Hey peeps! 'Nother one for you to read, let me know what you think. Tis the ball next which brings something interesting to the table so to speak. Anyway, hope you like this one. Please R &R ;)

Sarah XxXxX ;)


Chapter 17

'Right then!' exclaimed Arthur, making the rest of the group jump in their seats, 'who's going to be the first demonstrators?'

It had been a wonderful meal, and everyone was full to bursting after being offered seconds of everything. The wine and beer had flowed freely and everyone was cheerful, talking in small groups as they had done whilst they were eating.

'Harry and Hermione!' said Ginny which received glares from both of them, 'well it was your idea Harry, and Hermione you're probably the only one who can give him a real challenge!'

'Hardly!' Hermione protested, but that was as far as she got. Harry had stood up and was dragging her off her seat.

'Come on Hermione, I'll be gentle!'

'You'd better be,' she said, eventually standing.

'Any rules?' Harry asked Arthur.

'Err yes!' Hermione replied for him. Arthur smiled.

'Obviously no harsh spells, light to moderate hexes and jinxes only, we'll make the spells verbal for demonstration purposes, and if during the beginning phase you could wait after each part so I can explain to Charles and Jan what you're doing, that would be lovely!'

'Sounds fair enough, doesn't it H?'

'Yes Harry,' she replied,

The pair of them walked away from the table, far enough away that any rebounding spells probably wouldn't hit anyone still sat there but near enough so the observers would hear their spell casting. They stopped and faced each other, wands held upright an inch from their noses.

'Now traditionally this pose was the official challenge from one wizard-'

'Or witch!' Ginny added.

'Yes alright Ginny, from one of the wizards or witches to the other.'

Harry and Hermione put their wand hands down by their sides and pointed their wands at the ground.

'That means that both of them have accepted the challenge and are ready to duel,' said Arthur to Hermione's parents.

'Ready Saviour Boy?'

'Oh so it's gonna be like that is it? Right then, no more Mr. Nice Saviour Boy for you then, pen-exploder!'

'Oooh! Harsh words from the Wizard-kind Wonder!'

Harry's eyes widened.

'You know the more you insult me the less nice I'm going to be.'

'Less nice? Great grammar there Saviour Boy.'

'Ok then, sod the niceties this is war Granger!' he said trying to hide the smirk on his face

'Bring it on Potter!' she replied, failing to do the same

They spun on the spot and walked five paces forward. On their fifth step they turned to face each other, wand arm raised, the other raised above their heads and pointing to the other.

'This is the traditional duelling stance,' commented Arthur, 'now when duelling was a more…what's the word?'

'Noble?' Hermione answered, not taking her eyes off Harry as she did so.

'Yes Hermione, that's exactly it. When it was a noble art then this stance was nearly always executed before duelling, however nowadays the general requirement is that your wand is pointing in the vague direction of your attacker, facing them normally helps but is not always essential. Anyway, are you two ready?'

Hermione looked at Harry, he was concentrating, she could see that. Dammit! Why did I have to wind him up? She knew Harry's duelling style well, there were two things he would either do, regardless of which he did, he would do it the split second after Arthur said to start. He would either try and disarm Hermione, or try and protect himself with the shield charm. To be fair, Hermione would do the same thing. Maybe it was the wine finally reaching her head, but she decided to be brave and use the offensive technique as opposed to the defensive. But then again, Harry had a twinkle in his eye…

'Yes,' replied Harry,

'Yes,' replied Hermione, making sure she sounded as confident as Harry.

'Ok then, after three,' Charles and Jan watched hardly breathing in anticipation, 'One – two – three!'

Harry and Hermione cast their spells at exactly the same time.

'Expelliarmus!' shouted Hermione, a little louder than was absolutely necessary.

'Rictusempra!' Harry shouted just as loud.

Hermione watched hers and Harry's spells skim each other in mid-air exactly halfway between the two of them.

Rictusempra? Thought Hermione, I knew that twinkle meant something! She just had chance to realise Harry was playing dirty before she had to produce a shield charm to rebound Harry's jinx.

'Protego!' she shouted, and the spell was rebounded away from her.

Instead of Harry producing a shield charm he simply moved out of the way of Hermione's disarmer.

Harry took advantage of Hermione using her wand to defend herself and sent another spell at her.

'Stupify!' he yelled.

Hermione copied Harry's earlier move and simply dodged the spell stepping two paces to the left.

'Petrificus Totalus!' Harry ducked the spell which was closely followed by another from Hermione. At the same time she sent it his way he sent the same one back at her. They looked at each other and caught one another's gaze, both having a fleeting vision of the last time they used their wands to do battle. It wasn't for long but they were both distracted from what they were doing.

A split second too late they reacted to the spells, but they were both hit at exactly the same time by each other's stunners and both crumpled to the ground.

Laughter erupted around the unconscious pair, initiated by Fred and George. Charles and Jan's slightly worried expressions disappeared when Arthur reassured them they would be awake in seconds. Him and Ginny walked over to the unconscious witch and wizard. Ginny stood over Hermione and waved her wand, the elder witch opened her eyes and focused on Ginny. Her eyes widened as she remembered what had happened, she sat upright and grabbed Ginny's outstretched hand to help her stand. She looked up and saw that Harry was doing exactly the same thing.

'Rictusempra?' she exclaimed walking towards Harry.

'Petrificus?' he replied at the same volume.

'I only did that because you seemed intent on torturing me with tickling!'

Harry grinned, Hermione couldn't help but smile.

'I just wanted to make things interesting for our audience.

'I can't believe we stunned each other after about thirty seconds. We're supposed to be better than that!'

'I know, I'm glad no one from work saw, that would have been highly embarrassing!'

The two of them walked back to the table laughing, both choosing to forget the memories that flitted into their brains before they were stunned. The final battle was something that was not going to be forgotten quickly, they had learned to live with that.

'Who's next?' Arthur asked.

'Fred and George,' replied Harry, Hermione and Ginny simultaneously. The rest of the group nodded and smiled in agreement.

'Well Fred, it looks like we are wanted for entertainment purposes.' George said loudly.

'Well who are we to deny these good people what they want. Ladies and Gentlemen prepare to be dazzled by exceptional duelling skills!' his twin replied.

Hermione noted the twinkle the both of them had in their eyes, she looked at Ginny and Harry, both of them raised their eyebrows. They had seen it too, and all three took it as a sign that this was going to be interesting and no doubt highly amusing!

It wasn't so much as a lesson in duelling, as a highly entertaining routine that involved tricks, jokes, jinxes and a lot of explosions, and one which showcased a few of the twin's new product ranges. Apparently they had developed their shield hats to a new level: they were now invisible, so spells and jinxes bounced off the wearer with no obvious reason why. Their joke wands now sent fireworks into the air when used and their darkness powder now came in a variety of colours and glittery shades, just because!

After a good ten minutes the 'show' was over and the applause went on for minutes. Everyone had tears streaming down their faces from laughing so hard and Hermione, Harry and Ginny were doubled over. The evening continued in a very happy way, when it got dark, magical fires were lit around the table. Duelling continued between various pairings, but was put a stop to when it was obvious the alcohol was flowing far too freely for it to continue in a safe manner.

Charles was introduced to Firewhiskey, which he very much enjoyed, and the younger of the Weasleys, Harry and Hermione decided to make their Butterbeer a bit more potent by adding some of the strong stuff to it. It had to be said that they were drinking the most, but it was the adults that were behaving the worst, talking at unnecessary volumes and dancing in very lavish ways around the garden. The wizards were highly entertained by muggle stories, and the muggles the same with various tales of mishaps with wands and experimental spells.

Hermione was sat on a chair, her knees pulled up to her chest, a smile on her face as she half listened to the stories being told, and as she watched her mum and Arthur dance their way around the table. There was only one thing that could have made tonight perfect. She imagined Ron walking through the garden and placing his hands over eyes, asking 'guess who,' before picking her up from her chair and kissing her.

She closed her eyes, and felt two hands cover them.

'Guesshoo?'

She jumped up from the chair and spun round to see who was stood behind her.

'What?' Harry asked, startled by her reaction.

Hermione swayed slightly, the alcohol affecting her balance, her ability to focus and, now she came to think about it, her ability of rational thought.

'Nothing,' she said, 'I just thought you were someone else.'

'Who?'

'No one,'

'Pfff! Come one Hermione, you'll have to do better that than!'

'That than? Don't you mean than that?' she replied smiling at his mistake.

'That's what I said!'

Hermione giggled, a lot more than was necessary for the situation.

'Where's Ginny?'

'She fell asleep!' Harry replied with a sigh, 'I think she was tired.'

Hermione laughed again.

'Well Harry, generally if you fall asleep you were tired before you did. Otherwise you wouldn't have fallen asleep, unless of course you drank a sleeping potion; that would put you to sleep too. Oh and if someone jinxed you would be unconscious, but that's not really the same. Is it?'

'What? The only part of that sentence I got was 'Is it?''

This caused Hermione to laugh again, and this time Harry joined in. They were both drunk but still able to, just about, hold a conversation. Hermione fell quite, her mind wandering back to where it had been before Harry scared her.

'Harry when do you think Ron'll wake up? He's been asleep for weeks now, he can't be that tired.'

'It's Ron, of course he can be that tired!'

'Don't be silly Harry, no one can be that tired that they'd sleep for weeks on end!'

'I know 'Mione, he'll wake up when he's ready. Do you miss him?'

'I miss him so much, I love him so much too.'

'Well that's good, 'cause he loves you too.'

Neither of them says anything for a minute. Harry grabbed the back of the chair Hermione was sat on, as he had started to sway dangerously.

'Hermione would you like to dance?'

'What?'

'Would you like to dance? It's a simple question and I'm swaying already so I might as well do it with someone in time to the music.'

He laughed at his own joke and Hermione joined in.

'Well then yes, Harry Potter, I would like to dance.'

He walked around the chair and put his arms around Hermione's waist. At first it was Hermione supporting Harry, but then the constant swaying got to Hermione and Harry needed to support her too. They didn't realise the time passing, each immersed in their own drunken thoughts to notice. It was well into the small hours when the group realised how cold it had actually gotten, the alcohol they had consumed doing a brilliant job at keeping them warm. Hermione and Harry, amazingly, got Hermione's parents home, although the two of them appeared in completely the wrong rooms, Harry in the downstairs bathroom with Jan, and Hermione in her parents bedroom with Charles, but none of the four seemed to notice.

Harry and Hermione bade farewell to the two of them and then apparated arm in arm home. Hermione managed to remember to drink some water before she crawled into her bed. Thinking she wasn't that drunk after all, she reached for her book off her nightstand and started to read, however after trying to read a few lines she realised she was holding the book upside down. She closed her eyes for a few seconds, intent on opening them in a minute and right her book, but she never managed to open her eyes, dreamless sleep washed over her in waves, not even interrupted when her book landed with a loud thud on the floor.