Chapter Eighteen; Felix Felicis

"Oh my God!" Ginny cried before quickly mounting up on Angelica. "C'mon girl! We have to get back to Harry and the others!" she exclaimed before clicking her tongue against her teeth and giving her sides a soft kick. Angelica let out a rather loud whinny before rearing up into the air and starting to gallop away. Meanwhile Harry, Ron, Hermione, and the rest of their families were busy coming out of the house breaking into coughing fits.

"Ginny! Where's Ginny!?" Harry cried when suddenly he heard a scream inside the woods. "Ginny!" he hollered on the top of his lungs before he ran inside after her.

"Harry no! Come back!" his mother called but it was already too late.

"Don't worry, I'll go after him." Severus assured his wife before he darted away with Ron and Hermione chasing after him. "What on earth are you two doing!? This is dangerous!" he cried.

"Since when has that ever stopped us?" Ron questioned him as he heaved a heavy sigh and rolled his eyes.

"Oh very well but stick with me and do exactly what I say!" he ordered while at the same time Harry had managed to catch up to Ginny where Bellatrix Lestrange held her at wandpoint.

"Lookie here, I have Harry Snape's precious little girlfriend." She said with a sneer as Harry saw bright red flash before his eyes as his insides started to boil with anger.

"LET HER GO!" he hollered on the top of his lungs while Ginny continued to squeal and struggle to get away from her grasp but Bellatrix just simply placed a hand over her mouth and covered it.

"Oh I'll let her go, as soon as you agree to come with me to the dark lord." She told him when suddenly Harry couldn't take it anymore. She had already killed his godfather, she wasn't going to let her kill the one girl that meant more to him than anything in the universe. Harry raised his wand, but before he could open his mouth to say anything he heard a familiar voice behind him.

"Expelliarmus!" his father cried as Harry watched the wand shoot out of her hand and into his. "Ms. Weasley, if you please." He said waving his hand over to her while she quickly ran over to them and embraced Ron. Bellatrix scowled at them.

"This isn't over!" she spat before she disapparated and Snape turned over to look at the others.

"Is everyone alright?" he asked them as they all nodded.

"Yeah." Ron replied.

"Good, because I'm going to kill you, now c'mon." he told them before he turned around and started walking away. "There's a safe place for us at the church." He said.

"Really? Then it won't look too good on your permanent record if you commit manslaughter." Ron told him.

"Don't be ridiculous Weasley, I'm not really going to kill you. I just said that_ well,.. because, because I was_" he began.

"Worried about us?" Ron finished for him as Snape rolled his eyes again and turned his head away from him.

"Yeah." He muttered under his breath.

"Well gosh Snape, I didn't know that I meant that much to you." Ron said.

"You don't, I'm always worried about you." Snape told him with a sly grin that let him know that he was teasing him. "C'mon you four let's go." He said continuing to grin down at them before giving Ron a rough noogie.

"Ouch! Hey! Stop it what are you doing!?" he yelled.

"I'm giving you affection." Snape told him with a chuckle.

"Well stop it! It hurts!" he cried.

"Well,.. love hurts." He told him as Harry thought he saw a man standing beside them and quickly glanced over his shoulder to find that nobody was standing there.

…

Once Harry and his friends had gotten back to school, Hermione had a rather pleasant surprise waiting for her. Neville, who had stayed at Hogwarts for the Christmas break had kept Crookshanks for her in the Gryffindor common room. "Crookshanks!" Hermione exclaimed excitedly while she bent over and hoisted him up inside her arms and hugged him tightly. "Oh I never thought that I would see you again!" she exclaimed as Ron turned over to Harry.

"Neither did I, and I was really hoping and praying that I wouldn't." he whispered inside his ear. That's when suddenly Harry remember his promise to himself and dug deep inside his pocket for the bottle of liquid luck.

"Are you really going to drink that?" Hermione asked him.

"I don't think that I have much choice. It's the only way to get the information from Slughorn." He told her.

"Just be careful Harry." She told him as he tilted his head back and gulped it down.

"So, how do you feel?" Ron asked him as he lowered his head and grinned proudly at him.

"Brilliant." He told him. "In fact I don't think that I've been happier in my whole entire life, let's go see Hagrid." He said before he turned around and started walking away while Ron and Hermione exchanged looks at each other.

"Hi!" Harry exclaimed brightly as he passed another student on his way to the portrait hole before Ron and Hermione took after him. "After we go see Hagrid I think we should go into the woods and see the fairies dancing, and after that we can ride unicorns and hit Vegas!" he cried on their way outside.

"Take it easy mate you're scaring me." Ron told him before turning to look over at Hermione. "Why is he acting so weird?" he asked her.

"One of the side effects to the luck potion, the toxic inside of it causes the drinker to behave_"

"Drunk?" Ron questioned.

"Yeah, that's pretty much it." He told her and once they arrived at Hagrid's hut, they found him sitting down on top of his steps sobbing hysterically.

"What is it Hagrid? What happened?" she asked him as he gave out a very large sniff and rubbed his nose.

"Aragog's dead." He replied as he turned over to look at them through his teary eyes.

"Well then that's good isn't it? I mean that thing was a monster!" Ron exclaimed as Hagrid just simply looked at him while Harry elbowed him in the chest.

"Pay no attention to him Hagrid, he's just being insensitive." Hermione said.

"Yeah, I know how it feels like when an animal that you love dies." Harry told him.

"Thanks you guys, I really appreciate it." Hagrid began with another sniff. "Do you want to come to Aragog's memorial service?" he asked them.

"Let me get this straight," Ron began. "you want us to come to a memorial service for a spider?" he questioned him with uncertainty but Harry decided to quickly change the subject.

"Maybe later Hagrid." Harry began. "Right now, we were wondering if you have seen Professor Slughorn." Harry said when suddenly as if on que, he stepped outside.

"What about me?" he questioned him.

"Listen Professor, I've got to tell you something. Something that I should have told you a long time ago. Something that other people have only guessed at. I'm the chosen one. Only I can destroy Voldemort, but in order to do that I need to know every bit of information that you know about magic. You have to be brave like my mother did when she refused to step aside for him the night we both got our scars. Otherwise, we survived for nothing." He told him when suddenly raised his wand and pointed it at his forehead.

"Please don't think bad of me when you see it. You have to realize that I didn't have any clue what he was capable of back then." He explained as Harry removed the empty vile out of his pocket and caught his memory inside of it.