want to be with Fred. I—"
But, without any warning whatsoever, he interrupted her with a sudden, fierce, passionate kiss.
She pulled away immediately—at least, she tried; Cedric was much stronger and much larger than her. He released her after a second or two of struggling, his blue-grey eyes bright with desire.
"Just… think about it," he said. "That's all I'm asking. When he hurts you again—know that I'm here."
Well, she definitely wasn't into it... but will Fred see it that way if he finds out? Surely they can't be doomed this early, right? Stay tuned to find out, and keep reviewing and following!
