There was a commotion around the Dippet Quad, the flagstoned courtyard which sat neatly between the library on one side and the Charms classrooms on the other. There was an open channel at the north-east corner, which led to the long stone staircase coming up from the boathouse. A large cluster of students had gathered there to gawk at something, all whispering excitedly as they did so.
And though the throng of students was large, it was nothing compared to the size of the thing they were all staring at.
"Hermione!" Harry breathed as they joined the crowd. "Is that a -"
"Yes! It's a panserbjorne!" Hermione confirmed excitedly. "And that's not just any armoured bear, either. But what's he doing here?"
Harry raised his eyebrows at her. "You say that like a giant polar bear in thick armour is an every day sight around here! So what's so special about that one?"
"He's special because that's ... Iorek!"
Hermione called out and waved as the great bear-king stood on his hind legs to see her. The crowd hushed and gasped, then parted as the bear moved forwards and through them. Harry saw then that it wasn't just the bear who was drawing the crowd's attention. There were three people, too, and a black owl.
And the bird wasn't the only Black thing on display.
"Sirius!"
Harry bounded forwards and barrelled into his Godfather, who wrapped protective arms around him.
"Hey kiddo," Sirius barked back at him. "Your hair's getting long. Bout time you took the shears to it!"
"Nevermind that!" Harry chastised him. "You're back! You're alive! Maybe I should have said the second part first!"
Sirius hooted out a laugh. "And a swashbuckling tale it is, too! Involving me battling with bears and witches and giant serpents ... which is why we're here. Hermione - we need to talk ... in private."
Harry felt his stomach lurch. There was just that something in his Godfather's face just then. A grimace of sorts. He'd come with bad news.
"What is it?" Hermione asked cautiously. She'd seen the expression too. "What's happened? Is it Lyra? Is she okay?"
"Lyra's fine. If she wasn't, old Pan up there would have told me," Sirius replied, nodding towards the owl circling above them. "No this isn't about Lyra ... it's about your actual parents. They've been attacked."
Hermione's breath left her in a shocked rush. She clutched at her heart and took a fistful of Iorek's fur in her fingers.
"Attacked? By whom?" she whispered frantically.
"Not out here," Sirius warned darkly, glancing around at the crowd. "Don't want to start a panic. There must be an empty classroom round here somewhere. King Iorek - will you guard the door?"
"None shall pass," the bear-king replied in a gruff growl, sitting powerfully near the entrance way to that wing of the school.
Sirius nodded a thanks, then guided Hermione into the cool corridors outside the Charms classrooms. They found an empty room and Sirius herded them inside. Once the door was closed, Harry turned to the two strangers who were accompanying Sirius.
"Who are you?" he asked brusquely.
Hermione, who was pale with worry and deep in thought, suddenly squeaked next to Harry as she looked up.
"Oh my! Frank and Alice!" she exclaimed. "Harry - this is Neville's Mum and Dad!"
Harry blinked in his surprise, as the Longbottoms smiled warmly at him.
"And you must be Harry Potter!" Frank Longbottom exclaimed.
"Must be?" Harry asked, somewhat suspiciously.
"You're a spitting image of your father, but you have your mother's eyes," Alice went on kindly. "We were great friends, you know. I was carrying Neville when Lily was pregnant with you. I miss her so very much. Tell me she's well."
"She's very well, thank you for asking," Harry beamed at her. "I'm sure she'll be just thrilled to see you again. But, Hermione told me you weren't able to return to this world. She said you could only be whole in that other world?"
"And she was right," Frank explained. "And then Sirius shared a little secret with us."
"What secret?" Harry pushed, looking at his Godfather.
"The secret that long ago I combined magic from this world with the nature of humanity found in that one," Sirius explained. "I was able to extract my dæmon to exist there, but then put her back inside me to live here. Without being able to do that, I'd have died in either world within about ten years.
"Eventually, Hermione will have to learn to do the same ... or return to her world for good. And - before you ask, Harry - no, you wouldn't be able to go with her if she decided to return home. You'd die there in just the same way I would have."
Hermione looked at Harry in a strange way just then. He couldn't rightly say what she was thinking, but he had the feeling it was the same mind-blowing thought passing through his mind. That they were going to be together for a long time, so long, in fact, that one or both of them would have to make fundamental changes to their very natures in order to ensure it happened.
And that meant something big for them ... no, something huge. Harry knew what it was, and swallowed hard as the idea flitted through his brain and set his heart to rapid pulsing. But it was more than that, because Hermione looked sheepish, as though someone had given away her deepest secret against her will. Did ... did she know? Had she always known and not told him?
Harry wasn't sure how he felt about that. But he was equally confused that Sirius seemed to know about this, too. They both knew about this deep, serious connection that Harry had with Hermione. And they'd kept it from him.
But in that instant he decided he didn't care about that. Not one bit.
For he was filled up with an emotion so powerful and lovely that it was on the verge of overwhelming him. He wasn't entirely sure what he was supposed to do with it. It seared through his veins and warmed every inch of his skin, inside and out. He outright stared at Hermione with a dizzy sort of grin on his face. She gazed back, mildly puzzled at the look he was giving her.
Harry decided he didn't mind if Hermione was confused right now, because he was too. And it was a terrifying and exhilarating confusion at that. But, if he was right about what Sirius meant, they had a whole lifetime to work it all out. And it didn't much matter what world they were going to do it in, because they would be together wherever they were. That was all that mattered.
And as long as that was true, everything else would be alright.
But there were other things that weren't alright, and the others were talking about it as Harry tried to recover his overloaded senses from these mind-shattering revelations.
"So Sirius showed us how to, essentially, re-fuse our souls to our bodies," Frank was explaining. "We were only able to live in Ice Station Zebra because Serafina and her witches had created a pocket of our world in theirs. We were never able to leave the institute for very long."
"Right where the gateway was opened," Hermione nodded sagely. "I did wonder why I never saw your dæmons when I was with you, but you never had ones, did you? I thought that toad of yours was a dæmon at first, but my Pap told me he wasn't."
"No," Alice confirmed. "But we were able to possess Trevor for short periods. I was inside him with Neville on that first train ride to Hogwarts. We wanted to make sure he got to school okay. Then I saw him meet you, Hermione. And I knew he would be fine after that."
Hermione blushed shyly and looked down at her shoes. "Thank you," she managed to mutter back.
"You possessed Neville's toad?" Harry asked with a frown. "That sounds very much like what Voldemort does with his snake."
"That's where we got the idea," Frank quirked over at him. "But we just wanted to keep an eye on our son, not attack witches we were developing a blood feud against!"
"Thomas Riddle is developing a ... a blood feud ... against me!" Hermione cried lowly, the colour draining from her face. "Why?"
"It's because of me, isn't it?" Harry cut in guiltily. "This is all my fault. He's after you because of us being friends."
Hermione snapped her head at him. "If you are about to dare to suggest that we stop being friends because of him, then I'm going to be very cross with you, Harry!"
"But he's after you! He's trying to hurt you," Harry whined. "I don't want you to get hurt on account of me."
Hermione stepped close to Harry and placed a soft hand to his forearm as she smiled at him. Harry shuddered crazily at the contact with Hermione's skin.
"Not being friends with you would hurt far more than anything Voldemort could do to me," Hermione whispered gently. "So I'm not giving you up, okay?"
Harry smiled weakly. "Okay."
"But," Hermione went on, letting go of Harry's arm and addressing Sirius once more. "This blood feud? Is that what you're about to tell me ... about my parents?"
Sirius nodded in confirmation.
"What happened?" Hermione demanded.
"We went to see them, after I escaped the bears," Sirius began. "We wanted to use the two-way mirror, so you could tell Harry I was alright. I half expected him to try and come charging to my rescue as soon as he knew the portal had been closed. You know how he worries like a big girl!"
"I do not!" Harry protested.
"You sort of do," Hermione teased. "You'll develop a saving-people-thing if you're not careful!"
"Right, I definitely wont do that then!" Harry huffed mutinously. "You can all boil your fat heads for all I care!"
Sirius and Hermione laughed together as Harry pouted away in the corner.
"So, my parents?" Hermione urged.
"Yes, we went to see them," Sirius continued. "But we weren't the only ones there. Tom Riddle and agents of the Magisterium were interrogating your parents, trying to find out information on you. We fought them, got your parents away. But then Riddle unleashed a secret weapon."
"What weapon?"
"A giant serpent," Sirius replied. "A basilisk. He has a way with such creatures. It jumped right up from the canal near where your parents house is."
"Oh no!" Hermione moaned. "They didn't ... look at it, did they?"
Sirius nodded, and Hermione let out a hearty whine from in the depths of her throat.
"Is that bad?" Harry asked, immediately concerned.
"Usually, it is fatal," Sirius revealed.
Hermione looked up in hope. "Usually?"
"Usually," Sirius grinned smugly. "Somehow, we aren't sure how, but your parents didn't look directly at the basilisk. Maybe the water obscured it, or maybe it was something else, but they didn't get the full effect of the Stare."
"So ... they are still alive!?" Hermione cried in relief.
Sirius nodded. "Yes, but only just. They are in a Petrified state, but they are safe. We took them to the Ice Station, where Iorek and his bears are keeping watch over them. We came here to procure a Mandrake Restorative Solution. Iorek will return with it once we've located a batch."
Harry let out a huge breath, that he hadn't realised he'd been holding, as Hermione slumped down into a chair and closed her eyes, sighing heavily.
"But we don't think this is the end of the danger," Frank took over. "Nor of the basilisk."
"What do you mean?" Harry asked.
"Tom Riddle has a way with these serpents," Sirius went on. "He sent one to kill Hermione's parents, to draw you out into the open where you were vulnerable. It failed ... but after the events of last year he now knows exactly where to find you. And because of that ..."
"He will be coming," Hermione supplied grimly, opening her eyes once more.
"You can bet on it," Sirius returned with similar gravity.
"He may already be here," Harry interjected. "We, Hermione and I, have been hearing ... well, voices. In the walls. We think it might be from a snake, because I can talk to them, too."
"Yes, the residue of some of Riddle's magic remains in you, from when he attacked you as a baby," Sirius nodded. "But how did Hermione hear the voices?"
"We ..." Harry began, throwing a cautionary look at Hermione, who nodded at him to continue. "We think she might have been being possessed, by a diary she was using."
Sirius went pale in his shock and anger. Then he recovered himself, anger first.
"Hermione - get me that diary," he ordered. "Right now. I don't care what you might have written in it, I just need to see it."
"Yes, sir," Hermione replied meekly. She threw a bizarrely terrified look at Harry, flushed crimson, then scuttled away from the room with her head bowed.
Sirius turned to Harry as soon as Hermione was gone. "Tell me everything about this that I need to know. Leave nothing out."
So Harry began his tale, starting with Hermione's change of mood after his birthday, but Sirius stopped him almost right away.
"Hermione told you she was upset because of a diary that night ... and you believed her?" Sirius asked with a wry grin.
"Yes," Harry replied, slightly confused. "What other reason would she have?"
"Can you not think of one?" Sirius pushed, a smile curling at the edge of his lips.
"Not off the top of my head, no."
"You prattle on about a pretty witch and you don't understand why that might have upset Hermione?"
"No. Maria Edge is pretty. Even Hermione says so."
"And do you like it when Hermione talks about handsome wizards?" Sirius asked curiously.
Harry was immediately hit with a thought about all the times that Hermione had talked about Lockhart. Swooned over him, actually. It stirred a sort of corrosive force in his chest that Harry didn't understand at all.
"What's that got to do with anything?" he stabbed acidly. Lockhart was even on his tongue, it would seem.
Sirius shook his head in dismay. "You really are as dense as your father, aren't you? When you come home at Christmas, you and I are going to have a long, long talk about things."
"What things?"
"You being blind even while wearing glasses for one!" Sirius laughed. "Now, carry on with the story."
Harry frowned, but did as he was told. He was just getting to the part about finding Hermione in Lockhart's office on her birthday night, when the girl herself skidded back into the room. She looked frantic.
"It's gone! It's gone!" Hermione puffed out shrilly. "My diary ... it's gone! Someone's taken it from my room!"
Before anyone could respond, there was another sound of commotion from the corridor, followed by pounding footsteps as someone burst through the door.
"Hermione! I thought that was your voice. You'll never guess what's happened! Someone has gone and murdered all of Hagrid's chickens! They've had their heads cut clean off! Hagrid's going mental ... just barged into the Great Hall covered in blood and feathers demanding Dumbledore take action. We all have to meet for a special assembly. Where's Harry?"
Neville Longbottom then looked around the room, but it wasn't Harry who made him lose his breath, as just then his eyes fell onto two of the other people in the room. His shock was almost enough to give him a sudden heart attack, as he whispered out -
"Mum? Dad? Is that you?"
