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"Sleep well?" asked Mel as Hermione and Draco walked up to the door that had already appeared.

"Surprisingly," answered Hermione.

"Good, lets get started then." She opened the door to the room of requirements and stepped onto the cliff just inside, waiting for Hermione and Draco to enter before closing the door.

"So, what now?" asked Draco as the ground began to shake. "What the bloody-"

"Jump!" shouted Hermione just as the ground split beneath them. "They're testing us!"

"Bloody hell, could've told me that," grumbled Draco as he jumped. When he didn't come back down, he didn't have to ask to know that Hermione was holding him up. Out of nowhere, Mel showed up, the grass around her catching fire as she formed fireballs in her hands.

Draco extended his arms, thinking fast to form water droplets around him from the moisture in the air. He hurled the water at Melissa, extinguishing the fire in her hands. Hermione then set Draco on the plateau with the small lake, which was nearly dried up. He looked at it pathetically as rocks began to fall.

"Mione, I don't have enough water here," he protested

"Try to make it rain," she shouted back, slicing rocks with razor sharp slashes of wind and wandless magic. He sighed. Yeah, make it rain in the dry canyon, that was easy for them to say. He concentrated hard and it began to sprinkle.

"That's all you can do?" asked Hermione skeptically, a laugh creeping into her voice.

"It's too bloody dry up here!" he shouted back. "There's water at the bottom!"

"Draco, jump!" shouted Hermione, panic in her tone. "Now! Draco, get off the cliff now!" Draco looked back just in time to see the searing white fire that leapt rapidly along the ground toward them.

Without thinking about how he would survive the fall, he leapt off the ledge to fall towards the clear, blue river below him. Looking back up, he saw the fire pass over him, his mind immediately flashing to Hermione. She hadn't jumped in time.

"Hermione!" he shouted as he fell. Just then, he saw Hermione fling herself, off the top of the cliff. He nearly died when he realized that she had actually dove head first off of the edge.

He began to move slower until he came to a complete stop, and Hermione appeared next to him with a smile.

"You didn't think I would let you fall, did you?" she asked skeptically. "I've been training hard for months. I don't die so easily."

"You scared me."

"Get your water quickly," she reminded him. "I don't like where we are, between two rather large, painful looking, masses of earth." She glanced nervously from side to side as she lowered herself and Draco down to the riverbank below." Draco tried to lift all the water.

"Mione, it's a bit heavy," he muttered, receiving an eye roll from Hermione.

"Like I said, make it rain!" she exclaimed, as a strong sense of stupidity hit Draco.

"Right," he mumbled as it began to sprinkle again, which then turned into a steady downpour. "Okay, up we go," he said as he lifted up off the riverbank. Hermione stared at him at shock.

"You can fly?"

"I can?" Realization dawned on him. "Bloody hell, I can."

"No fair," muttered Hermione, "I had to train for months in order to do that."

"I'm sorry," he replied, stifling a laugh. "You can have your pick of which elemental you want to take down as a consolation prize."

"I'll take Jake. My powers aren't really suited for going against Mel."

"Alright then, let's get on it." Hermione nodded and went in search of Jake. Finally, she located him and landed.

"Good," he said, a smile playing at his lips as he twirled his preferred weapon, twin blades as black as darkest night, "I like a challenge."

"You'll get more than that." Hermione raised her arm, as if showing some invisible ailment, and she felt the cool wind form around it. When she was certain that it was ready, she launched herself at Jake. With narrow, calculated swings, she thrust her weapon at him, dodging his own blades, which he swung with quick, precise thrusts.

Narrowly avoiding the masses of sharp earth that tried to capture her on its point, she slashed at Jake, just barely catching with face with the tip of her invisible blade. A long streak of red appeared on Jake's surprised face, a single drop of blood dripping to the ground beneath him.

"I see," he said, recovered from his shock. "You've made a blade of wind, haven't you? Clever, but it won't work again. You forget that I use blades myself. I won't underestimate you twice."

She smiled. "Perfect, I like a challenge." And she swung at him again, sending powerful slashes of wind toward him as she avoided the spikes of earth that tried to reach her.

Seeing a chance for victory, she allowed the wind to push her rapidly to him, tackling him to the ground, binding his wrists where they were, preventing him from using his blades, her legs straddled over his stomach, wind blade at his neck, hand just above his head, poised for wandless magic.

"It appears that I am at your mercy," he said.

"Should I deliver the finishing blow?"

Silence followed her threatening words for several moments before grins broke out on both of their faces and Hermione lifted herself off of Jake.

"Tell me Mione," asked Jake with a laugh as they headed back to where Melissa and Draco would be, "do you always straddle your opponents so seductively?"

"I don't and you know it! The only way to keep you from spiking me was to make sure that you were under me!"

"I don't know," he replied with a shrug, "you might have something for me."

"Maybe I really should have delivered that finishing blow after all."

"Naw, I know the truth," he replied, lifting his hands in defeat. "But where did you learn that? We didn't teach that to you."

"There are some things that only the one controlling the element can learn. I mean, who knows the wind better than I do?"

"Good point."

"That couldn't have been all that you've got though." Jake shook his head, effortlessly twirling his blades in each hand, though it was a subconscious gesture and he probably didn't even notice that he did it.

"No, my other 'gifts' are too dangerous to use on a comrade."

"Like what?" she asked as they walked across the bridge of earth that Jake had made across the canyon.

"Well, telepathy doesn't just come as hearing the thoughts of others. As you've probably noticed, I can have others hear me if I wish it."

"Right."

"Well once, I tried to go farther into somebody's mind, and it drove them insane. Once I realized what I was doing, I stopped immediately, but it was too late. The damage had already been done. It scared me, knowing what I could do to a person."

"What happened?"

"He killed himself the next day."

"Well, that's dangerous alright."

"And the worst part is, I think I could go farther if I really tried."

"I find myself thinking about this a lot, actually," said Hermione pensively. "I mean, we're dangerous. We could easily kill, and we don't even need a wand to do it."

"I know what you mean," replied Jake solemnly. "It's how I discovered my powers, actually. Because I'd forgotten my wand, and I was pulled off into some alley by a man who wanted to mug me. He had a knife to my throat and was going to kill me. All I remember thinking was that I didn't want to die, and the next thing I knew, a spike had come from the ground, killed the man and gone back."

"Wow."

"You just have to be careful not to lose yourself, because our powers are linked directly to our emotions. It would be dangerous for us to lose control.

"I think it will be more difficult on you," he continued. "I mean, Mel and I don't really know anyone here, and we're only really close to you and Draco. We don't have cause to lose control of our emotions. Plus, we're used to seeing death. Our pasts are too dark. Draco, on the other hand, also isn't really close to anyone either. By nature, he is a cold person; he was raised to not care for anyone. His only weakness is you. But you, Hermione, are too caring. I'm afraid of what might happen to you if you see something that you can't bear, you especially."

"Why?"

"Because, Hermione, you are the strongest elemental out of all of us."

"No I'm not," she protested. "I can't be."

"But you are," insisted Jake. "You have the gift of wandless magic and you have the most potential. I think that if something set you off, you could be positively lethal."

Silence greeted his words, for Hermione could not debate him. Thinking of Draco and her friends, she realized that she was vulnerable. If anything ever happened to someone that she truly cared deeply for, she couldn't say what would happen.

The glint of his blades glinted once again, catching her attention, and she wondered where they had come from.

"I created them," he said, replying to her thought. "When Mel and I were still traveling. They were for protection, after we had been attacked. I realized that I didn't want to reveal what I was to just anyone, so I formed them out of the harder materials of the earth. I like them though. They give me a sense of safety."

"Speaking of Mel, I've been wondering, Jake," she said. "How did she discover her powers? I've never heard her talk about it before."

Jake's expression turned grim and he thought for a moment before speaking again.

"Melissa's story is really terrible," he finally said. "She didn't tell me exactly until I had seen it in her nightmares. You see, Mel used to have frequent nightmares when we were traveling together and when I didn't know how to control my telepathy, I caught glimpses of them. They were always filled with fire and cold, shrill screams. I didn't know until she told me, but the screams in her nightmares belonged to her family.

"You probably know that sometimes, an elemental gets their powers much like that of a witch or wizard-through spontaneous bursts of said power, though they are usually triggered by something." Hermione nodded to show her understanding.

"Well, once, Mel was really upset with her family-mind you, this was just before she got her powers-and she was thinking about how angry they made her. Well, her anger was the trigger, and her family became the target. Melissa's past is so dark, because she killed her own family with her powers."

"But magical beings can't be killed by fire."

"Melissa is actually a muggle born witch, though it still wouldn't matter. Mel's fire is much like hell fire-it burns through anything and everything.

"That night, she killed her parents and little sister and ran away, afraid of her own powers. Then, after time, she searched us out so that we wouldn't have to go through the same thing."

"I had no idea."

They approached Draco and Melissa, Hermione's eyes immediately going to Mel's short frame. Mel must have known the look that she received, for her eyes darted from Jake to Hermione and back to Jake again before comprehension verified itself and she turned out of the room, her emerald eyes filled with horror.

Jake's usually tan featured blanched and he ran after her, not bothering to offer an excuse.

"Mel, please stop!" he called after her, but she kept running. "Mel, you know running won't help!" At these words, she slowed her pace until she came to a complete stop and she turned on Jake.

"How could you tell her?" she demanded. "Now she probably thinks that I'm some kind of horrible person!"

"You're not, and Hermione knows it."

"I killed my own family Jake."

"And it was an accident. You can't keep beating yourself up about it."

"I don't"

"Don't even try to lie to me Melissa," he said brusquely. "I know you better than anyone. I know you still cry yourself to sleep sometimes. I know that you trained Mione, thinking that if you had had the same training, then your family might still be alive. You still blame yourself, and we both know it."

"Well, it's true!" she exclaimed. "I did kill my family! It's my fault, and I deserve to suffer for it." As she said these words, something in Jake's usually cheerful demeanor changed. He was no longer just the concerned friend, but his eyes spoke of something more as he hesitantly stepped closer to her.

"Do you really believe that?" The pain in his deep blue eyes betrayed the calmness of his voice.

"Someone like me deserves to die," she verified.

Jake's words and actions were no longer clam as he pulled Melissa to him, wrapping her in his arms.

"Please don't say that," he said. "Don't do this to me Mel."

"I won't lie to you. I don't des-" Her words were cut short, the pressure of jakes lips on hers preventing her from speaking. As Mel's shock wore off, she found her eyes closing as she tentatively kissed him back. Her hands tangled in his hair as she brought herself closer to him.

His lips trailed gently along her jaw, brushing softly against her neck. She let out a soft moan of pleasure as Jake kissed her fears away. For the moment, it was just the two of them.

And then she remembered. She couldn't be with him. She couldn't allow this to go any farther. Jake stopped abruptly at her sudden thought, and he knew.

"I can't do this Jake," she said.

"Why not Mel?"

"It's not fair to you. You deserve better than me."

"I don't care what I deserve, all I want is you. What's stopping you?"

She looked away, unable to answer his question.

"Let me in Mel, let me help you."

"You can't help me anymore Jake. Nobody can." Silence followed as comprehension flowed into his deep blue eyes. She would never be with him.

"It's a shame that you won't let anyone try to help you forget," he said quietly, turning from her, "because there are plenty of people willing."

And he left her there, as her grief consumed her. Collapsing to a broken heap on the floor, she sobbed silently, speaking softly to herself.

"What have I done?"

A/N: So that's the end of this chapter. I hope you enjoyed it. And remember, drop me a review =D