New Beginnings

By: Whyteroze28

Chapter Eight: Secrets

They had left the dungeons, finally. Miss Warbeak had told them that the band members would be announced during their next class. Harry was confused. She'd heard them all, and it couldn't be that hard to choose from between them.

If that wasn't enough, he'd bumped into Ron before dinner, and the redhead had asked him a couple of embarrassing questions about whether he knew if Hermione liked him, relationship wise. He was acting strangely, as though he'd received some kind of information he didn't know how to process. Harry had only told him that he needed to ask Hermione.

It wasn't until he'd entered the Great Hall at dinner that he'd finally figured things out. As soon as he'd walked in, the whole student body had erupted with cheers. It wasn't hard to figure out why. On the wall, beside the door was a ballot box, asking people to vote for their favorite singers, with little moving pictures of all the auditions... with sound.

He'd groaned, but then he'd grabbed the quill, and marked off his choices. He absolutely wouldn't vote for himself, so he'd marked Draco, Hermione, Blaise, Hannah and Pansy. Thankfully, the results weren't posted on the walls, or anything. The people in question just had points added to the line beside their names. He forced himself not to search for his name.

Then he'd made his way to the Gryffindor table, pointedly keeping his eyes off the Slytherins. If anyone found out that he'd voted for all of them, and not Seamus... no matter how badly he'd sung... he felt that he'd never hear the end of it.

Hermione was staring at him with a confused expression on her face. "What was that about?" she'd asked, and he couldn't believe it.

"Didn't you see the ballot box?" he asked her. When she shook her head, he'd told her. "Apparently, the whole student body saw our auditions..." but before he could say anything else, she'd begun to look panic-stricken.

"No! That explains it. Why Ron's been following me around, staring at me like he's trying to piece together a puzzle." When Harry told her that Ron had been asking him questions she had revealed that she'd told Ginny about the auditions, and that her song would be about the way she felt about Ron.

"Obviously, when Ginny heard the song, she told Ron about it," she'd finished up, softly.

Suddenly, the boy in question had arrived, and Hermione had looked at him for a second, before giving him one of her most beautiful smiles. Ron's face instantly lost the searching look it had as everything finally clicked in his head.

Harry had politely excused himself, before they could begin acting mushy. He knew it doomed him to eating dinner in the kitchens, but he didn't really mind.

As he reached the painting that led into the kitchens, and began to tickle the pear in the fruit bowl, he'd felt a presence behind him.

"What is it?" he'd asked, turning around, and confronting Blaise and Pansy.

The two grinned, slyly. "We just wanted to talk to you," Pansy said, her smile seeming to brighten. Oddly, Harry wondered if she had a spell on herself, but he pushed the thought away.

"So, let's talk," he'd said, allowing them to enter the kitchens before him. He may have been starting to like them, but that didn't mean he had to trust them.

As they entered the kitchens, Dobby raced over to them. "Mr. Harry Potter, Sir. Is there anything Dobby can get you, Sir?"

Harry had asked Dobby for three plates and asked if they could prepare Szechwan chicken. Dobby had said they could, and left to fill their orders.

"Szechwan chicken, hmm?" Blaise had asked, curiously. "Didn't know you liked Chinese food."

Harry nodded. "Yeah, I had it over the summer. My new friend and I got Chinese take-out." He noticed a strange, thoughtful expression on the other boy's face, much like the one he'd been wearing at the Welcoming feast. But before he could say anything, Dobby had returned with their food, and they'd sat down to eat.

After they had made a reasonable dent in their dinner, Harry had turned to stare at Blaise. The dark haired boy was definitely uneasy about something, and Harry figured that this was as good a time as any to find out why.

"So, Zabini, you wanted to talk to me?"

Blaise nodded. "Yeah, we have a few questions we want to ask you, and we're not leaving until we get them answered," he said, trying to sound tough, but failing.

Harry just stared at the two of them, waiting.

"All right, first question," Pansy stated, leaning back in her seat. "You obviously know that we've been working for the Order, so why haven't you asked us anything about what we were doing?"

Blaise flinched, but Harry pretended not to notice. "For the obvious reason, really. I'm glad that you joined us, but I really could care less what Dumbledore asked you to do. Unless it dealt with me, personally... It didn't though, right?"

Pansy shook her head vehemently, but Blaise just looked crestfallen.

"Did it?" Harry asked him, staring at the boy, and making him squirm.

Blaise looked up at him, and the expression on his face was so heart wrenching, that Harry actually pulled back.

"Mine did," he replied. "I was assigned to keep an eye on you, and make sure that you were safe from Voldemort."

"You...? It was you?"

"What was me?" Blaise asked, playing dumb.

"The day they came to get me. Were you the wizard that was pretending to be Dudley's friend? The one that said I deserved better?"

Blaise shook his head. "Definitely not. I spent one day around those Muggles, and that was enough to last me a lifetime. And why on earth would I say something like that, anyway?"

Then Pansy spoke up. "Aren't we supposed to be asking the questions here?"

"Just one more thing," Harry replied, and his gaze was penetrating. "If it wasn't you... then who was it?"