Ginny's Easter break wasn't fun filled in the slightest. The family were still reeling from Ron's death, and there was an empty feeling in the house without him. For Ginny, who'd never lived without Ron in her life, his absence was hard to deal with. She spent hours up in his room, crying over the brother she'd lost thanks to the dark.

Ginny had been hoping the holidays would give her a chance to talk tactics with Bill and Charlie, but for most of the holidays her brothers were elusive and always disappearing. It was only on the last afternoon of the holidays, when Ginny was sitting down beside the lake where Ron had died, that Bill and Charlie approached her to talk about their future plans.

"Whatever we do, we have to be careful," Bill warned his little sister. "The rest of the family want to stay out of things, but we can't let this go."

"Mum won't just sit back and do nothing," Ginny argued. Her other brothers and her father might be happy to pretend that Ron wasn't killed, but she knew her mother wasn't the sort to let injustices stand.

"Mum's in no fit state to do anything right now," Charlie replied. Since Ron's death, Molly had been like a zombie sleepwalking her way through life, and while they all hoped she would regain some of her old spark, she wasn't anywhere near that stage yet.

"So what are we going to do?" Ginny asked.

"You're going to keep out of trouble and not give Harry and Hermione a reason to come after you," Bill began. "I know it will be hard," He added as Ginny opened her mouth to protest. "But just get to the end of the year without interacting with them."

"I can do that," Ginny admitted. To be honest it was pretty much what she planned on doing until she could think of some way of paying them back for what had happened to Ron. "But I still want to get the pair of them."

"And we will," Charlie reassured his sister.

"So what's the plan?" Ginny repeated.

"First, we want to see if we can find Remus," Bill answered. "He hasn't been seen since the attack on Grimmauld Place, and even though we're assuming the dark have him, we don't know for certain. Charlie and I have started the search, and we'll continue it while you're at school."

"Then what?" Ginny asked.

"Then we have to figure out what to do with You-Know-Who," Charlie answered. "We already know he can't be killed thanks to his Horcruxes, and since we lost the two we did have, we're never going to get them all and destroy them."

"But we can kill everyone else, his wife, children and grandson," Ginny argued.

"We can," Bill agreed. "But before we can even think about taking them out, we need to render You-Know-Who useless. If we just kill his family as things stand, he'll come after us and none of us will survive."

"We need him incapacitated," Ginny said thoughtfully. "If we can trap him somehow, the rest of his family will be easy pickings."

"Don't get too ahead of yourself, Ginny," Charlie warned. "Yes, You-Know-Who is a problem, but the rest of his family are no pushovers. They're not going to be easy to take out, even if we have removed him from the picture."

"Although before we even think about taking anyone out, we need to find a way to hold You-Know-Who captive somewhere," Bill said. "Until we can get him into a trap of some kind, we can't touch his family."

"We'll think of something, I know we will," Ginny said with confidence.

"Of course we will," Bill agreed. "The dark do have a weakness, and that is their ego. They think they're untouchable. They're so smug and so sure that no-one can bring them down. But we're going to prove otherwise. It might take us a while, but we're going to bring their entire family crashing down. We will wipe out the dark, and we will never stop fighting."

With her brothers filling her in on their plans, Ginny felt much better. And even though returning to school and ignoring Harry and Hermione was going to be hard, she could do it. She could play the long game, and just when Harry, Hermione and their family got complacent, they would strike. The war was far from over, and the light side were a long way from giving up the fight. They would wrestle back control of the wizarding world, even if it took them years to eradicate Voldemort and his dark forces.


C.O.T.D.


Even though Hermione was looking forward to returning to Hogwarts, she was still nervous as she boarded The Hogwarts Express after the Easter break. It felt like every single student was watching her as she walked down the train with Harry and Draco. Keeping her head held high, Hermione greeted the few people who spoke and reassured the couple of people who asked that she was doing great and was feeling no ill effects from her hospital stay. Finally, they reached the compartment that their friends had already grabbed and Hermione disappeared into the compartment, out of the view of all the gossiping students.

"I wish people would stop staring," Hermione grouched as she settled down in a spare seat.

"People like nothing better than to gossip," Daphne remarked as Harry sat down beside her and gave her a peck on the cheek.

"Just ignore them, they'll soon get bored," Draco said, joining Hermione and throwing an arm around her shoulder.

"Yeah, they'll find someone else to talk about before long," Blaise agreed.

"Let's hope so," Hermione muttered.

Thankfully, her friends didn't spend too long dwelling on the fact she was back, and as the train set off back up to Scotland it was like she'd never been away. Nestled happily against Draco, Hermione spent most of the journey sitting back and enjoying the company of her friends. She also watched the way Harry and Daphne were interacting, and was pleased to see that their romance seemed to be coming along swimmingly. Blaise and Luna also seemed closer than ever, and only poor Theo was left on his own.

"I think we need to find Theo a girlfriend," Hermione whispered to Draco, once she was sure Theo was too distracted by a game of exploding snap he was playing with Harry and Blaise to overhear them.

"Why?" Draco asked with a frown.

"Because he's the only single one in the group," Hermione pointed out.

"Vince and Greg don't have girlfriends," Draco argued.

"But they don't spend as much time with us," Hermione retorted. "Poor Theo is going to start feeling out of place among all us couples."

"And just who are you going to set him up with?" Draco asked. "The only available witch I can think of is Pansy, and she's already tried to ensnare Theo."

"I wouldn't inflict Pansy on him, I like Theo," Hermione replied. "And there has to be someone out there for him. Leave it to me, and I'll find Theo the perfect girl."

"If you say so," Draco said, knowing it was better not to argue with Hermione. If she wanted to find Theo a girlfriend, who was he to stop her.

"I do say so," Hermione said, her mind already running through the girls at Hogwarts as she tried to find a suitable one for Theo.

By the time they reached Hogsmeade station, Hermione still didn't have anyone in particular in mind to set Theo up with, but she wasn't going to give up. She would find him a girlfriend in time, but right now her focus was back on her return to Hogwarts.

"Are you okay?" Draco asked Hermione as they disembarked from the train and she paused to take in the sight of the castle, looming over Hogsmeade.

"Just a bit nervous for some reason," Hermione admitted.

"You've got nothing to be nervous about," Harry said as he gave his aunt a quick hug. "No-one will cause trouble. They wouldn't dare."

Of course Harry was right, and there wasn't even a hint of trouble as Hermione settled back into school. The majority of people ignored her return, and those that acknowledged the fact she was back seemed genuinely happy to see her. One of those people happy to see her was Neville, and much to Hermione's surprise he greeted her with a hug in the middle of the Great Hall.

"It's so good to have you back, Hermione," He said with a shy smile.

"It's good to be back, Neville," Hermione replied. "And thank you for your get well messages. Harry said that you were always asking after me."

"I was worried about you," Neville replied with an embarrassed shrug. "You've always been nice to me, Hermione."

"That's because you're my friend, Neville," Hermione said with a smile. She really was happy that Neville hadn't fully joined the Order as she would hate to think of the sweet boy she'd always liked as an enemy.

While Neville was happy to have Hermione back, one person who didn't seem as thrilled with Ginny. Even though she never uttered a word, the redheaded witch spent the entire meal glaring at Hermione hatefully. For her part, Hermione ignored Ginny and chatted to Harry and Neville, and on occasions she gave Ginny her coldest stare which seemed to rattle the younger witch somewhat.

"Can you believe she hasn't said a word?" Hermione asked Harry as they left the Great Hall and headed up to Gryffindor Tower not far behind Ginny.

"She's been like this since her return," Harry replied. "We did have one run in, on her first day back where I warned her off."

"Maybe she heeded the warning," Hermione suggested, even though she didn't quite believe it. Ginny was far too stubborn to be warned off, even if Harry had managed to scare her.

"I'd like to think so, but I don't quite believe it," Harry said, voicing just what Hermione was thinking. "I think she's lulling us into a false sense of security."

"Do you think she has something planned?" Hermione asked.

"I don't know, but we should stay alert," Harry replied. "Let's not give her the opportunity to take us by surprise."

"We'll keep an eye on her," Hermione vowed as the pair headed into Gryffindor Tower.

Once in Gryffindor Tower, talk of Ginny and what she could be planning went out of the window. Settling down beside the fire, Hermione played wizard's chess with Neville, while on the other side of the fire, Harry talked quidditch with Dean and Seamus. There was still one more match to go in the season, and as always the title was going to go to either Gryffindor or Slytherin.

"We have to win this year," Harry said firmly.

After kicking Ginny off the team, he'd replaced her with Seamus, who worked well with Dean and Alicia. In actual fact, Seamus fitted into the trio better than Ginny had done and Harry was regretting not picking the Irishman at the initial try-outs. Maybe if he had, Gryffindor would have already won the cup and he wouldn't have to think about Slytherin taking the prize for the second year in a row.

"We can do it," Seamus said confidently. "Slytherin are good, but we're better."

Harry had to agree with Seamus. Even though Draco had built a solid team, they lacked the flair his three chasers had. Theo and Astoria were both good chasers, but their third one, a fourth year, was average at best. And in Slytherins last match, Harry had sensed that their third chaser was reluctant to pass to Astoria. It was as though he didn't want to be outscored by a girl. Then there was the fact that Astoria's presence on the team wasn't as shocking anymore. Everyone knew she was playing and as such, her presence didn't distract like the way it had the previous year when she'd gotten a last minute place on the team.

"Even so, I think we should have some extra practices," Harry said.

"I'm sure Slytherin will be doing the same thing," Dean pointed out.

"Not if their captain is otherwise engaged," Harry replied with a smirk as he glanced over to where Hermione was sitting with Neville. He couldn't be sure, but given the fact she'd been away for several weeks, he was betting she and Draco would be spending a lot of time together, meaning his friend wouldn't have a lot of spare time to think about quidditch.

"You're going to get Hermione to distract Malfoy?" Dean asked. "Would she do that?"

"She will if she doesn't realise what she's doing," Harry answered. "Just don't mention quidditch where Hermione is. Since she doesn't play, she'll forget about the final matches and won't mind spending time with Draco when he should be practising."

"And won't Malfoy think about extra practices?" Seamus asked. "He won't just forget in order to spend time with Hermione."

"I don't know, I would," Dean said admiringly as he watched Hermione laugh happily at something Neville had said. "She's pretty fit."

"Exactly, and Draco is head over heels for her," Harry replied. "Believe me, if it's a choice between quidditch and Hermione, Draco will pick Hermione every time. This is it, boys, this is our chance to win the quidditch cup."

Sharing happy grins with Dean and Seamus, Harry just hoped he was right. He really wanted to win the quidditch cup, and it really felt as though this was his year. Now all he had to do was wait and see if fate smiled on him. After all, a lot had gone their way this year so it would only be right if he won the quidditch cup in his first year as captain, just as Draco had the year before.