Chapter Six: Starting the Assignment

Harry was sitting in the Great Hall eating lunch with his two best friends. It had been a couple of days since Voldemort accepted to help him kill the Headmaster.

Merlin. Just thinking about the idiot made Harry want to walk up to the Heads' table and kill Dumbledore. Unfortunately though, there were two problems with that: One he would reveal the fact that he would become a Death Eater after the holidays, and two he would cement the fact that most people thought he was crazy. You're lucky, Dumbledore, Harry thought. Very lucky that I don't kill you right now even though I seriously want to.

"Harry?" a voice whispered. Harry turned toward the direction the voice came from and saw Hermione. She had a worried look on her face. "Are you okay?" she asked him.

He nodded. She didn't look convinced with his answer, so he decided to reassure her. "Don't worry about me so much, 'Mione. I really am okay. I was just thinking about something." Hermione smiled at him and turned back to the piece of parchment in front of her. He told me to see if she was one of them. She has to be one of them. She just has to, he thought. After thinking this, he decided to leave the Great Hall unnoticed. Unfortunately for him, Ron decided right then to look up at his friend.

"Where are you going, Harry?" he asked as Harry cursed him mentally for being so damn curious.

"I'm just going back up to the common room to rest for a while," he told him. Ron nodded as he turned back to his plate full of food, staring at it hungrily.

As he walked away from Gryffindor table, he hoped to Merlin that Ron wasn't one of the ones Voldemort told him about. When he was outside the Great Hall, he turned to walk in the direction he wanted to go.

A few minutes later, he was standing in front of the place he used a lot the past couple of days to think. He paced in front of it, thinking, I need a place to think on my own. He repeated that thought over and over again until a huge elm door with swirling designs appeared. After checking to see that no one followed him, Harry entered the Room of Requirement. Inside was a red chair that was completely identical to the one that was in the Gryffindor common room, a blazing fire, a sketch pad with a pencil, and a mirror that was a few inches taller than Harry. On the walls were drawings of people he knew and complete strangers he saw during the years he spent with the Dursleys. He smiled for the first time since he found out the truth about Dumbledore. He grabbed the sketch pad and pencil and he started to draw. Drawing was what helped him to think. That was something no one knew about and Harry wanted to keep it that way. He started drawing a mark that he had seen in one of the dreams that he had last night. It looked like the Dark Mark, but, instead of a normal one headed snake protruding from the skull's mouth, it was a three headed snake. Suddenly, he was startled by a noise coming from outside the room. A knock maybe? Harry stood up, placed his opened sketch pad on the chair, and pulled out his wand. He slowly tiptoed towards the door as he called out, "Who's there?"

"Harry? It's just me," a female voice called back. When he finally reached the door, he opened the door a little bit. He peeked through the small crack and his emerald green eyes connected with chocolate brown ones. He opened the door more and saw Hermione. She pulled him into a hug. Harry was confused.

"What the hell, 'Mione? I just came here to think," he told her, "and oxygen is necessary." Hermione let go. Her face was turned a red that was somewhat darker than crimson but lighter than the darkest red.

"I'm sorry about that, Harry. Ron and I decided to see if you really were in the common room, but when we didn't see you there, I got really worried. So I ran around the castle looking for you, but then I remembered that you sometimes come here to think so I came here and..." Harry put a finger on her lips, and she stopped talking. Her blush spread to her ears.

"I want to show you something, 'Mione. First, you have to promise not to tell anyone about it. I mean anyone." Hermione nodded. Then he took her hand and brought her over to the red chair. He picked up the sketch book and gave it to her. "Go ahead. Look in it," he urged.

Hermione looked through the sketches. Her look of relief changed to a look of amazement. "You really drew all of these, didn't you?"

Harry nodded. He knew that he looked like a little leaguer that hit his first homer.

"Why didn't you tell Ron and me before?"

"I just didn't want anyone to know that I draw to think and calm down." She flipped through the drawings. When she got to the last one, her face paled. Harry looked worried now. "What is it, 'Mione?" he asked.

"Nothing. It's just that I've seen this mark somewhere before. I'm just not sure where." Harry shrugged.

"Maybe you've seen it in you're dreams because I've seen it in mine." Maybe it's that mark Voldemort was talking to me about.

"Maybe you're right. I have been dreaming about a lot of things lately. Especially about that vision I saw a while back."

"Can you see that person's face any clearer now?"

Hermione shook her head. "It's blurred completely now which is really weird. It was clearing up as time went on, but now..." She trailed off to let Harry imagine it. She looked away from him.

Harry put his hand on her shoulder. "You'll probably see his face when it happens."

Hermione looked back at him. "How can you be so sure, Harry?"

A small smirk lit up Harry's face. "I just can, Hermione. I just can," he said mysteriously. He felt Hermione shiver. The small smirk disappeared. "Are you cold, 'Mione?"

"A little bit, but we have to leave now. Ron's waiting for us in the common room." Harry nodded as he lifted his hand from her shoulder. Hermione put Harry's sketch pad back on the chair, leaving it open to the mysterious mark he drew before she came in, and they left the room together. As they left, Harry knew that he must start the mission again during the holiday break.