A Fortnight of Worry

A card game? A card game!

A fucking card game had sprung free a dragon upon a school of children – upon a castle filled of laughter and mischief and above all…

Innocence.

How could he have not found that suspicious – if not downright obvious that something was amiss? That something was afoot – something that should have raised the alarm bells loud as a Sunday morning.

And why had Ron and Harry entertained this giant madman's crazed desires? A sense of adventure, perchance? Loyalty? Youthful arrogance?

Perhaps them all.

Perhaps more.

Who knew?

"What the hell is wrong with that man?" Ron asked the obvious, voice old and gnarly with worry as if the edge of time itself had wrought its way through it an age ago, ten-folded his years upon this world. Glancing at Harry sideways as they trod along the grounds back towards Hogwarts, towards the side entrance to the castle, he looked quizzically, almost expectantly – as one might do when looking upon a source of deity with a prayer upon your heart.

Harry dreaded that look. Or, rather, dreaded what it represented. What he'd, apparently, even as he grew up in a cupboard, always represented.

A source of hope. Utter, pure hope – the kind no mortal man could ever hope to live up to.

But where was his hope? His sanctuary, his… home?

Hogwarts loomed in front of them and grew beyond sight as they approached. Charming, twisting – and at places slightly leaning – chimneys seemed to smirk down upon them with curls of whispery-grey puffs of smoke, back dropped by the clear sky of eternal stars, and Harry could imagine the gentle hissed sounds of the fireplaces, the sparks aflame… Children hurdled together around them, seeking warmth, seeking laughter and joy and a sense of security that had always seemed bereft of him.

Was this his – that? Home? Could it be? Or was it all merely a mirage, an illusory sensation that had glanced through him for a moment when he first laid eyes upon her, only then to be yanked back into reality when he placed upon his head the Sorting Hat and found himself sentenced to once more reside beneath the weight of the stairs, hidden in the dark…

Despised by those around him.

It had long since grown dark – night creeping, creeping, claiming the light – and curfew had taken effect more than an hour ago. And Harry let the silence rest, gnaw, between them, having nothing to say and knowing Ron, full of nerves and weary fright, were all words just waiting to be let out.

Nerves always filled the silence with what they found needed to be said.

"I mean," Ron continued at last, "how could he be that… that stupid, that – gullible?"

"I don't know, Ron." Harry sighed, running a hand through his mess of a hair. "He always wanted a dragon – it was one of the first things he told me. Desire makes crazies of us all, I guess."

"But getting drunk and spilling secrets! Not even wondering about it afterwards!" Ron, not Hagrid's biggest fan to begin with, burned, livid with anger. And righteous rage – and there could be no crueller kind. "He shouldn't be here – I hate to say it, but he shouldn't be at Hogwarts. Much less be trusted with secrets concerning You-Know-Who… Merlin, look what he has done – I'm agreeing with Malfoy and the rest of his lot!"

"I know." And they had defended Hagrid, had held their ground in many verbal confrontations in their house these past few months, when housemates started noting their familiarity with the giant man. Their friendship – of which only tattered remnants remained. "I know. But I hate him even more for how he acted towards us. Accused us like that – after everything we have done to help him. I can't readily forgive that."

"Wait." Ron paused, literally, stopping as they stood at the threshold of the entrance door to the east side of the castle, a little ways behind the Great Hall. "We promised to help him, Harry. You saying now you're not going to?"

"We sort of have to, don't we?" Harry furrowed his brow, a scowl touching his face. "We have as much – if not more – to lose if this gets out. We'd probably have our wands snapped if our involvement, and the extent of it, were to be discovered."

"I doubt it – err, the wand part, at least," Ron said, pulling him off to the side, hiding in the shadow of one of the castle's vast towers. A long ways up, Harry noted, there was a flicker of light from one of the windows, as if a shadowed had passed in front of the dim hues. He saw his breath pass like fog in front of his face, shakily noticing the cold. His bones were beginning to rattle, snow reaching to his ankles all around them. Heating charm, Harry thought, look them up. Or something involving fire. Preferably both.

"We'd probably be serving detention for the rest of our years here, but I don't think we'd be expelled."

"Ron," Harry said, slowly, as if he was talking to a particular challenged kid, though there was perhaps a tinge of doubt installed in him. Maybe it was hope. Dangerous thing. "We helped a former expelled student of Hogwarts shelter a dragon, in secret, on the grounds of a school filled with underage students. They'd had to be crazy to let us keep our wands, much less stay in school."

"Oh, they'd have to be completely off their rockers. But, Harry, of course they are," Ron said, slowly, imitating Harry's tone of voice. Harry found it slightly infuriating, which he supposed was Ron's point. Maybe he ought not to use it against Ron, when he hated it being used against me. "Dumbledore himself is housing a monster inside the castle," Ron continued. "Granted he did warn everybody of the danger, but still… I think your muggle might be showing again."

And that was what Ron had dubbed it. His muggle-thing. Every time he applied a muggle perspective to a wizard situation. He searched his logical assumptions, tracing back his thoughts and the words spoken – trying to see the situation a little… aside. Aside his own logical propensities and ways of thinking. Aside assumptions born and endured in a cupboard, in a world devoid of human connection and something even resembling the wonders of magic.

Maybe he'd had a yearning for fairytale, in a time passed, but it had been stomped out of him a long while back.

And he had a very hard time letting go, it seemed, of that sort of pragmatism. His theory of life had been borne on the wings of evidence.

Observation and deduction. Cause and effect.

Things, he found more and more – as wizardry claimed a place in his assumptions, in his heart – that not always really held any sort of power in the world of magic.

Maybe there was merit to his argument. Certainly, muggles would expel their students for much, much less than endangering its fellow students. The magical world, exemplified clearly with Dumbledore's declaration at the start of term, didn't hold themselves to the same standards.

Or maybe the magical body of governs, this Ministry for Magic, simply didn't know what the hell Dumbledore was doing at the school. But surely that couldn't be true. Plenty of students must have written home, explaining to their parents just what was going on, what Dumbledore had said and done. And one of those parents must have contacted the ministry, maybe even worked in the ministry themselves, and tried to uncover just what that barmy old man meant by it – just what that crackpot was up to these days…

And even someone as esteemed and powerful as Professor Dumbledore must answer to someone, Harry thought. Must answer if someone comes along with valid questions upon their mind.

Right?

They must know, Harry thought. Dumbledore's hardly keeping it a secret.

They knew. They must. Maybe not the details, but even that was possible – after all, what were the odds that only four first-year students had looked – but they certainly knew that Dumbledore had warned them that there was something, something of his design, that now resided upon this school – something that could and would kill.

Which meant they must have sanctioned it.

What. The. Hell. Why?

Your muggle's showing.

Right. Maybe. But in this case he wasn't sure it was a bad thing.

"Okay," Harry said at last, nodding, and despite it all there was a wicked gleam that touched his smile, because if hiding dragons on the school didn't immediately mean expulsion – or rather, didn't mean there was a complete certainty of it – it meant that there was really an infinite amount of possibilities to explore. "Okay. You might be right. Muggle raised, I know. But let's get back. I don't fancy getting caught by Filch at this hour."

And to that Ron, still a boy of worry and uncertainty, nodded vehemently in agreement.


Christmas was fast approaching, and our grades had taken something of a hit in the weeks after Norbert's disappearance. There was one week left before most of the other kids would be going home. Though not the Weasley children, of whom only Ron really mattered to Harry – they'd be staying in the castle, as well.

Ron and Harry had already planned all the exploring they'd be doing, envisioning with words all the great winding, twisting, spiralling secrets this great castle contained.

"I hate him!" Ron snarled, voice a furious whisper. "I fucking hate him!"

Right now, though, they were doing their last Potions essay before the holidays.

"How can that utter git," Ron snarled, breaking Harry's daydreaming, "expect us to focus on the finer details of the Wiggenweld's healing properties during this crisis?"

Harry snorted. Crisis? Really? "I don't think he's acutely aware that we're going through a crisis – of sorts." He paused, troubled by a thought that occurred, frowning in bleak thoughts. "I certainly hope not."

"He ought to be aware. All of them." Ron whined, displaying an impeccable lack of logic he'd come to expect of him in times of distress. Relied upon, even.

"I know, right? It's like, you know, he doesn't care," Harry said, fake sorrow in the tone of his voice.

"Nah." Ron dismissed him with a lazy wave of his hand and then promptly dropped his head to the table, resting his cheek against his half-written essay. His body language could be so overly expressive at times. "I'm sure deep down – really deep down – he's all warm and fuzzy about us. I can tell that sort of thing, you know."

Harry laughed, glancing down at his parchment. Not much had happened on it in the last couple of hours he'd tried to manifest his thoughts into coherent words. Like Ron, he, too, found it difficult to focus on anything else than the dragon and its whereabouts.

Ah. The dragon. Broach the topic once more, I guess.

"He must have it hidden somewhere in the Forbidden Forest, Ron," Harry said at last, glancing at his friend to gauge his reaction. Predictably, for it was the same reaction every time, he tensed up, almost dropping his quill.

"Likely, but, Harry – we've been over it before. We cannot go out into the forest and retrieve the dragon. I mean, even if we did manage to find it, and that's hardly a given, we'd have to subdue it along with whoever took it. And our suspects as to who that is… is hardly to be trifled with. We can't do it on our own."

Their list of suspects was short and vague, only really encompassing two or three individuals. There was Voldemort, of course, and there was their mysterious and murderous man in black – beyond those two they toyed with the idea that the man Hagrid had gotten the egg from was a third person on the board.

"But even if it is a third person," Ron had said, when they first discussed it, "it only makes it that much more convoluted. Why would he hand over an egg to Hagrid, only to steal it later when it is hatched?"

Harry had not been able to figure that one out. The man that had provided Hagrid with the egg had learned about the defences – defences of which Hagrid was a part of – surrounded around the object from a drunk Hagrid. That had seemed like it was his goal with the whole affair of the infamous card game…

So why go back to get the dragon? Why risk it?

It made little sense. Which, unfortunately, only heighten the possibility that there was indeed a third player involved, and somehow either Voldemort or the man in black – most likely the man in black – had found wind of Norbert.

"There was someone there with us," Harry had said to Ron one evening. "I felt it! I knew it… knew it was something. Why did I not do something?"

"You think it was the man in black, then?" Ron had asked.

Who else could it have been, wondered Harry, as the quill in his hand hovered above his forgotten portions essay? The man in black had cornered them on their way back, had been following them for who knew how long. It had to be him.

There was also the fact that his scar hadn't exploded into a fit of throbbing agony, which meant it couldn't have been Voldemort.

And yet something seemed amiss.

"We have to," Harry said after a long silence, coming back to the present. "We have to. Too much is at stake. The Philosopher's Stone can't fall into the hands of Voldemort – not now, Ron! If half the things we'd read and heard about them are true, he'd be too powerful even for Dumbledore with it in his possession."

Hagrid, during their last conversation, had begrudgingly told them all he knew of the defences (which wasn't much, they learned), and – more importantly and at great, somewhat icily encouragement from Harry (according to Ron he'd been downright scary) – the item itself. The Philosopher's Stone. Something of a fairytale in and of itself in the Wizarding World apparently.

Imbued with the power to create gold out of any metal and said to be able to produce the Elixir of Life, which would make the drinker immortal, the Stone was an object desired by many a wizard.

Including the Dark Lord Voldemort.

Even Ron's eyes had gone alight with a sudden gleam, faced with the prospect of infinite gold.

"I know, I know," Ron said, breathless and worried. It glowed from his very being. "But we're out of our depth here. I really think we should take this to Dumbledore. Maybe he'd understand. Maybe he'd be lenient. No matter what, he'd know what to do."

"I don't want to risk expulsion," Harry said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"I don't either, but this… it's more important than us, Harry," Ron said, surprising him. "We don't have to tell him about the part where we helped Hagrid concealing a dragon, but we need to tell him that someone knows – maybe we can even keep it from him how he knows–"

"Doubtful," Harry muttered forlornly.

"But," Ron continued, and for all the uncertain fright in his eyes, there was something resembling steely, unwavering resolve in his voice, "we need to tell him. Even if we were to be expelled with certainty, we need to tell him."

Harry wondered if Ron dreaded being expelled as much as he. He wondered, for he couldn't possibly fathom that if he did, just how he managed to be so… reasonable. So right. Because he was right. This was right – the right thing to do.

"Okay." Harry yielded at last, nodding to him, and stood up.

Ron, looking flustered all of a sudden, stood up with him. "Now?"

"Yeah, we've waited long enough, wouldn't you say?"

"I don't know, Harry – I think we should think our story through before telling him, you know."

Harry blinked. Good point, Ron. "Hmm." He tapped his wand to his palm, thinking. "You're right. Of course you are. Maybe we can come up with a way to not implicate Hagrid while we're at it."

Ron, smiling with obvious relief, sat back down. "I thought you didn't care about the oaf."

"I don't," Harry said, and even he could hear the lazy shrug in his response. "Doesn't mean he deserves to lose his home."

Though, when Harry thought about it later, contemplating just what Hagrid had done, he reconsidered that statement something fierce.


Exiting the Portions Classroom, having just surrendered their last essays before the Christmas holidays – and having to listen to Snape's snarky remarks for the last time in at least a fortnight – Harry thought his initial conclusions of the educational system here at Hogwarts was for the most part correct.

Having good grades, maybe not outstanding – but really darn close – were more about excelling in the theory and the written word than it was about the practical side of magic. At least, in the first half of their first-year that had been the case.

At first, that hadn't bothered him – you have to crawl before you can walk. And, if and when things returned to a measure of normality, wherein he could focus and actual turn in a decent page of homework, it probably wouldn't bother him all that much afterwards.

But I want more, Harry thought, following Ron through the corridors. Magic was… awesome. There was no way around it. And contagious. Magic had become little more than a reflex since start of term. Swirling like a sentient being almost, he felt it swell within to comply with what of it he asked whenever he performed magic.

What was once, back with the Dursley's, simply just a part of him, something he failed to recognize as anything special, quickly proved to be so much more – and it grew in him. Grew and sang as he used it more and more. As if it was happy – happy that he finally used it. Exercised it.

But it wanted more. He wanted more. School was not progressing fast enough to keep up with his demands. He could do more.

So much more…

He longed for the day that this was all over so that he could return his focus to just being a student at Hogwarts. A student of magic, roaming this fantastical castle.

That day, however, seemed so far away at this point.

"C'mon, Harry!" Ron said, almost whispered, waving at him furiously. "We need to get to McGonagall before she leaves her classroom."

Harry frowned, shaking his head, noting that in his train of thought he'd fallen somewhat behind his lanky friend. Speeding up his steps, he fell in line with him as they pushed through the somewhat crowded hallways of Hogwarts, as people mingled to and fro at the end of classes.

"I have a bad feeling about McGonagall," Harry said, voicing his concern. Once more.

"I know." Ron rolled his eyes with the air of a boy who'd heard it all before. "You said so a million times. But neither of us know the password to Dumbledore's office. No one in our house knows. Not even Fred and George." Who had been exceedingly jealous when they'd learned they'd even been to the Headmaster's office. "And we're not asking Percy, he'd just want to know why we'd want to know." Ron, glancing at him with narrowing eyes, added, "And just so, you know, we're agreeing on it – we're not asking Snape."

Harry laughed, because, yeah, there was no way that they'd ever ask Snape for help.

As in ever.

They reached McGonagall's classroom as the last students exited her classroom.

Probably staying behind for questions, Harry thought, as he watched what he thought to be third-year Hufflepuffs leave. They cast their customary quick glance at his scar as they passed Ron and Harry, then, murmuring so silently amongst themselves he couldn't catch what they were saying, left in the direction of the Great Hall.

Harry turned back to Ron and noted he was already knocking on McGonagall's door, so with haste, he found himself at his side as the door swung upon.

"Mr Weasley. Mr Potter," McGonagall said, clearly surprised. They'd caught her in the middle of clearing up her desk, parchment folding neatly and disappearing into her satchel, already set to leave as she stood by its side. "Is there something the matter?" she asked, rather kindly.

Ever since the night of the duel with Malfoy, she'd seemed to have gained a soft spot for them. Like… Harry didn't know… like she knew it couldn't be easy for them. Like she knew just how out casted they felt in their own house.

It was, above all else, the reason they found themselves before her now, trying to exploit that.

Ron, gulping audibly, looked at Harry from the corner of his eyes. And Harry, sighing internally, gathered his thoughts, quickly going over how they'd planned to approach her with this.

"Hello Professor," Harry said, polite as can be if not a bit stiffly. Hesitating, he thought of how to approach it – somehow their careful plans where not really all that clear to him when the moment was upon them. To hell with subtlety then, he thought. "We have, err, urgent matters to discuss with Professor Dumbledore. And would like to know the password to his office."

If that was what she had expected, it didn't show on her face. Her eyebrows rose in perplexity, and then her eyes gained mild suspicion, narrowing in a decisively stern manner, of which they'd come to know her for.

"And what matters might that be, Potter?" asked the Professor, her full focus shifting onto him.

He tried – probably failed – not to squirm uncomfortably beneath her gaze. "You see, Professor, it's – that is to say… it's sort-of-a-secret." The words seemed to fall out of his mouth, clunking together in a bundled mess of a sentence.

"I'm sorry." She furrowed her brow further if possible, glancing with what was now outright suspicion between Ron and him. "Did you say it was a secret?"

Harry and Ron both nodded far too eagerly and vehemently to be even remotely trustworthy – with far too much relief clear as day on their young faces when they thought she'd understand.

Mistakenly thought she'd just comply.

"And you two have this secret in common with the Headmaster, I take it?"

They stopped nodding at once, glancing between each other, fidgeting with their hands. If another person were to barge in at that moment, they'd happen upon the sight of two Slytherin first-years that for all appearances looked to be performing some sort of imitation ritual for the Professor – such were their likeness in their nervous mannerism.

"Not in that sense, Professor," Ron said, words slow and careful. Measured. Clearly afraid of revealing too much. "It's more…"

"It's a secret we have to tell Dumbledore," Harry said, when Ron stopped talking mid-sentence. They'd prepared how much to share with the Headmaster, but not with McGonagall. They'd never even considered that she might want to know just what they wanted with the old Professor. "Please, Professor McGonagall! It's very important."

"I can see that." She nodded. "Be that as it may, the Headmaster is a very important, very busy man – I have to know why you'd like to seek his counsel before I bring you to him."

Harry, casting a glance at Ron, finding no helpful sign of encouragement or detriment, mentally weighted their options. Should I… what the hell, there's no other way. We've come this far – might as well go all the way.

Go. All. The. Way.

There's no other way.

"We know about the Philosopher's Stone, Professor," Harry said, giving himself a mental pat on the back for keeping his voice steady. And comprehensible. At this, Ron let out a little choking noise. "And… and we know someone is trying to steal it. We have to warn Dumbledore at once!"

McGonagall, apparently on the verge of fainting, had gone completely pale, nearly spluttering like Petunia Dursley often were wont to do at good ol' Private Drive.

"How can you two possibly-"

"At once, Professor!" Ron said, all but shouted, gaining courage in her confusion.

"No!" McGonagall seemed to thunder, yet her voice was quiet. Collected. Controlled once more. There was this sort of cling to it, reverberating inside the four walls of the classroom, filling it with steadfast certainty. She continued: "I don't know how you came to learn about the Philosopher's Stone. Merlin knows what you two have been doing. But I'll tell you to forget about this nonsense. Let it rest. It is heavily protected by the head of houses and the Headmaster himself – no one gets anywhere near it."

Ah, shit. She won't budge. The dragon, then. Sorry, not sorry, Hagrid.

"But there's a–" Harry tried, but was quickly shot down.

"That's enough! From both of you." Harry, eyes wide, found himself with a sudden lack of his voice. McGonagall held her wand in her hand, pointing it at them. "Keep this up and I'll be forced to deduct house points for this sort of behaviour."

She walked past them, opening the door to the hallways and the rest of Hogwarts, gesturing for them to leave with a sweep of her hand, ending the argument. "Now you two will take your leave. I'll bring this matter to Dumbledore, but rest assured, the Philosopher's Stone is quite safe."

Harry, trying to blink away the anger that had touched his eyes, tried to gain some semblance of control of his emotions, and followed Ron out of her office. They set off, silently – though their voices were returned to them as the door had closed behind them – towards the Great Hall. But when they turned the corner and felt suspicious eyes leave them, they quickly changed course, going for one of the first abandoned classroom that came their way.

"We have to do it ourselves, then," Ron said as soon as Harry closed the door behind him.

Harry turned, gobsmacked. What? "Why?" he asked. "Weren't you the one vehemently against going out there alone to begin with?"

"Yes." Ron nodded, and there was a sort of fierce resolve that clashed horridly with his dread. It was in the corner of his mouth, in the way his fist kept clenching and unclenching, and in the way his eyes seemed to almost be aflame with dogged tenacity despite his obvious misgivings about it all. "But if we can't convince the teachers," he continued, "if we can't even get any help, we have to do it ourselves, right? We have to find Norbert and… and stop whatever it is whoever has planned. Or at least come back with prove not even McGonagall can deny." Her name had left his lips like a curse, hissed between tight lips. "We have to go out into the Forbidden Forest."

Harry stared at Ron, impressed and incredulous in equal measures. "How the hell did the Sorting Hat put you in Slytherin and not Gryffindor?"

Ron, bless his soul, blushed. Though there was also a scorn bitterness – wherein Harry could see just why Ron often refused to talk about his sorting.

"It… err, it must have not found me worthy. Brave enough."

Harry frowned – yeah, sure. Maybe. But it made no sense.

"You're brave," Harry said, softly, with a warm gratitude he perhaps hadn't meant his voice to be touched with. "A sight braver than any Gryffindor I've ever spoken with."

"Wait until tonight before you say that, mate," Ron retorted, grinning darkly. "I already feel sick just thinking about it."


Wednesday, however, turned to Thursday. They'd agreed upon doing it on the last night before the break, hoping that whatever punishment that would come their way should they be discovered could wait until after Christmas.

And as Ron and Harry turned in for classes, punched the clock and bowed their heads, the hours both lurched and wobbled by. Slow and fast. Eager and dreading. Their nerves for what they'd planned to do so great, fear so obvious, that even their housemates were beginning to notice that something was quite clearly going on.

There was, as Ron soon would be wont to say, fuckery afoot.

"What's up with you two?" Daphne Greengrass, light blue eyes, blond hair, and so tiny it made even Harry look like a healthy sized boy, had asked them as they travelled, a foot or ten behind the rest of the Slytherins, towards Defence Against the Dark Arts – the final lesson of the afternoon. The last lesson before most would be going home for Christmas come Friday morning.

Harry arched an eyebrow at her. She blushed, no doubt noting just how obvious her approach had been. She'd been walking along with Tracey Davis and Parkinson, talking animatedly while casting not-so-subtle glances back at them, as they trailed them, whispering. Plotting.

Her blush contrasted something fiercely against the paleness of her skin. She bit her lower lip, glancing with obvious nerves between Ron and him, before coming to some kind of internal decision. Then she straightened, her head reaching Harry's chin and somewhere around Ron's chest, and her face became a mask of determination.

It was almost cute – if not just a measure misplaced.

"You don't have to tell me anything, obviously." She rolled her eyes at them, clearly indicating they were being more than a little thick. "But it might be – smart, you know."

She was nervous. Really nervous. Why?

Ron, taking her word a little more literal than she'd meant, looked caught somewhere between slow, growing fury and tired amusement. "Are you threatening us?" asked he with half a laugh.

"Don't be stupid, Ron," said Daphne, grinning and tucking a stray of her light-blond hair behind her ear hurriedly, irritably. She seemed to gain steam. A little. "I'm not stupid."

"Okay." Harry furrowed his brow, wondering what stupid had to do with it, looking between them. "Not that there's really anything to say, but – why would we be smart to tell you?"

"I remember the last time you got in trouble. With Malfoy, that is. Remember?"

"Ah ha." Ron tsked, and there really wasn't any other word for it. He looked to Harry. "Harry – do you remember that?"

"Trouble with Malfoy? No," he said, feigned innocence colouring his voice. "As if we'd ever do anything to the git."

"Though it'd do him some good."

"No doubt."

"Hey!" Ron snapped his fingers in Harry's face. "Have you seen his new broom?"

"Sent by his father, right?"

"Would be a shame if it went missing."

Harry nodded – with as much sagely ambience an eleven-year-old could muster. "Real shame, that is. But, alas, such things are prone to go missing amongst the young and the foolhardy."

"How right you are."

"Are you two done?" asked Daphne, annoyed, though there was a touch – a ghost – of a smile in the edges of her eyes. Harry noted, almost beside himself, how the lightness of the colour, in stark contrast to Ron's darker blue, seemed to give them an almost never-ending depth.

"Yeah." Ron nodded. "Though remember that thought for later, Harry. And you–" he rounded on Daphne, "–not a word."

"Okay." She smiled, her face all-too-innocent. "If you tell me what's going on?"

"Why do you think something's going on?" asked Harry.

"Because it's obvious."

Harry, glancing at Ron scornfully, tried to commit to memory that Ron and he ought to work on their poker faces.

"Well," Ron began, "even if there was – which there isn't! – then I don't see why you'd wanna know."

She shrugged, looking a tad sheepish. Like she herself hadn't really figured out her reasons. No – that was not it. "Well," she began – in much the same way Ron had, Harry noted, "I just thought it'd be smart because, err, by the looks of it, you two seem to be up to something… something reckless."

Ron stared at her, incredulous, no doubt running through the same thoughts as Harry's brain were currently sprinting through. If she'd noted that in the couple of hours they'd been together today, then what would a Professor not see if they looked?

Really looked.

They really needed to learn to look inconspicuous.

"I know you weren't at fault last time," she said, the dim light of the torches in the brackets, which hung adjourned to each other along the cobblestone walls of the corridor, cast her face in twisting shadows and gave her hair a sort of golden hue that seemed… almost unnatural. Harry stared, then caught himself. "I know Malfoy told on you, that he was as much to blame for the house points – and that Snape was an utter git again!" She almost seemed in a rush to say it, and Harry noted that they had almost slowed to a complete stop, far off from the rest of the Slytherins now. "I just… I don't know – don't do what you're planning to do, unless you have to do it. Okay? I don't think the others can forgive you a second time."

Okay. Harry was at a loss for words. Was that concern in her voice? Okay. He looked to Ron. Loss for words. Looked back at Daphne. Still nothing.

What was that?

She smiled, a touch… something… sadness? Insecurity? Yearning? And, having said what she came to say, she turned and ran, her hair cascading like golden waves of the ocean behind her. Harry noted that both Davis and Parkinson had stopped at the turn of the corridor and, looking back, were waiting for Daphne to catch up.

"What was that?" Tracy asked as Daphne caught up to them. She was a tall brunette, taller than even Harry he had learned to his shame, with a fierce face that was nevertheless prone to kindness at times.

"Nothing," he could just hear Daphne mutter as they disappeared around the corner, leaving Ron and Harry alone.

With narrowed eyes, Harry turned to Ron.

With narrowed eyes, Ron turned to Harry.

"What was that?" they both asked in unison.

They both shook their heads, caught afflux in confusion.

"I don't know."

"I don't know."

Again. Unison.

Then they laughed. And though Harry didn't know it, that laugher would come to mean something later that night, would come to save his very live. And, for a long while – at least to the adolescent mind – it was to be the last laugh for a long while.

"Girls," Ron muttered, as they took off after Daphne and the others. And, yeah, for right now, it was Daphne and the others. Such had she become in their heads.

Some people, for whatever reasons, simply stuck with you. If not in person, then certainly in mind. And Daphne was… is… that for Ron and Harry.

Always.

Forever.

Professor Quirrell, bless his frighten soul, seemed to – if at all possible – be even more on edge than usual. His eyes drawing back to the door to his office repeatedly and continuously, he almost yelped every time a student raised a hand for a question. Harry's scar prickled, though not unusually so, and so he paid it little attention.

"What's up with him?" Ron asked as they left. "I knew he was a bit of a coward, but he seemed…" Ron waved his hands in a manner that suggested Harry should know what he meant.

Which Harry did.

"I know, right?" Harry laughed. "He makes even our poker faces look good."

Dinner that evening was a rather disgustingly loud, short affair. Ron knew Harry wanted to get back to the sanctuary of their dormitory as quickly as possible, to rest and practice, so he had taken it upon himself to swallow as much food as humanly possible in the allotted timeframe.

"You do know about this thing called chewing, right?" Harry tried to pull some semblance of an indifferent mask over his face, but all it managed was to twist his obvious disgust into something twisted.

"O on't ave ime!"

"Swallow, Ron. Jesus Christ!"

He did. Painfully. "I don't have time for that," he said, his voice whisper-thin as he glanced around the Slytherin table. He didn't really need to. Between Harry's scorned face and his eating habits turned to the uppermost tapestry of repulsion, nobody sat within range to hear them speak even in normal voices.

They left shortly thereafter. Ron, happily carrying a plate with him filled with mash potatoes and steak, said his farewell to Harry, explaining he wanted to talk to his brothers before they went out tonight.

Harry nodded. Watched him set off towards the Gryffindor table, wondering if that was even allowed. Shrugged. Left. Ten minutes later he was lying in his bed, fully clothed, awaiting a time where everything would turn quiet, where the common-room would be empty, where everyone would be in bed, and where he could risk his life once more.

Was it really only for himself? To cover his involvement? It had to be, right? Hagrid had burned him at the first given chance. Kindness amongst his peers had been in short supply ever since he became a Slytherin.

It had to be for himself that he'd do what he was about to do.

It didn't feel like that, though.

Ron, still carrying food, arrived a few minutes later.

"How can you eat like that?" Harry asked, impressed. Envious. "At a time like this?"

He shrugged and, oddly Harry thought, put the food on their bedside cabinet. "It could very well be our last. Might as well make it a good one. You should eat that," he added, wagging his finger at the food. "You barely ate anything."

"Not hungry," Harry muttered.

"I know – me neither. You still should. Who knows how long we'll be out there? Could be all night. And I need you with full energy."

He was right. Harry sat up, turned towards the cabinet and, reaching into it and drawing out a piece of curled up parchment, he flung it at him. Then he dutifully ate.

"What this?" asked Ron, catching it easily.

"Read it."

He did. "Oh. Right. Good call."

Harry nodded. "Focus on the heating charm. Master it, Ron – before you move on. It will be cold. So cold that magic could be the only thing that will keep us alive."

"Right." He had paled a tad, eyes wide, but he stood up and began practicing it at once. He had… Harry frowned and withdrew his wand, mumbling as he held it over his head.

From the tip of the holly wood a hissed spark emerged and splashed in a great golden arc above their heads, coiling around itself in a never-ending loop, spinning in on itself, until it resembled an insignia of smaller and smaller circles, which laced and lanced and lurched together and clung to the ceiling. Then something emerged from the circles of the glittering, golden light – some of the cords twisting, trembling, rising onto the surface – becoming numbers that shone as the insignia beneath dulled to a hollow gold, as if, in the blink of an eye, it had been touched by decades of time.

18:34

"Hmm," Harry intoned, looking at his spell work. "When do you reckon we should head out?"

Ron, jaw slacked with awe, was staring up at the clock. Upon hearing his question – with a few seconds time to process – he looked back to Harry.

"How – what?"

Harry smirked. "This time I know the spell. I saw a Ravenclaw do it in the library – I'll teach it to you later. What time do you think is safe to leave?"

"None." Ron sighed, glancing up at the clock again. "None is safe, I reckon. But I think we'll be find around one."

Harry nodded, agreed, but… "Let's make it two. Just to be safe."

Ron groaned. "We'll be up all bloody night. After breakfast tomorrow I'm going straight back to bed. Sleeping until Christmas."

"The faster you master those spells, the faster you can be in bed," Harry replied, idly twirling his wand as he began eating again. "Napping until we have to go."

"One of them is the Reductor Curse, mate," Ron pointed out with a frown, scanning the parchment. "I can't really practice that one in here, can I?"

Harry shrugged, chewing his food with great difficulty and no appetite. "You can practice the wand movement and incantation. That should do for a start."

I set the timer to two o'clock and Ron practiced for the next several hours. Mastering the heating charm a little past midnight after hours of growing frustration, he looked over the Reductor curse, practiced that one for about twenty minutes before he lay back in bed, asleep within seconds.

Sleep found Harry no companion on this night. He had a bad feeling. A feeling that extended to far beyond simply what laid ahead for them out there in the Forbidden Forest. Though it still inspired in him a great weariness.

Restless, he rose a little past one o'clock and, with Ron's snore as his only mate, he started practising some of his own spells. Having moved a rather vast ways astray from the curriculum at Hogwarts – at least in the subject of curses and counter curses – he'd found it rather necessary given the circumstances Ron and he seemed to be caught in.

Seemed to keep getting caught in.

They had no idea what awaited them. Tonight, however, felt like the right decision still. There was a light of adventure in Ron's eyes that, for all the fear and worry, would not be extinguished. Refused to, in fact.

He found that same light within his own eyes whenever he happened to glance upon his reflection.

That was probably what Daphne saw, too, he wondered.

And though a yearn for adventure didn't justify their plans perhaps, there was still a tone of something right to this. To what Ron had said.

They, Harry found, had to do this.

The alarm sounded and while Harry, startled, reached for his wand, Ron, scared out of his mind, flew out of the bed, tangled in his sheets, and fell to the floor with a great noise.

Groaning blearily, he gazed at Harry with eyes so narrow with sleep they almost appeared shut. "Time?"

Harry nodded. Swallowed. Tried to settle. Time.

"Time."

"Hogwarts," he said, voice shaky, standing up, still entangled in sheets, "it's been a pleasure. Harry, are we crazy for doing this?"

"Undoubtedly," Harry replied. "But we wouldn't be doing this if someone would take us seriously. If we'd been Gryffindors they'd listen, I reckon."

"Reckon you're right." Ron nodded, grasping his brother's wand tight as he finally disentangled himself and stood tall. "Ready."

Harry nodded, smiled, and grasped his own wand as he stood. Half a year ago he was stuck on Private Drive, living in a cupboard, not knowing he was special, not knowing that there was a whole world of special, not knowing that there was someone like Ron out there – who wouldn't think of him as a freak but… a friend. Who wouldn't think twice before throwing himself in the path of crazy on his behalf.

"You don't have to do this, Ron," Harry said, for the thought was heavy, worryingly so.

"Neither do you, but if we're right, and I think we are. Then we need to, right?"

Harry needed to. He didn't think Ron had to. But he found an easy smile and held his friend's eyes, grateful. "Yeah. Let's go, then."

Ron flourished his wand, nervous and exaggerated. "Lead the way."

They ascended the winding staircase as they, somehow magically, descended the castle into the common-room of Slytherin below. The fire in the fireplace hissed merrily as they trod onwards through the room. It appeared empty, but they stayed silent all the same. As they moved passed the two black leather sofas that occupied the centre of the room, Harry reckoned to himself that they'd probably not speak for quite some time. Until at least they were-

"I knew you were up to something!"

Ron, for a second time in a matter of minutes scared out of his mind, spun with wand in hand and had it trained upon the intruder in a manner of seconds. His hand didn't shake. If Harry had been observing him, he'd probably been impressed.

As it were, Harry was doing exactly the same – the tip of his wand alight with red light the only difference.

And in the light of his wand, the almost infernal dark red, a face was illuminated, revealing a very frighten, very sleepy Daphne Greengrass.

This night, Harry thought with a silent groan, was not starting as he thought it would.


End of Chapter

Authors note: I had initially planned that this chapter should span Ron and Harry's time in the Forbidden Forest, too. But the chapter would probably break the 20.000 word mark and no one wants to soldier through that. And this seems like a good place to end this chapter and start the next.

I'm really excited about the next couple of chapters, as well. Excited where this is going as we turn more and more away from the plot of the original books. There is much in store for Ron and Harry.

Thank you to everyone who took the time to read so far. And especially to you who gave your thoughts about it in a review. So many kind words leaves even me blushing. Hope this did no bore or disappoint. And any word is, as always, much appreciated on your way out.

And to megacharizat, I began the sequel to The Guardian some time ago. The Crimson King. I have the plot vaguely written down and a couple of chapters written already. Though I must confess that I'll probably spent most of my time for the time being on this one. It has expanded beyond what I'd initially planned. And I like where it's going. I really like where it's going.

Once more thank you and good day.