To Ride the Carousel Again
Chapter 17
The rights to commercially owned characters belong
to the wonderful Duchess of Magic, J. K. Rowling, and whomever
she assigned other rights to.
A secret's safe 'twixt you, me, and the gatepost.
Sure. As long as there is no mind reading Greasy Git or Old Bent-Nosed Coot around.
/*
Approx. 5,400 words.
/*
She merely shrugged. "Welcome to my world. You've had my insides twisted in knots for a month. I don't think I'm a bad person for enjoying a bit of petty revenge."
She chose that moment to take a delicate bite of her chicken salad sandwich and exaggerated her chewing while maintaining eye contact with him.
"Finish your lunch, Harry. You'll need your strength. It's going to be a long afternoon."
/*
The duo was walking side by side headed to one of the few places where they figured they could get some privacy. They had returned to their tower to drop off their books and Hermione had added some items to her backpack including a small satchel that Harry knew contained mostly writing materials she liked to carry while doing research in the library.
Harry grabbed his invisibility cloak and grumped to himself that he really needed the Marauders' Map right now. Maybe Lupin could help?
Harry had insisted after they left the tower they only descend to the fifth floor when he stopped and looked around carefully.
"One moment, Hermione. Since this is really important to me, I want to make sure we aren't followed."
At her nod, he spoke. "May I call for a Hogwarts elf please?" he intoned uncertainly.
Ypres had told Harry the morning of the Express trip to the school that students could ask for assistance from the Hogwarts house elves. If the called elf thought the call for aid was proper, they would help the asking student.
A house elf with the usual large eyespopped into existence next to them, dressed in a clean white tea towel with the Hogwarts crest on the front.
"I is Guerna. How may I assist young Student Potter and young Student Granger?"
Harry knelt on one knee so as to be at eye level with the elf, and very seriously said, "Could you please check us and our belongings for tracking and listening charms? We have not yet learned the spells ourselves, so we need help. We believe those who want to track us are not our friends."
Guerna seemed to be thinking hard for a moment before abruptly saying. "Hoggywarts says I may help young Student Potter and young Student Granger." He then nodded his large-eyed head and raised his skinny grey arms while looking at Harry.
The boy raised his hand and said, "Please check Hermione first."
She could see his temper started climbing as Hermione's wristwatch, robe, shoes, socks and her brand-new backpack all showed having been tagged.
The grey elf turned and faced Harry. Just as at the manor, little blue fuzzy lights appeared on Harry and his 'stuff'. Harry's temper started rising as the fuzzy blue count went up.
His glasses now had two trackers, old belt two, old robe an additional two. His new shoes had a new glow each, and his old, baggy pants had a new addition also.
Harry became livid. "Merlin damned broken-nosed old coot! He's so free with the damned things, I wonder if he even realizes he's placing them anymore? It's only been two-and-a-half days!"
And then as the little elf also started wiggling his fingers, red fuzzy dots appeared on the nose piece of Harry's glasses and Hermione's hair comb.
"Does Student Potter want Guerna to remove the Findies and Listen-from-Office charms from you and your mate?" the small grey skinned being asked.
The young Student Granger took one glance at murderous looking Student Harry and stepped forward to kneel by a suddenly nervous looking Guerna.
"Yes Elf Guerna, we want you to remove every charm you have shown us," she said in the kindest voice she could muster at the moment.
A brief hands wave, and all the glows disappeared.
"Thank you, Elf Guerna."
And with a bow and a 'pop' the small being disappeared.
Hermione took two quick steps and wrapped the raging Harry in a hug. She now understood why he had insisted that everyone who entered his Manor was 'swept for bugs' by his 'retainers'. He had explained why to her once, but she would not, or could not, believe that the Headmaster would do something so invasive of their basic right to privacy.
At worst he just wanted to make sure Harry was safe. Didn't he? Really? What other explanation could there be?
She was trying to calm Harry down while she herself was releasing a torrent of wrathful feeling magic from being totally upset with the old man's actions.
Her emotions whiplashed again as Harry murmured into her hair, "Don't look him in the eye. Remember, don't look him in the eye."
She was not sure what she felt at the moment. Anger was foremost. Her trust in the most revered authority figure she knew had been betrayed. Her confusion was rampant. Why would he do such a thing? And finally, bitter realization that this was a part of why Harry had been so unwavering in his denunciations of the Headmaster.
Hermione was feeling that she and Harry were holding on to each other lest they collapse to the floor.
It was a few more minutes before the pair separated with suspiciously red noses and watery eyes. A pair of handkerchiefs were produced from the satchel and used on facial repairs before they walked down to the east wing, third floor, right hand side.
The door that had protected students from the great three-headed Cerberus named Fluffy opened easily when pulled on now.
Harry started talking as the time for his confession/interrogation drew nearer. "We, ah, made a small mistake upstairs there," he said nervously. "We should have maybe had the tracking spells transferred to something we could leave somewhere we are supposed to be while we are somewhere else."
He ran his hand through his hair as Hermione smirked. She knew he was cracking.
"I, uh, had Ypres leave some of the old tracking charms on my glasses, belt and other things as that way Dumbledore would think he knew where I was."
"That's a very good idea, Harry" she stated, praise showing in her voice. "I would not worry about finding renewed tracking charms to use in your little deception. I'd venture that you will have a whole new set within a couple of days."
Suddenly her mien shifted to angry. "I'll have to learn the detection and removal charms for these spells. Especially for that listening charm. What right does he have to listen in on me if I want to have a boyfriend in a couple of years?"
As she finished that sentence her eyes widened, and she slapped both hands over her mouth. Her words left Harry happy that he had not done the first action that had occurred to him, which was to laugh in happiness that she was now half-way to seeing Bumblefork as he now did.
However, if he had laughed at the dreams of the young girl, he would have been dodging hexes for a week. Or worse, she probably would have given him the silent treatment for, well, forever. Of course, given what was going to happen soon . . .
Hermione gave Harry a flat look. She then pointed her wand at the floor and wall near a corner and Harry could hear the Cushioning Spell. She swung her backpack off and reached into it, pulling out a lap table, muggle notebook and a pen.
She pointed at the other side of the corner. "Sit. We will be here a while. Might as well get comfortable."
With a thoughtful look she added, "Next time let's pick a room with chairs in it. Sitting on the floor, leaning against a wall is just somehow not suitable for super-serious discussion."
With pen in hand and her muggle notebook open, she looked at him expectantly.
He had known this moment was coming. He had for days even known what day it was coming. If he backed out now it would gut Hermione. Their relationship could never recover.
With the sigh of a man walking to his doom, he neatly sat against his section of wall.
"I want to change the method of your interrogation," he said quietly, nervously, not looking her in the eye. "I will tell you what happened, and then I want you to do some research and tell me why it happened. Alright?"
She appraised him slowly, her eyes narrowing. "And why do you not want to just answer my questions? Are you intending to hide things from me?"
She was going for 'tough female interrogator', but Harry was positive he caught a hint of fear in her voice. And that fear almost broke his heart. She was afraid that he would clam up and end their friendship in order not to answer her.
"No, Hermione, you are correct. I don't want to answer all your questions. And, yes, I will still hide a few things from you." However, I am going to give you most of the answers. As I just said a moment ago, I know what happened. If you can discover why it happened, then maybe we'll both have the answers we want. Ready?"
He got a firm nod and a poised pen. "Let me tell you about my Hogwarts letter."
And so, Harry told the tale. The original letter, the follow up letters with a different addresses. Then more letters. Letters even squeezing under the front door, slotting through the sides. More letters every day until his Uncle Vernon cracked and drove them away from the house.
He actually grinned as he talked about driving all over southern England, and how the next morning there had been around a hundred Hogwarts envelopes waiting for him at the motel desk.
His countenance darkened as he talked about being in a rickety, drafty hovel on a rocky little island during a raging storm waiting for midnight and his birthday. How his now friend, Hagrid, broke down the door, cowed his relatives and fed him for the first time in days.
Her friends voice became mechanical again as he described how the ranting and raving older Dursley's seemed determined to keep him from coming to Hogwarts.
"I've thought about it for over a year now. They never, ever let a day go by without telling me that I was a burden. How they clothed me, bought the food they fed me, and kept a roof over my head."
Harry determinedly kept his head lowered, refusing to look at the girl with the disbelieving look on her face. Which was just as well. Hermione's face was developing a look of pity. Even as she knew he hated that look on other people's faces when they talked to him.
"What they never spoke of was that the clothes were all hand-me-downs from my cousin Dudley. And you see how they look. The food I ate was about one-fifth of what my baby whale cousin scarfed down. And the roof over my head was the bottom of the staircase, because my 'room' was a broom cupboard under the stairs."
"You would think they'd be happy to get rid of their burden for ten months of the year."
"Even my first letter was addressed to,
Mr. H. Potter
The Cupboard Under the Stairs
4 Privet drive
Little Whinging
Surry"
"Something I don't understand is how did magic, or something, know I was born of magical parents so all I needed, in theory, was my acceptance letter. Yet, then someone sent Hagrid to guide me to Diagon Alley, as though I was muggleborn.
You and Dean both got a visit by the obviously knowledgeable Professor McGonagall. I got the Hogwarts Groundskeeper and Keeper of the Keys, who I now realize was a walking, talking violation of the Statute of Secrecy."
Harry finally raised his head to look Hermione in the eye. "So, first, why the strange introduction to the wizarding world? Second, I found from reading in my Manor's library, that not having at least the Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts personally informing me of my acceptance was a gross insult to the Most Ancient and Most Noble House of Potter."
Harry allowed a smirk to show. "If I could get the word out to that scandal rag, the Prophet, I bet the Headmaster would be asked some questions he would rather not have to answer."
Hermione could contain herself no longer. "Harry, why are you so suddenly anti-Headmaster? A couple of months ago you were grateful he saved you after He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named almost killed you. And when he gave us all those house points, you were as ecstatic as the rest of us. What happened?"
"I will get there eventually Hermione. But, that is at the end of last year's story," Harry said.
"Nearer the beginning, is the tale of September first last year. My Uncle surprised me by walking me into the station. There, he made a point of showing me platform nine and next to it, platform ten.
"No platform nine-and-three-quarters here, boy." He then then left me standing there got in the car, and they all drove away laughing."
Harry had a look of absolute anguish on his face. "I really think they were hoping I would never find the platform and would be left stranded, penniless in London."
"There I was, scared, lost, and confused in the middle of the busiest rail station in London because Hagrid forgot to tell me how to find Platform nine and three-quarters."
Harry could see Hermione was tearing up in sympathy of the young Harry's plight.
"Suddenly, a red headed woman with a gaggle of red headed children appears talking loudly about 'how crowded it is, packed with muggles everywhere.' She made very sure I heard her. And then she loudly asked her daughter, "Where are we going?"
"Platform nine and three-quarter's, Mum," the cute little red-haired girl said. "She was loud also."
"And that was how I met the Weasleys. Somehow they were there in just the right place to save me from missing the train because Hagrid didn't tell me how to board the train. I think I'll go visit him in a few days and ask him why he 'forgot'."
Hermione looked sharply at Harry and was opening her mouth when Harry held up his hand and said, "Remember, I tell you what happened. You will tell me why."
Picking up the thread of his story, Harry continued his narration. "After the train had left the station Ron showed up at my compartment and asked if he could sit with me, "because all the other compartments are full."
Hermione developed an instant frown at the last. Harry was sure she was remembering passing several empty compartments during her search for Neville's toad. He had noticed a couple while making the trip to the loo. He had been so worried he would not be able to find, or know how to use the loo on the train, he had not paid that observation the attention it apparently deserved.
This time when she opened her mouth, she caught herself and closed it with a literal snap.
Harry gave her an approving look.
"Ron spent the next several hours regaling me with stories about being a wizard, with small interruptions about how evil Slytherin House was, how rotten the Malfoys were, and how glorious being a Gryffindor would be."
"Two things do stand out in my memory despite my brain being bludgeoned with hours of quidditch minutia. First, he actually said that if he wasn't sorted into Gryffindor, Ravenclaw wouldn't be too bad." (1) Harry had to smother a chuckle as Hermione's eyes bulged at the thought of Ron Weasley as a Ravenclaw. He wondered if her over-stressed brain was about to explode out of her ears at the absurdity of that thought.
"Second, he really didn't want you to be sorted into the same house as him," Harry finished in a flat voice, and for the first time avoiding his friends' eyes.
"Seems that by sheer chance the first two people that gave me my earliest views of the magical world were both rabid Dumbledore followers, and the only counter was that complete arse, Draco Malfoy."
"So," he continued after a few moments. "How surprising is it that when the Sorting Hat wanted to put me in Slytherin, I fought and argued and demanded it not put me in Slytherin. I couldn't imagine living in the same place as Malfoy."
Hermione's eyes popped wide and her brain nearly short circuited at Harry stating that the Hat claimed he had all the traits of a Slytherin, but had ended up as a Gryffindor lion.
Knowing the Bombarda he had just cast into Hermione's world view, he sat patiently while her mind restarted.
As her eyes started refocusing on him, Harry spoke up again. "Don't be too surprised, Hermione. You must have had quite the discussion with The Hat as I'm sure it wanted to place you in Ravenclaw."
It was her turn to blush bright red.
"So, I start my Hogwarts time in Gryffindor. I sort of get friendly with Neville. Seamus and Dean are friendly enough, but we seem to have no real common ground."
"Then there is Ron. Looking back, I see how he decided that being known as my best friend was to be his way to be different from his brothers. A way to be better than them."
Harry sighed, sucked up his courage, and looked Hermione in the eye. "Make no mistake. I latched onto Ron just as hard."
Harry looked away from her, shame filling his voice. "I had never had a friend before. Not even a casual friend. My cousin, the Great Bloated Whale, made sure that anyone who tried to be friendly with me was threatened with being beaten up, or if they were stubborn, actually being beaten by him and his gang"
"And for some reason, the parents of the hurt kids seemed to go along with the story that it was their kids' fault for having wanted to talk to the neighborhood freak."
He very carefully examined the floor in front of him. "When a complaint was made about Dudley's bullying, by anyone, as soon as my relatives were told about it, I was blamed for having caused it.
Harry paused his tale to blink his eyes clear. He would not rub them. That would mean he was crying. He had learned the crying only made things worse at the Dursleys.
"I still don't want to lose my first friend. Even when he's being a total git," Harry finished quietly.
Hermione dropped her voice into the following silence. "You went Hogwarts shopping with the Weasleys while I was in Italy. You never said anything about him acting a prat then."
"That's because he didn't. He acted just like you would expect Ron to act on a day where he couldn't eat every ten minutes and nag me into playing chess when there are other things that have to be done. Thank Merlin for brooms at Quality Quidditch Supplies grabbing every Weasley's interest."
Silence fell between the pair again.
Harry gathered his courage up in both hands and restarted his narration. "Now that I look back on it, I find it very planned that I go from a primary school where if I am given a higher grade than my cousin, I get yelled at and thrown into my understairs cupboard with no food for a weekend. And the first person who befriends me, doesn't want me to be smart either."
In spite of having rehearsed this in his head for days, Harry has to stop as what he is saying seems rather ridiculous even to him. "If I acted intelligent like you Hermione, do you think Ron would approve?"
The question actually baffled her for a moment. He imagined as he watched he could see the shuffling of possibility's going on in her mind as he presented her with thought she had not contemplated before.
It took a few minutes before she resurfaced from the depths of her mind. She looked at Harry and quietly said, "There are times I've wished you were standing nearby under your invisibility cloak when Ron starts bragging about how he's your best mate, and how he's taught you everything you know about being a wizard, and that your listening to him coach you on how to be a Seeker is why you're so good."
Harry looked back at her dumbfounded. He'd missed the red-headed lout trashing him First Year and then for the next two? Ron the Berk in Fourth Year didn't count. That was open jealousy. Hermione's revelation was more like betrayal.
"Oh, and you're a loner who really doesn't want to meet a lot of people," she added.
When she made that comment, something clicked in Harry's memory. Healer Tonks had told him he had a minor Avoid-Me Charm placed on him. But hadn't Erzelkendis said that Mrs. Weasley wanted Ron and Ginny to be his only friends? Could she be pushing her son to do her bidding? This would require more thought.
He was thinking so hard, he did not realize he started musing out loud. "Now I'm really starting to feel paranoid. First, Mumblemork places me where I have to live isolated from everything magical and everybody who cared about baby Harry. Then I am guided into making for my very first friend the Gryffindor version of intolerant, privileged Malfoy. Then, just like my cousin, he chases off everyone who wants to talk to me."
He was so deep into his thoughts he did not notice Hermione opening her mouth to lambaste him for not calling Professor Dumbledore by his title, and then stopping her reflex correction when some instinct screamed "Don't interrupt!" leaving her again with her mouth open.
"Huh. Dudley and Ronald are so much alike, why didn't I notice that before? A lot of the same bloody disgusting eating habits also."
He fell silent for a moment. "Alright, that's it. I'm tired of ignorantly dancing to everyone else's tunes. As soon as I get some teaching from Neville, I'm going to start going Lord Potter all over their arse's."
There was silence in the room for the next two minutes. Harry just stared at something a thousand yards away. Hermione was sitting with tears leaking out of her closed eyes.
That changed when as soon as she opened her eyes, she flung herself into his lap, hugging him fiercely while wetting his shirt with her tears.
Harry let the hugging go on. He felt guilty that he was enjoying holding her while his friend was distressed about his past.
When her distress eased, handkerchiefs were produced and faces cleaned up.
After sitting peacefully for a minute, Harry cleared his throat and asked, "Do you want to keep going?
Hermione merely nodded her head and picked up her notepad.
"First year adventures," he announced. "Last year certainly was exciting, wouldn't you say?"
Hermione gave an un-ladylike snort. "If you mean being nearly killed by a rampaging troll in a girl's loo was exciting, then I guess the year became exciting early on."
"No, actually I consider that part terrifying," replied Harry. "I meant the hunt for all the clues to the Philosopher's Stone. It was thrilling adventure. Clues we had to find, research we had to perform, and every time we hit a dead end, another happenstance or a lucky clue would appear. Assuming it was happenstance and luck?"
Harry paused to regather his thoughts. "It had to be chance, didn't it? I mean I was the only person, except Fumbledork (He ignored Hermione's glare) and Hagrid, who knew he had picked up something at Gringotts to bring back to the castle. And then I, or we, find that someone tried to rob Gringotts right after 'the something' had been removed."
"Next, trying to avoid Filch, we get chased 'accidently' into the very room where," he raised his fingers and made air quotes, "the start of the Great Adventure begins.
"Harry! That monster three-headed dog almost ate us!" she admonished him.
"No," he replied. "While you were looking at the trapdoor, I was noticing he had three collars, with three chains, that wouldn't let his heads reach the door. We actually had a small safe space in front of the door where Fluffy couldn't reach us."
Hermione's eyes unfocused from the world as she replayed the incident from her memory. "You're right." she said in small, wondering voice.
By fighting hard, Harry kept his face from looking smug. "That chocolate frog card with the mention of Nicholas Flamel and you remembering he was the creator of the Sorcerer's Stone. It sure was lucky that I looked at that card as I gave the chocolate frog to Neville. AND that YOU had sent that card to me as part of your Christmas present. Quite a coincidence, eh?"
Harry could have sworn he could read the thoughts swirling around Hermione's mind as her fantastic memory took her back to the incident.
"As we start our fantastic adventure, we learn the odds are truly stacked against the heroic band." Hermione snorted at that description, giving him her best 'stop fooling around and talk' glare. "The Head Manipulator . . er, Master has left the school. He is absurdly traveling by the slowest magical travel method wizards have, and therefore will inexplicably be gone for hours."
He looked inquiringly at her. "You do know that travel by floo or apparition only takes seconds from place to place?"
She rolled her eyes , then nodded.
"Next we have the Deputy Headmistress who does not want to be bothered by a bunch of Firsties claiming the sky is falling. The same deputy who apparently didn't get the memo on what we found in the Forbidden Forest that night of the absolute insane detention we were given for having been out of the common room after curfew."
After a moment of introspection, he started up again using a slightly mocking, bombastic tone. "As out band starts its great adventure, remember we have me, the great flute player, to soothe the savage beast that Hagrid let slip was a big, cuddly puppy who would fall asleep as soon as someone played him some music."
Hermione looked as though she wanted to beat him around the head with her notepad for his delivery.
"We didn't even have to trust my flute playing. Snape, though actually Quirrellmort and his harp, had solved that problem for us."
"For the plant room, we should have had that brave Gryffindor plant expert, Neville Longbottom, except he was a bit too noble and some monster left him paralyzed on the common room floor. Therefore, he missed his chance to be a hero as we foolishly fought the Devil's Snare."
Harry pretended not to see the glare Hermione was sending his way. "Yep, winding her up is a lot of fun. Wonder what her revenge will be for that monster crack?"
"You know Hermione, I wonder how Neville might have changed if he had been with us all the way?" From the look in her eyes, she was seriously considering his thought. "Meh, just a thought."
Restarting his story with his home team, plumy, sports announcers' bombast, he said, "Next we came to the Room of Keys. And once again, a challenge that one of us had a HUGE talent for. Flying and seeking. That broom in the Room of Keys. It was somehow made to look as old and decrepit as the Flying Class brooms. It wasn't though. I could feel how much better it was as I flew it. I wonder, considering the room was supposed to be difficult to defeat, why was the broom so good? Mayhap we could ask Professor Flitwick about that."
Harry's story paused as he once again was almost overwhelmed by a memory from the Tri-Wiz tournament.
Shaking it off, he resumed, but now his tone was resigned. "Ron was our chess master, and that was a big, deadly chessboard. After playing an adult enchanted board to a standstill, he went all-noble Gryffindor and sacrificed himself so we could win the game and continue on."
"Hermione, why has that Ron changed into the prat that seems to hate us both now?"
The two exchanged a look that told the other nothing.
Harry sighed and continued. "Next, we find a troll. Fortunately, knocked out. I know we three managed to beat the one in the girl's loo, but I was so-o-o relieved to find it unconscious. Even if it meant we were now positive Snape was ahead of us."
Harry stopped in his tale and smiled warmly at his friend. This was not his usual lop-sided half ashamed grin, or his happy excited smile. It was a true smile of affection.
"Now, we come to the place where the muggleborn witch Hermione Granger steps to the fore. She had ably substituted for our resident herbology expert with the Devil's Snare solution, now she has a much harder problem. Having to use logic in the face of a culture that, and I quote, "A lot of the greatest wizards haven't got an ounce of logic." (2)
Hermione's cheeks pinked mightily at his remembering her comment.
"By using her brains and her muggle logic, she solved Professor Snape's poisonous potions puzzle, gave her departing hero his first hug ever, and delivered some uplifting words."
Her face flared red. Harry pretended not to notice.
"Our freshly burnished hero, The-Boy-Who-Lived because His-Mum-Saved-Him, strides off to do battle while his friend returns to aid their fallen comrade."
He stared at Hermione. "You brought help in time so that I didn't die in that room with Quirrell. I will remember your last words to me until I die before I left you for that cursed room."
Harry's stare intensified. She could not look away from those glowing emerald eyes.
"We assumed that Snape had already drank the vial that allowed him to go on. Yet it was filled when we got there. So, it had to be an automatic refilling vial. I think this means one of two things."
"One, after I drank, if we had waited, another dose would have appeared in the vial."
Harry looked Hermione straight in the eye. "I'm happy you weren't with me. I suspect he would have killed you immediately as you were in excess to his needs, a spare one might say, or tortured you to get me to do anything he wanted. You know I would have, too."
Hermione dropped the intense eye contact first.
"Or two, perhaps the original plan was to allow another person to drink the refill, which meant there would be two people in the mirror room. The thief and . . ."
Hermione shivered as she processed his last unfinished sentence.
She could swear his eyes were blazing as his mouth opened to state the question she was positive would dynamite her world view.
"Why was that bottle set up to refill, Hermione?"
A/N:
Ahh. Another common trope squealing for mercy as it gets used to a nub. I love it!
This should get Hermione joining the program.
One: HP and the Sorcerer's Stone, Chapter 6.
Two: HP and the Sorcerer's Stone, Ch 6.
HP and Ron the Ravenclaw. Never seen anything in the vein. (Should I make it a Challenge?)
Maybe need something like HP and the Champion's Champion by Driftwood1965?
Hil-ar-ious!
.