"Hello Amycus, I am surprised to see you here. We requested this interview with Alecto," James stepped into the man's parlor, followed by Sirius. The Carrows were members of a Noble and Ancient Family, so the tactic that they had used against Mcnair couldn't be applied. James had had to write a letter formaly requesting an interview, and then Alecto had replied with a time and place.
"My sister is waiting for you in the sitting room." He led the way into the house.
"Hello Auror Potter, Auror Black," The large woman stood and courtesied politely. "What brings you to my home?"
"Except this isn't your home, is it?" Sirius asked, "Why are we meeting here instead of at your condo?"
"Ah, I am having it remodeled, the whole place is a mess. I am staying with my brother until the work is finished."
"Hmm, fine. Let's talk about August 18, the Quidditch World cup." James continued.
"Oh, it was terrible what happened there, just terrible!" Alecto crooned.
"Can you tell me where you were?" Sirius asked
"We were there," Amycus interrupted, "It was a great match, and everybody was in high spirits afterwards. We walked the campsite, stopping by friends and sharing a mug. I don't know about Alecto, but I drank too much and turned in early. I didn't wake up until the following morning."
"You slept through all noise?"
"My tent is top notch - it has sound canceling charms." Amycus took a sip of his tea and leaned back, the very portrait on calm.
"And you?" James turned to Alecto.
"I joined my brother for some of the visits, but the partying was getting too rowdy for me, so I returned to our tent shortly before he did."
The two Aurors chatted some more with the Carrows, but were not able to elicit anything further.
As they apparated back to the office, James asked, "So what do you think?"
"I think we should swing by Alecto's apartment."
"Not without a warrant, we don't," James frowned.
"Not to break in - I'm not suggesting something like that." Sirius smirked in amusement. Now that James had become a stick in the mud, it was fun to sometimes push his buttons. And after being friends for over 2 decades, he knew where most of them were. "But we should swing by once in a while and check it out, maybe see if anything incriminating goes into the trash."
James nodded, "Good idea." He and Sirius stared at each other for a moment before Sirius gave a sigh.
"You want me to do I, don't you."
"It's your idea, Padfoot. I wouldn't want to steal your credit."
\*/
The days after the announcement of the Yule ball were pure chaos – Hogwarts hadn't hosted an official dance in years. The girls especially were gossiping non stop about who was going with whom.
After the initial scare, Harry had calmed down – unlike Ron, he didn't HAVE to go with anybody. He could just show up with his friends and hang out.
He was just leaving remedial potions (aka happy fun time with the most negative, condescending (and greasy) wizard known to mankind) when he almost walked into Daphne. "Potter. Can I talk to you for a minute?"
"What is it with people ambushing me outside of Remedial potions?!" He was not at his best after that stressful experience.
Daphne looked puzzled, "You're in my territory. You're alone. You're available. This prevents any unwanted rumors from circulating." It was also how spiders hunted and killed their prey, but that was irrelevant.
"Right." Harry replied as he regained his composure. "So what do you need?" 'I finally understand why zebras travel in herds when crossing lion territory.'
"The favor you owe me: I want you to escort Tracy Davis to the Yule Ball."
"Ummm," Tracy was a rather plain girl that was always hanging around with Greengrass. Not only that, but he had never so much as exchanged a word with her. "I don't know if that will work out, seeing as I'm a Gryffindor, and she's a Slytherin.." Harry began.
"Stop trying to weasel out, Potter. I'm not asking you to date her. This is just for the one dance. Whether you have fun or not is irrelevant – you just have to be by her side for two hours."
Harry swallowed. He had agreed to this, kind of. "Ok."
\*/
"Harry, what's wrong?" Neville asked as Harry shambled in through the portrait hole.
"Greengrass ambushed me."
"Are you injured?" Ginny asked.
"Only emotionally. She wants me to take Tracy Davis to the Yule Ball."
Neville's face lit up, "Good for you."
"No, but.. I guess." Harry couldn't come up with a reason not to go. Sure he didn't really know her, but he didn't really know any girls. And she wasn't ugly, just plain. But on the other hand, Cho was pretty hot, but there was no way that he would ever ask her out, not in a million years.
Ginny nodded. "You can always ditch her if she's a skank or something." At Harry's confused look, she elucidated, "You know, if she's acting weird."
"But that means I'm going to be stuck all alone." Neville moaned.
"Ask Luna." Harry interjected quickly, "Third years are allowed as long as they're a date."
Neville was taken aback, "But I… She's.. I don't know..."
"Look, do you want me to ask for you? It won't be weird - apparently asking for your brother (or friend) is a thing. " Harry reassured his step-brother 'How can he be such a wuss when it comes to girls?' It was obvious (to him, at least) that Neville had it bad for Luna, and at least she was already a friend.
Neville steeled himself, "No, I'll ask her myself."
****\
Tracy Davis was just exiting the girls room when something whirled her around and slammed her into the wall.
"What's the deal with you having Daphne ask Harry out? Are you playing some sort of Slytherin mind games?" Ginny demanded as she gripped Tracy's lapels, pulling them tight. Given the difference in height – Ginny was petite, while Tracy was of an average height and and weight, as well as a year older – it was less intimidating and more amusing, like a chihuahua trying to menace a German shepherd.
"I'm not playing at anything. And I don't see how it's any of your business anyways."
Ginny glared at the other girl as she leaned in, trying to restrain the larger girl, not certain what to do next. She was always very impulsive, and her plans didn't typically have a 'step 2'. "Fine. But if you do anything to him, I know where to find you!" She stalked off.
Tracy adjusted her clothing and tried to calm her breathing down as she watched Ginny's backside as the hot blooded Gryffindor disappeared from sight.
\*/
"Ok, let me get this straight, you asked Fleur to the ball?" Harry repeated for the third time.
"I said yes," Ron mumbled, not looking up.
"Dude..."
"What made you think you had a chance?" Seamus was never one to mince words.
"Look, I need a date for the ball! I have to open the dancing. That means I have to go with a girl!" Ron was hyperventilating. "I don't know any girls!" Hermione was standing of to one side, her hand half raised like she was in class, but for once wasn't certain of the answer.
"Maybe you can ask Greengrass – she's into setting up people" Harry joked.
"Fine! I'll do that!" Ron stormed out.
Harry and Ginny exchanged a look. "That's not going to end well."
"You want to go after him?"
Harry considered, "Nah. She won't kill him. It will be educational." He chortled.
Hermione scowled at the pair, "You're irresponsible!" And ran out after Ron.
Harry shrugged, "That sounded more like Neville than the Friz. Incidentally, Where is he? I haven't seen him today outside of classes?"
Ginny shrugged. "Maybe he's trying to work up his nerve to ask Luna out?"
\*/
Neville sneezed – it was cold hanging out up on the astronomy tower all by yourself, but at least he didn't have to deal with his stupid brother trying to set him up with Luna. She was a nice girl, but he wasn't interested in her.
Just then the door to the roof slammed open and a petite form stomped out onto the roof, and taking a deep breath, screamed at the top of her lungs.
Neville was monetarily shocked immobile, but before he could move to render assistance, the girl began ranting "He doesn't know any girls! So what am I? Swiss cheese? I have been by his side every free moment, trying to keep him from failing or dying or doing something stupid – again! - and what does he do? He asks that French floozy! Ugh!" Hermione kicked one of the uprights holding the railing so hard that it rang like a basso bell.
"Oh, fudge nuggets!" She grabbed her toe. After a moment, she gently lowered her foot back to the ground and cast a soothing charm on it before limping back down stairs.
"Ooh-kay" Neville stepped out of the nook that he had hidden in to avoid becoming a collateral damage to Hermione's … whatever that was.
\*/
"Hey, are you coming in?" Neville called out. They had just finished up an impromptu game of quidditch – it wasn't just the team: everybody was getting so stressed about the Yule Ball that when Harry asked if anybody wanted to come play, half the common room had joined them. They had even picked up a couple of guys from Hufflepuff that they walked into on the way to the pitch.
It had been pretty chaotic, will all sorts of skill levels, but fun.
"Nah," Harry gestured with his broom, "I'm going to do a little flying. It's a beautiful night." The pitch had been too crowded for him to really let it rip.
He kicked off and swooped into the sky. It was all the way dark, but the moon was full and bright. Harry banked and swooped towards Hogwarts. As he flew, a presence shadowed him on his right. He looked up to see Ginny paralleling his course. He waved but didn't say anything.
They flew silently until they reached the castle. Harry banked and swooped around Gryffindor tower before dipping down to fly parallel to the third floor gallery. It was empty at this time of day, so there was nobody to report him to the teachers for reckless flying.
A moment later Ginny swooped in beside him, grinning like a maniac.
He gave a grin back and swerved hard, racing up the Astronomy as fast as his broom would go, his feet almost brushing the stones. At the top he looped over backwards, so as not to disturb any couples that were making out up there. As he did, he saw Ginny following the same trajectory up the tower, a look of concentration on her face.
Harry gave an evil chuckles and did a barrel roll through the owlery, rotating to pass through the narrow windows untouched, careful not to disturb the birds.
Ginny followed, though she managed to fly into the cloud of straw that his passage had swept up, so she was coughing as she righted herself.
"You ok?"
"That was fun."
"Yeah." Though it was also dumb. Especially that last stunt - they had had to hunch down on their broom and turn sideways to avoid hitting the window frames, 'Her broom's not as good as yours, dumb-ass. What if she couldn't pull of the barrel roll and got hurt?'
Harry flew up higher, up towards the moon, as Ginny pulled in closer.
"We don't have enough opportunities to fly." She sighed.
"I thought you lived out in the boonies. Can't you go flying there whenever you want?"
Ginny shrugged and didn't reply right away, "It's not the same. Ron and George don't fly. Not like this, and Charlie isn't around anymore. And flying by yourself is not as much fun."
"Yeah." Harry considered, "And I bet you don't have challenging terrain like the castle to fly through." Harry leaned forward and accelerated straight up before stalling his broom and let himself fall backwards, dropping by Ginny just a hands-breadth away before pushing into a dive and letting out a whoop.
"You're crazy!" Ginny shrieked out a laugh as she turned to follow. 'crazier than me, and that's something!'
\*/
Finally, the day the Yule ball arrived. Girls all over the school were clustering and twittering about makeup and jewelry, while the guys pulled awkwardly at their dress robes, hoping to look less dorky.
Harry was waiting by the entrance to the great hall along with Neville for his date, "So, are you certain Luna is coming?"
"Yes."
"You did ask her, right?"
"Yes," Neville sounded exasperated that his brother didn't trust him – he had asked Luna!
Yesterday.
"Well, I was just.." Harry faded out as Luna arrived, surprisingly on time. She was dressed in a nice but not formal spring dress. "You made it!"
Neville turned to his date, "Uh, you look nice." He was dressed in formal robes, and despite wearing almost the exact same thing as most of the other guys waiting here, he now felt terribly overdressed.
"Hello Neville," Luna replied with her usual oddly infected voice, "by the timing of your invitation, I assumed that you wanted to go more casually, rather than putting on a mating display." She gestured to a sixth year Hufflepuff girl that was in a fancy evening gown, with her hair up in a coiffure that must have taken an hour to arrange (even with magic), and a string of pearls around her neck. The ensemble would allow her to pass for 25.
"It's not a marriage display!"
Luna looked at Neville with a puzzled frown, "Of course it is. But please note that many animals start putting on mating displays before they are ready to mate, as training for later."
Harry swallowed nervously. He had been fairly relaxed before, but Luna's comments ratcheted up the tension. 'What is Tracy expecting? I thought we were just going to go hang out with my friends, but what if she has some other idea?' He swallowed nervously again, 'I really should have talked to her before hand.' Maybe she had a crush on him, and this was a huge deal for her, and his laid back attitude would end up destroying her spirit or something!
Just then, the girl in question came up,. She appeared fairly relaxed, "Hey, Harry. Thanks for agreeing to this!" She looked surprisingly pretty dressed up in an evening gown, with a pair of earrings accompanying a tasteful necklace.
Before Harry could say anything, McGonagall called out, "Champions, please line up with your date by the door. You will lead the way in and open the dancing." Harry smirked to see Ron, looking extremely uncomfortable, escorting a second year girl.
"Who's that with Ron?" Harry whispered. He was surprised when Tracy replied.
"That's Astoria, Daphne's little sister."
"Well I'll be – he really did go and ask Greengrass for help." Harry replied as they filed into the great hall, which had been emptied of tables and transformed into a passable dance hall. The far end had a small band stand for the Weird Sisters to perform on.
"Oh, yes," Harry could hear the amusement in her voice. "He was so desperate, she squeezed out three different favors from him."
Harry snorted. And all he got in return was an underage kid. 'I bet Astoria just wanted to get in to the party and see what the big kids where up to. Daphne might not be as cold as she first appears.'
"So how do you know Greengrass – Daphne? She seems pretty unapproachable." She sometimes seemed more a mafia don than a student.
Tracy shrugged. "The usual – our families knew each other, so we got to be friends as firsties. We've gone in different directions since, but we've stayed friends."
"Well, good for you, I guess. Everybody needs friends," Harry replied noncommittally. "Um, you want to sit over here?"
"You mean with all your friends?" As Harry cringed slightly, she added, "Yeah, that's fine. I don't really hang out with anybody other than Tracy."
"Is she here?"
"Maybe in the shadows, but she wouldn't come to something like this to dance."
Um..." Harry looked around nervously, "Full disclosure – I don't know how to dance."
Tracy nodded, "It's ok. I don't particularly want to dance with you." They took seats next to a very nervous looking Neville, while Seamus and Dean joined them a moment later with their dates.
"Then why are you here?"
Tracy bit her lip as she looked around the room. Everybody was busy talking, and the level of noise was high enough that you had to speak loudly to be heard. She leaned in and whispered. "I'm trying to avoid Nott – he's been following me around all year."
Harry nodded, but before he could ask why she didn't go with somebody that she liked instead, Tracy added, "And I'm a dyke, so I can't exactly ask out a date for real."
Harry boggled, but having grown up in a muggle area, he wasn't horrified the way most pure blooded wizards would be. "Oh, do you have a girlfriend, then?" He finally asked. He wasn't certain why Tracy had trusted him with something that was borderline scandalous. Maybe it was because he was a Gryffindor? Or maybe she had been keeping it to herself so long that she had get it out before she exploded.
"That's none of your business, Potter."
Harry swallowed nervously and started scanning the crowd. Greengrass had to be somewhere around, watching. If he did anything to offend Tracy, he was now certain that Greengrass would have him murdered in his sleep.
Fortunately, Tracy was fairly laid back, and she was fine just hanging out with Neville, Luna and Dean. Seamus had wandered off and was spending almost all of his time over by the punch bowl, talking quidditch. His date, Parvati, eventually left to sit with her sister in frustration.
Neville, who was usually very glib, had a hard time getting two words out, so Harry ended up having to carry the conversation and attempt to include his step brother and his date. Dean and Susan Bones (his date) were both loquacious, so that made it easier. For her part, Luna mostly just nodded along with what he said out of politeness, but appeared to be quite bored. Tracy found all of this quite amusing, but she did attempt to help the conversation along from time to time.
After an hour of this, she plucked at Harry's arm. "Mind if we take a walk?
"Yeah." Harry was emotionally exhausted. "I'll see you guys later."
He and Tracy walked out onto the courtyard. A warming charm had been cast to make it pleasant despite the wintry weather. Harry took a deep breath and let out the tensions of dealing with Luna and Nev. "You're a good guy, Harry."
"What?" Harry looked up in surprise.
"Nothing. Walk with me over to the astronomy tower and we can call it a night."
\*/
"So, how did it go?" Ginny intercepted Harry as soon as he came into the Gryffindor common room.
"Surprisingly, not bad. I was expecting some crazy psycho like Greengrass, but she's mellow."
"So.. You have a girlfriend?"
"No, definetly not," He paused, "If you want somebody to worry about, Nev crashed and burned. If you can talk to him when he comes in, that would be great, but I'm going to sleep." Harry figured that he had put in his time. He was going to punch out for the day.
\*/
"I can't believe I messed things up so bad, 'Tuna," Lily slumped at her sister's kitchen table. "If I hadn't been in a rush to get rid of that darned contract, James would have been able to use the escape clause to break it. Now, the thing is so broken that there IS no escape clause."
"What exactly does it say?" Petunia asked as she patted her sister's back awkwardly. Usually, it was Lily who was reassuring and helping her put her life back together, not vice versa. Lily had always had a gilded life, where nothing went wrong, not for long.
Lily waved her wand, and a duplicate of the parchment appeared.
Petunia sat down and put her reading glasses on (something else that Lily didn't need). 'Magic makes everything so much easier.' No, Petunia wasn't bitter, why do you ask?
"Hmmp. Of course there is an escape clause. All this says is that Harry has to marry somebody. There is nothing here about staying married. In modern England, a divorce is not hard to obtain, why they even have something called a no-fault divorce!" She should know. It's how she had gotten rid of Vernon. She sighed. And he had seemed like such a nice young man when they had first met. But he was controlling and couldn't stand the fact the she was close with her sister, calling her all sorts of names behind her back. The straw that broke the camels back came when she and Lily were patching up their relationship, and Lily had mentioned that magic was recessive, and there was a chance that Dudley's children would end up as wizards. Vernon had lost it, yelling and storming about the house.
Petunia tsked.
He had been a good provider, though.
Lily perked up, but still looked pensive. "Divorce is still very frowned upon in wizarding society."
"Of course it is," Petunia rolled her eyes, "So he'll have to make an arrangement with a 'muggle born' girl. If he doesn't have any female friends that would be fit for this, then you can just put an ad out in the paper. There are plenty of girls that would be willing to file some paperwork for a couple hundred quid."
"Petunia!" Lily replied shocked.
"I'm not saying that they do anything!" Petunia retorted, flushing.
Any further discussion was interrupted by the front door opening, "Hey mom," Dudley strode in. He attended Guilford Comprehensive school, just a few miles up the road. He was still large, but since he had gotten into boxing it was turning more into muscle.
"Thanks, Petunia, I'll think about what you said." With a nod to the boy, Lily apparated for home.
"What was all that about?" Dudley grabbed a protein shake from the fridge as he kicked off his shoes.
Petunia smirked, "Don't tell anyone, but Harry is stuck having to get married to somebody right out of high school."
"Oy, that's bad news. You can't make anything of yourself if you do that." Dudley replied sympathetically. Petunia had trained him well – first get a college degree, then marriage. She didn't want her son to end up like her. Or now like her nephew, it seemed.
"I wish there was somebody I could talk to about this.." She sighed. That was the one hardship about Lily living like she did – she couldn't gossip about half of what she told her.
But where there was a will, there was a way.
\*/
"So, how was school?" James asked as he picked the boys up from the Hogwarts Express. It was the day after the Yule Ball so the break would be abbreviated this year for those students who had attended. Some of them had elected to remain behind at Hogwarts, but most had decided to come home on this second train. Nevertheless, it was a much less crowded platform 9 ¾, as all of the younger students had gone home two days earlier.
"Meh, it was fine, though Harry might have a girlfriend." Neville replied, preempting Harry before his step-brother could bring up his 'date' with Luna.
Harry rolled his eyes, "I do not. I told you, we just went as friends because she's trying to avoid Nott."
"Well, Nott is well worth avoiding. Cantankerous Nott is a suspected Death Eater." James replied, "But if something does come of it, that's ok too." James tried to be supportive. He was nervous about his son starting to date (what parent wasn't?) but he would rather Harry come to him for advice on such things than Sirius. Not that Sirius didn't have (far) more experience dating, but James didn't want Harry to pick up Sirius's approach to relationships, which could best be characterized as 'wham, bam, thank you ma'am'.
Harry sighed. Everybody was getting so tiresome about this. It's not like his going to dance was that big a deal. "Are we getting together with the Evans' this year? I know we missed the usual time."
"Yeah, They're coming over for lunch tomorrow," James let the topic of girls go. If Harry didn't want to talk about it, he couldn't force him. "Grab hold of the portkey – we have presents already wrapped for you under the tree." He held out a piece of junk mail that he had charmed.
"Oh, I hate portkeys" Harry took a corner of the letter and the three of them whirled through the air to land in the Potter's back yard. The house was a touch bigger than average, but nothing ostentatious. When they bought it, James had used the money from renting out the Potter cottage to help pay the mortgage, as it was bigger than he could have afforded back when he had been a rooky Auror. But Potter cottage was just too small for a family of four.
"Welcome home."
\*/
Harry woke up late, luxuriating in sleeping in his own bed for the first time in months. As he came down stairs, his mother was already in the kitchen, preparing lunch. Typically his parents traded off cooking duties, but when they had guests Lily always took over. It's not that she didn't trust James to cook something good, it's just that his repertoire was limited. Very, very limited.
"Oh, hey, mom. I've been meaning to ask – were you really into potions when you were in school?" Harry asked as he sat down to breakfast in the kitchen. They had a mix of muggle and wizarding appliances, and Lily was making full use of them. Whenever they had 'lunch' guests, the meal would actually start around 2, and run until sometime after dinner-time.
"No. My best subject was Charms, though I was also in the Transfiguration club – they used to have that back then. That's how I got to know Minerva – that was her thing."
"Huh." Harry took another spoon full of cereal as 'Snape lied.' Not that it was much of a surprise – it was Snape – but the fact that Harry had allowed him to use that lie to dragoon him into three years of 'remedial potions' was galling. 'But I guess I am getting something out of it, so it's not a waste of time'. "I wonder what happened to the club?" Harry quickly switched the subject so as not to dwell on it.
"Minerva's getting older, and I guess interest waned." Lily shrugged. And so many wizards died or fled England in Voldemort's reign of terror that the current Hogwarts class was barely half the size of her year. But she wasn't going to say that. Nobody talked about it.
"Who else is coming besides the Evans?"
"Just Sirius and Remus. After you finish eating, you and Neville can show Dudley around the mall."
Harry nodded. And sighed. He didn't really have anything in common with the larger boy. When they were younger, he had been all abut video games, but now it was boxing and girls. That and complaining about all the chores that his mother assigned him (Harry was glad he didn't have Petunia as a mother – she sounded so much more strict that Lily). But he was the guest, and Dudley would be bored out of his gourd listening to dad talking to his school buddies.
And it would give him an opportunity to buy some novels to bring with him to Hogwarts – the library there didn't have any light reading.
\*/
The last night before he was to go back to Hogwarts, Harry snuck down into the greenhouse. He wasn't really sneaking – the greenhouse was open to all, and he had every right to be there, but it felt like sneaking because he was about to do something he knew he really shouldn't. Neville was upstairs packing up for the trip back to Hogwarts, and mom was baking them some last minute cookies to take with them.
The shelves next to Lily's desk held all of her recent projects, each one in a carefully labeled wooden box. The one he was looking for was right on top - 'Contract Breaking'.
Harry pulled it off the shelf and opened it up. Inside was a collection of half-burnt candles, a diagram and a list of the ingredients and the order they we used in., as well as a note card with the actual incantation.
Harry meticulously copied all of it out into his notebook, including the instructions on which candles to purchase, before putting everything back in the box and heading upstairs to finish packing – the Potters usually watched a movie the last night before the boys had to head back to Hogwarts, and he didn't want to miss out on that.
It was a good thing that his mother was a very organized woman, or he would never have been able to squeeze this in.
\*/
"It's made out of tooled dragon leather!" Harry was showing off the wand holster he had gotten for Christmas (Neville had gotten one just like it, but he was too slow to show his off, so he lost out on the coolness points). He was standing with a small cluster of Gryffindors in the back of the Hogwarts Express.
"And not only that, it has muggle repelling and aversion charms – nobody will see it unless they know that it's there, and muggles will avoid noticing it under any circumstances – you can even wear it with a T shirt when you go to the mall," Neville added, managing to steal Harry's thunder as he whipped out his own.
"Boys, Please take your seats, we will be leaving momentarily," A sixth year prefect called out from the other end of the corridor, causing the guys to split up into two mobs as they filtered into separate compartments.
As the Hogwarts express pulled out from the station, Hermione slid open the compartment door and dropped into the bench opposite Harry. The compartment was only half full with the regulars – Neville and Ginny - as well as Dean, who was busy arguing quidditch with Ginny. Luna was markedly absent.
"So, were you able to make any progress?" Hermione asked without preamble, assuming that Harry would be able to read her mind.
"Yes, I got it," Harry replied before turning to Neville, "Hermione asked me to help keep Ron from dying in the Triwizard Tournament." He turned back to Hermione. "I just need to owl order a few things. I should be ready to do break the contract by the end of the week."
Hermione snorted at the word 'contract' before nodding "ok."
"What's so funny?"
"Nothing – it's just that my family just got a weird letter from the Ministry. It was labeled as a 'contract', but it was just a parchment saying that I should get married at the end of my seventh year. It didn't say to whom or anything, but it was still extremely patronizing and very parochial. Don't they understand that it's not the middle ages anymore? Woman can be something more than housewives – in the muggle world, most women work, why my mother earns as much as my father!" Despite her rant, she sounded a little nervous.
"Don't worry about it, it's probably the ministry trying to mess with Muggleborns again." Harry replied, "When we get back, can you scout out a place where we can work undisturbed for about a half hour? Or maybe an hour, come to think of it. Maybe in one of the unused classrooms on the third floor. We just need a clean floor that is twenty feet across."
Hermione nodded, a sense of relief settling in. She beamed a smile at Harry. "Thanks, you're a life saver!" She was actually a little surprised that she had never really interacted with Harry until now – he seemed like a really good guy. And he wasn't bad looking either. She bit her lip and quickly looked down at her hands, embarrassed. "Um, I should go tell Ron the good news."
Once she left, Dean blurted out, "why would you help? The Boy-Who-Lied deserves everything he has coming."
"True. He's managed to piss off pretty much everybody in the school at some point or another. I think everybody is watching, waiting to see how he bites it." Neville agreed. It was an open secret that Malfoy was running a betting pool on when Ron would die, and it was getting into the high Galleon range.
Ginny bit her lip, not certain how she felt about all this. On the one hand, Ron was an arse, but on the other hand he was her brother. On the third hand, these were her friends – she didn't want to go against them. Before she could say anything, Neville continued, "But, at least this will piss off Draco, so that's worth something. I'm in, if you need help."
"Thank," Harry nodded. "And I'm doing this because being annoying shouldn't be a death sentence."
\*/
A week later, Harry had everything he needed and Hermione had identified an unused, out of the way classroom (which wasn't being used to store tons of desks and junk).
"Ok guys, my mother came up with this. It's pretty straight forward, but it is kind of like using a meat cleaver to cut off all of the magical bindings on you. If you have any family magic, you're going to have to have it re-cast."
Ron swallowed, "We don't have anything like that." He glanced at Ginny who nodded. "I think the Prewitt side had a magical tapestry, but I don't know what happened to it after my uncles passed."
The classroom was empty save for the cluster of student at one corner. Harry and Neville were using scouring charms to clean the dust off the floor while Hermione, Ginny and Ron waited anxiously. Finally, Harry began scribing the magical circle, just like his mother had, and arranged the candles.
"Um, Ron, you you should step into the circle. Nev, why don't you and Ginny go out into the corridor to a keep watch." This corridor was rarely traveled, especially after dinner, but he didn't want to risk being interrupted.
"What about me?" Hermione asked.
"Watch & learn, my Padawan." Harry smirked. It wasn't often he got to one-up the bookworm. Hermione rolled her eyes but she couldn't contain a small smile, while the two Weasleys looked confused at the reference.
Harry quickly looked over the notes he had copied from his mum and compared them to his memory of the ritual. It was all pretty straight forwards. The only tricky part was the Latin phrase, but he had practiced that a bunch.
"Show time!"
Fifteen minutes later, they were done. "Is that it? I don't feel any different." Ron examined his hands as if hoping to see 'WITHDRAWN' stamped on them, like a library book, or something.
"That's it. My mum used it to get the marriage contract off of me, so this should work as well. We'll find out in a bit, I guess."
"That means you can't quit prepping until you know for sure," Hermione felt obligated to add.
"Speaking of, have you made any headway with that egg thing?"
"No, every time I open it, shrieks out in some crazy language. Hermione's tried every translation spell in the library, but none helped. Sometimes we get more screeching, and once we made it sort of warble, but never anything that sounds like English."
"Oh. I forgot to tell you that Moody said that you should soak the egg." Harry mentioned as they packed up their supplies and headed back for the Gryffindor dorms.
"Is that ok? It won't ruin it?" Hermione was skeptical. The egg reminded her too much of a radio or some other electronic deice, and soaking those was a recipe for disaster.
"At this point, I'll be happy if it DOES get ruined," Ron groused.
\*/
The next morning Harry came down to breakfast early, as it was a Monday. Ron was already there, arguing with Hermione, something to do with her SPEW activities. "Well, he certainly looks more cheerful," Harry sat down next to Ginny.
"Tell me about it. He's already almost started a fight with Draco. Something about the Slytherin charming the buttons that Hermione is selling to everybody. Draco walked off half way through his rant, but he's still going even though Hermione is the only one still listening."
Harry poured himself some tea. "Well, whatever makes the two of them happy."
"You know, we have a Hogsmeade weekend coming up.." Ginny began before pausing. "Do you think we can get them to stop dancing around each other and just go as a couple?" She quickly finished.
Harry looked at her incredulously, "Those two? A couple? They would kill each other." He paused before adding, "I know that you grew up in a single parent household, but that is NOT how normal couples interact." Harry took a bite of pancake off of his fork before gesturing with it towards the Hufflepuff table. "For example, take exhibit A."
Ginny looked. And then started and looked closer – Angeline was sitting with her brother, shoulder to shoulder, and chatting!
"That's.. he's a Hufflepuff. They're different!" Why was George smiling? He never smiled!
Before Harry could reply, Professor Dumbledore approached his end of the table. "Harry, would you be so kind as to please come with me? There is something we need to discuss."
Cold ice formed in Harry's stomach as he exchanged a worried look with Ginny, 'Did the Headmaster suspect that he had messed with the Triwizard tournament?'
"Of course, sir. Give me one moment."
Harry took a final bite of his pancake and wiped his mouth before following after the headmaster out through the door behind the head table. He led them up the winding staircase to his office. Harry was so distracted that he didn't even notice what the password for the gargoyle was today.
"Take a seat Harry. And relax, you aren't in trouble. Though you may be in for some difficulty." Albus shuffled some papers on his desk, straightening a few before pulling out a particular parchment. "I was just going over some Triwizard preparations when a discrepancy came to my attention." He handed Harry a parchment labeled 'Official Champions'.
The list read:
Fleur Delacour
Viktor Krum
Cedric Diggeroy
And then a smudge, where the last name had been mostly erased, replaced with"Harry Potter"
"Um, sir.. What does this mean? Did somebody write my name in?"
"I am sorry, my boy, but this parchment is enchanted. You can't write on it. Something happened, and now you are the fourth champion, in place of Ron Weasley."
\*/
A large black dog sat under the bushes of a row house, to all appearances waiting for its owner to return. It gave a friendly wag of its tail the one time a child came up to pet it, but it's attention was focused up at a third floor apartment. It was 6pm – after dark at this time of the year – and there were no lights on inside. But several times today somebody had shifted the curtains.
\*/
Bellatrix closed the curtains again. She sensed that somebody was watching her – over the past year on the run, she had become adept at scribing warning wards so fine that they would sense even a trickle of attention. But each time she checked out the window there was nobody there.