Chapter Three
Lucia noticed, however. She followed Harry out to the lawns and down by the lake. He sat down on the bank, looking moodily into the water. She sat down beside him, causing him to give a quick glance in her direction before looking away again. She said nothing, and neither did he.
-----------------------------------------------------------------Ginny was angry with Ron for having shouted at Dean and making a big mess out of such a tiny matter. As if she couldn't handle it herself. As if she needed his protection. She avoided him and the others at breakfast, and instead went to the owlery to send her mother a note saying they had arrived safely.
Dear Mum and Dad, she wrote
We are all each in one piece, safe and healthy. So don't worry like you do. We all met up at Diagon Alley. Our friends are both fine, and send their best. She is watching the news carefully, and he is okay, we are cheering him up. We are all disappointed in the papers. I'll write more later.
-Ginny
She read it over, wondering if she had worked in the right amount of clarity and veiled references. She hoped they would recognize her "disappointment in the papers" as a plea for information. Whatever. It would have to do. She called Pigwidgeon to her and tied the letter to his leg.
"Take it to Mum, okay?"
He hooted excitedly and flapped his wings. She knew Ron would probably be angry that she was using his owl, but she didn't much care. If he was too busy flirting with Hermione and shouting at Dean to write their parents, that was his problem.
After Pigwidgeon flew off, Ginny stood by the window a little longer, painfully aware of the short time she had left before the start of class and official beginning of her O.W.L. year. She surveyed the grounds, feeling the hot breeze and wondering when the heat wave would break. Sturdy, black Hogwarts robes were not meant for such weather.
By the lake, Ginny saw Harry and Lucia sitting together. She felt a slight pain in her ribs, a stab of jealousy. It wasn't so much that she fancied Harry- she had lost her hero-worship for him as soon as she got to know him. Impossible not to lose that awe, equally impossible not to keep that thrill. She no longer wanted to be rescued, however. Now she wished to be the rescuer. She had to pay him back or live forever in his debt, feeling weak and damsel-esque. She wanted, too, to have the power over him that he had had over her. Not maliciously, but she wanted him to feel that sweet pain, that anguished joy, that had characterised her exaggerated crush. She wanted to give him the same thrill he had given her.
Not that it would ever happen. Ginny knew very well that Harry was likely to die in the war. He could be gone by this time next year. She had very little confidence in Dumbledore, having seen how he let Harry and everyone else get into danger again and again. Besides, experience and the twins had taught her to distrust authority. The ministry had betrayed them, Percy turned his back, and countless teachers had proven unworthy in some form or another. In the end, she knew, the only person she could really rely on was herself. Not that she didn't trust others, she just knew that a trustworthy self is worth a thousand trustworthy friends. If she wanted to save Harry from whatever it was making him thinner and paler every day, she would just have to do it herself. She vowed to do everything she could to rescue him. And if, from this stonehard determination, she managed to save him from one second of pain, than perhaps it would make up for the time he almost died of her stupidity. She had been weak before, a little girl. But now she was a woman, and she was strong.
If Harry was going to die, it wasn't going to happen without Ginny Weasley doing all she could to stop it.
With this thought, Ginny ran from the owlery, having just realized she was late for her first lesson of the year.
----------------------------------------------Much to Harry's displeasure, NEWT Potions was first. He showed Lucia down to the dungeons, Hermione joining up with them when they passed the great hall. (Ron waved merrily at them, sniggering and wishing them good luck.)
Since NEWT classes were so selective, each class was comprised of students from all houses. And since students only chose a few subjects to pursue, the majority of work was done outside the classroom, as homework.
Of course, Draco Malfoy was also in this class, as were Pansy Parkinson, Ernie MacMillan, and Padma Patil. Obviously, it was not the most popular of classes. It was also probably the hardest to get into. Harry assumed Dumbledore had spoken to Snape about letting Harry into the class. Harry knew now it was just another of the things he had to endure to prepare him for battle. As he leaned against the wall with the others in the corridor outside the classroom he thought how he was less of a person now than a weapon. Of course, he had been all along, really. He just hadn't known until now. And hadn't that been Dumbledore's mistake? He had seen Harry as a human instead of a tool, and that was what had kept him from telling Harry all that he should have.
"Harry?" said Hermione. "Are you okay?"
"Huh? Yeah, yeah, I'm fine."
"Someday I'm going to stop believing you when you say that," Hermione commented.
Several minutes later, Snape still wasn't there, and the students were getting restless. Hermione paced up and down the corridor; Ernie MacMillan gave Padma a long-winded speech detailing his opinions concerning the war, which led to a complicated political debate between them. Draco chatted with Pansy, trying very hard, it seemed, not to glance in Lucia's direction. Lucia, for her part, watched him the entire time, shifting her weight from foot to foot in an annoying way and remaining oblivious to everything else. Harry slid down against the wall until he was sitting on the floor, half-listening to Ernie and Padma's arguing and trying not to think about Ron.
When ten minutes had passed, Hermione said, "Why isn't he here yet? I wonder if he's even coming."
Parkinson glanced at her watch. "Good point, Granger. He's not here; I'm skivving. Draco?"
Draco shrugged. Pansy was impatient. "Well, I'm leaving," she said. "Bye, losers."
"So sad to see you go," said Hermione.
Harry half expected Draco to pounce on Hermione for this, but to his surprise the blond wizard sneered after Pansy and performed a rude gesture at her retreating back. He then turned sullenly away from her, catching sight of Harry's face as he did.
"What are you smirking at, Potter?" he spat.
Harry stood up. He didn't have Dudley to torment anymore and he was itching for a good fight.
It didn't seem that Draco was, however, for he turned away without even waiting for an answer. He was visibly thrown off balance by Lucia's presence, which he still seemed determined to ignore.
Harry felt disappointed and somewhat slighted. He was hungry for their ritual insults and threats, taunts and violence. In fact, Harry desperately wanted to punch something and would have been quite happy had Draco decided to physically attack him. He couldn't pick a fight, though. Not now, anyways, with Hermione and witnesses present.
Abruptly, as if suddenly coming to a decision, Lucia said, "Draco, you can't ignore me forever."
"I can and I bloody well will."
"Well, I thought you might like to have these." From the pocket in her robes, Lucia pulled out a bundle of letters, a delicate iron chain tied around the stack.
"What's this?" said Draco as she shoved the packet into his hands.
"Father's letters," she said.
"I don't need these," he said disgustedly. "He writes to me, now."
"That's not what I meant at all. I want you to give them back to him. I haven't opened a single one."
Draco flushed. Hermione had stopped her pacing to watch, and even Ernie and Padma had paused in their discussion. However, just as on the train, Draco and Lucia seemed again unaware of the spectators.
"Give them back yourself," he said, holding the pile out towards her. "I'm not doing your dirty work for you."
She didn't take the letters. "I'll never get the chance to give them back. You know why? Because I'm never going to see him again. And if I do, I'm going to kill him!"
Draco snorted contemptuously. "No, you won't."
"Won't I?"
"No, you'll end up licking his balls like you always do."
She took two swift steps forward and slapped him across the face.
"Go back to Mother," she hissed, "the bed's all warmed up for you."
In one quick motion he caught her in the chest and threw her against the wall. "Don't confuse me with yourself, you fucking cunt!"
And he was gone, walking as quickly as possible without actually running.
"Draco!" She called out after him, but she didn't follow him.
Harry helped her up.
"Well," she said, "so much for that."
"He's a git," said Hermione at once.
"No," said Lucia, "He's right. So do you reckon we're still going to have class?"
"I doubt it," said Padma Patil, "considering class is half over."
"It's not like Snape to miss a class," said Ernie MacMillan.
Harry and Hermione exchanged a look. They had some things to discuss once they took care of Lucia.
-----------------------------------------------Hermione, Harry, and Lucia went back to the Gryffindor common room, where Ron and Seamus were enjoying their free period playing wizard's chess in the corner by a window. Ron hailed them when they came in. "Get kicked out of class already?"
Hermione gave him the look that had always meant something was up, and she saw the grin vanish from his face. He knew enough not to ask questions; all would be explained in time.
Harry was still holding Lucia's arm, though she hardly needed the support now. Hermione wished he would let go so that she could talk to him and Ron alone about the significance of everything that had just happened. In fact, it would be the first time since Diagon Alley that they would be free to talk. Two days was a long time when so much had happened. Susan Bones, for instance. But in a second Hermione realized the meeting wasn't going to happen, as Harry clung to Lucia and refused to meet Ron's eyes, and Ron returned to playing chess.
Hermione bit her lip. She wanted to at least talk to one of them. So she watched as Harry and Lucia sat on the hearth rug by the fireplace in which, in the strange weather, had been conjured a cooling fire. Then she caught Ron's eye the next time he looked up from the chessboard. She gave him a look which she hoped said "I don't care what excuse you give, just get out of here so I can talk to you- now!" and climbed back through the portrait hole.
A minute later, Ron followed. She was waiting in the corridor, nervously chewing her tongue.
"What is it?" asked Ron.
"What did you tell Seamus?" Hermione wanted to gauge how much time they had.
"I just told him we were snogging."
"You didn't!"
"No," he admitted, "I didn't. But it's what he thinks anyway. I told him I had to go to the loo. So what's up?"
Hermione swallowed her anger with Ron. She had to focus. "Snape didn't show up."
"What, like not at all? Just plain wasn't there?"
"We waited through half the period; he never showed."
Ron was quiet. "You think he's doing... other things?" he said after a moment.
"That was my guess. But it wouldn't be regular duty, to interfere with class time. And there wasn't even a note or anything. The more I think about it, I'm actually worried."
"Worried about Snape?" Ron grinned.
"Come on, Ron," she lowered her voice, "you know he's important. If they...." she was speaking in a barely audible whisper now, so that Ron had to lean in close. "If they find him out, we're done."
Of course Seamus would choose that moment to come out through the portrait hole. "I knew it!" he crowed at the sight of them. "I called it! I absolutely called it!"
Hermione felt the heat rising in her face, and Ron's ears were bright red.
"Sod off, Seamus," said Ron, through a grin.
"I'll tell you the rest later," Hermione muttered.
"There's more?" Ron muttered back.
"There's always more."