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Chapter 7

The October Hogsmeade weekend was the last weekend of the half term and a few days before Halloween, as it landed on a Tuesday this year. Harry and Hermione were looking forward to getting out of the castle; Harry had asked one of the older N.E.W.T students who wasn't going to Hogsmeade this time to watch Harry's little letter-writing club and got dressed up a bit for his date with Hermione. Hogsmeade was the same as ever. Hermione found two books she just had to have in Tomes and Scrolls, and then pulled Harry into the apothecary so they could refill their potions kits and stock of contraceptive potions. The witch behind the counter of Slug and Jiggers didn't even bat an eye at what they were buying, but the two teens were blushing like crazy as they exited the store.

They stopped by Harry's house for an hour to see how Sirius was doing (now that Remus wasn't living there full time anymore) and talked as Sassy served them tea and shortbread biscuits. Remus was visiting as often as he could still, and Sirius usually saw him twice a week. Emotionally, Sirius had back slid a little, but he was better than they had hoped. They spent most of the hour convincing the man that it was probably better if he started to look for a job. Not for money, the Black accounts had plenty of that, and Harry even turned down Sirius' offer of paying rent that he gave when Harry mentioned him getting a job. The sale of Harry's wand rings had exploded after the Triwizard Tournament and he had more than enough gold coming in. Harry knew it wouldn't last; like wands, most people only needed one wand ring. A few people wanted a few because of the style choices, and the D.M.L.E. had bought one for every officer they had. Soon, however, sales would drop off.

No, the reason Harry and Hermione were suggesting Sirius get a job was for structure and interacting with other people. Right now, the only interaction Sirius was having most days was with the elves and when he popped into the Three Broomsticks for a pint. While it wasn't unusual in Britain for someone to go for a pint every day and chat with everyone, Sirius was still fighting off the depression of being so long in Azkaban, and while he was doing brilliantly it wouldn't take much for one pint to become two, just so he could stay longer, then three and soon a full blown alcohol problem. Sirius agreed that he would look for a job but wasn't sure what he would do, as he definitely wasn't going to go back to work for the D.M.L.E. after what happened last time.

After visiting Sirius, the two teens went to the Three Broomsticks for lunch. It was as packed as it ever was on a Hogsmeade weekend, and Harry fought his way over to the bar while Hermione found them somewhere to sit. Eventually, Harry was able to order two large warm butterbeers, along with a fish and chips for Hermione and a steak and chips for himself. He took the butterbeers and went to find Hermione, who had found a couple of seats on the end of a long table that was mostly filled with third year Ravenclaws, for whom Hogsmeade was still a novelty. About a third of them were bragging about some book they had found in Tomes and Scrolls that would help with one subject or another, and the rest were begging to read it once the owner was done with it.

Hermione thanked Harry for her drink, and the two of them were lost in their own little world until a waitress they didn't remember seeing before delivered their food. As they ate, Hermione told Harry of a breakthrough she had had in her animagus transformation. Neither of them had mastered their forms yet, Harry could transform his arms into wings or his legs but never both at the same time, and he was having a lot of trouble getting hips even when he transformed his legs. Hermione could already do her arms and legs at the same time, but due to her breakthrough she could now transform her hips as well, which meant that she could now walk and run on all fours like a cat, whereas Harry still needed his broom to fly.

They were just about finished with their lunch when they overheard a commotion outside the pub. Suspecting that it probably involved Hogwarts students and guessing that they were the closest prefects, the two rushed out to see what was happening. They found half a dozen students surrounded by a small mob of adults, all of whom already had their wands drawn.

"This is a pub for humans, not your kind!"

"Go drink out of a toilet bowl instead! I doubt an animal like you can tell the difference!"

One of the students was Kathryn, the new girl in Hermione's dorm, and it all clicked into place what this argument was over. Harry and Hermione were just about to go rescue the group of Hogwarts students when Kathryn tried to push through the crowd, but one of the men grabbed her. Both Hermione and Kathryn reacted to the middle aged man grabbing a school girl, Kathryn by punching the man in the face and Hermione by charging forward, intent on ending this whole thing now. Unfortunately, another one of the crowd saw Hermione's ears and tail as she pushed past and grabbed her as well. "Look, this one is already half transformed! We need to drive them off!" He yelled.

Harry saw red. In under five seconds, with a swift kick to the back of his knee, Harry had the man who grabbed Hermione flat on his back, a foot on his throat and a wand pointed at the man's face. "If you ever lay a hand on my betrothed again, I guarantee that by the time I am finished you will be begging me to kill you. Do I make myself clear?" Harry's tone was icy enough to convey that while he may not be being literal, his threat was serious. The man still refused to answer, so Harry pressed a little weight onto the foot on the man's neck. "Answer me."

The man's defiance faded and he answered "Yes sir, perfectly clear." Harry then turned his wand toward the rest of the adults. "Does anyone else still feel like attacking school girls?"

Even if half the country believed that the Voldemort Harry fought at the end of the Triwizard Tournament was a fake, that Harry duled a Dark Lord and sent him running for his life was an established fact, and not one of the crowd felt up to crossing wands with Harry. Especially now that they looked and recognised that the girl with ears and a tail was sporting cat ears, not wolf, and was one of the Triwizard champions who was in the Prophet all last year standing next to Harry Potter. Now she was standing next to him again, wand out ready to fight and back him up.

The crowd quickly dispersed, and before Harry could let the man who had grabbed Hermione up, the waitress who had brought them their dinner came rushing out of the Three Broomsticks and threw her arms around Kathryn, pulling the girl into a hug. Kathryn sagged in relief and returned the hug to the woman who was obviously her mum. Harry left Hermione to deal with the two of them, as she was the more tactful one, and rounded up the lycanthropy students that were involved and asked them for their side of the story.

Apparently Professor Lupin had suggested that all the lycanthropy students that felt like going to Hogsmeade do so in a group so as to stay safe. That had led to this group of students from every house in Hogwarts walking around the village taking in the sights. One of the boys, a Hufflepuff fourth year student, had been recognised by a passerby who knew he was a werewolf and had started to hurl insults at the Hufflepuff. The noise had drawn a crowd, and the insults had quickly told the crowd that the group was made up of the lycanthropy students from the school. The group had tried to go into the Three Broomsticks, hoping that the crowd in the pub would shield them from the forming mob. The mob had other ideas though and had kicked off the commotion that had attracted the attention of Harry and Hermione.

Harry quickly gathered up the lycanthropy sufferers that he could find and told them they would all be heading back up to the school. One of them, a Slytherin girl, asked, "Why should we be punished for the actions of others? It's not fair to make the victims lose their day out."

"Look, I agree with you, but I have even been exactly where you are right now -"

The girl scoffed. "As if the great Boy-Who-Lived has had it hard."

"When Bellatrix LeStrange escaped two years ago, I was kept from visiting Hogsmeade. Not because I was being punished, but because the school had to keep me safe. Now, as a Prefect I need to keep you safe, and that means at least for now you all are going to have to come back up to the castle with me," Harry told her and the whole group. The Slytherin girl looked like she still wanted to object, apparently on a point of principle, but the others convinced her to go back up to the castle.

While this was going on, Hermione was talking to Kathryn and her mother. Eventually, after Kathryn got one last hug, Hermione brought her over and they started back up to the castle. Harry did see Tonks on patrol as one of the Aurors who were watching the village in case it was attacked. Whether people thought it was Voldemort himself or a group of copycats, the D.M.L.E. was taking the line that it didn't matter as both would need to be dealt with quickly. Harry waved Tonks over, hoping she would come up to the castle to take a report. When he told her what had happened, Tonks agreed and ran off to tell her supervisor that she had to go take a report, but she said she would join the students up at the castle as soon as she could.

Harry and Hermione led the newer students up to the headmistress office. Now that Professor McGonagall was headmistress, the gargoyle at the foot of the stairs leading to the head teachers office no longer required a password, it just told people if Professor McGonagall was in the office. If it was outside of office hours, then it would ask for someone's reason to disturb the headmistress,and if the reason wasn't good enough it would tell you to come back during Professor McGonagall's office hours. As it was the middle of the day, the gargoyle told them that Professor McGonagall was in the office and stood aside letting them pass.

Hermione really liked the new system. She felt that the head of the school should always be approachable by the students, the idea that a student could be left standing outside a door guessing the names of sweets for ten minutes during an emergency was just ridiculous to her, as she had said to Harry during their first visit to the office in September to work on their animagus forms. Harry let Hermione walk up the stairs in front of him out of habit, so she was the first to the office door and knocked. Professor McGonagall called for them to enter so half of them were in the office before everyone had finished coming up the stairs.

"Miss Granger, Mr Potter. Care to explain what is going on." The Scotswoman asked from behind the large desk that now held a number of the former head of Gryffindor's personnel effects.

Hermione explained what had happened from hers and Harry's points of view, and Professor McGonagall looked angry very quickly. "Do any of you know the name of the men who grabbed Miss Caddell and Miss Granger?" All of them shook their heads, but Auror Tonks arrived before they could go into any more detail, so they had to start again from the beginning. Soon there was a report filed so that the guy who grabbed Kathryn couldn't try to claim he was the one attacked, a not uncommon tactic according to some of the lycanthropes in the room.

It was an emotionally drained group of teenagers that left the office and made their way back into the rest of the school. The Slytherin girl turned and held out her hand for Harry to shake. "You're not as bad as my brother says."

Harry shook her hand but had to ask, "Who's your brother?"

"Adrian Pucey, Slytherin. Chaser on the Quidditch team."

Harry did know him, Adrian was the one member of the Slytherin Quidditch team who only seemed to care about Quidditch when it came to the rivalry between Gryffindors and Slytherins. In fact, Harry was sure that if he wasn't the seeker for the Gryffindor team, he and Pucey wouldn't have any problems at all.

-ϟϟϟ-

The incident in Hogsmeade was quickly passed over; most students weren't even aware anything had happened. The focus of the students was still on the Halloween feast that was just around the corner. Harry's thoughts were on Halloween as well, but for completely different reasons. Not only was it the anniversary of his parents death but somehow something always seemed to happen to him. Troll, opening of the chamber, attacked by LeStrange, and his name coming out of the flaming cup. It was as if Hogwarts had cursed that day for him, he didn't have anything like this happen before he came here. He did, however, have a letter from Sirius that offered to take him to visit his parents' graves on Halloween. Professor McGonagall had already approved Harry and Hermione leaving the school for the day if they wanted to. Sirius had sent parental/guardian permission slips from him and the Grangers.

In the end he decided to go, and really he should have gone to visit them sooner. The two of them only had a half day of lessons, so after lunch they went up to their dorm rooms to change into muggle clothes and then walked down to the school gate to meet Sirius. The three of them took the Knight Bus to get there, as Sirius couldn't side-along two people and Harry couldn't remember the village they were visiting. The Knight Bus ride was like all trips on the infernal device: unnerving, unsettling, and uncomfortable. Harry and Hermione ended up clutching each other, not for any emotional support (though Harry suspected that he would need that soon enough), but because they were a little concerned that the crazy turns, stops, and acceleration was going to throw one of them out of their completely inadequate loveseat.

The Knight Bus made a few drop offs and pickups, but Harry was surprised when it pulled up outside the visitors' entrance to the Ministry of Magic and an absolutely gorgeous blonde bombshell stepped on the bus. In perfect English, though with a heavy French accent, she asked to be dropped in Godric's Hollow. Fleur turned and smiled when she saw that both Harry and Hermione were staring at her. "Hi guys, Sirius told me the plans for today so I came to support you as well. Ho-" She was cut off by the bus suddenly rocketing forward and the sudden change had Harry and Hermione's graceful Veela girlfriend crashing into their laps. They helped Fleur straighten herself, and she ended up sitting in Harry's lap, his arms around her acting as a seat belt.

Mercifully, the rest of the trip was short and there was only one more drop off before they were let out at Godric's Hollow, in what looked like a village square. There was a large war memorial across the other side of the square that looked vaguely familiar to Harry, but that was about it. Sirius remembered the church because it was the one where he was made Harry's godfather, as Lily had insisted on a mundane ceremony as well as the magical one that James and Sirius were familiar with. The problem was, he didn't remember where it was specifically and the village had two churches. They decided to stop in a shop and ask for directions, and while they were there Harry bought a couple of bunches of flowers to leave on his parents' graves.

The way to the church led them back through the village square and passed the war memorial. They all stopped and stayed as when they got within about eighteen feet of it, as the large stone obelisk that had the names of locals who had given their lives in World Wars One and Two shifted to become a statue of a young couple holding a baby.

"Is that what I think it is?" Fleur asked.

"I think so. I mean it's hard to tell without any colour, but who else could it be?" Harry said as he looked at what was clearly a statue depicting his family.

"Isn't it weird for Harry to be part of the statue? Isn't it a memorial? As in remembering the dead?" Hermione said. "Also isn't it disrespectful to the soldiers who gave their lives for this country to mess with their memorial?"

James and Lily Potter

Who gave their lives in this very village

And in doing so protected their son

And saved magical Britain

31st October 1981

They read the piece under the statue when they got close enough to make out the words. Harry reached out to touch the statue of his parents but when he did all he felt was the invisible surface of the war memorial. Harry sighed, disappointed. The statue was life size, and like all magically made statues looked almost alive, so Harry had hoped that he would get to feel the contours of his parents' faces for a second, but it wasn't to be.

They moved on and came across the church, and it was only as they were about to walk in that Harry noticed Sirius hesitate. Harry realised this was likely Sirius's first visit as well. He had been sent to Azkaban before the funeral, so he could only have visited after he got out, but just because Sirius had been freed didn't mean the man was up to it. He was recovering from dementor induced depression, maybe visiting the gravestones of his friends was too much for him. Harry put his hand on Sirius's shoulder and asked. "You okay?"

Sirius shook himself almost like a dog before he turned and flashed Harry what was overly a forced smile. "I'm fine Harry. I just miss them. Come on, let's go find your parents." And before Harry could say anything more, Sirius strode through the gate and started looking at the gravestones.

Hermione took Harry's hand while Fleur slipped her arm around him from his other side. Sandwiched between the two loves of his life, Harry stepped into the graveyard. A lot of the headstones were so old that they could instantly discount them. Even so, it took them a while to find the right plot, and as they searched they saw a bunch of familiar wizarding names. Abbott, Bagshot, Crabbe, and even Dumbledore. Harry mentioned it to Sirius who said, "Godric's Hollow was where Godric Gryffindor originally came from. While it's not an exclusively wizarding village like Hogsmeade, it has never had less than a third of the households with at least one magical living in it. While a lot of families have manors and estates all over the country, a lot of second or third sons moved here to be around other witches and wizards, and a lot of mug-, uh…" Sirius stopped when he saw Fleur glaring at him. "I mean, first generation witches and wizards like to move here as well because of easy access to the mundane side of our world. So the graveyards here will have names from a lot of wizarding families. There used to be a lot of villages like this, but the witch burnings ended a lot of that. However, the Welsh were never as big on blaming witches for everything as the English, they were closer to our Irish cousins and blamed the faeries most of the time."

While Sirius talked, they kept searching and eventually came across the grave marked Potter. It turned out that his parents were buried together in a wide couples' plot, and their grave was marked with a simple but elegant white marble headstone.

In loving memory

Lily Potter - James Potter

Born

27th March 1960 - 30th January 1960

Died

31st October 1981 - 31st October 1981

"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death"

Harry wasn't particularly interested in what their headstone said, he knew their names and when they died. He wanted to talk to his parents, but now that he was here he couldn't think of anything to say. Everything he could think of just sounded extremely dumb. Luckily, Sirius didn't seem to have that same trouble, and when it was clear that Harry wasn't going to go first he did.

"Hey Prongs, hey Lils. Sorry I haven't been around before now, I went and got myself in some trouble. I'm sorry I didn't do what I promised with Harry, but I'm here now and I'm doing what I can. Moony said to say hi, he would be here as well but he has to work. Would you believe that he is a Hogwarts professor now? The bearded old goat finally got kicked out and Minnie was made headmistress. She sacked Binns and hired Moony and started letting werewolves openly attend the school." Sirius talked for about five minutes, catching Harry's parents up on everything that had happened to him in the last 14 years, which went rather quickly as the man hadn't even been out of Azkaban a year yet.

Then it was Harry's turn. Both Fleur and Hermione gave him a reassuring squeeze before he stepped forward to and knelt down in front of the grave. "Hey mum, hey dad. It's me, Harry. I know I should have visited sooner, but it's not all my fault. I ended up living with Aunt Petunia and her family and they weren't exactly very nice. Before I got my Hogwarts letter they told me the two of you were drunks and died in a car crash. After my Hogwarts letter I was so busy learning about being a wizard and I still didn't know where you were.

"What would you want to know?...I'm doing pretty good in school. My best subjects are Defence Against the Dark Arts and Ancient Runes. I actually have a runic invention to my name. It's just a ring to summon your wand but it's being sold in Ollivander's Wand Shop. I remember that night mum, I remember you desperately trying to summon your wand. I didn't want anyone else to go through that, so I made the rings. And I make sure everyone I love has a set of rings." Harry gently pulled Hermione and Fleur down next to him.

"This is Hermione, and I'm sure you both remember Fleur. Hermione and I love each other so much that we actually developed a soul bond, and I'm sure if Fleur and I didn't have a Veela bond that we would have a soul bond as well. I'm the luckiest guy on the planet because they both love me and have agreed that they can share me."

Harry went on to tell them about every year in Hogwarts. He told them about meeting Ron and Hermione on the train, the troll in the bathroom, Hagrid's baby dragon and smuggling it to the dragon reserve, being made the youngest seeker in a hundred years, and of course Quirrell and the Philosopher's Stone. Then his second year, the messages in blood on the wall, the petrifications and how everyone was blaming Harry, their plan to investigate at Christmas and how it resulted in Hermione's accident with Polyjuice. He told them how he and Hermione became a couple, then his despair at Hermione being petrified, how useless Lockhart was, and of course the fight with the basilisk.

Then moving in with Hermione and her parents, Bellatrix LeStrange breaking out of prison, the dementors, meeting Moony for the first time, the repeated attacks. He told them how he used his free time to create the rings to summon wands and the accessories Hermione used to conceal her feline features when out among mundane people. Finally, he related how he and Hermione were finally able to master their Patronuses to save themselves and Neville from a gang of dementors.

He told them about his first trip to France and how he only found out later how close he unknowingly had been to the Potter Chateau. Then about the Triwizard Tournament and meeting Fleur, and how that led to Harry discovering that Sirius was innocent of the crimes he was sent to Azkaban for. He told them about the tasks, facing a number of snake-shaped fire golems, flying against a world famous seeker, and the tower of trials. He told them about being kidnapped, how he was tied to a grave and his blood was used to resurrect Voldemort, and how he had escaped with Voldemort using the family blood gift, hoping that with people like Dumbledore there they could finish Voldemort off this time. Only, he had had to duel the man all on his own.

"And now Voldemort is back. Even after everything you gave and everything I did to stop him coming back, he came back anyway. And he isn't going to leave me alone. How can he? People credit me with his first downfall and now I duel him to a standstill and take his arm in front of hundreds of witnesses. As long as I'm alive, he looks weak." By now Harry felt a little lighter, like telling his parents everything had somehow shared the weight of the burden.

Harry placed the two bunches of flowers on the grave, careful to make sure the bunch that had lilies in it was on his mother's side of the grave. "I love you dad, and mum I remembered and I love you too." As he said that Harry felt a slight breeze shift his hair around and he could smell a mix of lilies, roses, and honeysuckle. Strangely, the breeze only affected his hair and didn't lift even a strand of the two girls' rather long hair. There were also no roses or honeysuckle around for the smell to come from, yet Harry was sure that he had smelled that combination before. Wizards didn't know much more about life after death than mundane people did, they had confirmed the existence of the soul and the existence of something after death, but that was it. However, Harry couldn't help but wonder if that was a sign that his parents had heard him.

A/N

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