Chapter Eight: Never Let Go
The thing about Hogwarts, when maniacal murderers weren't plotting the demise of a certain student, was that time went quickly. Too quickly. Before Harry knew it, it was almost Christmas and he was standing at the front of a classroom, blinking in amazement at the amassed students before him.
How had he ended up here? Oh yeah, a joke with Daphne that his girlfriend had idly run with, then Astoria had picked it up and before he knew it Hermione was all over it too and it was too late to stop the runaway train of enthusiasm. Snape was doing an awful of job, which surprised literally no one, of fostering a helpful teaching environment for Defence Against the Dark Arts. So, when rumours appeared that the famous Harry Potter was suggesting that he lead a Defence class, plenty of people jumped at the chance. He was pretty sure he'd said no. In fact, he knew he had.
There'd been a couple of people there to find out about Cedric, a couple of Hufflepuffs mainly, and they'd left when he'd flat out refused to talk about it. He didn't even talk about it with Daphne, he certainly wasn't going to share with a bunch of nosey third years. Cho was there too. A pang of guilt always pulled at his heart when he saw her, not least because she always thanked him for bringing Cedric home.
"So, this week we're going to be wrapping up on everything we've learned so far." The class listened with a level of intenseness that Harry really wasn't sure he deserved. But every one of his, for want of a better word, students had started improving in Defence Against the Dark Arts. Snape was furious, a fact that made it completely worthwhile.
"I thought it might be fun to make it a tournament." He pointed to the parchment that had been pinned to the back of the door. People at the back craned their necks. "Split into your groups, we'll figure out the knockout rounds and then go from there. We go on the whistle, and you stop when you hear it again. Anyone who casts spells after the whistle goes is disqualified. Right, off you go."
The room was suddenly abuzz with excitement. The Weasley Twins had already volunteered to help with refereeing and were gleefully bossing their groups into semi-organised chaos. Harry, desperate not to show favouritism, had taken a group completely free of Ron, Hermione, Tracey or Daphne and instead was watching Ginny easily tear apart most of the competition.
"She's rather good, isn't she?" asked an airy voice Harry now knew to recognise as Luna Lovegood. The school's resident conspiracy enthusiast and all-around eccentric, Luna had been one of the first people to sign up to what people were calling Potter's Army (of nutters) - depending on who you spoke to. He preferred the Defence Club.
"I'd say so," Harry agreed as Ginny easily disarmed Katie Bell and Harry blew the whistle. "That's enough Ginny, you're through. Let's give someone else a chance."
Ginny beamed at him. Not for the first time, Harry wondered if the grin was a little too bright, remembering the girl who had hero-worshipped him during his time at the Burrow. It wasn't that she was shy anymore, it was the opposite.
"I've rather enjoyed your classes, Harry," Luna continued as Justin and Dean took to the small 'duelling platform' Harry had asked Hermione to hastily erect when he'd had the idea. It was nothing more than a bit of wood and hope, but it did the trick.
"Thanks, Luna. You're doing great." Which wasn't a lie. He'd been impressed by the diminutive witch.
"The Nargles seem to agree, they have been plaguing me far less."
"That's good," Harry said, before blowing his whistle as Justin stumbled out of the confines of the duelling area. His first strike of the night. Not bad.
"It's wonderful. And my shoes have stopped disappearing. I think they must be pleased with me."
That was definitely not something to be attributed to magical intervention, but rather Neville stumbling on some of his fellow Defence Clubbers one night on his rounds and promptly putting them all in detention before threatening to tell Harry and get them kicked out of the club. It didn't surprise Harry that Zacharias had been the ring leader, nor that Neville had told him anyway. If there was anyone whose fifth year was treating more than Neville then Harry hadn't met them.
The groups gave four victors each. From Harry's team Ginny, Neville, Dean and rather surprisingly Astoria's friend Penny, who had managed to tie Seamus in so many knots he'd fallen from the stage. Fred presented Hermione, Ron, Susan Bones and a determined Cho, while George gave him Daphne, Angelina, a Ravenclaw boy called Thomas, and a Slytherin girl Harry had never expected to see in his class. Pansy Parkinson glowered as everyone applauded her, but beneath the furrow of her brow, Harry could've sworn he'd seen a small smile.
Luna floated away to talk to Astoria, who greeted the young Ravenclaw with a fond hug, leaving Harry to focus on the task of refereeing the knockout rounds. It went by incredibly quickly until they were left with four. Parkinson, Hermione, Neville and Cho. Ron had been deftly beaten by Hermione, while Daphne - who despite improving at an incredible rate had never been a natural at Defence Against the Dark Arts - had been just a second too late with her shield charm and suffered defeat at Cho's hands.
A fact that contorted her face into a scowl that even Harry doubted he could shift.
Neville beat Cho narrowly, but the real battle came with Parkinson and Hermione, who threw everything she had at the Slytherin girl. The trouble was Hermione fought fair and expected to overwhelm Parkinson with a variety of spells. Parkinson didn't. After lulling Hermione into the rhythm of shield charms and stupefy, the only spell she'd used to that point, Parkinson changed tack as she pretended to miss the shield charm and instead dodged to the side and hit the wood beneath her with a reducto that splintered wood and caused Hermione to trip. Hermione attacked, Parkinson surged forwards and before Hermione knew what had happened her opponent had struck with a body-bind curse so effective that Hermione toppled from the stage.
The room was stunned. No one had expected Hermione to lose, not least the Gryffindor girl herself.
"Well, I didn't see that coming," Daphne confessed from beside Harry. She'd pulled herself up onto the desk that he'd been leaning on and had stopped looking like she wanted to throttle Cho in indignation.
"I don't think anyone did."
The final round was, rather unsurprisingly, incredibly tense. Parkinson was desperate to prove she was more than everyone assumed she was, while Neville needed to put his own personal demons to bed. Pansy, after all, had been bullying him for years and the boy hadn't been happy to see when she'd entered the classroom.
"What if it's a trap? What if she's spying for Snape or Malfoy?"
"What if it's not?" Harry had asked. "We can't treat them like they've treated you, Neville. Then we're just part of the problem."
After almost two minutes of frantic spellwork, it happened. Parkinson threw up a dark cloud of smoke, following it up with a burst of water from the edge of her wand, intending to do what she'd done to Hermione and ruin Neville's footing. When she followed up with a stupefy at chest height, the glee in her eyes was triumphant as something hit the wood. Harry was about to blow the whistle when a jet of red light and Neville's voice sounded from the cloud. Parkinson didn't even have time to dodge.
The smoke cleared and Neville was on one knee, his round face bright and his eyes filled with pride. Gryffindors surged forwards to pick him up and cheered as Daphne went over to rouse Parkinson. Harry, who was the only person close enough to hear them, was stunned to hear Daphne reassuring Parkinson.
"But I lost!"
"Beat Granger, didn't you? More than I managed." He heard Parkinson scoff. "C'mon, get up. No one likes a sore loser."
"Coming from you."
"I never said anyone liked me." From the floor, Harry saw Parkinson grin and then accept the hand Daphne offered her. It hadn't been that long ago that Parkinson had been threatening to hex Daphne at every chance she got. Whatever had happened at Slughorn's party had clearly changed that.
"Let's hear it for Neville," Harry called when the room quietened down briefly. There was a loud cheer and Neville, rather sheepishly, smiled at them. Hermione was closest to him and beaming with pride. That was something he'd have to unpack later. "As the winner, Neville, you get to choose what we move onto next."
Neville considered his options, then rather timidly said, "well, I've always wanted to learn how to do a Patronus."
Eyes turned to Harry expectantly. He should've been expecting that. "Okay. Sounds good to me."
"And who's gonna teach us that?" Smith. Daphne had suggested kicking him out of the group, but Harry refused. He wasn't going to preside over something that excluded people, not after years of Dudley doing just that to him. Everyone had a right to join, even if he didn't like them.
But that didn't mean he wouldn't enjoy embarrassing him every now and again. It wasn't hard to think of a memory. The Quidditch game. The heavens open. Daphne in his arms. The stag burst from his wand with practised ease and cantered around the room happily, before coming to a stop in front of Harry and bowing its head.
"That answer your question, Zach?" Daphne asked. Smith bristled. He hated being called 'Zach', never mind being humiliated by Harry.
"Right, Patronuses it is," Harry said, the question settled. He didn't bother to tell them that unless they had an actual Dementor it'd be nearly impossible to practice properly. Neville's face saw to that.
oOo
When they weren't practising Defence magic or trying desperately to keep up with their workload, Daphne found herself juggling actual dates and time with Harry and Tracey, who was struggling to deal with Blaise's continued existence.
"It's not that I hate him," Tracey said quietly the week before Slughorn's little shindig to Daphne over a copy of Counter-Charms for the Charmingly Charmed. "It's just, why does he get to be okay?"
"Because boys suck?"
"Please, you're dating the best guy in school."
"Most boys suck," Daphne amended, "besides, didn't you think that Hufflepuff -"
"Has a girlfriend."
So much for a quiet romantic lakeside walk. "Gross."
"Well, I say has," Tracey corrected herself, "had would be more accurate. She dumped him when a little birdie let slip he'd been chatting up girls that really weren't her. Remind me to thank Tori for putting some distance on that one." Knowing Astoria that meant three girls, a vicious rumour or two and a picture of him in a broom closet with another girl.
The school's biggest gossip that girl. There was no relationship she couldn't topple if she put her mind to it, and the papers thought Daphne was the schemer of the family.
"And you're sure I can't convince you to give Weasley a try."
"Just 'cause you've got a thing for Gryffs, doesn't mean I'm bored enough to try and bag Weasley," Tracey objected. It was good to see her riled up. "Ugh, I can hear it now. All Quidditch and brooms and 'oh hey, did you hear about this time Fred and George blew up Filch's office.'" A great sigh escaped her. "No, I'll just die alone and buy fifty cats."
"Bit extreme."
"What can I say? I really don't like Quidditch."
"You'll find someone."
"So you keep saying."
"And one day I'll be right," Daphne assured her friend, when Tracey was not roused by this frankly amazing advice, Daphne continued: "Besides, if I can get Harry of all people to think I'm worth his time then you can get anyone."
"All except the one person I actually want." Tracey sighed, giving up the pretence of reading her Charms textbook and letting her head fall face-first into its pages. From across the library, a boy started to snigger and was surprised when his book snapped shut and flew across the room. It gave Daphne no small sense of glee.
"Screw Blaise."
Tracey lifted her head slightly so her mouth wouldn't be muffled by the pages. "Tried that."
"You know what I mean."
Tracey muttered something that sounded like "Iii knuppf," before dragging her head off the book. "Sorry."
"What for?"
"Being all bleh and crappy and mopey and annoying."
"It's fine, it's what happens, I think." Daphne really wasn't sure, but she could imagine it wouldn't be fun. "We'll get you there and before you know it, you'll look back and wonder why you were ever so messed up by someone who thinks a fun afternoon is playing gobstones by himself." The boy said it was because no one was on his level, that was true, but only because he was so bad.
Tracey gave her a watery smile, then noted: "I like how you didn't say I wasn't annoying."
"I'm your friend, not a liar." Daphne joked, hastily adding when her brain once again caught up with her over-active mouth, "I mean, you're not by the way. It's fine. It's what I'm here for. Sorry."
"You know, you really suck at this."
"Yeah," Daphne admitted limply. She wished she could be better but great rousing speeches of affection and general inspiration weren't really her thing.
"But thanks, how are things anyway? We've been aboard the Tracey Train of…" Tracey clicked her tongue, "is there a word for sadness that begins with T?" Daphne shrugged, she was a painter not a poet. "I dunno, point is, enough about my life, how's Harry?"
"Good."
"C'mon Daph, you can gimme more than good. He's the freaking Boy-Who-Lived and you fancied the pants off him for years, now you're finally together and all you'll give me is 'good'?"
Daphne faltered then admitted, "I was trying to protect your feelings."
"Yeah, well, don't," Tracey said flatly. "I'm not gonna break. Not any more than I already have, anyway."
Because that wasn't upsetting. "Okay, fine. He's great. It's great, we're…"
"Great?" Tracey supplied when Daphne's brain failed to think of any other adjective. She could tie McLaggen into knots, embarrass Malfoy in front of a room full of his cronies, but she couldn't even compliment Harry without turning to a pool of mush. God, this was so embarrassing.
"Shut up." Daphne felt her face betray her. Damn. "I don't do gushing."
"And to think you didn't even want to ask him out."
Daphne glowered, trying to think of a way to get out of admitting Tracey was right. She failed. "This is the part where you say I should 'thank you'."
"Too right," Tracey grinned. "Without me, you'd still be pining over him in Potions. 'Oh, Trace, doesn't he look so handsome.'"
"Shut up."
"'His eyes are just so dreamy.' Ow!" Daphne's copy of Magical Britain 1400-1450 bounced relatively harmlessly off her shoulder. "That hurt."
"No, it didn't." Tracey looked indignant. "Okay, maybe a bit, but you asked for it."
It didn't take long for them to earn the ire of Madam Pince and soon the girls moved to the Common Room, hoping that would help their work. Oddly, since the Defence Club had started it had been weirdly peaceful in the Slytherin Common Room. Quite a few younger Slytherins had joined up, not to mention Pansy who was coming on leaps and bounds now that she had a healthy environment to thrive in. All this added up to Draco, who had been roundly embarrassed by Daphne the previous year, now having the effective sway of a dead Kneazle.
There was, naturally, a rather large power vacuum and more and more Slytherins were trying to fill it. No longer able to rely on their own families' images, thanks in no small part to Minister Bones' fresh investigations into Death Eater activity, they had to create new personas for themselves. It was all thoroughly uninteresting to Daphne who couldn't care less, but it was nice not to have to listen to Draco whining.
The only trouble with the Common Room was Blaise. He didn't go out of his way to upset Tracey, but that didn't mean she took seeing him laugh with the other boys or talk to Daphne about prefect duties well. Despite a raging battle inside her, Tracey managed to quietly carry on with her Charms essay despite Blaise lounging by the fire playing gobstones with himself. To his credit, Blaise never once came over. It was sad in a way. They'd been friends, or at least Tracey and Blaise had been good friends and Daphne had jokingly annoyed him for four years, but she still missed how things had been.
Still, she could sleep without threats from Pansy or Millicent, so that was something.
All too quickly Christmas was on the horizon. It was her father's favourite time of year and he was more than he ever was. This was a fact that was normally fine when it was just the four of them, but Daphne had been hoping to change that for one year.
"So, I've been thinking," Daphne began. They were sat at the top of North Tower, Daphne's prefect privileges allowing them access so late at night. The stars sparkled and twinkled above them and a small orb sat between them, containing a writhing ball of fire that let off far more heat than Daphne had expected.
Harry twisted to look at her. His thin legs were crossed and propped up against the stone battlements, which had likely been designed to protect people defending the aged castle rather than for teenagers to use as a footrest. One hand was propped behind his head, ensuring that his skull wasn't pressing against the cool stone, while the other gently held hers. It was rough as ever, the calluses on his fingertips and palms that had once confused Daphne now felt like small islands in the sea of smoother skin.
"What're you doing for Christmas?"
"No idea, probably something with Sirius. I think he's getting a bit sick of that house."
It was completely understandable. Grimmauld Place wasn't exactly nice by anyone's imagination.
"Think he could manage being on his own for a few hours? Mum and dad normally cook way too much so if you fancied it? It'll have been a year after all."
"Our first first date."
"You remember that?" Since she'd called Hogsmeade their second first date, he'd retroactively teased her that that made the Yule Ball their first first date. It'd been months since he'd even made that joke. Her heart fluttered at the fact he remembered.
"Like it was yesterday," Harry grinned goofily.
She rolled her eyes. "You're so cheesy."
"And? You love it."
"Whoever told you that was lying, Potter." But she did, he knew it despite her protestations to Tracey, Daphne loved that about him. Where her brain determinedly tried to undermine every single piece of confidence she tried to have, Harry would always be there with a kind word. She often wondered if her own brand of nonchalant love was enough for him. On her worse days, she didn't think so, but most of the time she did.
"To answer your question, yes. I'd love to. I've just got to check with Sirius. If that's okay?"
"'Course."
He hummed happily and cast his eyes up to the sky. Daphne had always thought the sign of a good relationship was talking, the only role model she had was her father who never shut up so it made sense, but she enjoyed these slices of silence with Harry. It wasn't awkward, it just was and it was perfect. A year ago she'd have dreaded taking him home, the idea of Christmas with her family would've been a nightmare, but now? Now, she knew he'd love it and so would she. Would her father embarrass her? Yes. Would Tori wind her up? Naturally. And her mother, well, she'd just enjoy the chaos. And Harry was a part of that, one that she hoped she'd never have to let go of.
AN: I know it's been a while but I'm glad to be back writing this, it's a lovely change of pace from everything else at the moment and I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I do!