Chapter Nine

"Double, Double, Toil and Trouble!"

Harry and Ginny returned with Claire in tow to find the party in full swing. With amusement, Harry noted that Fred and George had taken up residence as the self-appointed bartenders and were busy making sure that everyone had plenty to eat and drink. Dudley seemed to be sulking in the corner, and Katie, Alicia, and Angelina were making friends with Audra, Andrea, Daphne, and Mary.

Meanwhile, Ron and Hermione were still in the middle of their chess game, and the boys had chosen to pass the time with a cut-throat game of poker. Harry was not surprised to see Lee in the middle of the card game, although where he had got the Muggle money to add to the pot, he could not imagine.

Rejoining Ron and Hermione in the kitchen, he was shocked to find Hermione in the lead. "Well, done, Hermione!" he exclaimed, earning a frustrated grunt from Ron. "Way to put this prat in his place!"

"Just because you can't beat me," Ron retorted. "Besides, it's not over yet - I may be down, but I'm not out."

"Yet!" Ginny laughed. "But as soon as Hermione takes your queen…"

"Will you be quiet, Ginny! I'm trying to concentrate," Ron hissed desperately.

"It's all right, Ron," Hermione said condescendingly. "You'll be out of your misery soon."

"I—I just can't understand it…" Ron said, shaking his head and raking a hand through his hair. "I never lose!"

"Well," Hermione said, taking his queen. "I think there's always a first time for everything. Checkmate," she grinned.

"What! How?" He examined the chessboard furtively.

"Let me explain, Ron," Harry said sympathetically but with sarcasm. "When Hermione's queen is about to take your king and there is no way to escape, that's called a checkmate."

"Chess is such a dignified game," Claire said from behind Harry to no one in particular. "Do you play often, Harry?"

Harry was startled by her question. He had forgotten that she was even there and had to think a full minute before answering. He played Wizard Chess at least once a week with Ron when at Hogwarts. Of course, he always got thrashed, and he only really played for Ron's sake. This was Muggle chess, though, and Harry could not truthfully ever remember playing it before.

"Sort'a," he said finally, hoping she wouldn't question him.

"What do you mean by sort'a? Either you do or you don't," she said, her eyes narrowing.

Seeing his friend struggle, Ron answered for Harry. "What he means is that he tries to play chess but usually fails miserably." He smirked at Harry in payback for his earlier ribbing.

"Yeah, well…" he stammered as he tried to think of a suitable comeback, "we all have our strengths and chess is not mine."

"I'm sure you have many strengths, Harry," Claire said sweetly, looking him up and down appreciatively. No one could mistake her meaning and Harry could see Ginny's temper rising. Oddly, he liked she was irked by Claire's comment.

"Of course Harry has strengths," George declared as he set a new bottle of Butterbeer Special down for Ron to drown his sorrows into after losing so magnificently to Hermione. "Why, he's one of the best teachers I ever had."

"George," Harry growled in warning.

"Now, now Harry. Don't be modest!" Fred said, clapping him on the shoulder and handing him a bottle as well.

"What exactly do you teach, Harry?" Claire asked.

"Why, defence, of course!" George told her. "Harry's an expert at defence, aren't you Harry?"

"Excellent!" Claire said, sounding very impressed. "Do you think you could teach me a few moves?"

Harry squirmed under Ginny's glare. "Umm… maybe some other time," he stammered, feeling more and more like he wanted to drop through the floor or bolt out of the room. He shot Fred and George murderous looks that they returned with identical clueless grins.

"And don't forget the duelling, right George?" Fred added. "Harry's especially good at duelling."

"Fred," Harry groaned helplessly. Turning to Ron, Hermione, and Ginny he pleaded silently for their help.

"Really, Harry, you are being too modest," Hermione said in attempting to salvage the situation. "You are one of the best in our class at swordsmanship."

"I'll second that. Harry is very effective with a sword," Ginny muttered darkly, making Harry wonder if she was thinking of the Chamber of Secrets.

"Isn't that interesting?" Claire said. "The more I learn about you, Harry Potter, the more I like." She squeezed his arm and flashed him a winning smile, before returning to the living room to retrieve her drink, which she had abandoned there when she had set off to find him upstairs. Harry watched as she was beckoned by her friends to join the conversation being held around the sofa.

Ginny looked as if she wanted to take out her wand and hex Claire from behind as she watched her sauntered away, swinging her hips seductively, and glancing back at Harry flirtatiously to see if he noticed. The sight was not unpleasant, and all four boys watched her retreat with open admiration. Harry knew Claire was trying to manipulate him. It was glaringly obvious. Although he was not interested in the least, a small part of him couldn't help but admire her lovely backside as she strode away.

Coming to his senses, he glared at the twins. "You're not helping. I'm trying to get rid of her, not make her more interested in me!"

"Ooooh… sorry, Harry," Fred and with fake concern, flashing George a triumphant smile. "We had no idea she even liked you that way."

"Bullocks!" Harry hissed.

"Language, Potter," George tsked. "There are ladies present. We wouldn't want you corrupting our little sister."

"As if," Ginny muttered.

Laughing, the twins turned to leave.

"Not so fast you two," Hermione said sternly, putting both of her hands on her hips and frowning. Her tone of voice was effective at stopping the duo from slinking off. They both stiffened as if preparing for a blow, but turned back around. Their identical faces were the picture of innocence. Harry could easily imagine them giving their mother those very same expressions, after being caught doing something they shouldn't.

"Yes?" George asked, attempting to act confused.

"Did we do something wrong?" Fred asked, in the most innocent voice he could muster.

"What possessed you to do that?" she hissed. "Do you want the Muggles to become suspicious?"

"Aw, lighten up Hermione. We were just having a bit of fun," George said.

"Yeah, we knew what we were doing," Fred said. "Besides, you're a fine one to talk. You didn't see us saying anything to you when you were giving Ron the encyclopaedic version of the differences between wizard chess and Muggle chess, did we?"

Hermione blushed. "Well, I wasn't talking to any Muggles, was I?"

"No, but if anyone had bothered to listen they could have got an earful, all right," Fred said, wagging his index finger at her.

"Lucky for you, Hermione, no one but us bothered to listen. It was about as exciting as one of Binns' lessons," George told her malevolently.

"Now wait just a moment!" Ron erupted. "I don't think she's boring, and she was talking to me, you know!"

Harry noticed that Hermione, who had at first looked hurt by George's frankness, now appeared to be highly pleased that Ron had defended her. She was about to retort back when Harry decided he had heard enough.

"Shut it now, all of you," he said irritably. "Everyone needs to remember what's at stake here. I don't need any more trouble from the Ministry, do I?"

"Too right you are, Harry," George agreed haughtily, looking Ron and Hermione up and down in indignation.

"That goes double for you two," Harry said firmly to the twins. "And I think I'll have your wands for safe-keeping." He stuck out his hand palm up and looked at them expectantly.

"What!" the both yelled in unison.

"You heard me," Harry said firmly. "I told you that wand magic will most likely get me expelled, even if it's not me doing the magic. So hand them over. I'm going to collect them from everyone just in case. With all this alcohol being consumed, one of you might slip up and forget. Then, before you know it, I'm being tried in front of the full Wizengamot like last summer, facing charges for underage magic or worse.

"Don't worry…" he assured them, "you'll get them back when you leave."

Neither twin seemed happy about this demand, but neither could they argue with Harry's logic. Harry had the satisfaction of seeing them both shamefaced as they reluctantly handed over their wands. He quickly stowed them out of sight in Hermione's backpack, then as unobtrusively as possible, called each of the witches and wizards aside and asked them for their wands as well. Each obliged grudgingly.

As he walked towards the hallway with Hermione's backpack towards his old cupboard where he intended to store them, he was pleasantly surprised to find Ginny tagging along behind him with her backpack slung over her shoulder. "Can I put mine with Hermione's?" she asked, motioning to her bag.

"Sure," he answered, shrugging his shoulders. "No problem."

They stopped just outside the door to the cupboard under the stairs. "So… this is the famous cupboard that the famous Harry Potter grew up in," Ginny said softly, touching the door gently and turning to look at him with unreadable eyes.

"Yep," Harry murmured, staring at the door, lost in nostalgic memories. "My room - the only thing in this house that ever truly belonged to me," he told her.

"Is what you said upstairs true, then?" she asked. "Do you sometimes wish you were still living in here?"

"Sometimes," he said. "This is where I lived most of my life, after all… before I came to Hogwarts. I spent a lot of time in there."

Harry opened the door to the cupboard and reached for the light, noticing the various mops and brooms that his aunt used to keep her house spotless. "Now it's a broom cupboard again, like it was meant to be, I suppose. I guess that means I'm nothing more than rubbish as far as my aunt and uncle are concerned," he said bitterly.

Not really understanding why he telling her this, he said, "Sometimes, this was the only place where I could go to escape from the yelling and stuff that I'd get almost every day. I'd go in there and, if I was lucky, they'd forget about me." He smiled a bittersweet smile. "I'd dream that someday some long lost relative would come and sweep me away from here and I'd live a fairy-tale life with people who cared about me…. Then Hagrid came and I did go away."

Ginny smiled, "You are living a fairy-tale life, Harry. You're the hero and everything," she said softly.

He frowned. "I'm no hero."

"You are to me," Ginny said evenly.

"Heroes don't get other people killed," he said, a lump forming in his throat. "Heroes always know the right thing to do and the right thing to say. I'm no hero, Ginny."

"Harry," Ginny said, turning him around so that he was forced to look at her. He averted his eyes. "Look at me, Harry," she commanded.

Turning, he looked her straight in the eyes and once again he had the sensation of drowning. He realised suddenly that he was so tired. Tired of the pain… tired of the burden… tired of the responsibility.

"You saved me from the Chamber of Secrets and Tom Riddle. You saved lots of people from certain death by stopping Voldemort when you were only a baby. And then you delayed him from returning when you were eleven years old by stopping him from getting the Philosopher's Stone. You went to the Department of Mysteries without thought for your own safety to help Sirius. You are a hero."

"But I—" Harry tried to protest that his mother had saved him and his own stupidity had actually got Sirius killed, but the words got stuck in his throat. If he had only stayed put, maybe…

Ginny continued, and Harry had the feeling she was willing him to see the person that she saw. "Even though you knew the risk - that you might be walking into a trap - you chose to sacrifice yourself for the possibility of saving him."

Harry felt his anger stir. It leapt out of him like a striking snake. "But I didn't, Ginny! Can't you see that? I didn't! I made it worse. I—I as good as killed him."

He looked down at his feet because he could bear to see the sympathy in her eyes. He had said it. The thought that had been tormenting him for weeks hung in the air between them like a lead weight. The truth of it was dragging him under.

He was surprised when she jerked him up and forced him to look at her. "That was not your fault," she said angrily. "Bellatrix Lestrange killed Sirius while he was fighting her. It was his choice. Professor Lupin told us all about what happened. Sirius was itching for a fight. He couldn't wait to get there so that he could be in the middle of things again. They were fighting and Sirius was taunting her and then she hit him with a curse and he fell backwards into that veil. You were nowhere near him Harry. You couldn't have saved him."

Being reminded of his failings deflated his anger. If he hadn't been there in the first place, if he hadn't allowed himself to get tricked, then Sirius would have been safe at Grimmauld Place. "You don't understand," he said sadly, turning away.

"You think I don't understand?" Ginny said angrily. He tried to avert his eyes again. "Look at me, Harry Potter!" she demanded, jerking him to attention again.

He looked up at her reluctantly. Her angelic face was lightly dusted with freckles and her beautiful, brown eyes were glowing with emotion. Her long mane of fiery-red hair billowed around her shoulders and framed her faced perfectly. He didn't deserve for someone so beautiful - both on the inside and out - to look at him that way. Not when he was a murderer… when he was destined to either kill or be killed.

"I used to live with regrets and guilt, Harry," she told him quietly. Harry could see the truth of it written on her face. "For a long time I blamed myself for what Lucius Malfoy and Tom Riddle did to me… what I did to myself and the people I hurt. I could have stopped it, but I didn't. I could have chosen not to write in the diary… but I did."

Her voice grew softer and she reached up to touch his cheek. "Harry, life is full of regrets and sorrows. There will never be a time when you look back and say 'I did that exactly right.' You do the best you can with what you're given - you make the best decisions you can with the information you've got. There's not much more you can do. Look at it this way… what if Sirius really had been captured? Would it have been worth it then, if you could have saved him?"

Harry frowned, thinking. "Maybe," he answered truthfully.

"What if you had died trying to save me from Tom? Would you want me to pine away and blame myself for your death?"

"I went down there of my own free choice," Harry told her unquestioningly. "But that's different."

"How is that different?"

"What happened to you wasn't your fault. You were only a little girl."

"I was old enough to know better. No one made me write in that diary," she pointed out. "My dad always warned me about enchanted objects, but did I listen? People almost died because of me. You almost died."

"But they didn't. Sirius did die because I made a poor decision and I should have known better," he said stubbornly.

"It was only dumb luck that no one died from that Basilisk," she countered. "I could be a murderer."

"Please stop blaming yourself, Ginny," Harry said angrily. "You wouldn't be the murderer, Voldemort would! How could you be responsible for what Tom and Lucius Malfoy did? They used you. If it wasn't you, then it would have been someone else who maybe wouldn't have fought as hard. Dumbledore even said that older, wiser wizards had been tricked by him…."

Then it hit him like a ton of bricks. If Ginny wasn't responsible, then how could he say he was responsible? Tom had tricked both of them. He had known better, yes, but his feelings and emotions had over-ridden all sense of caution. Just like Sirius - charging into the Ministry even though he was a wanted man, taunting Bellatrix until she killed him. But if he had learned Occlumency in the first place he would not have been hoodwinked, and Sirius would still be alive. In a way, he was partly responsible.

"Harry, if you believed Ron or Hermione was in danger, would you try to help?"

"Of course!" he said automatically, somewhat distracted by his reeling thoughts. Then he finally understood. He would try and help, because that was what he was about. Ginny did understand. It all came back to that saving people thing that Hermione tried to talk to him about in June; it was as natural to him as breathing.

If Sirius was alive and in trouble or if Ron or Hermione needed him, Harry knew he would go to the end of the Earth to help the people he cared about. He acted with his heart and hoped for the best. That was how he lived. He was guilty, but only of miscalculation and poor judgement… no more than Sirius. Voldemort and Bellatrix were truly the ones guilty of murder because they had wanted people to die and had used Harry to accomplish it. They knew he would come and he played right into their hands. But no more.

They had to pay.

In that instant the hate spread through him like a wildfire, consuming him. It was a feeling like he had never had before. Only one other time in his life had he ever felt or experienced anything comparable to this hatred - when he had attempted to cast the Cruciatuscurse on Bellatrix at the Ministry of Magic. A thirst for revenge consumed him, and he felt himself nearly suffocating with the heaviness of it.

He felt the snake inside him rear up and arch to strike. He tried to warn Ginny to get away but before he could speak, his scar exploded and he could hear the high-pitched evil laugh ringing in his head. He screamed in agony.

The snake was coiled around him, trying to squeeze the life out of him just like he had done in the atrium of the Ministry of Magic. He could feel Tom's pleasure through the pain and it sickened him.

Something was happening. Something terrible was happening and he was powerless to stop it.

He… had… to… protect… Ginny… That was his last coherent thought before the world as he knew it turned to blackness and he passed out.