Chapter 19- The 30th of December

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Hello everyone. There has been a title change. The original date held meaning for someone and as a mark of respect I thought I should change it. it makes no difference to the story. This chapter is so…well I'll let you read it and decide for yourselves. Suffice to say there are some surprises in store! (And don't forget not all surprises are good!)

Disclaimer: Nothing I tell you! Nothing is mine!

Don't forget if you want to be on my email update list just tell me in a review or email!

'-'=thoughts

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***

Three days passed and nothing untoward happened. Every time Draco got close to Hermione he was forced back and anyway she was constantly in the companionship of either Ron or Harry. Things had become relatively normal again although if one was a close observer they would notice that Hermione had started wearing very long skirts or trousers, as if she was trying to cover something that was fastened to her ankle…

***

It was the 30th of December. Ron had just beaten Harry in a ferocious game of wizards chess, Hermione was studying and quite soon after the game Harry had disappeared again. So now Ron was just strolling along the length of the Quidditch pitch day-dreaming about the start of the season and all the fantastic saves he was going to make, when he distinctively heard someone sobbing. He stopped and spun around on the spot trying to determine where the sound was coming from. He soon deduced that it was coming from a small knot of trees off to his left. He jumped the barrier that surrounded the field and decided that he would just take a peek to see if anyone was in trouble and if they weren't he would leave. He approached quietly and peered around from behind a large tree to see-

"Pansy?" he said in astonishment.

He had said it quite quietly but she heard and spun around to face him. Instead of screaming abuse at him as he had expected she let out another anguished howl and fled. As she ran a piece of paper slid out of her hand. Ron walked over and picked it up giving it a cursory glance to see what it was.

"Dearest Pansy," it began and even though when he realised it was a personal letter he should have closed it, curiosity as to why the usually tough girl was crying made him read on-

"I have awful news to break to you. Your brother is dead. He died on Christmas Eve. Our Lord has relieved all of us from our duties for a couple of days and I suggest you take this opportunity to befit yourself to proper Parkinson mourning. Please inform Draco that he is invited to the funeral which will take place tomorrow. I will come and collect you sometime in the mid-morning. I know you and Robert were always very close and that his death will hurt you more then the rest of us. If you so desire we can pull you out of school and you can concentrate solely on the dark arts at home. Although I wish I could tell you that he died at the hands of an Auror that would be a lie. Robert seemed to have been going through a rather rebellious stage, he said he was in love with a mudblood and wanted to run away with her and leave the dark arts behind him forever. Of course the Dark Lord couldn't allow that and Mr Malfoy was sent to dispose of him. Perhaps it is better that he is gone as there is now no question of him leading you astray. I must go and collect the body now and so I will see you tomorrow.

Happy Christmas,

Father

Ron folded the letter up with a low whistle. That was heavy stuff, no wonder she was crying. And Draco's dad had killed her, well if that didn't convince Hermione that Draco was evil he didn't know what would!

***

Ron wandered up and down the dungeon corridors hoping to bump into Pansy so he could return her letter to her. Finally he saw a girl coming towards him up the corridor. He had never seen her before but she was extremely pretty. She had brown/auburn coloured hair and her eyes were a light green, she was slender and graceful but at the moment looked excruciatingly sad.

"Excuse me," Ron said as she drew near him, "I'm looking for Pansy." He said this politely but he expected a scolding anyway, after all if she was a Slytherin like he expected he could hardly anticipate a warm welcome.

"Yes Weasley? What do you want?" the girl was right in front of him now and she looked surprisingly like Pansy

"Are you a relative of Pansy's?" he asked rather confusedly

"I am Pansy, now what do you want?" she asked again her voice monotonous.

"But…but…" he stammered this girl was beautiful and nothing like that Slytherin cow.

"Weasley haven't you ever heard of the colange range?" she asked exasperated as he stared at her in shook.

He shook his head dumbly.

"Well it is a beauty product for witches. You choose the colour iris you want then squirt it into to your eyes every morning it turns them that colour, I choose grey. The same goes with the hair except you squirt it in your hair and I choose blonde, now could you stop gaping and tell me what you want?"

"Oh...um…oh your letter, you dropped it." he held the crumbled paper out to her and she snatched it back from him with a look of pure mortification.

"You read it." she said calmly but with the same note of despair

He nodded uncomfortably.

"I'm sorry about your brother." He said simply

"Why?" she snapped a little colour flaring in her cheeks, "You didn't know him and anyway shouldn't you be happy? One less to conquer in your quest to rid the world of evil, after all."

Ron opened his mouth to protest but she cut him off

"Don't worry about it, it doesn't matter now. He's dead." A solitary tear slipped from her now light green eyes and slid down her cheek. "Oh Merlin," she suddenly let out an anguished cry and slapped her palm against the wall, "he's dead, he's dead, he's dead." She sobbed over and over to herself thumping her hand against the wall to punctuate each word.

"Hey, stop that." Ron reached forward and grabbed her hand just as she was about to pummel it again. She wrenched free from him and slid down the wall weeping pitifully. In Ron's limited experience he knew that a crying girl was something that you left well alone but he couldn't just abandon her so he sat down next to her, staring at the opposite wall of the dungeon corridor and waiting for her cries to subside. Eventually they did and Pansy lifted her face, only to bury it again when she saw Ron was still sitting there.

"Go away." She mumbled

"Are you…um…alright now?" Ron asked curiously, desperately wanting to leave but not knowing if she would go crazy again when he left.

"No of course not." She said bitterly.

There followed a long period of uncomfortable silence which was broken only by Pansy's occasional sniffles.  Suddenly Ron's pocket began to vibrate. He whipped his wand out and watched in amazement as it started to spin around on his palm and let off red sparks. His eyes widened as he realised what it meant. He leapt to his feet yelling:

"Hermione!" at the top of his lungs.

Pansy watched him flee in amazement.

***

Somewhere in the forbidden forest Cho was leaning over Harry shaking him.

"Harry? Harry? Come on you have to wake up. There's something wrong with your wand."

Harry's eyelids fluttered and he gazed up into her chocolate brown eyes.

"What?" he mumbled cupping his hand against his scar as it always stung badly during his sessions with Cho.

"Your wand!" she pointed at it and he glanced down.

"Oh no!" he shouted, "How long has it been doing that?"

"Just a few minutes." Cho answered confused at the note of panic in his voice.

"You idiot! Why didn't you wake me sooner?" Harry snarled grabbing his wand and beginning to run back towards the castle.

"I tried to!" Cho yelled at his retreating back trying to hold back tears.

***

Harry and Ron met each other in the entrance hall and without a word glanced at their wands to see where they should go, the wands pointed up the stairs and they pounded up them two at a time. On they ran every now and again checking they were going in the right direction. It soon became clear that they were heading for the hospital wing their speed increased and then suddenly the sparks went out and the wands stopped.

"NO!" they both screamed in terror, knowing what this meant. They had just sped into the hospital corridor when they were stopped by Madam Pomfrey. She was shaking and crying silent tears.

"You can't go in there boys." She said unsteadily.

"Why?" they both demanded

Just then Casey appeared out of Madam Pomfrey's office.

"I can't believe it." she said in a distant sort of voice, "I can't believe this would happen."

"What? What has happened?" Ron asked desperately.

"It's Hermione she's…she's…"

"What?" Harry screamed.

"Dead! Hermione's dead!"

***

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Oh the sexual connotations that were possible in this chapter! I'm not going to list them all but I'm sure you know what I mean. The whole wands thing…ewgh! That is so not how I meant! Anyway I'm sure I'm going to get flames for this chapter considering how out of character all the characters are… and of course my little surprise at the end! My thankyous are as follows:

Keresha: Yay, you think I made it good! Yes, quite a bit of action, for my stories anyway. I can't believe you are deprived of good d/hr. there are tonnes out there! Anyway thankyou for reviewing so wonderfully.

Katalina O'riley: Maybe he could be a bit of a sadist! Anyway thankyou for reviewing, I love Ron's temper too1

Blink 182 Girl: I'm glad you loved that chapter. It was pretty eventful, I agree with you. Thankyou for reviewing and I will continue.

Loveyourstory: I'm glad you liked this chapter, I did too! Thanks for saying I did a good job and commenting on my characters, I'll try and keep it up1

Reader: good I'm glad you liked it and I will write more, thankyou1

The Great Duckie: I don't know about great once again but thankyou you anyway! Yeah it was fun making her suddenly take charge! You are going to have to wait and see what is up with Cho and Harry though I gave a little hint in this chapter! Thankyou for reviewing…again!

Shivohnsongbreeze: Wow, you think my Draco is in character? Thankyou so much!  Suspense building? Do I? I never noticed! Thankyou for your review it was really nice.

CrAzYpOeTiCgUrL: Love my story? Wow cool! You are now on my updates list! Thankyou for review.

Tomluvr14: Thankyou so much! I meant to write an email back to you but I was clearing out my inbox and I accidentally deleted your message so I couldn't! Sorry. Wow I can't believe I helped you with writers block! How did I do it? Thankyou for recommending this story to your friend, I love to have lots of people read my story! You are most welcome, but I should be thanking you not the other way round! Thankyou so much for your kind review and email, they mean so much to me!

Snow White: Yes it was interesting and I'm glad you liked it. Thankyou so much for reviewing and continuing to review!

Carla:  Hey, I'm glad you think it is really great. I will definitely try and keep up the good work. I try to be detailed but I don't think I am anywhere near as good as a proper author. Thankyou for saying I am anyway and thankyou for reviewing1

LILYBREEZ: Wow you got hooked on my story?...weird! One of the best? Blimey, you can't have read many! I'm glad you are so excited about an update and I hope you liked this chapter! Thankyou so much for reviewing and for being so complimentary!

Stephanie: I try! Well I'm afraid you are just going to have to wait! All will be revealed in time. Thankyou for reviewing!

Aki: It was really good, and don't worry I don't think you are advertising! It's cool that you have your own pen name. I'm glad that you liked the chapter and the romance scene. I've never really written something so intense before so I'm glad you liked it! Hey, screaming is good, when you are screaming about something that you like, that is! My deepest condolences on being shot again…maybe one day you won't be…you can always hope.

Kuri: I'm glad you also loved it and that you thought ahead and brought ear plugs. That is very organised of you! Well at least you researched to see if there were any side-effects, it shows what a good friend you are! I have updated fairly soon at your request! Thankyou to you both for reviewing.

Vixen: You are going back again?! You are so lucky! Yeah, most people have just driven through Gillingham but it is quite a nice place. Anyway there is no need to apologise, you don't have to review all the time and so I'll forgive you : ) I'm glad you thought it was amazing and that my kissing scene wasn't too blah! Thankyou for reviewing!

Angel Malfoy: Pure gold?! Nice, thankyou! Me too, aren't they just the perfect couple? Romantic Sigh anyway thankyou for reviewing!

And that is it for today people. This chapter has been in my mind for a while now and I am anxious to see what the response will be. Not too good, I imagine!

Adeus,

Jess/star123