It was not too long after that Harry found himself back at Platform Nine and Three Quarters, receiving a joyful hug from Hermione. He felt simultaneously as though his heart would jump out of his chest for joy, and the slight anxiety of a closely-held secret. Ron seemed no less overjoyed, picking Hermione up and swinging her in a complete arc.

"Ron! Honestly!" she said, flushing with a nervous glance at her parents, who were surveying them suspiciously from the brick divide that separated the Platform from the Muggle station. "My parents"

"I can't say hello to my best friend?" he asked, with an impish grin. Hermione rolled her eyes with a smirk.

"They don't seem too chuffed to see us," Harry muttered through a fixed smile, as he waved to them. They did not return the wave.

"Yes, well," Hermione both waving and simultaneously walking briskly towards the train, "Let's get a compartment, shall we?"

Harry didn't need a Veritastone to know that Hermione was hiding something – more specifically, had been hiding certain things for quite a long time. He had a feeling her parents had finally dragged some details out of Hermione, pertaining to exactly what went on at Hogwarts...perhaps they'd finally started reading the Daily Prophet, or had heard second-hand what had happened at the Ministry last year

The train ride itself was rather uneventful, and the trio spent it with Ginny, Neville, and Luna. There were fewer students on the train, since many had stayed at Hogwarts over the holidays, their parents feeling that the school was the last bastion of security in the wizarding world. The Prophet certainly didn't help to assuage these suspicions, as they continued to document the decay of security at the Ministry of Magic. Luna's copy of the Quibbler even went so far as to suggest that militant goblin activists working with You Know Who himself had organized a private hit squad, determined to assassinate Cornelius Fudge.

"He wouldn't need them," Harry thought, chuckling to himself non-humorously, "If Lucius Malfoy can walk in there any time he pleases."

A quick ride in a thestral-drawn carriage later, Harry was again inhaling the scent of home, this time made even crisper and cleaner by the scent of snow and woodsmokeâ€probably from Hagrid's cabin, or maybe even carried from the common room fires by a vagrant, chilly gust of wind, whistling briskly over the ancient slate shingles.

"Home," Harry thought, with a swelling of affection.

His scar prickled slightly, and Harry though he detected a note of loathing, or something that felt a bit like pride. But he took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and simultaneously closed the doors of his mind. He didn't want to let anything spoil this moment.

"Good to be back, eh?" Ron asked, noting his expression.

"You know, we only have another year and half left here," Hermione said thoughtfully.

"Bite your tongue!" Ron said, looking scandalized.

"I'm just saying, we should probably start thinking about what we want to do Iafter/I Hogwarts, is all," Hermione said, "And you had better start studying your Potions, if you want to make Auror!"

But Hermione dropped it, seeming to realize that the idea of leaving Hogwarts put a wave of unease into Harry's heart, almost like a slight nausea.

To Harry's great discomfort, their first day of classes was just as hard as always. The professors were not inclined to go easy on them in the slightest – in fact, they seemed oblivious to the fact that most of them had just spent a couple weeks lounging about eating sweets and sleeping in, assuming instead that they had been rising at dawn to sneak in some extra studying (which was only true in Hermione's case). Binns continued to plow through the same notes he'd written forty or fifty years ago, at the same ponderous rate. Snape was especially unfair, looming over their cauldrons, and snapping irritably at the slightest noise.

"Wonder what's got into him?" Ron breathed, while Snape was busy ridiculing another student for not knowing the difference between "clockwise" and "counterclockwise."

Harry didn't reply. Could it be that Snape was still upset about Harry having discovered his secret? Probably. But this didn't seem like Snape's usual quiet loathing – he seemed distinctly angry, like something bad had just happened.

Harry shuddered as he realized he was getting good at reading Snape.

It was at lunch, however, that Harry got his first real shock of the day. They had all sat down to eat, Ron muttering viciously about his potion, which Snape had Evanesced.

"It wasn't that bad, really," Hermione was saying soothingly, "You only forgot the—"

"Hermoninny," said a gruff, yet warm basso voice.

Harry sputtered a bit on his pumpkin juice, and looked up to see—

"Viktor!" Hermione shrieked happily, leaping up from her spot on the bench, and throwing her arms around his neck, "How are you?! I never expected to see you –"

"Didn't you graduate?" Ron asked, bluntly, clearly a bit disgruntled at the warmth of Hermione's greeting, or possibly by the soppy look on Krum's normally scowling face.

"Charlie Veasel. He vorks with the dragons in Romania. He comes to me, and tells me, 'Come to England,' for..."

Krum looked over and Ron and Harry, and censored himself awkwardly.

"For to visit."

"Well, yes, you'd written that you might come to England," Hermione said, her face having lit up, "But I never expected to see you here at Hogwarts!"

"I vanted to see you," he said, his stark features rendered almost comical by the sappy smile on his face.

"Besides vich," he continued, his expression darkening a bit, "It seems Hogwarts is vere –"

"Don't suppose you'd care to say hello to us, then?" Ron asked, abruptly.

Hermione tsk'd, and rolled her eyes, but Krum's usual scowl returned, and he nodded sternly at Ron, and Harry in turn.

"Hullo," he said, in his usual dull voice.

"Hello, Viktor," Harry said, still recovering from his shock, "Pleasant trip?" The last time he'd seen Viktor had been at the Triwizard Tournament, and seeing him standing here at Hogwarts again was bringing other things rushing back...things like Cedric Diggory. Things like—

"Don't think about that," he automatically told himself again.

But it was not only this that was bothering him. He'd known Hermione had been keeping in touch with Viktor casually, via owl, but he wasn't sure he liked this recent development any more than Ron did.

But to come all this way to say "hello?" What was Krum really doing in England? And moreover, what was he doing at Hogwarts?

"Yah, it vas fine," he replied abruptly, "Hermoninny, vould you valk vit me?"

"Yeah, Hermoninny," Ron said sarcastically, "Why don't you take a valk?"

Hermione eyed him sternly, but something in her seemed to melt.

"I'm sorry, Viktor," she said, putting a hand on Viktor's bulging bicep, and smiling gently, "But we're all headed for class fairly soon. Maybe after classes end today."

Looking fairly put out, Krum scowled so that his eyebrows resembled nothing so much as too very furry black caterpillars kissing.

"Yah," he said, "Perhaps ve study in the library."

Again, his stony expression was broken by a warm smile, and he closed the distance between them a bit. "It is good to see you, Hermoninny."

Harry thought he detected a nearly imperceptible tic in Hermione's right eye, as he butchered her name yet again .

"Yes," she said, with a firm smile, "Good to see you too, Viktor."

He leaned in to give her a kiss, but she angled her head at the last minute, so that he got stuck with her cheek. She quickly turned her head about, and gave the air at his other cheek a perfunctory peck.

Clearly having expected a real kiss, Viktor nodded curtly at Ron and Hermione, and stalked off in his duck-footed walk, scowling.

"So, IVicky's/I back in town," Ron said, jabbing at his pork chop, "Really, Hermione, we know you're excited to see each other, but did you have to make out at the table?"

Supremely unperturbed, Hermione reached for a roll. "It's just polite, Ron...it's like a handshake, on the continent."

Harry was a bit surprised – the subject of Viktor Krum had always been a hot topic for Ron, but equally so for Hermione...why did she seem so calm?

"'Like a handshake,'" Ron repeated, "'On the continent'... Honestly! You'll excuse me, Harry, if I don't snog you every time we bump into each other"

Hermione giggled, and despite his grouchy expression, Harry caught Ron sneaking a small smirk of triumph at having made her laugh.

"What's Krum doing here anyway?" Harry asked, with a bit more irritation than he'd expected.

"Wrong question, Harry," Hermione said, "The real question is, what was Charlie doing in Romania?"

"Hey, yeah," Ron said, something dawning on him, "And Bill's not back yet either"

Firenze was no less hard on them in Divination. It seemed the holidays had not lightened his mood in the slightest.

"We approach now, a crossroads that the centaurs have been mapping for centuries," he intoned, "The cycle of time is as the cycle of life. The dying pangs of one era are the labor pains of the new – it is a time of uncertainty, darkness, of struggle, and deep pain, that both cleanses and scars...it is a trial by fire," he said, sprinkling some pungent herbs into the small fire on the faux-forest floor in front of him, which wafted sage-y smoke up into the night sky, "A fire which burns away the parts of us that are unecessary, stripping us down to our essential core...a fire which burns red in the sky...Mars draws nearer, and burns ever brighter...we die, and are born, in the fire"

"Bet he played with matches when he was a colt," Ron muttered to Harry, who stifled his laughter. Harry knew, with a slightly guilty tug, that he should be paying more attention to Firenze. But he'd heard so much doomsaying in his short wizarding career, that he was pretty much immune to it by now.

"So what d'you reckon Vicky's after?" Ron muttered darkly.

"You mean besides the obvious?" Harry asked, mischievously out of the corner of his mouth, earning a punch on his shoulder from Ron.

Parvati shushed them quietly from her place in front of them.

"Honestly?" Harry whispered, "I think he's here for the Order. Whether he knows it or not. Sounds like your brother recruited him...I dunno, or maybe Hermione did, through her letters...I don't think she'd mention the Order by name, though, it's not safe. Either way, he's definitely here on official business of some sort. I don't think he'd drop the Quidditch season just to come see Hermione."

"I dunno," Ron said, darkly, "He just might. Git."

But Parvati shushed them again, and they fell silent, paying attention to Firenze through to the end of the lesson.

"Harry Potter," Firenze said, as they were leaving at the end of class.

"Yes?" he asked, as Ron was forced to wait in the doorway for him yet again.

"You understood what I said today, did you not?"

"Hmm? Oh, yes. Mars is getting brighter – trial by fire...yes."

Firenze eyed him dubiously, "About the cycle of life and death?"

"Yep. Got it," Harry said, feeling annoyed. If Firenze insisted on talking in broad metaphors, he wasn't going to have patience for any more gloom and doom.

Firenze seemed to think for a moment, then nodded, looking a bit downcast.

"You may go."

"Man, what's got into him?" Ron asked, as they walked to Defense.

"I dunno," Harry said, annoyed, "All I know is, if I hear any more bad news, I'm going to plug up my ears and sing 'God Save the Queen.'"

"They found Madame Bones," Hermione said sadly, as they entered the Defense classroom. She had been waiting for them by the door.

Ron turned to Harry, a glum expression on his face.

"Hope you can carry a tune."