Chapter 20: Turmoil in the Head and at the Game
Thanks for all the reviews.
Just to let you know, I absolutely hate writing forth year. Plus, this is a warm and fuzzy fic, so I have to keep with that. Yeah.
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It was towards the end of August that Harry had a horrible dream. He was dreaming of a man that was walking towards a house because he heard a noise. When he got to the house, he saw two men and a strange child with a large snake, and they were talking about killing someone? or setting them up? He wasn't sure, but magic was involved. When the man confronted them, he was hit with a spell, and it killed him and then the snake ate him.
It was a horrible dream, and it scared Harry and his scar hurt terribly. And Harry woke up and he knew that it was Voldemort. He went and told Millie.
"Millie! Millie! Millie!" Harry called as he ran down the hallway to her room. It was the middle of the night, and he didn't really care if he woke up the entire village. He wanted Millie. He hadn't felt this insecurity since he was eleven years old, and he was fourteen now. But this was a terrifying dream. It was almost as bad as listening to his parents die because it was so real. It was as if he was the one who was killed and eaten by a snake.
"What is it, Harry?" Millie said as she came out of her room, putting her sash around her robe. She hadn't seen Harry this upset ever. Not even the time he was kidnapped.
"I just had a terrible dream," he said as he grabbed her arms, and he told her about it. "What do I do about it? My scar is hurting something terrible." That was one of the scarier parts, is how bad his scar hurt. The last time that happened was when he was around Voldemort.
"I don't know. Do you think this dream is real?" she asked, brushing his hair aside to look at the inflamed scar to see if it looked any different. It did look a bit redder than usual, but other than that it just looked like a normal scar. Well, a normal curse scar.
"It felt so real, and he was so angry and so joyful at the same time. I just don't understand. Why is Voldemort in my head?" Harry asked. He was trembling from head to foot. This was not something he was used to dealing with. Millie always took care of everything.
"Let's go and see if Sirius is awake, and if he's not, we'll wake him up and see what he has to say about it. He knows more about the Dark Arts than we do. This is important. I'm sure he won't mind if we get him up," she suggested. Sirius always said that if they needed anything they could come and talk to him. And he was well versed in the Dark Arts. His family was known for it. They were as black as their name.
"OK, I'll go get dressed, or at least put some shoes on," Harry said. It was times like this that he really wished that the wizarding world had telephones. It would be so much easier just to call Sirius up and have him come to them.
With that, the two of them put some clothes and shoes on and rushed over to Sirius' cottage. Which wasn't far from her flat. Millie banged on the door to wake Sirius up. He was often awake at this time at night because he had a hard time sleeping still. It didn't take long for Sirius to answer the door.
He was still dressed for the day, even though his clothes were rumpled, and he had a coffee cup in his hand. He looked like he had just been sitting and brooding.
"What's wrong?" he said. He had already been mostly awake. He had had a hard time sleeping this night. The one thing he wasn't doing was drinking. That's the one thing the doctor said he really shouldn't do on the potions he was on. So, he just sat and agonized.
"Sirius, Harry just had a horrible nightmare. And we were wondering if you had time to talk to us," Millie asked as she stood in the warm summer's night air waiting for him to answer. She didn't think so. He would never turn them away, but she wasn't going to just rush into his house either. That was rude.
"I always have time for you two," the dogman said. He opened the door and let them in. "Tell me about this dream." He led them into the dining area of his home and sat them at the table and offered them each a cup of coffee. Harry was a little young for coffee, but it was late at night and they were going to need it to fortify them to keep them awake through this.
They both accepted the cup and Harry doctored his with a lot of sugar and cream. Then the teen told him about the dream, how he felt and how his scar hurt, and Sirius was very concerned about that scar.
"Does your scar hurt often, Harry?" he asked. He had an inkling as to what it was, and he was going to have words with Dumbledore about that because he had a feeling the headmaster knew what it was too. There was no way that the old bastard didn't know what was going on.
"The only time it's ever happened before was when I was around Professor Quirrell," the teen said, remembering well the time he had been kidnapped.
"Tell me about that," his godfather said, leaning back in his chair to listen to the story about his godson.
So, Harry told him about the kidnapping in his first year and what had happened and how his scar felt then, and the times that hurt when he was in his classroom.
"And you say that this professor had Voldemort sticking out of the back of his head?" Sirius asked, again confirming his suspicions. There are only a few things that he knew of that would leave somebody a wraith like that.
"Yes, he talked to me and everything. It was horrible. He kept saying things like it was all my fault he was the way he was the way he was," Harry said, shuddering at the remembrance.
"I'll have to do some research about this and find out what's going on. Don't you worry. You let the adults take care of it. Until then, every time you have a dream like this, write it down, keep some sort of diary and give it to an adult, okay?" Sirius said, putting his hands on Harry's head and rubbing it gently, trying to ease the boy's pain.
"Okay, but I wanna know why this… man is in my head. It's scaring me," the teenage boy said, looking in both the adults' eyes and wondering what he was going to do about this new fear in his life. He did take comfort in the fact that these two were here. He'd hate to think what it would be like if he was just alone with the Dursleys. He shuddered at that thought.
"I know, and I understand that it's scary, but we're gonna figure it out, okay?" his godfather said, letting go of his grandson and looking at Millie like, 'What are we going to do?' This was new to him. He didn't know how to handle a scared teenager. She was more of an old hand at it than he was.
"Alright," Harry said, taking a deep breath and relaxing just a little bit. "I'm gonna trust you on this. I trust Millie, so I'm gonna trust you." He gave his godfather a watery smile. He took a large drink of his now cooled coffee. It was bitter now that it wasn't hot, but he drank it anyway.
"Thank you, Harry. I also want you to practice your Occlumency. That'll help keep the dreams at bay. You should be doing it every night before you go to bed. I know the nightmares about your parents stopped for a while now that the dementors aren't near, but you need to practice it every night now to keep these at bay too. Do you understand?" Sirius said, looking at the boy's face. It was very important that he understood just how important the practice of clearing his mind was. Especially if Voldemort was going to be rummaging through his brain.
"Yes, sir," the dark-haired teen said, giving a huge yawn. Now that the panic was over, he was tired again. He did understand now that clearing his mind would keep the Dark Lord out of his head. He would not forget his Occlumency again.
"Okay, why don't you two head back to Millie's place and try and get some sleep. I know I'm going to try and get some and tomorrow I'll start research to find out what's going on so we can get this taken care of," Sirius said, getting up and giving Harry a big hug. He then turned around and surprised Millie by giving her one too and whispering in her ear, "Don't worry, I've got this."
"Thanks, Sirius," Millie said, returning the hug. She was going to sit down and talk with him as soon as Harry went back to school, and she was going to have a very serious talk with him about what was going on, but she didn't want to have it with Harry around in case it was something that he didn't need to know about.
Not that she wanted to keep secrets from Harry, but there were just some things that the teen didn't need to know about at this time. The Dark Arts was not something you should dabble in until you were older. At least sixteen years old. That was when your core was mature enough to handle them.
And with that, Millie and Harry went back to her flat, and Harry made a vow to practice Occlumency every single night. It helped with organizing his mind anyway. He just didn't know why he had stopped practicing it at the Dursleys. The nightmares of his parents' death had gone away about a month ago. And so, he had just stopped practicing it when they hadn't come back. Now he gets it, he was just going to have to do it every night for the rest of his life.
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The Quidditch World Cup was something that Harry had been looking forward to for quite some time. The camping was a great time and Neville and Hermione had great fun with him as well. Setting up camp was fun, and going through all the booths was fun too. They bought all sorts of stuff that they really didn't need, but they had a great time meeting all the people from all different walks of life.
Seeing how wizards thought muggles were supposed to dress was a hoot. There were people dressed in kilts and nightgowns and all sorts of dresses. There was even a man wearing a rain poncho and boots. It was just bizarre how they were attired.
The game itself was exciting and Ireland won even though Krum caught the snitch. It had been intense and nail-biting, and everybody sat on the front of their seats watching it. Unless they were like Hermione who was just there to placate their friend. It went by so fast that the commentator was just calling out names instead of plays.
The chaos afterwards was insane, and they thought they were going to be caught by the Death Eaters. While they were hiding in the woods, they ran into Draco Malfoy. He was disparaging against Hermione. Both Harry and Neville punched him in the nose, and they continued to run.
They were surprised when the Dark Mark was shown in the sky. It was then that Neville noticed that his new wand was missing. When Barty Crouch came and accused them of causing it, Sirius got very upset.
"How dare you accuse these kids of causing the Dark Mark?" he said, getting up in Crouch's face, ready to throw punches at the man. "What is the matter with you? First you threw me in prison and now you're accusing Harry Potter of all people of causing the Dark Mark in the sky. What is wrong with you, man?" He never liked this little man. For all he cared, he could just disappear off the face of the earth, and he would never miss him. Nobody would.
"Somebody had to have cast it," Crouch stated, getting right back into Sirius' face as if he had the right to. If he had it his way, this man would go right back to prison where he thought he belonged. As far as he was concerned, he was black as his name. There wasn't a Black alive that didn't belong in prison.
"This is Neville Longbottom. Do you honestly believe that the boy, whose parents are in St. Mungo's because of Death Eaters, would have cast the Dark Mark?" the irate man said, pointing at Neville, who was looking at him in slight betrayal, but firmed his face and looked at Crouch like he was insane.
"Well, now that you mentioned it, I don't believe so, no," the man said, looking at the sandy-haired boy, who was looking at him defiantly as if to dare him to say that he would put the Dark Mark in the sky.
Everybody in the ministry knew the Longbottoms' story. And everybody knew that there was no way that Neville would cast this dark spell.
"And that's Harry Potter, Harry Bloody Potter, do you honestly think he would have cast the Dark Mark?" Sirius all but bellowed in the man's face? Because honestly, who would think that Harry Potter would cause the Dark Mark?
"Well, no, no, of course not." This time, Crouch had an honest contrite look on his face. He looked nervously around at the men surrounding him because they were all looking at him like he was stupid.
If there was one person in the entire wizarding world that would not put the Dark Mark in the sky, it was the Boy-Who-Lived.
"And the other girl is muggleborn. A muggleborn, what is wrong with you, man?" the dogman said, pointing at Hermione, who just stuck her chin out.
"Well, somebody had to have cast it. Who else would it have been?" the other man blustered. He was looking like a fool in front of his men, and he wasn't sure how to take that. Well, they weren't actually his men. He wasn't the head of the department anymore, but he was the head of a department, and he was still in control of some of the Aurors.
"If you bothered to ask us, sir," said Hermione, who was still holding her head high. "We would have told you that a deep voice came from over in those bushes." She pointed her hand off to the bushes to the right where they had heard the voice come not moments before the people came and cast stunners at them. They had heard them pop in and ducked immediately, or they would have been knocked out on the ground.
"You lot go there and search those bushes," said Crouch, ordering some Aurors that were standing around laughing at him, well, internally. They wouldn't dare laugh at him aloud. He was still high enough in the ministry hierarchy that he could have their jobs if they did that.
So the Aurors went over and started searching the bushes. They soon came back with a house elf and Neville's wand.
"Here now, that's my wand," said Neville, going to grab for the wand only to have Crouch snatch it from his hand. He glared at the man for taking it from him. It was his wand, after all. Who did the man think he was?
"So you did cast it," said Crouch, holding the wand up in the air as if it were a golden trophy.
"I did not," said Neville, reaching out to snatch the wand from Crouch, only to have it jerked away from him. "It was stolen from me during the game." He tried one more time for his wand, but it was still kept out of his reach. He truly couldn't wait for his growth spurt. He had a feeling he was going to get quite tall and then he'd show this short man what for.
"Oh, that's a likely story," said Crouch Sr., examining the wand as if it was a piece of evidence, which actually it was, but…
"It was, I say, it was," Neville said, looking at Sirius pleadingly. He was truly hoping the only other adult on their side would get in the man's face again. It was a sight to see Sirius get all presumptuous.
"I can vouch for that," Harry said, speaking for the first time, but also looking at Sirius with a pleading look. "He said it was missing when we were running from the Death Eaters."
"And you would vouch for your friend," said the pompous man waving his hand dismissively.
"Here you go, accusing innocent people again," said Sirius, turning on Crouch like an avenging angel. He wasn't going to stand by and let him walk all over these kids. The last thing he was going to do was let him railroad a bunch of children into jail, that was for sure. "If the boys say they didn't cast the Dark Mark, then they didn't cast it. The young lady said it was a deep voice and you found the wand yards away from them. Where in all that do you think the young man with a high voice and standing right here could cast a Dark Mark?" he concluded.
"Here, now, Barty, isn't that your elf?" Ludo Bagman said, gesturing to the elf that they had found the wand with, who was trying to look as unobtrusive as possible.
"Winky, what are you doing here?" Crouch bristled, as if he didn't know what his elf was doing there. "And what are you doing with a wand?" And that he probably didn't know.
"Winky is not doing anything. Winky is only doing as she is told," said the elf in a squeaky voice as she worried her tea towel. She looked very scared. She was nervously looking up at her Master as if she was going to be fired any minute now.
"You know this means clothes," said Barty. He had a nervous look about him too, as if he was about to be caught out on something.
"But Winky is only doing as she is told. Winky is not doing anything. Winky is not knowing how," The elf squeaked. She was pleading with her Master not to free her. She had done nothing wrong. She kept saying that over and over and over again.
But Barty Crouch did not listen and handed Winky clothes and freed the poor elf.
"You're an arsehole," said Sirius. "You know elves can't use wands. Winky, I take you as my elf," he told the elf, putting his hand on her head. Which is all you really needed to do to take an elf.
"Winky accepts," Winky said too overjoyed about not being free to worry about what Crouch would think.
"Here now, you can't do that," said Barty, nervously sweating as if he was scared that his secrets were about to be revealed.
"You'll find I can. You just freed her," said the dogman, who noticed the sweat. He told Winky to go back to his place in Hogsmeade. He grabbed Neville's wand and then he took the kids and went back to the tent in the campground. "Come on, you lot, we need to get home. It's getting cluttered around here."
So, Sirius, Harry, Hermione, and Neville gathered all their things and went back to Millie's house and told her what happened. She was decidedly upset that she missed it, but she had had to stay to run her business. She was exceedingly happy that everybody was not hurt. And had set everybody down and gave them cocoa and made them tell her the whole story.
"Well, it sounds like you all had a really good time, but then again, not, yeah," she said as she refilled their cups. She was really beating herself up that she hadn't been there. That she had scheduled classes and hadn't had the time to take off. Her business was too new to be able to close it for the three days it would take to see the World Cup.
"It was fun at first, but then it got scary," said Harry, picking his cup up and taking a fortifying slow sip. There was nothing like Millies hot cocoa. She put extra chocolate in it and made it nice and creamy.
They drank in silence for a few minutes until everyone was done.
"Well, let's get the rest of you home. Sirius, you take Hermione and I'll just make sure Neville gets home, yeah," she said, gathering all the cups up and putting them in the drain board. She made sure everybody had all their stuff with them and started hustling them to where they needed to go.
"Okay," said Sirius and he waited until she was done getting Hermione ready and escorted the girl home.
Millie took Neville to the floo and made sure that he got home and then came back and gave Harry a hug. "I'm sorry that your camping trip turned out so bad in the end, but I'm glad you had a good time in the beginning," she said as she guided him to the living room and sat him on the couch so that they could cuddle a little bit.
"That's okay, I've got you now, and you and Sirius will make everything alright," said Harry, snuggling down into her embrace.
"We'll do our very best," said Millie. "You go to bed now."
Harry let out a huge yawn and then nodded and got up and went to go get ready for bed. He came back down in his pajamas, and they snuggled for a little while longer, but he was really tired from all the excitement of the night and went to bed shortly thereafter.
Sirius came back a little while later. He took the chair opposite hers, next to the fireplace.
"So how are we going to do this?" he asked, staring at the empty fireplace. It was too warm for a fire right now, but the fireplace was pretty anyway.
"We're just going to take it one day at a time, yeah," said Millie. She just really hoped that he was mentally up to the challenge. She knew he had been in the last war, but she hoped that he was able to hold up in this one. Not that she wanted to be at war, but if the Dark Mark was in the sky and the Death Eaters were out then it didn't bode well.
"I think I can handle that," the dogman said, sighing a huge sigh but giving her a normal look. Like he could handle anything that came up. And he was going to be there right by her side handling it.
And the two of them sat down and hashed out how they were going to handle the new death threats. Because what was coming meant war, and that meant the adults had to plan. And somehow, some way, Harry Potter was going to be smack dab in the middle of it, and they were going to have to be right by his side.