Story: [Harry the Marauding Weasley]
Summary: Neville is the Boy-Who-Lived. Harry Ron and Hermione still form the Golden Trio. And there are adventures out there that don't have anything to do with being a prophesied savior of the Wizarding World.
Genre: Friendship, Family, Adventure, Romance
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(Insights into the life of Harry Potter-Weasley)
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Harry tilted his head thoughtfully.
"I really don't think that's it, Ron." He finally voiced. "I mean, look around you." He nodded at all of their star-struck classmates. "Wouldn't it be hard to find friends when you're that famous?"
Ron frowned, clearly not quite ready to give up on his jealousy for the other boy, but slowly beginning to grasp that he was being unreasonable about it.
Harry sighed, understanding why his good friend wasn't comfortable with the idea of giving up any kind of recognition, no matter how harmful, but also being a bit tired with the subject.
"Hermione, help me out here. Ron is being stupid again." He asked for aid.
"Ronald, stop being stupid." Hermione responded absently as she continued to read her book, having obviously forgotten that breakfast was a time for eating, not reading. It was a reoccurring issue for her.
"I'm not being stupid!" Ron defended indignantly.
"Hermione, don't forget your toast." Harry handed his other friend her toast, knowing that she'd be distracted by hunger later if he didn't make her eat now. "And yes, Ron, you're being too stubborn. Fame isn't always a nice thing." He paused, thinking of how to phrase this. "Right, you know how being a Prefect is a bit like being famous?"
Ron looked at him questioningly, obviously not understanding where he was going with this, but nodded slowly.
"Percy is a Prefect." Harry continued. "Do you think he's a good Prefect?"
"He's annoying." Ron admitted instantly, still not seeing where he was going with this.
"But was he annoying before he was a Prefect?"
"Well, yeah. He always obsessed over rules." Ron muttered.
"Then, the only thing that has changed with him being a Prefect, is that a lot more people knows just how annoying he is, and then they start talking and relating to each other about how annoying he is behind his back. That's kind of what fame is." Harry finished.
"I don't get it." Ron frowned in thought.
"You get blamed. For everything that happens, and for everything that doesn't happen." Harry tried to explain.
Ron paused, trying to relate to what that would be like. "So, you're saying that it's like getting blamed whenever the twins do something bad? Even if there isn't any proof?" He looked down at his food. "That's... that's really not..." He frowned. "Yeah, I can kind of see why fame would be bad." He finally relented.
Harry breathed out a sigh of relief.
"Still going to aim for it though." Ron admitted with a shrug.
"Then you need to study more Ron." Hermione joined their conversation.
"But I want to be a quidditch player!" Ron whined.
Harry just laughed.
XXX
They were known as the Golden Trio by some. A muggleborn, a half-blood and a pure-blood. The brightest witch of their generation, the humble quidditch star, and the iron-stomached chess-player.
Admittedly, most people considered the latter as something that the other two kept around because he made them laugh. And whilst neither Harry nor Hermione could ever honestly say that it didn't play a part in their continued friendship, what is life without laughter?
Hermione helped them with homework, Harry made sure she didn't forget to eat, and Ron made sure that neither of the two got too caught up in schoolwork to actually have fun. Their grades ranged from average to amazing, but then they were more interested in being children than in academics. Just like most any child.
Though, that didn't mean that they didn't work very hard in order to slack off. Restraining Hermione from the library was a constant struggle that sometimes escalated into full-blown duels. Of course, all such duels were done within abandoned classrooms, for the rules only complained about magic in the corridors.
And of course, every now and then, they'd get themselves involved in some wacky adventure to smuggle dragons out of Hogwarts, or save Ron's little sister from a giant basilisk, or try to keep Neville alive through a gauntlet towards a magical stone. So yeah, life wasn't bad for the three of them, and even if they kept a reasonable distance to the Boy-Who-Lived, as they had their own problems to deal with, Neville didn't seem to mind.
Still, technically, Ginny wasn't only Ron's little sister. Anymore.
Because Harry was a Weasley now. Had been since the Christmas of Second year, as it'd taken about six months before the quite furious parents had managed to wade through the frightening heaps of paperwork that had been involved in Harry's adoption.
Apparently, having your parents die from over-exposure to the Cruciatus curse after having been betrayed by their best friend to the Lestrange family – the same best friend who'd been Harry's legal guardian in case of their deaths – had created a somewhat complicated situation.
The fact that a lot of people were somewhat wary of the Potter fortune falling into the hands of blood-traitors hadn't really helped. Thankfully, that idea had been nipped in the bud, with Arthur swearing a Wizarding Oath in front of the full Wizengamot that Harry's money was Harry's money, and that they would not touch it.
Harry hadn't liked realizing that he couldn't help out his new family's financial situation without risking Arthur's magic, until he'd begun to tap into his 'Slytherin side', and 'accidentally' bought 'extras' or 'wrong books' or much-closer-to-a-Weasley's-size clothing because he thought that the clothes had been flirting with him.
Needless to say, the twins had tried to recruit him after his obvious bypassing of rules had been found out. Ron had turned red, Arthur had been both impressed and annoyed, Molly had been both upset and amused, and Percy had tried to protest until he realized that it was Harry's money to do with as he pleased, and that as a family member, Harry wanted them all to be as happy as possible.
They'd still drawn a line that he wasn't allowed to buy things past a certain amount of money, and that he needed to use a certain amount of his spending purely for himself.
There'd been a bit of bargaining involved in those discussions, but it'd ended on a level where everyone was satisfied.
XXX
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(First Year's Gauntlet)
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Neville identified the Devil's Snare almost before they realized that they'd landed on top of something. The boy was ridiculously good with plants.
And with the next room being Harry's own specialty of broom-flying, well, by the time the gigantic wizarding chess appeared before them, the Golden Trio plus one turned to each other.
"Is anyone else noticing a pattern here?" Harry asked as he recalled his best friend's skill at chess.
"You mean that Neville's expertise on plants, Harry's flying, and Ron's chess-playing are used as defense of an invaluable artifact?" Hermione asked rhetorically.
"Huh." Ron frowned. "That's... why would they set it up like that?"
"That's the question, isn't it?" Neville mused to himself, staring out at the chess-pieces.
All four Gryffindors paused as they considered this for a moment.
"Do we have time to question things right now?" Harry finally asked with a resigned sigh.
"No." Neville admitted, frowning. "We still need to stop Snape."
And that was that.
All the First Years hurriedly took the places of the chess-pieces on their side.
XXX
"Hermione. I've already flown, and Ron has played. Considering the pattern..." Harry trailed off, glancing down at his unconscious friend.
"I'll be needed for the next trial." Hermione finished, biting her lip.
"Don't worry about us, we'll be going backwards." Harry shot her a weak smile. "Nobody ever cares to lay traps for the ones going backwards."
Hermione didn't look convinced as she turned to Neville, but that was to be expected. "Let's go."
And off they went, leaving Harry by the giant chessboard to slowly pull the slightly taller boy over his shoulders. They'd played their parts, and now they could only hope to make it in time to signal one of the teachers for help.
All the while praying that they wouldn't be forced to meet Snape as he emerged alone, for that would mean that the other two had failed. And they would not fail unless-... no, better to not even think about that.
XXX
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(The Serious Truth Uncovered)
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The Dursleys had locked him in his room, putting bars on the windows, and giving him food through a cat-flap in the door. Then Ron and the twins had come, arriving at the scene in their father's car. His flying car.
Perhaps it was the late hour, perhaps it was the lack of food, perhaps it was something else, but those moments were a blur to him. Relief, surprise, joy, confusion, fear.
They were severely scolded for their actions once Molly finally got her hands on her wayward sons.
She was told of the bars on his windows.
She went to talk with Arthur.
Harry was asked a question he couldn't have imagined ever being asked of him.
"Do you want to be... adopted?"
He wasn't certain how many times he said yes. Most of the memory got blurry around that part, anyway. Something about the tears burning down his face.
XXX
The amount of red-tape they had to wade through was ridiculous.
The Dursleys didn't want him, the Weasleys did, and he wanted the Weasleys. Should it really have to be more difficult than that?
No, it still took them several months to fill out all the proper forms, and when they finally reached that point everyone realized that there was something a bit strange with Harry's guardianship.
Harry's godfather was in prison, but he'd never been convicted according to the law, so he wasn't technically not Harry's guardian. This meant that whoever had put him on the Dursleys' doorstep had been at the very least severely bending the law, and most likely breaking it completely.
So, Harry needed to either get Sirius Black a trial for the betrayal of his parents' location to the Death Eaters that tortured them to death, or he needed to get the supposedly insane massmurderer to agree with letting the Weasleys adopt him. For the latter, he would also need to visit Azkaban personally, which wasn't possible since he was a minor and minors weren't allowed anywhere near the Wizarding Prison – with good reason.
Thus, if Harry didn't want to return to the Dursleys, he would need to convince the Ministry into giving the man who'd helped torture his parents to death a fair trial. Harry wasn't very pleased with this, feeling that if they were going to insist on Sirius being his guardian, then he should've been given his damn trial years before Harry was forced to witness it. Because now he'd have to be there and watch, what with being a 'chief witness' on account of being fifteen months old and in the other room when it happened.
Wizards made no sense.
XXX
It was almost Christmas by the time Sirius Black was given his trial, elven years late.
Harry arrived straight from Hogwarts, and the Weasleys came with him for emotional support in the face of he who'd caused him so much suffering.
Sirius Black was a wreck.
Dragged in by the aurors, his skin was like wax, his hair long and unkempt, and his body more akin to a skeleton than flesh and blood.
He didn't fight against the aurors, and in spite of all that he'd done, there appeared to be hope in his eyes. An irrational kind of hope.
His and Harry's eyes met from across the room, and he stilled.
Then he began to cry.
Only the Veritaserum and the emotionless responses that it produced allowed them to get any kind of answer at all through his tears.
And so the horrible betrayal of Peter Pettigrew finally came to light.
Then Ron held out his squirming pet rat, a terrified yet resolute expression on his face. "Is this him?"
The room erupted into chaos.
XXX
Sirius, his innocent godfather, stared at him for a long moment. Then he turned his gaze on Ron, who was standing next to him.
He looked at him in silence, then, apparently finding what he'd been looking for, nodded solemnly.
"Harry, your father was a brother to me, in more ways than one." He closed his eyes. "I wish I could've been there for you, but I wasn't, and that's something I can never take back." With a wry smile he opened his eyes again. "I'm probably not very good parent-material, anyway. But, you'll only need to ask and I'll be there for you, kid. Don't ever forget that." He grinned through tear-filled eyes. "The Weasleys are nice people. Make tons of good memories with them, you hear me?"
And thus Harry, for the first time in his life, initiated a hug with another person.
Sirius hugged him back.
XXX
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(The descent into the Chamber of Secrets)
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"The adventure ends here, boys. But don't fret." Gilderoy pointed his newly acquired wand at Ron. "The world will know our story. How I was too late to save the girl. How you tragically lost your minds at the sight of her broken body."
Three boys watched as the teacher they'd all considered a fraud turned on them.
Ron was silently cursing himself for underestimating the wand-stealer, and Harry just wanted him to go away so that they could continue on their way to save Ginny.
Neville though... well, Neville was a Gryffindor.
With a roar, Neville's shoulder impacted Lockhart in the stomach, bowling him over just as he reached the syllable of 'Ob-'.
Then there was chaos.
Magic lashed out around them as the spell was interrupted, and the ceiling of the tunnel proved itself unstable in its antiquity as Lockhart impacted the wall with a heavy thud.
Next thing Harry knew, he was standing alone.
Neville, Ron, and Lockhart were all trapped on the other side of the cave-in, unable to continue.
As they considered their options, it became clear that Harry would have to continue on his own, and Ron wouldn't be able to move to get reinforcement since his leg had been broken. Neville volunteered to go back and attempt to contact Dumbledore by owl, with Ron declaring that he'd try to clear the rubble whilst he waited.
Lockhart was a mindless mess, thankfully.
"Harry!" Ron's voice came out muffled from the other side. "Don't you dare die! You hear me!? This is an order from your big brother!"
Harry stared at the wall of rubble, feeling a happy warmth in his chest at the knowledge that he had family that would be waiting for him.
"I know!" He responded, a smile tugging at his lips.
XXX
It took Harry several precious minutes to pronounce a decent enough imitation of what Neville had hissed at the sink earlier, but finally the doors opened.
Harry stared at the 'memory' of Tom Riddle, ignoring the disappointment that the teen was exuding during his speech over how Neville hadn't been the one to attempt to stop him.
Finally, the older boy growled, and then hissed something in a rather loud voice. Which was contradictory in a way that would've intrigued Hermione. Hermione who was petrified in the hospital wing.
Harry gritted his teeth.
Then the mouth of the statue opened, and Harry truly realized for perhaps the first time that he was planning on fighting a basilisk as a twelve year old with nothing but his wand.
He felt rather hopeless in that moment, but squeezed his eyes shut nonetheless.
He couldn't run. He couldn't risk leaving Ginny to the snake's mercy. He needed to fight it. He needed to fight something without looking at it.
He was so screwed.
He could feel the heavy thump of the giant snake hitting the wet floor of the Chamber reverberating through his feet in a way that made his knees want to buckle.
Tom Riddle continued to hiss at the snake, making Harry realize that by comparison, what Neville sounded like when he spoke parseltongue wasn't nearly as creepy. In fact, Neville sounded rather a lot like a benevolent grandfather in comparison to the cruel, sadistic glee of Tom Riddle's voice.
Then the snake moved.
Harry wasn't entirely certain what happened.
One moment he was barely standing up despite his trembling legs, his wand clutched in his hand as if through cramp, and the next he was aiming at something he didn't see, his legs carrying him backwards at the last moment, his mouth already mouthing the words needed.
"Reducto!" He cried, just as the jaws of the massive snake clamped down on his arm.
He would never complain about Bludgers ever again. Bludgers were such nice and pleasant things.
There was a deafening boom, and Harry's legs folded underneath him, the fang piercing his arm breaking off by the opposing forces that sent the ancient basilisk tumbling to the floor.
The dead basilisk.
The dead, mostly headless, basilisk.
Harry only realized that he'd opened his eyes when he saw that the basilisk no longer possessed the eyes with which to kill.
He also realized that he didn't have a wand anymore.
The hand that had been holding it was blackened, the fingers twisted into shapes that made his stomach turn, despite the lack of pain he felt from them. The only thing left of his trustworthy wand were the splinters buried within his palm.
But that didn't really matter, because Harry knew that basilisks were poisonous. Unbelievably poisonous. And he had a fang of one that was piercing his arm.
He knew he was dying, but that didn't mean he couldn't fight back.
Growling, Harry yanked the fang free from the wound that might've cost him his arm even if it hadn't been poisoned, then he glanced around.
The diary.
Ginny had been possessed by the diary. That might mean that it was the diary's fault. Therefore the diary needed to die.
Ron injured, Hermione in a coma, Ginny dying.
He refused.
"Don't touch my family!" Harry spat back at the boy in Slytherin robes, before plunging the fang into the diary with the last of his rapidly fading strength.
He heard the scream of a tortured soul.
He heard a musical trill of happiness and love.
He saw Ginny wake up.
He was content.
The world turned black.
XXX
Ginny had witnessed her youngest big brother scream out in terror as he found himself holding a spider that was half his own size instead of his teddy bear. Ginny had witnessed her father raging at the twins for going too far. Ginny had made a fool of herself in front of the Boy-Who-Lived. Ginny had seen her brother's pet rat turn into a Death Eater in a court room. Ginny had realized that she was the cause behind the attacks on muggleborns. Ginny had watched, incapable of protesting, as the diary she had trusted walked her to where she would die.
"Don't touch my family!"
It echoed softly in the deepest parts of her addled mind, and she would've forgotten it if she hadn't opened her eyes.
Ginny stared into the mixture of relief, joy, and mindless agony, that so filled her adoptive brother's quickly fading eyes.
Green eyes that sometimes appeared to glow with feeling, now rapidly turning dark and dull.
She had never been so utterly terrified.
She couldn't move, her throat clogging up as she tried to reject the idea that her adoptive brother, the humble, caring brother who she'd always wished would rub off on Ron a bit more, had come to rescue her.
And now he was dying.
The mournful cries of a phoenix filled the Chamber as Fawkes swooped down in front of Harry Potter-Weasley, and began to cry into his wounds.
Ginny whimpered, a sob threatening to escape at the sight.
Phoenix tears could heal anything, right? Right? Harry would live, right? He wouldn't die?
The moments ticked away at the speed of months, but finally, finally Harry drew a sudden breath.
Then he settled into sleep, with the singing phoenix lulling him into peaceful rest.
Only then. Only once she was absolutely convinced that Harry wasn't dying. That she still had all of her seven brothers – even if Ron was a prat – did she realize something rather important.
There was a giant headless snake in front of them.
Ginny paused.
Ginny slowly turned back to her sleeping brother, staring at him with wide eyes of a different sort.
"I thought Ron was the beast-slayer..." She muttered softly to herself, recalling the most-likely-exaggerated tale of how the Golden Trio had first been formed.
She wasn't sure how long she sat there, listening to Fawkes singing, watching her brother sleeping, staring at the headless corpse of the monster that had been terrorizing the school mere hours ago. But she was shaken out of her stupor by the sudden presence of Neville Longbottom.
With him came Dumbledore, whose eyes remained rather wide at the sight laid out before him.
Neville's eyes were wide too, though he seemed distracted by the sleeping Harry.
Ron was floating along on a stretcher.
The redhead's eyes glanced at the headless snake, before sweeping over to Ginny, and then turned to stare at Harry for a moment.
"Mate, I don't know what you did, or how you did it. But if you've managed to get yourself seriously injured, I will stomp on you. Broken leg or not." Ron declared at the sleeping boy.
Everyone paused.
Three pairs of eyes – plus Fawkes – turned to stare in disbelief at the conviction in the boy's declaration.
Ron flushed red at their looks. "I specifically told him not to get himself killed! Getting really hurt is like-..." He made a violent gesture with his hand. "Like, totally not allowed!"
Dumbledore's eyes twinkled cheerfully at her most prat-ish of brothers, before he conjured another stretcher.
"I'm quite certain young Mr Potter here will be fine." He glanced over at the giant basilisk. "Though I must admit to being curious as to how he managed to cause that." He admitted with an expression that reminded her a little bit of Professor Flitwick and his boundless enthusiasm.
Ginny decided that now would be a good time for a nap.
XXX
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(Summer before Third Year)
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Harry shook his head in exasperation as he stared at the door from where Molly's muffled voice berated the twins for trying to lock their elder brother inside of one of the ruins.
Arthur didn't seem all too bothered with the conduct, apparently either too distracted by other things, or honestly not caring in what might be his belief that the twins wouldn't do something that stupid and not break their brother out before there was any danger involved, or perhaps merely completely assured in the knowledge that his wife would be strict enough in her punishments that there was no reason to involve himself.
If he'd been told to bet on an option, then Harry would've placed his money on the middle one, because the twins never actually tried to hurt anyone, and were willing to go quite far indeed to not risk it – even if they still experimented on their fellow students, when they could get away with it.
Turning to Percy, who seemed mostly amused by the whole thing, Harry finally asked the question that he'd been wondering ever since he'd been freed from within the pyramid. "Why did you look disappointed when we finally let you out?"
Percy blinked, momentarily startled by the question, before turning to his adopted little brother with a partly amused and partly wistful smile appearing on his face. "I didn't have time to go explore the closed off sections." He admitted.
Harry felt his jaw drop, as he stared at the boy that was always so strict and proper about rules. "But-?" He tried to find words.
Percy seemed to recognize his problem, because his smile grew a tad bit wider. "I've always found hieroglyphs fascinating. It's a thing." He shrugged.
Frowning thoughtfully, Harry tried to find the right words once more. "Then why don't you work with them? Why try to get into the Ministry?"
"Bill is the curse-breaker." Percy explained patiently. "He's better at wards and curses than I'll ever be, and mother is paranoid enough about the dangers in the business that she had the family clock made when he revealed what he wanted to do." He shook his head at the memory. "I don't want to put her through that again, and even if I did, I don't want to mess up Bill's job by forcing him to have his little brother running around underfoot."
"So... you'll just give it up?" Harry asked, sounding a little bit scared that a dream could wither away for such mundane reasons.
"Of course not." Percy scoffed. "I'm aiming to get into the International Cooperation part of the Ministry, then it's just a tiny little matter of where I'll get stationed..." He grinned conspiratorially. "In fact, I hear Egypt doesn't have a lot of applicants."
Harry blinked, his jaw once again being surrendered to gravity. "Th-... that's... genius!" He hissed in the voice of an awed thirteen-year-old.
Then Percy held up a finger to his lips. "But, of course, if my interest was to be known... well, mother might believe that I'm trying to do something as dangerous as my older brothers, and that would be horribly pointless, wouldn't it?" He smirked, and then with a final wink, turned away from his youngest brother as the door finally opened and the twins emerged.
When Ron a few hours later challenged Harry to chess, he was shocked to hear Harry stating in a completely serious voice, that Percy was probably the coolest brother ever. Most of the Weasley family quickly checked him for head-injuries. They found none, but Percy spent the rest of the week wearing a distinctly smug smirk.
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(Third Year)
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Harry's first meeting with Luna Lovegood had been... unique.
She was the childhood friend of his adopted little sister, and she was... different, in many ways.
Her having just started on her Second Year meant that one of the girls must've let their friendship cool somewhat during their First Year at Hogwarts, since he hadn't ever seen the two of them together before. But that was to be expected with Tom Riddle the Voldemort Diary on the loose.
All in all, he was pleased to have met the blonde girl, but was also hopelessly confused by most of what she'd said.
It didn't really help matters when Ron declared her 'loony', as Harry had dragged him away and explained to him that he was a 'freak'. Ron had hurriedly apologized, promising to never use the term again, no matter how crazy she might act. Harry was satisfied, but also curious, and decided to look up the Quibbler. It sounded like the magazine at least didn't pick on children, which was more than he could say about the Daily Prophet.
Neville was the Boy-Who-Lived, and if they didn't want to listen to him like an adult, then they shouldn't expect him to act like an adult. Ruddy wizards.
XXX
"Hermione? How are you in several classes at the same time?" Harry finally confronted her, looking a bit worried at the haggard look his friend was starting to sport.
Ron was standing next to him, equally worried, though much less capable of expressing himself without risking to turn their confrontation... confrontational.
Hermione didn't seem like she wanted to explain herself to them, which either meant that they'd done something really mean to her lately – that Harry had absolutely no memory of – or that this was somehow related to 'rules'.
Considering that the school had allowed for her schedule to be in several places at once, it was rather likely that rules were somehow involved in how this could be achieved. That she wasn't allowed to tell them, meant that there was a high likelihood of it either being very secret, or extremely easy to abuse.
Usually, very secret things were things that could very easily be abused, so Harry was leaning towards Hermione having been told that only she would be responsible enough to handle it.
This had possibly caused even more stress for the poor bookworm, as she didn't like hiding things from people.
Harry sighed heavily. "I get it. It's secret. You've been told to be responsible with it. You're not allowed to tell us. And you're running yourself haggard with too big a workload."
"It's not too much!" Hermione protested indignantly.
"Hermione, have you looked in a mirror lately?" Harry asked in a deadpan. "You look like death warmed over, and if this is what it's like after the first three weeks then can you imagine what you'll look like by the end of the year?"
Hermione opened her mouth to protest, but then met Ron's eyes.
Ron might not be willing to say anything, because he would be accidentally prat-ish, but that didn't make his face any less worried. The ginger had always been a softie at heart.
Hermione dropped Divination and Muggle Studies, and her schedule suddenly started making sense again.
A few days later, she hesitantly told them of the Time Turner that she'd been entrusted with to attend her unreasonable schedule.
Ron looked scandalized, Harry was amazed that time travel was real, and both of them were adamant that she spend the next week slacking off in order to compensate for driving herself so hard.
Hermione thought that they were being silly, so they dueled her in a classroom until she finally gave in.
They had to ask for Neville's assistance in order to win. She'd gotten good.
XXX
The moment Harry found out that Luna's things kept being 'borrowed' by her Housemates, was the moment Ravenclaw learned that whilst Neville might be the most famous of all Gryffindor's members, Hermione the brightest, and the Weasley twins the most prank-happy. Nobody knew vengeance quite like Harry Potter-Weasley.
He borrowed help, he explained his plans, he allowed for modifications, he began to recruit helpers, he set up a safety-net to keep the innocents from being exposed to the punishment, and he left a simple anonymous note outside of all four Houses of Hogwarts.
It stated simply: "Bullying is not tolerated. Violators beware."
The twins had, after some consultation with Hermione, decided to recruit another muggleborn into helping them make sure that none of their future pranks would ever constitute as bullying, just to be on the safe side.
The Ravenclaws who did not better their treatment of Luna Lovegood found themselves... inconvenienced... into the Black Lake, at midnight, straight from their beds.
None of the victims bettered their behavior however, and so they found themselves located inside of the owlery one morning. Hedwig had made sure that they'd all been treated as target practice during their sleep by the other owls. She was a brilliant bird, who was easily as skilled at vengeance as her owner.
Those who by now still refused to cease in their 'borrowing' of Luna's things, found themselves waking up inside the Chamber of Secrets, right next to a gigantic, headless, rotting basilisk.
By the time that Dumbledore had fetched Neville to open the door – the boy had a solid alibi, and Harry wasn't actually a parselmouth, being only capable of saying the word 'open' in parseltongue, so he wasn't even a suspect – all three girls were in need of Calming Potions.
Luna had hit him when she found him after that time. He got a bruise and everything. Then she hugged him, and called him a friend, so he figured that it evened out.
And it wasn't as if he hadn't left a distinctly anonymous letter to the Headmaster to make sure to search the Chamber for a few wayward students. That it'd taken the old man so long to get to them was not Harry's fault. Much more likely, it was Ron's fault, for staying up all night with the rest of the Gryffindors in an in-House chess-tournament, causing Neville to be needed to be fetched from the Gryffindor Tower, as he was quite contently sleeping-in. Neville had gotten second place, and a very solid alibi.
Luna was never called 'loony' after that month, and nobody ever 'borrowed' her things without permission again.
A few weeks later however, a couple of Slytherins found themselves hanging upside down above an old trapdoor in the third floor corridor. Nobody could prove anything, of course, but there were some rumors about a First Year Slytherin with tear-marks on his face.
Thus, Hogwarts learned that 'Mr Anonymous' was a fairly non-judgmental person, and didn't like bullying, regardless of the victim's House.
Snape had notably given Harry three weeks of detention for arriving to class on time the next day, and then awarded him 120 points for starting the fire under his kettle properly.
All of Gryffindor had because of this Snape-actually-giving-points-to-any-House-not-Slyt herin been absolutely certain of the oncoming Apocalypse, and spent the next three weeks being even more reckless than was the norm for them. By the end of those three weeks, Snape had taken a total of 170 points from Gryffindor. This made them all breathe out in relief, as they'd been returned to negative values from that particular professor, proving that it had probably merely been a false alarm.
Of course, his detentions had technically made Harry the unofficial spokesperson for the Mr Anonymous, but then, everyone already knew that by now, so the new information was mostly shrugged off by the Hogwarts rumor-mill.
Much more interesting was the fact that Slytherin started behaving politely to people. Mostly. There were some confrontations between other Houses, and general mayhem, but they were kids, and hating each other's guts had nothing to do with bullying, so it was sort of out of Harry's jurisdiction.
He was however making a careful note of seeing to it that his 'position' was filled by an equally non-judgmental person when he graduated, so that Hogwarts could continue being bullying-free for generations to come. It was a good goal to aim for.
XXX
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(Summer before Fourth Year)
XXX
Harry groaned as Ron excitedly shook him awake.
"Harry, get up. The World Cup will be on in a few hours!" The quidditch fanatic hissed – he knew better than to accidentally wake up the ones who didn't want to be woken up at an ungodly hour in order to fidget uselessly in front of the wireless.
Harry glanced at his watch. "Ron? Why are you awake before six am?" He asked dubiously, not entirely certain that his friend-turned-brother hadn't been replaced by someone else who hadn't done their homework on the boy's sleeping habits.
"Because we need to prepare for the World Cup, Harry." Ron explained, his eyes shining with an intense gleam that reminded Harry horribly of Oliver Wood.
Harry might like flying, and be used to waking up early, but Wood had always been insane about quidditch. Even Ron had admitted that Wood was a bit crazy in his passion.
Therefore, it was perfectly understandable that Harry's hand began to inch its way towards his wand in an effort to defend himself from what could only be a completely insane Ron.
XXX
After waking up, hexing Ron for being insane, and being unable to go back to sleep, Harry's day started with finding Percy – who'd officially gotten somewhat past his obsessiveness about rules once he'd realized that a lot of stupid people were often the ones hiding themselves behind them – hiding from the twins.
Percy might not act like a stuck-up prat anymore, and he might've seen Mr Anonymous' quest for fairness and equality and considered it a good cause, but he was also one of the two people currently in the house that were considered acceptable targets by the twins. The other was Ron, and since not even the twins could fail to pick up on the Wood-like madness emanating from his person they were leaving him alone in an effort not to reawaken unpleasant memories from their quidditch training.
So, Percy was the target of the twins on this most nervous of days.
After making sure not to laugh at the sight of the newly hired Ministry-employee curled up in his – fairly small – hiding place, Harry promised to distract the twins from pranking if Percy promised to distract Ron from obsessing about the upcoming quidditch match.
An alliance struck, the rest of the day passed enjoyably enough.
XXX
"And Victor Krum has caught the snitch!" The voice boomed through the wireless, causing resounding cheers from the twins, a groan about Seekers who didn't understanding tactics from Ron, a moan of misery from Percy – which was followed by handing money to the twins – and a cheer of enjoyment for the match from both Harry and Ginny.
Neither of the latter had made a bet on the outcome, but Ron – who'd also avoided betting, on his mother's orders – had still been rooting for the young Bulgarian to see his team through.
And, the match over and done with, the quidditch-happy family glanced in between each other before finally grinning and going to fetch their brooms.
They might not all be obsessive about quidditch, but after listening to the excitement of it all, there was no way they weren't spending the rest of the day in the air, trying to outdo the unseen feats of the professionals.
XXX
When the Daily Prophet was read the next day, the excitement of the World Cup suddenly abated.
Because on the front page, was an image of Death Eaters causing trouble at the World Cup, and of the Dark Mark hanging in the sky.
All of them were suddenly relieved that they hadn't been able to acquire tickets.
XXX
XXX
(The Triwizard Tournament)
XXX
Harry and the rest knew that it would be one of those years the moment Neville's name was spat out of the Goblet of Fire as a fourth note.
Ron initially wasn't entirely sure what he ought to feel, seeing the Boy-Who-Lived accidentally amass even more of the fame that the sixth son longed so desperately for, and knowing that considering the quiet boy's regular luck, this was most likely an attempt at his life – people had after all died in these tournaments. But then Harry got that look on his face, and well... Ron knew better than to argue when Harry was wearing his Saving-People-Face.
He knew this in large part because any arguments that he made would just end up sounding horribly selfish and morally petty in comparison to Harry's determination, meaning that the only one capable of stopping his reckless Gryffindor of a little brother was the far more logical-sounding Hermione.
Turning his eyes to the final member of the Trio, Ron tried to convey his desperate need to keep Harry from doing something stupid and noble that would land him in the Hospital Wing at best, and a far-too-early grave at worst.
Hermione was wearing the same bloody face.
Ron groaned. He hated when they ganged up on him.
XXX
All members of the Golden Trio had paled when they heard of the dragons that would participate in the First Task, and even Ron had honestly admitted that they really really really needed to study in order to keep Neville alive.
Anything that convinced Ron to hit the books was Bad News, his brothers used to joke that it was a sign of the Apocalypse, and even Ginny managed to lend a few comforting words to her crush, though her stuttering and blushing had meant that the Boy-Who-Lived had asked Harry if he knew how to translate 'girl-speak'.
Harry had – as the twins had once told him solemnly – as demanded of him as Ginny's big brother, adoptive or not, teased her for this. Though he had been unusually nice about it, in comparison to both the twins' relentlessness and Ron's usual, accidental bluntness.
Hermione was also making use of Ron's unusual motivation to get him to study his classes a bit more diligently, but that was to be expected of Hermione, who always wanted to impress authority figures.
XXX
With Ginny notifying him of the gossip of Cho Chang already having acquired a date, Harry was left feeling rather down on his luck, though thankfully not nearly as humiliated as Ron had been in his attempt to ask out Fleur Delacour.
It was one thing that the girl didn't go with you to the Ball, it was a different thing entirely to know that the rest of the school knew that she didn't go with you to the Ball. Harry felt quite sympathetic.
Having thus established Ginny as Harry's information-basis on who did and who didn't have a date for the Ball, Harry enlisted her help in finding a reasonably likeable girl that might say 'yes'.
It took some time for Ginny's exasperated search to find anything of use, and by then Harry hung his head and sighed at his own stupidity. Of course he ought to have asked her, she was always fun to talk to, and she was a she, so that was that part covered.
Harry happily asked Luna to be his dancing-friend for the Yule Ball.
Luna didn't seem to mind the idea, and Ginny had already snagged a date with Dean Thomas – who Harry had spent a total of five minutes staring blankly at, until the boy admitted that he would rather jump out the window than in any way incur the wrath of her brothers by being too forward.
Ginny threatened them all with her Bat-Bogey Hex if they dared to scare her date away, but all of her brothers believed that this was a fairly low price to pay in order to make sure that no boy toyed with their little sister's heart.
Ron had managed to be utterly prat-ish in asking Hermione to the Ball, and Hermione refused to tell anyone with whom she was going, which basically meant that Harry was spending a bit more time away from his two rather explosive friends in an effort to not be ranted at. He didn't want to listen to his friends badmouthing each other, no matter how much of a prat Ron was being, or how frustratingly secretive Hermione might be.
Hermione was like a sister to him, and if he was allowed to stare flatly at his adoptive little sister's date until they promised to behave, then he wanted the opportunity to do the same for his 'older' sister, as well, regardless of how much he trusted her judgment.
Which he actually didn't. She'd swooned after Lockhart after all. Really, that just proved that she couldn't be trusted with romance until they'd been properly screened by the rest of the Golden Trio.
Harry could admit to being slightly overprotective, but he could understand where Ron was coming from, even if he was being a prat about it. Of course, since Ron really was being a prat about it, he couldn't argue Hermione's point either, she had after all, every right to be angry at him for being a prat.
It just wasn't pleasant to see both of his closest friends fighting with each other.
Thus, he spent his time with Luna, who was teaching him how to dance. Which he was very glad that she knew how to do, because otherwise it would've been horribly embarrassing.
XXX
Ginny looked stunning in her dress.
Not quite as different as Hermione looked in hers, but stunning nonetheless. She was going to grow up into a very beautiful lady in the future, and Harry found himself thankful that she had six other brothers with whom he could share the responsibility of beating unworthy boys away from her using sticks.
Ron didn't seem to have noticed at all though, as he'd spent the entire time trying not to look at Hermione. He'd been trying so hard that his ears had turned red within the first thirty seconds.
Harry found this vaguely amusing, but was still not comfortable with the idea of Hermione's mystery-date being allowed in her proximity when she looked so girly, without either of them having a wand aimed at the boy's back.
Thankfully, Harry figured he could be sneaky enough with his wand that Hermione wouldn't notice if he aimed it at the boy's back, meaning that he should technically be able to do so during the Ball itself.
Ron had been more or less roped into his own date by Parvati, who set him up with her sister in an attempt to snag the Boy-Who-Lived as her own date. Neville already knew that she was more interested in the idea of an amazing Yule Ball than she was in a relationship with the quiet boy, but he seemed rather comfortably resigned to that type of arrangement.
Still, this meant that both Harry and Ron would be picking up their dates outside of Gryffindor Tower. And Hermione was being picked up outside as well, so that eliminated any Gryffindor from their suspicions. If it was Malfoy, Harry would figure out a way to get Ginny to teach him the Bat-Bogey Hex, and then stalk the blonde ferret for the rest of the school year, hitting him with it so often that he wouldn't be able to attend his classes.
He respected Hermione's right in choosing her date for herself. But that didn't mean that he couldn't make absolutely certain that the amount of effort that the boy would be forced to go through in order to be with her would be so mindboggling that he would be so relieved at finally being accepted as her boyfriend, that he wouldn't dare to break her heart.
Ginny hadn't been pleased with this plan of theirs, after she'd finally blackmailed it out of them, but she grudgingly gave in once she realized that they wouldn't interfere as long as they knew that the boy in question wouldn't risk breaking Hermione's heart. The fact that Harry had shown signs of overprotective paranoia however, didn't bode well for whatever boy that Hermione had chosen.
XXX
It was Viktor Krum.
Viktor Krum, quidditch star and Champion of Durmstrang, had asked Hermione Granger to the Yule Ball.
Grabbing onto Ron's arm, Harry hurriedly steered the wide-eyed boy into a seat.
Padma looked a bit confused at their sudden action, but Luna looked understanding.
Ron's... well, hero honestly, had asked Hermione to be his date. Early on, meaning that it hadn't been some last choice. And Ron now wanted to punch him. Really really hard.
Ron was confused, hurt, angry, intimidated, betrayed, and in dire need of someone keeping him from blurting out something prat-ish and making Hermione cry. Because Ron didn't want to make Hermione cry, and he wasn't good enough at putting on masks that he wouldn't lash out at her somehow.
Thus, Harry spent most of the meal talking to a Ron who barely poked on his food, and trying to make an argument for why Hermione hadn't trusted them with her date's identity. This wasn't made easier by the fact that Harry wanted to go over to Krum and explain to him that he was perfectly willing to extract horrible vengeance on him if he hurt Hermione in any way.
Luna did however help with distracting, both Ron from his funk, and Padma from digging too deeply into what she was beginning to realize was the problem.
All in all, it was a very tense meal, that wasn't nearly as pleasant as the beautiful decorations should've made it.
They did however manage to placate Ron enough that he wouldn't be a prat to Hermione unless she actively provoked him. Which Harry would caution the intelligent witch from doing, as the Yule Ball wasn't the place for such a confrontation. No matter how much he wanted to threaten Krum to treat her right.
XXX
Harry excused himself from Luna, after their first – but most definitely not last – dance, and swept away towards Hermione.
"May I have this dance, Miss Granger?" He asked her with a uselessly elaborate bow.
Hermione looked vaguely amused at his act, and after a brief exchange of glances between her and her date, she went along with it. "You may, Mr Potter." She told him in a pointlessly proper voice.
And then they were dancing, moving slowly around the dance floor.
"Don't provoke Ron tonight." Harry decided to be blunt.
Hermione's eyes snapped over to his, narrowing with anger. "Excuse me?"
Harry sighed, knowing that it was better that she be mad at him than Ron, since he wouldn't resort to yelling across the entire Great Hall, but not liking it. "You're precious to us, Hermione. And you kept your date a secret, meaning that we didn't get to intimidate him into behaving properly." She opened her mouth, but he waved her off. "I understand why you did it, Ron would've blown his top, and you would've been hounded by every girl in Hogwarts for it. But right now, you're dressed up extremely girly and going on a date with someone Ron admires hopelessly. He feels betrayed, and he's going to lash out if you provoke him."
Hermione frowned, looking torn. "I-... I didn't want him to-..."
"I know." He smiled at her. "And he won't make a scene, it'll be a great night, and maybe he won't even be all that upset if we can just get him to dance with Padma enough times." His smile turned into a conspiring smirk. "Merlin knows he's normally pretty easy to distract."
An answering smile appeared on Hermione's face, looking vaguely hesitant. "How upset was he?" She finally asked, her guilt shining through.
"He didn't touch his food." Harry sighed.
Hermione fumbled, almost missing a step. "He what?"
"I know." A brief smile ghosted over his face. "Personally though, I'm more amused by how he hasn't been able to look at you without his ears going red since the moment you walked down the stairs."
Hermione blinked, confused. Then her eyes widened to comical proportions and her face turned a Weasley-worthy red. "I- I-..." Her mouth opened uselessly.
"I'm not saying anything that you wouldn't have already seen if you'd actually been looking at him." He grinned cheerfully at her.
Spending time with the twins had made him oddly aware of a great many things that he hadn't known before. Such as how teasing people was a lot of fun.
XXX
Harry stared at Dumbledore in a slightly dazed way as he explained that the Champions were to fetch their hostages at the bottom of the lake.
He'd been wondering where Hermione had disappeared to. Now he knew.
Sharing a glance with Ron, Harry motioned for him not to move, knowing that his adopted brother wasn't always calm and reasonable when faced with a danger to one of his loved ones.
Harry himself waited patiently for the speech to be completed, and for the Champions to start, before rising to his feet with an eery calm and beginning to walk over to the judges.
Dumbledore blinked in surprise as he realized that they were being visited by a student.
"Mr Potter?" He asked him curiously.
"Hermione Granger is one of the hostages, correct?" Harry explained his purpose behind confronting the judges.
Karkaroff sneered at him, and Maxime was frowning heavily at the tournament being interrupted, but Dumbledore nodded patiently. It was true after all, and it'd probably be more time-efficient to listen to his words than to try and order him back into the crowd.
"Then I trust that the hostages aren't in any kind of danger whatsoever. Because if she gets injured, then I will shatter your kneecaps, Headmaster." He explained in a calm and reasonable voice. "And after that, I'll actually start hurting the judges." He concluded, the polite smile on his face looking sharp enough to shave with.
All judges felt a distinct chill travel down their spines as they looked into the boy's eyes, those icily cold eyes that seemed to be literally dissecting them.
Dumbledore was the first one who managed to recover from the shock enough to speak, which was perhaps strange considering that he remembered perfectly well the sight of the headless basilisk that still graced the Chamber's floor, and could easily translate that protective violence onto his own person if something should go wrong. "I assure you, Mr Potter, that the hostages are in no danger whatsoever."
The boy tilted his head, calculating green eyes lingering on the Headmaster's own, before nodding. "I do hope you're correct, sir. I don't dislike you, after all."
Then Harry James Potter-Weasley turned on his heel, and marched straight back to his seat and the rest of his family.
Karkaroff turned to sneer at his fellow Headmaster. "You allow such insubordination from your students?"
Dumbledore met him with twinkling blue eyes. "Mr Potter has always been very protective of his family. Official members of it or not."
"And Ms Granger is a member?" Maxime regarded the man critically.
"Ever since he and his brother fought off a troll to protect her in their first year." Dumbledore nodded, feeling his lips curling into an amused smile as his fellow judges turned to gape at him in disbelief.
"Why would there be a troll-?" Maxime started.
"It's a bit of a long story." Dumbledore admitted, still feeling slightly foolish at the idea of having lured Voldemort into a school filled with children – no matter how certain he'd been that the Dark Lord wouldn't want to risk attacking his students.
XXX
The reunion between the Golden Trio also featured some approving pats on the back for Neville, who'd decided to help out his fellow competitor by saving her hostage as well.
Fleur was also quite grateful indeed, and gave the boy a very wet hug.
Harry considered Gabrielle and her enthusiasm, and then turned to Hermione as she was the only one of them who knew French. "Should I ask what she's saying, or should we let it come as a surprise for poor Neville?"
Hermione considered it for a moment, a slightly mischievous smile touching her lips. "Maybe he'll figure it out on his own. We can't be expected to fight all of his battles for him, can we?"
Ron frowned confusedly, staring in between them. "What are you guys talking about?"
"Ron, the famous Boy-Who-Lived just rescued a damsel in distress. A damsel who's still young enough to think of herself as a princess." Harry felt his lips twitch with mirth. "He's so doomed."
The redheaded Weasley continued to frown for a moment, before glancing towards Gabrielle's older sister, and the kind of shape that the young girl was apparently quite likely to grow up into. "As long as she waits until she hits puberty, he'll be putty in her hands." He finally commented wisely.
"Too bad she's a young girl who already thinks she's an adult." Hermione sighed, still smiling.
"He's so doomed." Harry repeated his statement.
XXX
Bloodied and broken, Neville appeared in the confused chaos that had erupted when the portkey-Cup activated and didn't appear where it'd been supposed to.
Of course, this set off even more confusion and chaos, because the boy's wounds didn't look like they'd been caused in the maze, and he was demanding to talk to Dumbledore about something.
Harry distractedly hexed a ministry worker trying to interject himself on the conversation that Neville wanted to have with the Headmaster, not particularly caring if it would be getting him in trouble later on.
But even that disinterest fell apart at the seams as he managed to hear the hissed words of the Boy-Who-Lived.
"He's back."
And of course it was obvious who he was talking about. There could be only one, and now he was back. And he'd kidnapped Neville – though obviously he'd managed to escape somehow – in the middle of an extremely public event.
Fudge was going to have a heart-attack. And if his attempts at burying the investigation into Sirius's lack of a trial was any clue, then Fudge would hide and squirm and refuse to admit the truth until it hit him like a wet fish to the face.
Harry frowned dramatically as he made his way into the conversation, ignoring that he really didn't want any part to do with it, and that he honestly felt like he was intruding on a moment between mentor and student. Because they needed someone who could actually think Slytherin-like before they got themselves dragged through the mud by a desperate Fudge. "Someone dressed up as You-Know-Who?" He gasped theatrically.
Neville frowned at him, indignant through his fatigue and fearful depression. "It was V-" He started, only to flinch as Harry deftly stepped on his toes.
"How awful! That someone would try to take up where that monster left off!" Harry shook his head in revulsion. "Why, I'm sure the ministry will put an immediate stop to this-... this despicable action!" He finished, turning to Fudge for confirmation.
Neville continued to frown at him, now carefully not putting weight on the foot that had been so ruthlessly stomped on.
Fudge however, reluctantly agreed that someone impersonating the most-definitely-dead-and-gone-forever Dark Lord was an awful thing to consider, and that the aurors would be on the case immediately.
Then Harry turned to the two leaders of the Light, and made a slightly sheepish face. "Truth is subjective, and stopping an impersonator is actually going to be good for his career, whilst everyone knows that You-Know-Who was only stopped by your scar, which in context means that his best option is to run and hide and hope nobody notices that the Dark Lord came back to life on his watch."
Neville's jaw dropped as he stared at his classmate, as Dumbledore's own eyes widened appreciatively.
"I don't like Malfoy, so I told the Hat 'not Slytherin'." Harry answered their unasked question with a whispered smirk to the shell-shocked two.
He might be good at it, but he really really didn't want to get involved in politics if he could help it.
XXX
XXX
(Fifth Year)
XXX
"So... you convinced Fudge to pretty much decimate Voldemort's plans. And then Neville managed to kill him again, without him actually dying for good, by ambushing him when he set out to strike some fear into the Wizarding World once more." Hermione concluded as she reviewed the year's events.
"Pretty much." Harry nodded from where he sat in his pleasantly soft chair in front of the cheerfully crackling fire – they lived in a giant stone castle, summer or not, it was always slightly chilly.
"We also pranked Malfoy." Ron interjected. "That part is important."
"Why is that important?" Hermione asked curiously, apparently not understanding its relevance in the greater scheme of things.
"Because he was being a dick to the younger years and the look on his face is something that I shall treasure always." Ron explained it to her, completely serious.
Harry snickered.
Deciding after a moment to simply ignore the idiotic boys seated across from her, Hermione continued."So Voldemort is dead again, but will probably be back sooner or later. Unless Dumbledore finally manages to figure out what the hell is keeping him alive."
Ron gasped. "You cursed!" He pointed accusingly at her.
Just to be funny, Harry pointed at her too, though he didn't actually bother to look away from the fire as he did so.
Hermione huffed as if annoyed, but her cheeks had turned red at being caught.
They were probably a bad influence on her.
XXX
XXX
(Sixth Year)
XXX
And maybe Harry had broken the guy's nose, but-... well-...
It wasn't like she could honestly be blaming him for that, could she?
The guy had clearly not taken 'no' for an answer, and though he knew that she could defend herself – oh boy did he know, ouch! – he'd decided to step in so that she didn't have to.
Then the guy had started picking a fight with him. All for telling him that the girl clearly wasn't interested and that the gentlemanly thing to do was to back off and not even consider coming back unless it was with an insane amounts of flowers – because girls were crazy like that.
And okay, she might be mad at him for the thing with the flowers, but usually she just settled with hexing him for that, so he doubted that was at least the entire story. Though, likely, it was at least part of it, because girls were crazy like that.
Anyway, the guy starts picking a fight with him, and he doesn't really want to punch the guy's lights out because that would be seen as encroaching on the girl's ability to defend herself, which is also this crazy girl thing that he'd never really figure out. But the guy doesn't want to talk it over, or just piss off and cut his losses like a sane person would – in hindsight, he was probably a girl in disguise, from all that crazy. No, he needs to get physical about the whole damn thing.
Apparently, he didn't think he cut an especially imposing figure and his anger was only feared because he was a tricky little annoyance and fairly decent with magic.
So, feeling slightly insulted, but generally just pissed off at the guy for touching her, he broke the guy's nose.
It was quite simple actually. Body twists and leans, fist comes rushing forward, knuckles impact with enough blunt force to knock the guy on his ass with the crack of breaking bone.
His knuckles got sore, sure. He knew that he'd probably get a detention, sure.
But damn if it didn't feel good to just punch the bastard's lights out.
There were lots of reasons why she could be mad at him, but the problem he was faced with was making sure that he apologized without making it worse.
He'd seen Ron apologize to Hermione. Heh, if it weren't for the fact that he hated it when the two of them were having a big fight – the little fights were still funny though – he would've probably laughed himself halfway into a coma from all of the groundbreaking Ron had done on just what not to say to a girl who's angry at you.
Therefore, Harry needed to figure out exactly what she was mad about, so that he could apologize for that and then not touch anything else that he might think that she could possibly be mad at him for.
Partly to keep possible reasons for keeping a grudge away from her. And partly because sometimes girls got mad at you for thinking that they were mad about something that you thought made sense but that they didn't think made any sense at all. Because girls were crazy like that.
Of course, that hesitance due to not being able to figure out exactly what to apologize for had been the reason why he was still on the outs with her even after a month, which meant that by now everyone else had also figured out that they were fighting.
Ron was particularly gleeful about it.
If it weren't for the fact that his gleefulness could technically be related to the fact that Ginny had declared him as her 'new favorite big brother' due to the whole mess, then Harry would probably have hexed him into sleeping awkwardly for weeks.
He was actually a little bit hurt at losing the title of 'favorite big brother' that he'd gained that year when he'd rescued her from the basilisk.
He understood it perfectly, and was guessing that she'd dump Ron back into his place of 'prat-ish big brother' the moment that Harry finally figured out how to apologize for what he wasn't entirely sure she was mad about, but he didn't like fighting with Ginny.
It made him feel... far too vulnerable, actually. Which was odd, because they didn't interact overly much, being in different years and not having the same electives when it came to homework. Not that he in any way blamed her for avoiding Divination like the roadkill of a time-killer that it was.
Hell, Trelawney probably used all that incense to hide more than just the smell of alcohol. It certainly wouldn't be the first time they'd found some unidentifiable animal dead and rotting inside of the school.
But that was getting off topic, the topic being that he needed to have Ginny stop being mad at him, because he honestly hated fighting with her with an intensity that he normally reserved for his love of flying.
Harry paused at that thought, before sighing. "Screw it. I'm going flying." He finally concluded, suddenly standing up and marching off to go grab his broom.
He'd been horribly upset when he'd lost his Nimbus to a Bludger, but Sirius had given him a Firebolt as a replacement, before – with surprising delicacy – mounting the shattered pieces of his first broom on a plaque to be hung from the wall in memory of its faithful service.
Their relationship might be a bit odd at times, but he truly did love his godfather.
He was nearly at the ground floor when he passed by a broom-closet where he could hear a very familiar voice saying 'no'.
He really couldn't be allow to clear his head and get away from his troubles, could he?
Throwing his self-pity into the wind – and putting away his Firebolt where it wouldn't get in the way – Harry swung open the door to the broom-closet, causing its occupants to freeze.
"You know. I think we've had this conversation before." He pointed out to the boy with a now-crooked nose.
Seeker reflexes kicking in, Harry dodged underneath the boy's fist, grabbed onto his outstretched wrist and then pulled him off balance and into the corridor.
That was the moment he realized that Ginny's clothes were looking mighty ruffled, and there were tears in her eyes.
Harry saw red.
He wasn't entirely sure what happened after that.
He woke up in the infirmary.
"The Professors had to hex you to keep you from killing him." Ginny told him from the side of his bed.
Harry blinked up at her, carefully making sure that she was alright. "Did they succeed?" He finally croaked through dry lips.
"Yeah." She did something that was halfway between a sob and a laugh. "He's in St Mungos."
Harry wasn't sure if he was proud or ashamed of that. Sure, he'd damn near killed someone, but that person had hurt her, and the fact that the boy had even survived was something of a miscalculation when he thought of it like that.
"Are you alright?" He turned his attention to things that actually mattered.
And suddenly found himself with a crying girl in his arms.
That probably meant that she wasn't mad at him anymore. Which was a good thing, but to get there, she'd been forced to cry, and he really didn't think that was a good outcome to things at all.
Gently rubbing her back, mumbling comforting nothings into her ear, and doing his best to make her feel better after what was most likely an absolutely awful day, Harry wondered briefly if she'd punch him at some point after she'd calmed herself for interfering.
"My knight." She mumbled into his chest, a whimpering giggle escaping her.
Harry blinked down at her, feeling confused.
"The princess and half the kingdom..." Ginny continued, still not making any sense.
She pulled away from him, looking up into his eyes, a suddenly somewhat confused expression of her own on her face.
What happened after that was a bit blurry to his memory, because something salty touched his lips, and it was... beyond words. Beyond words in that way that you can't help but try to describe it, only to realize every time that it wouldn't explain anything at all.
Ginny pulled back once more, her cheeks a beautiful pink. "Would my knight be willing to have me as his princess?"
Harry didn't actually answer, he was too busy trying to get back to that amazing thing that had been beyond words that had happened a moment earlier.
She responded to his kiss, most eagerly.
XXX
"It's legal in several countries in the muggle word Harry. It's not incest. Stop worrying." Hermione said tiredly as Harry fidgeted nervously in front of her.
Harry smiled happily, reassured.
He would continue smiling like that until he started fidgeting again, and then the whole cycle would repeat itself.
Ron had given up after the first five minutes and simply excused himself for writing a letter to his other brothers in order to try and figure out if they were supposed to beat Harry up, threaten him with bodily harm, or simply cheer him on.
Ginny, had of course commandeered the letter at some point and written her own notes on what their reaction ought to be, and several threats about hexing them all.
None of her brothers would care a lick about her hexing them, but they knew Harry and quite frankly didn't at all think that it'd be a good idea to beat him up.
Molly would either be ecstatic or be visited with the same headache that had already claimed Ron. Arthur would be confused but probably stop trying to figure it out fast enough to avoid that same headache. And the rest of the brothers... well, they knew Harry, and they all knew that there were probably very few boys indeed that they could entrust their sister to, to the extent that they could Harry.
Hermione was happy for them. In no small part because it would let her get a bit more... time to do... other things... with Ron. But also because they were both rather dear to her – Harry most of all – and she was so wonderfully relieved to find proof that there was someone out there that loved her mischievous but shy little brother enough that she might actually experience becoming an aunt one day.
The fact that he'd fallen in love with the girl who was his adopted little sister... well, alright, there were probably more socially-acceptable choices, but it wasn't like there was any actual blood-relations there, and they were so happy together.
In hindsight, they'd always been happy together. And they'd always been rather protective of one another.
The way Ginny went about dealing with the Slytherin Beater that had destroyed Harry's broom in their Third Year had been all but a declaration of war against the way that House played Quidditch. A declaration that had been heeded, and the violent cheating they'd engaged in had at least to some extent been curbed.
That the one making the declaration had been a small, innocent looking, red-haired Second Year with eyes that seemed just about ready to tear off the arms of anyone who argued her point... it'd been rather humiliating for the Fifth Year Beater who'd found himself hanging in his underwear from the ceiling, and realizing that the perpetrator was not only a little girl, but also scary enough that none of his friends were willing to try and help him out.
She was a nice enough girl, but she could be rather intimidating when she set her mind to it.
Hermione rather approved of it.
Harry started fidgeting again, causing Hermione to groan in frustration at having to repeat herself.
"It's legal in several-"
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A/n: Yes, this is technically a Harry/Ginny fic. And it shows one of the few ways I can accept Ginny "getting over" her crush on the Boy-Who-Lived only to rush into Harry's arms at first sign of interest.
A fangirl does not a good lover make, and unless we're provided with definite proof of character development from her side of things – which can't be done whilst sticking to Harry's POV – I won't see her as anything more.
Anyway, I wrote this fic in no small part as a response to all the 'Neville is the BWL stories' in which Neville proves himself utterly incapable of handling the pressure that Harry did, leaving a neglected Harry to save the day.
Actually writing it however has been something of a pain in the neck, in large part due to the fact that I wanted to make the idea of Neville being the BWL justice, meaning that bashing and stupid jokes weren't allowed.