Another really fun chapter in my opinion this week… and so I won't waffle on here and I'll instead jump straight to it, and hope that you all enjoy it too!

"Wow." Ron said, after Harry had eventually finished his tale of his Felix induced adventure. After leaving the Common Room he had indeed ran into Lavender as suspected, pushing the idea that Ron was enjoying his company with a group of women that didn't include her and setting up an argument that would spell the end of that particular relationship. Harry had then ended up meeting Professor Slughorn down by the Greenhouses and inviting the previously elusive Potions Master to the funeral of Aragog, who Leo had now learned was the Acromantula pet of Hagrid's that had been the scapegoat for the initial opening of the Chamber of Secrets some 50 years previously. That had all led to a series of events involving a pair of drunk Professors and some well placed guilt tripping on Harry's part and finally ended up with the memory that they had all been desperate for being retrieved, and Harry had explained to the small group of Gryffindors exactly what Professor Slughorn had said to the young Tom Riddle that one night so many years earlier, and also about Dumbledore's theory of 6 Horcruxes that the Headmaster had shared with the Boy-Who-Lived in the early hours. Leo felt ill when he had heard that particular theory, remembering the foulness that went into creating just a single one, but his stomach had quickly solidified at the news that Ron was now reacting to, that Harry had been invited to go on Professor Dumbledore's next trip to destroy a Horcrux. "Wow! You're actually going to go with Dumbledore… and try to destroy… wow." He trailed off, so amazed at the idea that he didn't realise that he was making it snow in their small section of the Common Room, something which Hermione quickly corrected and they began brushing themselves off.

"So something of Gryffindor's or Ravenclaw's?" Leo asked Harry once again, this now being the fourth time this particular question had been asked. "That's the theory?"

Harry nodded his affirmation again, not even close to being annoyed at the repetition. "That's what Dumbledore said, yes."

Leo could only agree based on the knowledge that he had heard. "We know that he has had Hufflepuff's cup, Slytherin's locket and the Gaunt ring in his possession, and that these were all, most likely, turned into Horcruxes. It stands to reason that he wanted to use items from famous families, and especially those with links to the founders." His brow furrowed as he began to think of everything that he knew about the Founders and their lines of descendants. "Rowena Ravenclaw's line died out with her daughter Helena, while we don't actually know if Godric Gryffindor had any descendants, the end of his life is shrouded in mystery..." He thought for a moment, his mind racing through his knowledge of magical history and the important families that managed to last the test of time to the 20th Century. "If You-Know-Who was thinking along the lines of wanting to prove himself as more than a Half-Blood son of a muggle, then perhaps looking more into the Sacred 28 could work…" He trailed away, grabbing some parchment and writing out the list from memory, underlining those with students at Hogwarts there and then. "We don't have anything that I'm aware of, but I can check the vault come the summer just in case…" He then began to list them out loud. It was quickly presumed by all that Hannah Abbot, Neville Longbottom and Ernie MacMillan wouldn't have any relics that Voldemort would desire, while the list of Slytherin's would need to be combed through more thoroughly. A pair of names did intrigue Leo though as he turned to both Ron and Ginny. "There's nothing that stands out for you two is there? From the Weasley or Prewett side."

Hermione's eyes bulged in recognition as she knew exactly what Leo was thinking without him needing to verbalise anything. "You think that Fabian and Gideon could have been protecting something?"

Leo shrugged. "I think that whatever You-Know-Who turned into a Horcrux, he would want to retrieve it himself, not leave it to his followers to hand to him so he could murder somebody else later. He killed his family himself, he killed Hepzibah Smith himself too, what if he took something from another of his victims?"

"Nothing comes to mind." Ginny was the one to say, shaking her head as she thought. "Mum's never mentioned an heirloom from the Prewett side of the family of any kind at least."

Ron concurred, adding. "All I got from Grandad Prewett was a chess set, hardly something Voldemort would care about."

Leo clenched his jaw, frustrated at the lack of further progress. "I'll have a look in the library at some familial records though, something might come to mind…" He muttered to nobody in particular, not really seeing where Voldemort would be so enamoured with a family that he would need one of their heirlooms to desecrate, but nothing else made any sense.

He was brought away from his internal thoughts when Ron audibly shrunk into the back of the armchair, trying to almost bury himself within the crimson fabric, his eyes wide as he looked beyond Leo. He quickly turned around to see what was going on behind him, and only saw that Lavender and Parvati had entered the Common Room, the former's eyes red and puffy as they made their way straight up to the dormitory.

"Oh, grow up Ron." Ginny rolled her eyes as she shifted herself to a more comfortable position, her legs draped over Harry's on their own sofa. "You didn't want to be with her anyway."

Ron's face reddened. "Well, no, but the shouting wasn't pretty and I don't fancy another round of that."

Hermione scoffed. "Coward." She muttered. "You should have just been upfront with her when you stopped liking her and made it easier on everybody. I had to throw up a silencing charm around my bed last night because she was so upset."

Ron shrugged. "Perhaps, but we are where we are. She'll get over it eventually, she's the one to break up with me after all."

"Pig." Hermione retorted unhappily, moving her focus back to their Charms homework while Leo was flicking his own way through Hogwarts: A History to see if there was anything in there on the Founders that he had somehow forgotten, though a glance up at Hermione showed that she had had the same idea to look over at him too, their newfound relationship still being kept a secret from their friends for the time being, a wise decision they had both agreed earlier that morning once the truth about Ron and Lavender's split had spread.

"Well, just don't rush into anything else Ron." Ginny warned her brother. "You'll only end up hurting people if you do."

"Don't lecture me." Ron pouted. "Just because I gave you two my permission…"

"Your permission?" Ginny fought back, her face turning a scary shade of red as she moved her legs so she was sitting stiffly upright. "Since when do I need your permission to date Harry?"

"Guys, please." Harry mumbled weakly, but everyone knew once the two Weasley's started, stopping them was nigh on impossible, and so Leo tried to drown out the bickering siblings by focusing on his book, though he subtly shifted so that his hip was touching Hermione's while trying to keep the inevitably forthcoming grin from appearing on his face.

As the weather started to get warmer and dryer, May was soon upon the students of Hogwarts and as usual for this time of year the discussions around the castle became increasingly about one of two things, either the end of year exams that were beginning to creep up on them all, especially the 5th and 7th years… or the upcoming Quidditch final round of games. The first weekend of May saw Hufflepuff trounce Slytherin by 400-90, meaning that going into the final match of the year between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, Gryffindor only needed to win it in order to win the Quidditch Cup, whilst Ravenclaw needed to win by a whopping 490 points to have any hope of winning it themselves. A tall ask considering the Gryffindor team had been bolstered by the return of Katie Bell from St Mungo's, meaning that it was easily the strongest Quidditch team since Gryffindor in Leo's 3rd year taking the field, and the entire House was confident of a win.

That was, until, the Tuesday before the match. Leo had been late down to dinner after their Arithmancy lesson after Hermione had wanted to stay behind, waiting to question Professor Vector about a mistake she believed she had made in her latest essay, and after a quick detour making use of the empty Common Room for a few minutes, they arrived at the Great Hall to find it abuzz with rumours of Harry running through the castle drenched in blood. As usually happened whenever a particularly alarming rumour around Harry surfaced, Hermione couldn't relax until she had found her best friend, and so despite only having been sat down for a matter of seconds, she grabbed a chicken leg and apologised to Leo, running out of the room as she tried to scoff the leg as quickly as she could.

Leo meanwhile arrived at the Common Room later on, figuring that if Harry being covered in blood was the worst of the rumour then nothing more serious had happened and he didn't need to give himself indigestion to find out the truth as quickly as possible, and as he straightened himself from the Portrait hole, he saw that he had stumbled onto a scene of Hermione finishing a long and damning speech, and as he grew closer to the group, the first words he could hear succinctly was when Harry snapped at her. "Will you stop harping on about the book!"

"Woah!" Leo interjected loudly, and without thinking, he waved his wand with a silent Muffliato. "Don't have a go at her!"

"Back off, Leo." Harry countered angrily, turning towards him with a glare.

Leo was long past the stage of doing that to Harry Potter however, the Boy-Who-Lived no longer a source of eternal jealousy and rather just a guy that Leo often clashed with, and he stood firmly beside Hermione as he glared back at Harry venomously. "Not until you calm down." He stated coldly, his hand gripping the ebony wand tightly.

"Enough, boys, please." Hermione exclaimed exasperatedly, for the first time not being put out by the use of the muffling spell. "Harry… I just can't see how after what you've done, you are still defending the book…"

"For all we know that spell was there as a warning!" Harry countered angrily.

Leo looked confusedly between Harry and Hermione, but none were moving their focus away from being angry at the other so it was left to Ron to fill him in as to what happened quickly, and Leo felt ill as he heard the state that Malfoy had been left in after use of Sectumsempra. By the time he was paying attention to the argument again, Hermione was looking completely baffled. "Are you telling me that you're going to go back…"

"And get the book? Yeah, I am." Harry retorted powerfully. "Without that book, Hermione, Ron wouldn't be alive."

"And without that book, you wouldn't have almost killed Malfoy." Hermione snapped back.

"Enough!" Ron came between the pair of them, standing tall as he moved in between his two friends. "Both of you, just stop bloody shouting at one another." Now it was Ron's turn to face the ire of both angry Gryffindor's, but it went nowhere as Ginny had arrived with a stern look on her face, and so Leo quickly dropped the spell and recast it, including the 5th year. Ron looked towards Hermione first, telling her. "The book isn't evil in itself, Hermione, you know that, you know that it's simply one students scribbling stuff down, you've just had the hump all year because someone is actually better than you at Potions…" He held a hand up to her face, stopping Hermione's tirade before it began. "But, Harry can't keep it. Not after what he did. So here's what we'll do." He looked towards Ginny. "Take Harry and grab the book, and then you hide it somewhere that he won't find. If we ever need it again, we'll know it isn't lost but Harry won't be able to get to it without you."

Ginny for a moment was taken aback by Ron's authority in the matter, but nodded his head. Hermione wasn't comfortable still though, butting in. "Ron, we have to turn it in! Who knows what other dark…"

"Oh, zip it Hermione!" Ginny was the one to snap harshly this time. "Ron's right, we might need it some day and you know the book itself isn't dark."

"He nearly killed Malfoy!" Hermione was almost screeching now, trying to get her point across.

Ginny shrugged, before muttering something that instantly reminded Leo that she had also lost a parent last year. "One less Death Eater."

Hermione was left flabbergasted by the blasé statement, blinking rapidly towards Ginny. "That's callous." She told the red-headed girl, quickly adding. "And unproven…"

"Right, let's all of us shut up, and stop this arguing right now." Leo stated sternly as Ginny opened her mouth to rebuke Hermione angrily. "Hermione, come on, we have that Arithmancy work to work on." He immediately noticed her turn her angry gaze towards him but refused to let her begin another rant, glaring back at her strongly and exclaiming. "Now!"

He took her hand and dragged her away from the others, making sure that he picked up her bag on the way past. They didn't speak to one another all the way through the Common Room and through the Portrait Hole, even as the Fat Lady complained about being forced to open every three seconds. Their silence continued through the 7th Floor Corridor and until they had reached the Grand Staircase when Hermione yanked her arm back, folding her arms angrily as she glared at him. "I can't believe that you're not…"

"I am on your side on this." Leo interrupted her knowingly, silently relishing the sight of the stubborn woman's face shifting more towards surprise as her arms relaxed. "That book is dangerous and knowing what we know now perhaps we should have handed it in."

"Then why…"

"Because Ron is also right, and we might need dangerous very soon, Hermione. What Harry did was wrong and he should have never tested an unknown spell on a person, even Malfoy, but now we know what it does, and with what's coming… we might need something like that in our pockets."

Hermion's face now morphed to bewilderment, as she struggled to comprehend his words. "Leo, that spell is foul! It's extremely dark magic!"

He was torn. She was right of course, but a little voice in the back of his head was also telling him that times were changing. "The important part behind any form of magic is intent." He explained. "I could use a spell as simple as the levitation charm to drop a rock on somebody in order to harm them, or I could use a spell like Sectumsempra to save somebody's life when it's threatened by a Death Eater. Harry went about it wrongly, I'm never going to deny that, but we need to think beyond the here and now."

She sighed, and Leo could see she was beginning to relent and come around to his way of thinking. "I don't like it." She muttered stubbornly.

"Neither does Harry, but he's been punished enough without an argument that will end up in him being a prat and saying something he can't take back." Leo added, remembering his feelings from the year before and how Harry had unilaterally ignored him when it came to leaving for the Ministry. "Let's just, leave him be for now. Let us all calm down." He held his hand out again, this time pausing before he reached her to let her make the choice. Hermione hesitated for a moment, but thankfully she moved her own hand, placing it into Leo's. He grinned at the contact, closing his own hand around hers and rubbing the back of her hand gently with his thumb. "I don't want us arguing too." He told her softly, not caring that they were in the middle of the staircase and that anybody could walk through and see them.

Hermione nodded. "I know, I don't want that either… but it does feel like 3rd year once again." She said quietly, a tear forming in her right eye. "I just hate that it came to this when it was so obvious that that book was dangerous. Now Harry can't play Quidditch and everyone will be on his back again, he'll get angry and take it out on us because he's stuck with Snape every weekend…" She sighed. "Thank you for stopping us… me before I went too far."

"Ron stopped you guys." Leo said with a light smirk. "I just felt like you would be better off away from one another, at least for now. Leave Harry to Ginny, she will calm him down. And then you can both apologise to each other and it will all be like this whole thing never happened."

Hermione went to complain, but a stern look from Leo stopped her as she seemed to realise that she was going too far, kicking Harry while he was already down and backed into a corner. "Fine." She muttered, before a smile and a blush formed on her lips. "And I guess Arithmancy will distract me."

Leo pouted slightly, not actually expecting to need to do any homework, rather hoping that the pair of them could find a secluded place in the castle to distract one another in a different way, but he wasn't about to counter Hermione just so they could snog, and so with a forced bright smile he nodded, leading the way towards the library asking a number of questions about the magical mathematical subject to get Hermione's brain as far away from one battered copy of Advanced Potion-Making as it could possibly be.

Thankfully, all animosity with the fallout of the Half Blood Prince's book was placed on hold as the weekend arrived and the day of Gryffindor v Ravenclaw was upon them. Harry may have left for his detention feeling dejected, but Leo was still feeling confident as the players flew out onto the pitch, with Ginny taking the number 7 Seeker shirt and Dean Thomas filling in once more as Chaser. It was an entertaining start to the game as of the stadium were supporting Ravenclaw for various reasons, but the strength of the Gryffindor team won out as despite an early end to end flurry of goals, the return of Katie Bell, taking over as Captain for the day as she was playing her last match before graduating, spurned the team decked in crimson to a romping 450-140 victory, spawning jubilant celebrations in the Gryffindor section of the stadium, and the call of another party was immediate once the players had received the cup.

"Three in a row!" Fay was the one to call out over the noise as they made their way back to the castle. "Who'd have thought that after 1st year!" She was technically correct. In their 6 years of schooling they'd already had 2 years of Quidditch suspended, and whilst Ravenclaw won the cup in their first year Gryffindor had won every other time.

"When you have a team like ours, who's going to stop us next year?" Anna asked. "It's not like we need any replacements… Dean will slot into Katie's place..." She grinned ecstatically. "And now Ron is looking better and better with each game…"

"Oh stop." Fay groaned. "I've had enough of this… can you please stop drooling over Weasley of all people?"

That was news to Leo who looked at the two girls, bewildered. "Excuse me?"

"Anna totally has the hots for Ron." Fay laughed. "Ever since Lavender split up with him she's been…" She paused, hard at thought until a grin spread across her face and she looked towards Anna with a teasing glint in her eye. "Well, she's been sickening really, I can't think of any better word."

The auburn-haired girl pouted. "He's grown up a lot this year." She then shrugged with a matching grin. "He's grown fit this year, and you heard as well as I did everything that Lavender was saying about him."

"And I would not want her sloppy seconds, thank you very much." Fay snorted, grabbing Anna's arm tightly. "Come on, what you need is a drink and a dance, not a snog with Weasley." She then marched the pair away, leaving Leo left with Hermione and Neville looking completely bewildered at what had just happened.

Once they got to the Common Room the party was already in full flow, and Leo managed to get onto his 3rd butterbeer when the portrait opened to a roar, as the team filtered through, with Katie Bell being the one holding the cup aloft in jubilation. Despite Fay's best intentions to keep Anna under control, the brunette herself got distracted when Vicky Frobisher came and joined her, Leo and Hermione standing in a corner, the latter of whom was merely nodding along instead of getting involved excitably in a retelling of the match. That distraction proved costly when a loud cheer went up, and eventually Leo managed to spot the source, as Ron and Anna were seemingly wrapped around one another in the centre of the room, locked at the lips.

"Unbelievable." Hermione muttered, and Leo could only agree, counting that after both of the matches that Ron had played in, he had ended up snogging somebody in the middle of the Common Room. He quickly spotted Lavender Brown running away in tears, closely followed by Parvati.

"You'll have to deal with that tonight then I guess." He muttered to both Hermione and Fay, who looked at each other with grim glances. "I can't say I envy you."

"I can't believe her." Fay shook her head, though her grin betrayed her.

Vicky took her hand at that moment. "Come on, let's get out of here before you end up hexing her. Today is a celebration, not a battle ground." Leo simply grinned at the obvious excuse that the 5th year was making, an extremely unsubtle look that earned himself a punch on the arm from Fay.

"See ya." Leo called after them with a smirk. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do!"

That one earned him another punch, before Fay stuck her tongue out at him, giggling as she was led out of the room by the 5th year. "Bye guys." Vicky called, joining in the laughter as the two snaked through the celebrating crowds to also leave the Common Room.

The distraction of Ron and Anna had allowed Hermione and Leo to also move to a more secluded corner, though still being careful to not be too overt to draw the same amount of attention as Ron was currently doing. The lack of needing to tiptoe around the Weasley meant that for the first time Leo felt brave enough to hold her hand while people surrounded them, and he enjoyed the blush that appeared underneath her hair as he made contact. They were eventually joined by Ginny, now having taken hold of the cup and refusing to let anybody else take control of it until Harry himself had held it. Thankfully, she only needed to wait around 20 minutes longer as the usual Quidditch Captain wandered through the Portrait at around 1 o'clock to yet more thunderous cheers, and Ginny went running into his arms, planting a forceful kiss onto his lips while all around him people were screaming their own versions of the match towards him, something which Leo was happy to avoid. He did however take the moment of distraction to plant a kiss of his own on Hermione's cheek, laughing as she pushed him away with a grin on her face. "What?" Leo asked her, mock innocently. "Everyone else is kissing." He shrugged, dodging her second shove before going to the now empty table of Butterbeer and grabbing some more bottles, happy to spend the afternoon celebrating quietly with just her while the rest of the House went crazy over the victory.

That Ron Weasley and Anna Bailey were going out was the talk of the castle for days past the Quidditch Match, and something that neither party were doing anything at all to try and dissuade the gossip, spending nearly every second they could in one another's vicinity, something that was causing a lot of tension in the girls dormitory, a fact that Leo was more aware of than most boys after getting the retelling of the night before from both Fay and Hermione every morning. Fay seemed more put out about it than Hermione, telling Leo that she felt more alone without Anna at her side, so Leo made more of an effort to spend his days with his friend, while ensuring that the evenings were spent with Hermione in the library, doing either homework or research into the Half Blood Prince, something that Hermione was still worryingly obsessed over despite his concerns.

It was one such Thursday evening, spent in the library closer to curfew than both Leo and Hermione would have initially liked due to a particularly public display of affection from Ron and Anna in the middle of the Common Room where Hermione was multi-tasking, talking at breakneck speed about the bursts of silent treatment and arguments occurring between Anna and Lavender whilst the Prefect was also searching through public school records for any hint on who the Half Blood Prince could be. Leo meanwhile was finishing up on a Magical Law assignment from Professor Marchbanks about the Supreme Mugwump Election of 1932 and the eventual illegal rise of Grindelwald when he interrupted his girlfriend by slamming his quill on the table, saying "Of course!"

Hermione, looking somewhat put out by being interrupted, looked at him questioningly. "What is it?"

"I've been looking at things from too narrow an angle." He said softly to her, wary of Madame Pince's glare that had found him. "Looking at the Sacred 28 as if that's something You-Know-Who would have cared about. It's not about being a Pure Blood, it's about his own relationship to the wizarding world." He took out a brand new piece of parchment and began to scribble, jotting down You-Know-Who in the middle of the page, before splitting it into 6 sections. In each section he wrote a heading, Diary, Ring, Locket, Cup, Snake before the given reason from Professor Dumbledore as to why each were chosen as Horcruxes. And finally, he wrote down a question mark for the final, unknown item. "Each has a personal meaning to him, even the cup, yes it's a founders item but what if that's not the reason that he chose it? What if he chose that because it represented his first entry into the adult Wizarding world. His first job that gave him access to such valuable historical artifacts."

Hermione frowned, not sure where he was going with that line of thinking. "But he cared about Hogwarts above all else, it makes complete sense that the last object is something we haven't discovered belonging to either Ravenclaw of Gryffindor."

"But failing finding one." Leo then carried on. "Where would he go? He had access at Borgin and Burke's to all sorts of treasures. If he could find something once belonging to a famous magical family, one not necessarily on the Sacred 28 but meaningful to the world…"

Hermione pondered that for a moment. "What sort of families are you thinking?"

"Families with undisputed importance to history." Leo began. "People like the Flamel's and the Philosopher's Stone, the Peverell's…" A brainwave hit him as his eyes widened excitedly. "Professor Dippet… he was Headmaster at the time, the person that was in charge when You-Know-Who learned who he was. What if there's something of his?"

He rushed to his feet and moved to a section on Wizarding History, finding the book Nature's Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy and bringing it back to the table, this time sitting himself down next to Hermione as he flicked through the book, passing by Deverill, Dipple and Diggory before frowning. "Huh. He's not here."

"Professor Dippet was a Half-Blood." Hermione explained, causing Leo to sigh, deflated. "Keep searching though, there must be something here."

He did just that, flicking past names such as Hopkins and Lovegood before stopping for a brief moment on MacDonald, before continuing to the P's, where after a quick look at the Potter page, another name stood out clearly. "Prince." He said.

"Excuse me?" Hermione asked.

Repeating himself, Leo said. "Prince. The Prince's were Pure-Bloods."

It took two more repetitions before Hermione, abandoning the newspapers she was currently reading to take the book and pore over the words, before a bright smile appeared and she looked at Leo, beaming. "This is it! It has to be it! She exclaimed, before grabbing Leo by the neck and pulling him in for the most passionate kiss they had shared yet, only breaking apart when the voice of Madame Pince was heard warning everyone that curfew was almost upon them. Another kiss followed once they had packed everything away and Hermione had checked the book out to read that night, as the pair found a secluded corridor to continue their earlier activity, leaving Leo to be extremely grateful twenty minutes later that Hermione could use her Prefect badge as an excuse when they were caught running towards the Gryffindor Common Room after curfew by a frowning Professor McGonagall.