Chapter 3: The Burrow: From Dreams to Friends

As they drove down the bumpy track to the Burrow Harry's heart rose into his throat, this was like coming to his second home, his first of course being Hogwarts. As he got out and breathed the deep country air of Ottery St.Catchpole, he felt at peace, for the first time since the Tri-Wizard Tournament he didn't feel like he wanted to curl up and die. He looked up at the rickety stories that make up the Burrow and grinned, and this one lasted all the way to the front door, as he reached out to knock at the door it burst open and he was grabbed around the waist by Hermione and he saw Ron standing back a few paces

                "Harry" she shouted, squeezing the air out of his lungs as she hugged him

                "Good to see you mate" said Ron, smiling oddly at Hermione's enthusiasm.

                "How have you been" said Hermione, and Harry's smile faltered, then returned

                "Good, well, good now anyway"

They all smiled and just enjoyed being together again, before they walked inside to a happy greeting from the Weasley family, and harry was sad to see that Charlie was absent, but enjoyed the hug he got from Mrs Weasley ( "what have they been feeding you dear, ill just go put dinner on the table" ) and the warm handshake from Mr. Weasley also made him feel at home.  Ginny was even less embarrassed to see him than last year, and she surprised even herself when she hugged harry and kissed him on the cheek, Harry was overcome with surprise at her action, and went redder than Ron's hair while stuttering a thank you. While Ginny was busy thinking 'I am over Harry Potter' 'that jumper really makes his eyes look nice' 'I am over Harry Potter' 'Did he grow muscle over the holiday?' I am over Harry Potter' 'sigh.. look at that messy hair' 'I am over Harry Potter' 'and look at his scar, he's so defenseless' 'I'm not over Harry Potter'. While Fred and George took Harry aside and told him of how his prize money was spent, he was thinking, 'Ginny kissed me, why am I still thinking about this, Ginny sure got well, cuter over the holidays, not that she would still like me, she must be over the crush by now, or she would have gone red after kissing me, but she just smiled and moved away, that's good that she's over her crush'. But Harry felt tight chested, and couldn't explain it.

                Hermione and Ron interrupted George's lecture to harry on the ideas he had for the quidditch team and took him to Ron's Room. As he walked up the flights of stairs he realised that for the first time someone talking about the Tri-Wizard tournament hadn't caused him to think about Cedric. Harry's smile faded as he opened the door to Ron's room to see the familiar bright orange, not because of the color, but because he had just had a pang of guilt. Everything about the situation he had just experienced was wrong, his thoughts about Ginny when the last girl he though of like that was Cho Chang that way, who was linked in his mind to Cedric. Plus the fact that because he hadn't felt guilty when George mentioned the Tri-Wizard tournament he felt more guilty, he felt guilty about the actual event, but more for not feeling guilty about it.

                "HARRY"

Hermione's voice broke through his reverie and Harry realised she had been talking to him and was expecting him to reply. Harry coughed nervously and looked apologetically at Hermione.

                "Sorry `Mione, I wasn't listening"

                "God you're as bad as Ron, and don't call me that"

                "Sorry Mi.. Hermione"

Hermione laughed as she noticed the serious expression on Harry's face, then frowned when it didn't go away.

                "Whats wrong Harry, I was just joking with you"

                "I know, I guess I just havent had much cause to laugh for the last few weeks"

Harry forced a smile and then Hermione grinned, Ron laughed and shook his head

                "Harry, I just remembered, you haven't seen my new broom!"

Hermione looked sternly at Ron

                "That sounds good, ill just get my Firebolt and we'll go have a go"

Hermione just snorted, as Ron and Harry walked away Hermione muttered what sounded like

                "Boys, Ill never understand"

As the boys went to leave the house, through the kitchen, Mrs Weasley saw them with their brooms and promptly recruited them to set the tables up as she prepared dinner. Once the tables were set everyone sat down and toasted the beginning of Harry's real holidays.

                Over dinner Harry stole glances at Ginny, so he could see if she was looking at him, but she spent the entire time talking to Hermione about the new dress robes Ginny wanted to get, while harry was making noncommittal noises in response to Fred and Georges tactics conversation and their plans for quidditch domination this year. The night wore on as Mrs Weasley's dinner was slowly consumed, first the soup, then an excellent stew, and followed by an absolutely delicious cake. Harry stumbled up to bed after his long day and brushed past Ginny as he went up the stairs, not even noticing her flinch and blush in his tiredness.

Harry went to sleep full and content, and he instantly slipped into his old nightmare, the graveyard, the cup by his side, Cedric on his right and Ron on his left, wait a minute, this wasn't right, but still here was Hermione, as well, just behind him.

                "No Ron, Hermione go back, go back you'll just die like Cedric, you cant"

                "Whats wrong harry, we'll be alright" said Hermione

                "Wands.. " Cedric was cut off mid sentence by Voldemort,

                "Kill the Spare, and torture the other two, we might be able to learn something useful that Potter might not know"

Pettigrew raised his wand and said "Avada Kedarva" and there was a bright flash of Green light, and Harry's knees buckled with the helplessness he felt. He closed his eyes and tried tried to ignore the guilt that wrenched at his guts, and the inhuman screams of pain that were coming from Ron and Hermione. Suddenly he was looking at Ron's roof, but the screams hadn't stopped, it took him a full ten seconds to realise that the screams were coming from him, and he writhed in his bed at the pain from his scar. In seconds Ron's room was full of worried Weasley's, all with wands drawn, asking him where You-Know-Who was and what he had done, Harry couldn't see from the pain, but he distinctly heard Dumbledore's voice and two other wizards he had never heard before who might have been hallucinations or just have left by the time Harry could prise his eyelids open to see anything. Harry groaned with the dull throbbing pain that had replaced the feeling of being pierced through the forehead with a white hot knife, he reached for his glasses, and everything swum into muggy focus. Ron was snoring gently in the corner of the room and the dawn light played gently over the bright orange of the room, he suddenly felt hungry and tiptoed to the door, he eased it open and went to walk down the stairs to see Dumbledore standing there waiting for him, and Mr Weasley sitting in a chair with his wand in his lap, who was also snoring gently. Dumbledore motioned for Harry to follow him downstairs. Once in the Weasley's loungeroom he sat down and sighed, there was no twinkle in his eyes today, but that feeling of awesome power still remained in him. As questions buzzed around Harry's head Dumbledore murmured an incantation and a plate of biscuits and tea appeared. Harry smiled gratefully and took a biscuit and a cup of tea.

                "I suppose you are wondering why, and indeed how I am here Harry?" Dumbledore said quietly.

                "Yes" said Harry

                "I was wondering who the other two wizards were last night aswell"

Dumbledore smiled and for a moment the twinkle in his eyes returned, before returning to the serious matter at hand.

                "Harry, last night's dream, have you ever had anything like it?
Harry hesitated, trying to remember the details of his earlier dreams.

                "No Professor, I haven't, the dreams have always been actual events, this one was different, heard my friends get tortured by Peter Pettigrew"

Harry looked at his hands before looking up into Dumbledore's face

                "Hmmmm, this is serious Harry, but ill get to that in a minute, as for why and how I am here, I will have a Portkey to The Burrow on my person at all times until you leave it, it is linked to you aswell, when you are distressed, seriously distressed, it automatically brings me here. As for the Wizards you heard last night, I have assigned two of my best unspeakables to your protection, they are with you day and night, invisible to all, even me."

Harry was surprised by the lengths that had been taken for his protection, he thought for a minute then asked

                "Why am I so special, I no longer have protection against Voldemort, im just another teenage wizard"

Dumbledore looked uneasy, and he appeared to be searching for words, at this Harry repeated

                "I am just another teenage wizard right?"

                "Well Harry, as far as I or any of your friends are concerned yes, but the wizarding world sees you as a symbol of defiance against Voldemort, and in that role no, you are not ordinary, or average, you are vital to the resistance against Voldemort."

Harry sat back, trying to understand what it would be like to lead a normal life for a year but gave up, and tried to understand. Looking up at Dumbledore he came to a conclusion, his green eyes steeled

                "Is that what my dream means then, that being my friend makes Hermione and Ron, and the rest of the Weasley's targets? I cant do that to them, can I stay at Hogwarts until the start of the year, or Diagon Alley?

Dumbledore smiled, much to Harry's annoyance

                "Harry, once again you show yourself to be mature beyond your years, and I really don't think you can make the choice of being your friend or not for them, tell them your situation, im sure they will wish to remain by your side"

Harry nodded dumbly, but he wasn't assured, he wasn't dealing well with causing the death of Cedric, he didn't know what would happen if Ron was captured and tortured. Shuddering at the memory of Ron screaming he heard someone coming down the stairs. Arthur Weasley rubbed his neck on the way through the living room to the kitchen, looking very much like he'd had a rough night. He emerged a minute later to see Harry sitting alone and staring into the distance, his face blank, betraying no emotion, and left him to his misery

*              *              *

                Ginny had awoken last night from nightmare images of a basilisk and Tom Riddle to Harry's screams, and was the first in his room to see him grasping his head in pain, the sight of Harry Potter in pain caused her to go weak at the knees, feeling useless and worried she left soon after and Hermione came back into the room not long after that. Waking up later that morning to the weak dawn light, she rested in bed for a few minutes before hearing footsteps creaking down the stairs past her room. Curious and lonely she decided to go talk to whichever of her brothers was up so early. Tiptoeing over Hermione's camp bed she silently made her way down the stairs, snatches of conversation in low voices started wafting up to her. Pausing just out of sight she heard Harry say he was willing to sacrifice anything to keep his friends safe, she was no longer unsure of her feelings - there was no longer any doubt about just how much Harry meant to her.

                She ducked out of sight as her bleary eyed father stumbled past to get his morning coffee then waited till Dumbledore disapparated before heading out to confront Harry.

                "Bad Dream Harry?" she asked as she sat down in a couch opposite him, he glanced up at her, his green eyes two empty pools as he seemed to stare through her, making her feel invisible. Harry started when he actually focused on Ginny while she mentally berated herself for such a stupid line to start the conversation with. As he searched for the words to describe how bad and how he felt, she turned pink

                "Sorry, if you'd prefer not to talk about it its alright, I can go" and as she got up to leave harry seemd to wake up and said

                "No, please don't, its ok, and yeah my dream was pretty bad, hearing your friends being tortured by Peter Pettigrew will tend to upset anyone"

Ginny frowned and tried to remember where she had heard that name before, then she remembered.

                "What do you mean Peter Pettigrew, he died in the Sirius Black Massacre"

Harry slapped his forehead at his own stupidity, in his morose state he had forgotten that Peter, or Scabbers, was supposed to be dead.

                "Well, uh, yeah Ginny, that's what made.. uh….. the dream so bad, because it was like Voldemort.. ohh ummm, used the imperius curse to torture others". Even to harry it sounded lame, and Ginny realised he was lying straight away.

                "Is that the truth Harry?" said Ginny quietly, Harry's embarrassment shone through to his face as he looked crestfallen. Sighing, and deciding that Ginny could probably be trusted with the information he began to tell her the truth about Sirius Black, and although at first she refused to believe, accounts from Hermione and Ron made her believe, in return she confided in Harry that she still dreamt about the Chamber of Secrets, and Tom Riddle's repeat occurrences in her nightmare's.

                From a day that Harry began by swearing vehemently to himself that he had to sever his friendship with Ron and Hermione, ending the day with a new friend in Ginny surprised none more than himself, but that's because there are some things that people can share that inevitably bring them closer together, sharing clandestine knowledge about an escaped convict, ant and sharing the same kind of nightmares both fall into this category, and although Harry still didn't get to see Ron's Broom in action, he felt the day couldn't have gone better, and went to sleep with a warm fuzzy feeling in his chest, and in place of his usual guilt about Cedric he fell asleep thinking of Ginny.

(A/N: Read/Review, I did like getting some praise from those of you who bothered to read chapter 1, even a flame would be nice just to see that you have read it :-p )