A/N: THanks so much for the reviews! Haha. i know this is a little quick, but im just gonna write the third chappie. (: i hope you like it!
Cocoamo1223- Thanks so much! (: Here's the third chappie for you! -shoots love arrow
ElizabethV- Haha! I'm glad you liked it! I hope this chapter is as exciting too! (: Thanks alot! -shoots love arrow
DISCLAIMER: I do not own Harry Potter, they all rightfully belong to JK Rowling. If I did, I'd publish the good fanfics. :
Chapter Three
And So It Begins
Hermione almost fell over from the weight of Draco Malfoy, who had conviniently fainted and fell into Hermione, who struggled to stand straight despite the weight.
"Malfoy?" said Hermione, completely bewildered, holding the unconcious Malfoy at arm's length while he swayed and fell back into her arms. Hermione cast a desperate look at Harry.
Harry looked positively livid, and in a moment, pushed Draco Malfoy off Hermione, leaving the young man lying sprawled out on the floor. Grabbing Hermione's arms, he pushed her further away from Malfoy and stood in front of her like a shield. His wand still pointed at Malfoy, who now, in his state, was unable to hurt an ant let alone Hermione. But Harry wasn't taking any chances with him, and quickly moved a few feet away from his sprawled out form.
Dumbledore peered cautiously at the young Draco Malfoy. Noticing a steady stream of blood that was now staining the carpet, Dumbledore quickly and deftly turned Malfoy over to face him, and held the Death Eater gingerly while examining him.
By this time the loud yells that came from Harry had already woken up the entire household, and members of the Order came trapeizing down the stairs, all holding their wands out. Seeing Hermione hidden behind Harry, Ron stepped up to Harry's side, and saw Malfoy. Immediately, Ron wanted to shout the killing curse, but Hermione blocked him once again.
"NO! Ron, wait!" Hermione said breathlessly. Harry glared at her, not quite knowing why she was shielding this Death Eater who had killed so many. Obviously as the other members of the Order came down the steps, and saw the young Death Eater, they too wanted to know why he was not killed immediately.
"Albus! Whats the meaning of this?" asked Minerva McGonagall shrilly, pointing a sharp finger at the unconcious Malfoy. The rest of the members started voicing out their thoughts too.
"He should be killed! What is HE doing here on our turf?" piped up an angry Seamus Finnigan, whose wand was also pointed at Malfoy.
"Get him out of here!" exclaimed Dean Thomas.
"No, kill him!" screeched Nymphadora Tonks.
"Castrate him!" yelled a slightly flushed Terry Boot.
Dumbledore placed Malfoy on the floor and stood infront of him. He raised his hand and an immediate silence fell over all the members.
"Thank you all for keeping quiet," said Dumbledore softly, "please, let us not be rash and try to kill Mr.Malfoy here, as he is obviously incapable of harming us as of now."
Snickers of disbelief echoed in the household, and Flitwick tutted disapprovingly. "Shush!" he ordered, casting a glare around the circle of members that had gathered around the doorway.
Dumbledore smiled serenely. "I ask for your understanding now, that we must save this boy first and not kill him whilst he is so badly injured. It is unethical to do so, and I assure you I have an explaination for all this. But now we need to save young Malfoy and save him quickly." Dumbledore paused and looked at the disgruntled faces of the members of the Order and cast a reproachful look at a particularly livid Harry Potter. "Now, we all know that this boy has killed more than his fair share of people, but he could be a useful addition to the Order. We don't know his motive for coming here, and we don't know if the Dark Lord knows our hideout. These are all valuable questions he must have answers to. So we must save him."
"But Albus, what use is he to us?" asked Lupin.
"Of much use Remus. But we cannot talk about this any longer. Dean, kindly go over to the other house and wake the group residing there and tell them to meet us here quickly. Molly, Nymphadora; I hand this boy to you. I implore you to take good care of him not just from the goodness in your hearts, but because he could help us defeat Voldemort. The rest of you, please, adjorn to the living room and make yourself comfortable. As soon as Mr Malfoy is settled in, we will have a discussion promptly and quickly about what next to do." said Dumbledore, and though disgruntled, most of the members nodded, and Dean soon sprinted to the other house to inform them and the rest left for the living room, which Flitwick majicked to be larger. The remaining teen members of the Order, Seamus, Terry Boot, Harry, Hermione and Ron, walked back to the living room, whilst Flitwick and McGonagall, Lupin and Arthur Weasley followed Dumbledore into the kitchen where they started discussing in low tones with sudden bursts of emotion from McGonagall.
Hermione wrapped her arm around Harry's, and slowly led him towards the living room with the rest of the members and away from the sight of Draco Malfoy, now being levitated by Tonks and led upstairs to one of the vacant rooms. Harry was positively seething, and his emerald eyes blazed with anger, whilst Ron lagged behind, running his hand through his messy hair and muttering to himself.
"Harry, please, don't fume." Hermione said quietly, pulling Harry to sit on the couch with Ron and Seamus.
"How do I not be angry Hermione, when Dumbledore chooses to provide this..fiend, with shelter, at our expense no less!" said Harry loudly, clearly agitated, and shrugged Hermione's hand off his arm.
Hermione flinched a little, hurt by this gesture, but nevertheless, placed a firm smile on her face. "But Harry, Dumbledore has explainations, he always does."
"Yes, but giving shelter and comfort to this son of a bitch who killed so many of us! Hermione! That man was a Death Eater! Why are you defending him!" snarled Harry, this time he glared at Hermione heatedly.
Suddenly all eyes focused on the argument between Harry Potter and Hermione Granger. Everyone started to stare pointedly at Hermione, a blush creeping onto her face.
"I'm not defending him Harry! Its just that he's so badly injured and comes all the way here, shouldn't we help him! And what, just leave him to die there and suffer? He really might be a great help to the Order! Maybe he just wants to turn over a new leaf. Shouldn't we give him a chance!" countered Hermione hotly, she couldn't believe Harry was being such a prat when it came to this.
Harry clambered off the couch, shaking slightly with anger. He strode towards the middle of the room, still glaring at Hermione.
"Don't you get it Hermione! HE is the reason we are stuck here! HE is the cause of so many deaths! Where's Professor Sprout I ask you? Six feet under. And why? Because of DRACO MALFOY. The jackass has killed so many people, caused us so much pain. And yet you sit there and calmly defend him! If Draco Malfoy wanted to change into a better person, if he wanted to defect Voldermort and come join us, he could have done so MANY YEARS AGO HERMIONE!" yelled Harry, his emerald green eyes sparked with anger as he glared furiously at Hermione.
Hermione felt tears sting her eyes. Harry never talked to her like that, and clearly they had issues to iron out, but she couldn't let him off without a good argument. Especially after he just insulted her intelligence!
Ron saw the anger that sparked in his best friend's eyes, and turned to see Hermione's chocolate ones glaze over with tears. He reached out a hand to pat her back, but she withdrew quickly, flashing him an apologetic smile.
Hermione stood up too, her back was straight and her eyes flared. "I'm not saying that he didn't do anything wrong Harry! I'm just asking you; is it so wrong to let him rest and get well, before we do anything about him? Why can't we treat him well? He is as of now, a prisoner in the Order. And even if we find out that he was on some twisted mission for Voldemort, we can still kill him LATER."
"You obviously don't remember how people were killed by Draco Malfoy, Hermione. They were slaughtered like animals, not given an ounce of respect. How can you shield a monster like that!" Harry now turned his back upon Hermione, and said later in a softer tone, "You're not the person I thought you were then, swayed by a pretty face."
Hermione felt her blood boil at his last statement. Her hands curled into balls of fists, and she looked at everyone else sitting in the living room, her heart felt like someone stuck a dagger right through it and left it there. Her throat felt dry and her tongue was still. No retort came from her. She couldn't even bear to look at Ron, Harry had thrust a dagger into her heart and just left it bleeding there.
Ron stepped up between the pair, and placed his hands on Harry's shoulders. "Mate, calm down. She didn't mean anything." he muttered in a soft tone.
From the armchair by the fire, Seamus nodded, "Yeah, come on, she didn't mean any malice."
But Terry Boot thought otherwise, and shot a fiery glare Hermione's way. "I think Harry's right." he said audibly, staring at Harry determinely.
Hermione was about to answer when a loud noise came from the door.
"I'm back! I got the rest of the Order!" yelled Dean, and true enough, Anthony Goldstein, Fred and George Weasley(all tousled hair and groaning), Moody and Kingsley Shaklebolt trudged through the door, and all naturally filed towards the living room and settled themselves comfortably.
The fiesty couple could not continue their argument, and Hermione instead settled for a seat far away from Harry's at the couch, and she sat gingerly next to George Weasley, who seemed to notice her teary eyes, and patted her on the back before falling asleep, his head lolling about.
Hermione didn't dare look at Terry who was oppsite her, and instead focused on the floor, feeling nonetheless lousy about the whole evening.
Dumbledore, McGonagall and Flitwick came in later, and a silence fell over the members of the Order. Harry, still seething, refused to look at Dumbledore or Hermione.
"I apologise for waking you up at this time, I know its far past your bedtimes," said Dumbledore, "but there is an important matter to be discussed."
Everyone sat up straighter, and even George Weasley awoke from his stupor and sat straighter.
"Just awhile ago, Draco Malfoy, arrived at the doorstep of this house. He was very badly injured, cut in various places, sporting bruising around his abdomen and he looked terribly horrid. It seems to be the end product of a particularly nasty Cruciatus curse. Draco Malfoy is now lying upstairs, while Molly and Nyphadora start to help him."
As he finish, as predicted, the other members, who were unaware of this started their protests. George Weasley was flushed with anger as he and his twin brother started yelling in identical voices about what a traitor Malfoy was.
Dumbledore put his hand up and silenced them. "Please. Listen. We do not know his reason for coming to us, but we should not deny him a shelter, especially when he is so injured. The reason being that Mr. Malfoy could well be a defector of Voldermort, and was thus punished and maybe he wants to help us. Either way, if he is out to harm us, we have the upper hand. I want your support in this. I cannot have everyone gaining up to attack him while he is here. May I ask that until we discover his true motives, everyone should place a calm and unbias front? Should he turn out to harm us, we can easily kill him and eliminate Voldermort's trump card. And if he really wants to return to the light side, then we have earned ourselves a very talented young wizard."
Mummers of agreement(from the adults) came and most adults nodded, Hermione, Anthony, Seamus and Dean nodded calmly too. But Ron, who cast a sideways glance at Harry, was about to nod, but changed it to a shuffling of feet and bent head. The Weasley Twins glowered at Dumbledore for awhile, then seeing their father's glare, nodded slightly, still muttering in soft tones about Dumbledore's decision.
Harry and Terry did not nod, and instead they fixed a penetrating gaze at the members who did nod, and Harry's gaze fell on Hermione, who tried to give him a weak smile, but instead of reciprocating, he instead glared at her before glaring at Dumbledore.
Hermione felt crushed, and listless as Dumbledore and the other members started discussing about certain things she was sure the younger members of the Order were not allowed to hear. And she was right, Arthur Weasley soon stood up and smiled at the teenagers.
"Alright, this is adult stuff, so you teens just scoot back to your house, and your beds." he said smiling at Hermione. Hermione smiled weakly, and quickly left the room first, and nearly broke into a run back into her room, which was on the third level oppsite Tonks, she and Tonks were the only 'single' women in the household, and thus were granted their own rooms with their own privacy on the third level. They shared a bathroom on the third level too, and Hermione was grateful now, that Tonks was opposite her instead of any of the boys. She couldn't face them today.
Hermione made it upstairs safely, and she quickly locked herself in the room, she could hear the boys going up to the second level. She could hear Ron's soothing voice, and she too could hear Terry's impatient grunts of disapproval. Shaking her head, tears now falling down her face, Hermione sank down onto the floor, her back against the locked door, still stung at Harry's words.
How can he just doubt me like that? 'Swayed by a pretty face'! What the hell does THAT mean!
Hermione bit her lip, her face now flushed with anger. Later, she calmed herself down, and thinking properly, she convinced herself that Harry just had a flood of bad memories.
Hermione got up from her position at the floor, pulled out her wand and muttered a few locking spells before she sank into her bed, and fell into a deep sleep.
Maybe all this was just a dream and it'll all go away..
End of Chapter! (: Yay! Okay, this chapter right is a little shorter so sorry, Harry displays that bout of teenage angst you see in bookfive(i hated that in bookfive!) and he kinda feels threatened by Malfoy, yup yup. Being the hottie and cutie that he is, Harry can't think straight, and is quite confused about it. All this to the unconcious Malfoy's advantage of course.
NEXT CHAPTER: Malfoy talks to Hermione, and Harry and Hermione try to iron their issues out.