"Your move." The small ivory rook slid up a few spaces and rested just next to an obsidian knight.
"Are you going to be this predictable the entire time?" An obsidian pawn moved forward on the other side of the board to challenge an ivory pawn.
"Hey, I'm not the one with the ability to see the future, so stay out of my head." An ivory knight moved forward, claiming one of the obsidian pawns.
The board that the two men were playing on seemed to hover between them and then rested on a large pedestal for a moment as the chairs formed between them. It had been a while since either had enjoyed a game of chess and it was interesting for the two to sit with one another and simply enjoy the game. Harry stared at the board in concentration, not even looking at his white robed male companion as he considered each of the moves that he could make. Unlike when he would usually play with Ron, he actually cared about this game and was having fun simply figuring out how this man played.
The game had started as a way of getting into an easy conversation with the older man that was seated across from him, but after a while Harry learned that he was rather enjoying himself. The old man wore pure white robes with several layers of draping and a manicured white beard that bristled around his chin hiding his neck. He held his cool green eyes on the chess board as Harry reached out and pushed one of his bishops up to challenge his king.
"Check. I hope that I didn't cause any problems between you and your wife earlier." Harry kept his eyes on the chess board as he spoke, as both understood that it was not meant out of disrespect.
"Of course not, Harry. We have come to an understanding over the years. She has her projects and I do not interject myself into it." He slid the rook to intercept the bishop, making the piece vanish from the board.
"Although I will hazard a guess that you know what's been going on all along." Harry slid another piece across the board and a rook disappeared in a wisp of smoke.
The old man chuckled as a piece moved on the board on its own, making another vanish. "Yes, not much does escape my notice. I let my wife have her fun though; she knows enough of what I've done in the past."
"Yes, I seem to remember her cursing a cow at one point." Harry smiled. The easy banter was not meant to offend the other, simply used as a means of conversation that the two had easily fallen into.
"Now that was a simply misunderstanding, I'll tell you." The old man slid another piece over the board, not really caring now that the board was dominated by ivory pieces and the obsidian ones were disappearing faster.
"I did have a question, more like a curiosity, that your wife and daughters were never able to answer for me." Harry slid an ivory pawn up the board to challenge the obsidian queen.
"My wife did mention that you might have a lot of questions regarding your destiny and such, so ask and I will answer what I can." The obsidian queen slid up the board and an ivory pawn vanished from the board.
"It was once said that Merlin was the greatest wizard alive, was he one of your special projects as well?" Harry slid a bishop into place and waited for an answer. He leaned back in the chair and stretched his arms over his head.
"He was one of mine, actually. Both Fate and Destiny thought that he would have a large role to play in the formation of the world and so he was taken for training." The man made his remaining rook slid up the board and takes another pawn.
"When do you suppose I'll get training as well?"
"You already have everything that you could possibly need; you just don't know it yet." The old man looked up from the chess board and over towards his left. "I need to go as do you. Oh…Checkmate."
XoXo
Harry felt slightly annoyed at the old man for getting the better of him as he felt the world around his swirl into nothing and then he could feel things again. He could feel the cool glass under his cheek that he had been laying down on, he could feel the frantic hand on his shoulder as it shook him harder with each passing second, and he could finally hear his name being called out as if from very far away.
"Harry!" The voice got closer with each call until it seemed that it was right next to his ear and yet still yelling. "HARRY!"
Jerking awake his wand came into his hand as he pushed up from the window and got a quick look around the compartment. The first thing he realized was that a girl was hanging upside down in front of him attempting to keep her skirt from flipping up over here head. The redhead looked rather cross with him as she glared down at him from her position, but she wouldn't say anything else. The other occupants of the compartment, now that he could see, were snickering softly into their hands. He noticed a few people missing, but figured they were off visiting with other friends and the such; those left in the compartment were the three Black girls, one of them upside down, and Luna.
"Put me down, this instant." Rachel roared and Harry was all too quick to let her gently down back to her feet.
"It's what you get for startling him like that." Luna smiled and her voice lost the usually present dreamy quality to it.
Rachel marched over to Harry standing over him with her hands outstretched. She seemed ready to harm him, but he smiled when he noticed a slight twitch to her eye and the calm breathing suddenly getting a little faster. As he watched her she groaned and forced her legs closed as she went to go sit down next to her sister. He raised an eyebrow a little as the rest of the compartment dissolved into giggles and open laughter. Once everyone had had their fill of laughing at Rachel, Harry turned to Luna to get a few answers.
"Where did the rest of the girls go?"
"Oh, Hermione went to the prefect meeting, Lavender and the Patils went off to find their own friends. They did say that they would be back though once they found the time." Luna twirled her wand expertly between her fingers while she was reading an article in The Quibbler. It always amazed Harry that she could do so many things at once and still hold a decent conversation.
"It feels weird, being on this train and sitting here. The last time I was on this train was as an Auror, and now I'm a student." Cassie stared in wonder around the compartment and then out the window silently.
"Oh, I hope everything is going to go all right." Claire wrung her hands sitting between her two new sisters. Rachel gently put a hand on her sister's shoulder as Harry came to kneel before all three of them.
"Listen, I pledged that I would protect all of you and I will do what I can." Harry looked from each of their eyes, making sure that he had their attention. "You sacrificed a lot, you three, so that you can come with us, but I'll be sure to make it up to you."
Luna smiled as she watched the exchange between Harry and the other girls. When he had moved from the bench near the window, she couldn't help but peek around the edge of her magazine and watch them. As Harry leaned in to hug the girls Luna tossed aside the magazine and made a jump into the pile, hugging all four of them at the same time, and sending them crashing down to the floor of the compartment laughing hysterically.
The door to the compartment slid open suddenly, causing the four people on the floor to freeze in anticipation. This had the added embarrassment of causing Harry to be at the bottom of the pile of girls with Luna's hand wound in the dark red hair of Rachel and her hand on Claire's thigh. The girls all looked up to the unexpected visitor hoping that they wouldn't start a rant immediately and allow them to right themselves. Thankfully, for everyone, the visitor was their bushy brown haired companion.
"If you four were going to have a nice little tickling session, then you should have waited for me." The sixth year prefect and shoe in for Head Girl locked the compartment door and jumped on the top of the pile, getting tangled almost immediately in someone's robes.
It took several more minutes before everyone was able to situated themselves back on the benches as well as untangle various articles of clothing. Somehow, and no one was going to admit to it, Hermione's robes had been tangled in Luna's foot, causing the blonde to fall down on top of her when Hermione tried to stand up. This also had the added effect of causing the cat-girl's tail, still hidden under complex disillusion and glamour charms, to slide along the blonde's thigh, eliciting a moan and a quick blush from both girls.
The others laughed at the embarrassment of the two, but quickly untangled everyone to sit back down on the benches that had lined the compartment. Just as everyone was starting to get settled in there was a tentative knock on the glass of the compartment. As the person nearest to the door, Harry moved to open it and received a shock as he looked at the person on the other side.
Draco Malfoy was always one to pride himself on his appearance and his outward show to the rest of the students and to the public at large. Standing on the other side of the compartment door was not what Draco Malfoy would have normally portrayed to anyone, not even his mother. His face was haggard with bags under his eyes and his hair seemed to be messed up quite a bit and even his robes were crumpled in places and pushed off to the side. Harry was so speechless when he opened the door that it took him a moment to realize that Draco was waiting for something.
"Can I help you?" Harry asked tentatively to the blonde before him.
"Potter, I need to talk to you about my mother." Draco's voice sounded horse, like he hadn't used it in years. Perking up at the sound of her son's voice, Harry could feel Claire move towards the door only to be held back by her sister with a firm hand; this was something they had talked about and tried to anticipate beforehand, but it was hard when the evidence was staring them in the face.
"Of course, Draco, please do come in." Harry stepped aside for the other boy to enter the compartment. If Malfoy hadn't of been in such a state he might have commented on the use of his first name and the fact that his arch nemesis had invited him in.
As Malfoy slumped down onto the bench next to the door he didn't seem to notice the shocked looks on the other girl's faces; in fact he seemed to barely notice that there was anyone else in the compartment at all. Luna and Hermione calmly slipped out of the still open door heading down the corridor telling Harry in whispers that this was more a family matter and they would just get in the way. Cassie tried to leave, but Rachel grabbed her hand and pulled her down to the bench next to Claire to hold the shaking girl. For his part, Harry moved to sit next to the blonde and to let him speak rather than forcing the issue.
"I never realized that running a family could be so much work. I haven't slept or eaten much in the past month and when I finally take a break I realize that I had forgotten all about my mother." Draco sighed heavily and collapsed back against the side of the compartment, groaning as he stared up at the ceiling. "What kind of son am I? I forgot everything about her from when the goblins told me that I had to manage the estate and take care of the rest of the family members."
"Draco, you had a lot put on you so quickly that I'm sure that anyone would have buckled under the pressure. All things considered you've held up remarkably well." Harry smiled as he put a tentative hand on the other boy's shoulder.
"How do you do it, Potter? By all intents and purposes you're the head of two families and don't nearly look as bad as I do." Draco chuckled slightly.
"Hey, one family I'm the only one left of and the Blacks pretty much manage themselves and as long as they're not killing each other I'm good." Harry tried to keep the pointed look away from Rachel, but she still looked saddened by what he had said. As a show of strength Harry reached over and gently took her hand in his, giving it a squeeze as he turned to address Draco again. "I'm sure that you're mother will be proud of you and what you've accomplished in a short amount of time."
"Do you know where she might have gone? The last time I saw her was at the will reading, and I've been so bogged down in family requests and payments and such that I haven't been able to send her an owl." Draco looked imploringly towards his formal rival and enemy, missing the look of intense pain that crossed one of the girls that was seated across from him.
"I think that I might know of way to get a message to her, Draco, but what would you want to say?" Harry was trying to get Draco to say something specific so that both people could help to move on from their past, but whether or not the boy would admit it was another issue.
"I don't really know. I had been so focused on simply finding her that I never thought about what I would actually say to her when I found her." He ran a hand through his hair and tried to straighten it out as he laughed again. "Look at me, a pureblood at a loss for words."
"Why don't you just say something from the heart, something that your mother would never expect coming from you?" Harry felt a reassuring squeeze from Rachel's hand that he was doing the right thing.
"I suppose I would tell her that I love her, and that I would not be joining any dark forces anytime soon. Gods, listen to me, whining to you like one of your Gryffindor friends." Draco ran a hand through his hair once more. "After seeing the drain on the family from what father had done, I have no intention of giving away our fortune to the Dark Lord anymore; I've decided to finally follow the family motto."
It was as if it was all planned out and well choreographed as Rachel lost her hold on her sister, Claire launched herself across the compartment and slammed into the confused blonde boy, sobbing into his chest, the entire time whispering. "My poor poor boy, mummy is here for you." Harry did his best to support Claire, gently patting her on the shoulder.
The action took less than a few seconds to complete, but it was still going on several minutes later when Draco had successfully rebooted his brain. He wasn't completely sure why a girl with blonde hair was crying on his shoulder or why the girl seemed to be saying that his mum was going to be fine. He rather enjoyed her being so close to him, the feeling of her body against his was rather nice until what she was saying registered in his head, and then he started to push her away.
"Wait, what are you doing?" Draco held the sobbing girl at arm's length and stared at her for a moment, doing a few double takes between her and Harry. "Potter, what the hell did you do to my mother?"