A/N: I thought I'd give you all a small notification. I know I've upset some of the more 'conservative' fan fic fans in the past, by pairing Harry with Katie, killing off Ginny, etc; I am going to continue to go down this type of path, and I know people have stopped reading before because of it, so I thought I'd give fair warning this time. If you like happy endings, perfect couples, and everyone alive and well - stop reading now. For your own good, loves.
If you're up for the bumpy road, please continue to read and review :) Thanks.
Chapter 16: Searching for Answers
The door of the Hospital Wing burst open, and Lupin came in carrying Katie. Harry stood up and rushed to him.
“Katie…” he said painfully, touching her pale face with his hands.
“Harry, you can see her later “ but I need to get her into a bed,” Lupin said quickly.
“No, please “ Katie…”
“Harry “ please, she needs rest…”
“What…” Harry said, dimly
“She needs rest, Harry…”
“But… she’s dead…” Harry said.
“Harry “ she’s not dead,” Lupin said, sounding confused. “But she’s weak “ I need to get her to a bed…”
Lupin began to walk away, carrying Katie in his arms.
“She’s alive…” Harry said in breathless relief, feeling happier than he’d ever remembered being. “She’s alive…”
Numb to the flurry of conflicting thoughts and emotions that raged within him, Harry walked blindly towards the library. The news of Draco’s trial had brought the all but carefree Gryffindor crashing back to his own miserable reality. He had spent the remaining two hours of Alex’s Saturday morning lesson only vaguely aware of anything he was doing, thinking instead of everything that had happened the summer before in Denmark.
The mere idea of his former classmate still made his stomach churn with anger, though Harry could not deny that it was because of him that Katie’s life had been spared. He couldn’t explain why he felt so passionately about defending Draco’s actions yet he could feel the need to do so coursing through his veins.
Harry traipsed mindlessly into the library; grabbing a book from the nearest shelf he took a seat and an empty table. He was sure there was an essay he was supposed to be working on, but he felt it difficult to be bothered by such trivial concerns as his mind became more troubled; Draco’s trial was the least of his worries.
His distressed thoughts turned to Voldemort. Most of the time, Harry tried not to think of him, as Dumbledore had said that when the time came, he would know what to do. However, he could not help but wonder that perhaps he should be taking more initiative in fulfilling the prophecy.
What can you do? Leave school on a thestral and challenge him to a duel?
Harry knew the idea was insane, but he still felt uncomfortable with being passive when so many people were suffering at Voldemort’s hands, and the longer he sat alone, turning everything over in his head, the more burdened and helpless he felt.
“Potter? … Potter… Potter!’
Harry pulled himself from his thoughts and lifted his distracted gaze to find Siobhan seated across from him, looking at him as though he were mad.
“Is there a specific reason you’re staring into a copy of The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1?” the red-haired Slytherin asked with worry-tempted amusement.
“Oh… er, no…” Harry mumbled in confusion, as though pulling himself from a subconscious state. “Just thinking…”
“You seem knackered,” Siobhan said, scribbling furiously across a piece of parchment.
“Er…yeah…” Harry replied.
“Up late last night?” she asked, still focused on what seemed to be an essay.
“Uh-huh,” he responded dully.
“Probably weren’t too happy saying goodbye to Katie, again, I’d imagine…”
“Yeah…” Harry sighed, but remembering Siobhan’s unusual behavior from the night before, he ended his string of apathetic responses and turned an interested eye to his new friend. “You and Katie got along well last night…”
“Oh, yeah, I guess…” Siobhan muttered indifferently.
“I’ve never seen you so friendly,” Harry pressed.
Siobhan lifted her face and cast him a dark glance.
“It’s the truth, isn’t it?” he asked, entertained by the return of the Siobhan Murphy he had grown accustomed to.
“Perhaps I don’t have the most warming and welcoming personality “ not compared to the likes of Miss. Granger and Miss. Bell, I’m sure…” she replied bitingly.
Harry was surprised to hear a hint of animosity in her voice, but considered that he had perhaps touched a nerve and changed the subject quickly.
“What are you writing?” he asked, nodding towards her parchment.
“An essay for History of Magic,” she answered lightly.
“Banshee Troubles of the 14th century?” Harry asked. “What book are you using, I haven’t been able to find a thing…”
He scanned her work area, but saw only the standard textbooks for Transfiguration and Potions.
“I don’t need a book. I learned about the Troubles when I was younger “ that on top of what Binns gave us in his lecture last week is more than enough for twelve inches…”
“And you just remember all of that?” Harry asked, astounded.
“Yeah “ I have a knack for remembering information. My mother always called me ‘Muggle smart’… she didn’t mean it as a compliment, either.”
Again, Siobhan had rendered Harry speechless; he wasn’t sure it would be appropriate to commend her on her talent when she had so bitterly mentioned her deceased mother. Before he felt pressured to change the subject once more, he was saved by the appearance of an anxious looking Ron and Hermione.
“You alright, mate? You seemed a bit spacey earlier...” Ron said, taking a seat next to Harry.
“Did something happen? What did Alex need to talk to you about?”
“Nothing… just Malfoy. His trial is coming up,” Harry informed them.
“Draco Malfoy is going to trial?” Siobhan asked, giving a snort of laughter. “Good riddance…”
“Not a Malfoy fan, eh?” Ron asked with a dark grin.
“Can’t stand him “ worse still, he asked me to the Yule Ball in our fourth year. And to the Halloween Ball last year. Sad, really…”
"Yeah, well... Alex told me I'll probably be asked to testify," Harry continued, conveniently leaving out his own plans to exonerate Draco. He wasn't up for trying to explain himself to them.
"That'll be rough," Ron said wistfully; Hermione offered a sympathetic smile of agreement, but remained anxiously quiet.
Nobody said a word, and the four of them suddenly found themselves trapped in an odd silence. Ron was looking awkwardly at each of the others in turn, and Hermione was rocking back and forth slightly. Harry got the sense that his two best friends had something they wanted to discuss with him privately, and so he muttered a polite goodbye to the inattentive Siobhan and stood up to leave.
Ron and Hermione echoed his farewell and followed quietly at his heels.
"We've been thinking, Harry," Hermione started in a low voice as soon as they were outside in the near empty corridors, making their way back to Gryffindor Tower, "about a couple of weeks ago when we promised you..."
"That we'd help you find away to defeat him," Ron finished for her.
"Oh," Harry said, a little confused as to where this was going. "And...?"
"Well, we'd want to get a move on, wouldn't we?" Ron said honestly. "It's not like we have time to waste..."
"And we're so sorry that we haven't done anything about it until now," Hermione cut in apologetically. " I think we've all just been so preoccupied... and well, it's no excuse - so now we're ready to do whatever necessary."
Harry tried to give them an appreciative smile, but secretly doubted how much help they could be in the situation.
"Do you have a plan, then?" he asked unsurely, feigning a hopeful smile and doing his best to hide his skepticism.
"Well... yes, actually," Hermione said, with the air of someone getting ready to jump over an open flame; she looked to Ron for support and though the smile he offered appeared more terrified than encouraging, she seemed slightly fortified. "We thought we'd start in the library."
"The library?" Harry repeated inquisitively, only a trace of exasperation evident in his voice. Many a time had the three of them been presented with a lack of information, and each time Hermione had run in the same direction - to the hundreds of dusty shelves of Hogwarts Library. And though Hermione had proven quite the successful researcher in the past, he felt sure books weren't going to provide them with much of a solution this time.
"I highly doubt we'll find anything on how to defeat the most powerful dark wizard in history, Hermione..." Harry said, again taking her concern into consideration and trying to remain only slightly sarcastic. "If that were the case, we wouldn't have much of a problem, now would we?
"You're thinking too broadly, Harry," Hermione said gently. "You're asking the wrong questions, and if you continue with that line of logic, you'll never get any answers."
Harry was quiet as he considered what she was saying, but decided he still wasn't convinced. Hermione seemed to view his silence as an opportunity to further prove her point.
"You don't need one answer, Harry," she continued. "You just need to learn as much as you can...and maybe somewhere along something will click into place... something you can use."
"Floo powder," Ron muttered to the portrait of the Fat Lady as the three of them reached the entrance of the common room. The common room was full, but quiet, and so they continued up to the boys’ dormitory to continue their discussion without being disturbed. With each step he took, he gave further thought to Hermione’s reasoning, and came across the realization that, as was usual, she was perfectly right. After all, even if they didn’t discover anything useful, a bit of extra information couldn’t possibly hurt their cause.
“Alright then “ where do we start?” he asked with a sigh.
“We start with what we already know,” Hermione said seriously, not wasting any time; then more delicately she asked, “What exactly happened the night… your parents died?”
“Oh… er…” Harry said, his voice catching slightly in his throat as he was caught unawares with the suddenness of the question. “Well, Voldemort came to our house and my dad tried to hold him off, so that my mum could run with me… Voldemort killed him first.”
Harry was surprised at how difficult he found it was to relate the story aloud. Since the age of eleven, when he had discovered the truth of his parents’ death, he had never told anyone of the events of that night; not even Ron or Hermione.
“Then he came after my mum, and she begged him to kill her and leave me…”
The echo of his mother’s screams which had haunted him from the time of his first encounter with a dementor once again resounded in his memories. Hermione’s eyes were already to the brim with tears, and Ron, with a comforting arm around her, looked upon his best friend with painful sympathy.
“And… then he murdered her, too… and then he tried to kill me. But it didn’t work, because my mum’s protection still lingered.”
“The curse rebounded, didn’t it?” Hermione asked. “And hit Voldemort?”
“Yeah…”
She frowned thoughtfully, as though something wasn’t adding up.
“And when the curse hit him, what happened?”
Harry shrugged; it had been an emotional morning, and the conversation was draining the last of his energy.
“Voldemort said himself that his soul was ripped from his body…” Harry said.
Hermione’s brow furrowed deeply in thought, while Ron seemed thoroughly puzzled. Harry couldn’t understand what there was to think about, or what there was to be confused by; Voldemort’s curse had rebounded and destroyed him “ it was a truth that the entire wizarding world knew by now.
“But…Harry -” Ron said, sharing a quizzical glance with Hermione. “If Voldemort’s killing curse backfired… why didn’t he die?”
“Exactly what I was thinking,” Hermione agreed, looking inquiringly at Harry.
“I dunno,” Harry answered. “Maybe the spell lost some its power when it rebounded…”
“No, that’s impossible “ spells deflected by shields rarely lose their efficacy, Harry. And Voldemort’s so powerful… even a weakened killing curse wouldn’t be any less than that of an ordinary wizard’s.”
“Voldemort took steps against his dying,” Harry said suddenly, barely aware that he had even said it; his head was spinning. “He said that something must have worked “ he stopped himself from dying…”
“So… what did he do?” Ron asked, looking as though he might be excited were he not so horrified.
“I don’t know,” Harry replied.
“What if his precautions are still in place?” Hermione asked, her brown eyes widened in frightened concern. “What if he still can’t die?”
“There’s a way…!” Harry said defensively, overwhelmed with their questions, suffocated by his own fear. The prospect of an invincible Voldemort wasn’t something he needed to be faced with.
“How can you defeat someone who can’t be killed?” Ron asked.
“I DON’T KNOW!” Harry shouted at them, silencing them both immediately.
“Sorry, mate…” Ron said throatily. “I just…”
He didn’t finish, but gave a helpless look around the room at nothing in particular and sat down on his bed. Both he and Harry looked at Hermione “ her fear was still evident, but she drew herself up bravely and took a deep breath before walking over to Harry and looking him straight in the eye.
“Well, you’re not the only one to have survived a killing curse, Harry,” she told him. “Clearly Voldemort did, too “ and we have to find out why, and how.”
---
"HEALY! Stop trying to impress Patrons and keep your grip on the bloody Quaffle! - And Oaks, if I'm hit one more time by that Bludger, I'll have to find a replacement Beater!"
Harry sailed high above his team mates on his Firebolt, only vaguely paying attention to what Ron was shouting about. It was the day after the three had discussed Voldemort, and Harry couldn't find much strength to devote to Quidditch practice; Ron had understood and hadn't asked anything of him. And so, the black-haired Seeker had taken to the skies to be alone with his thoughts.
Not that he got much thinking done, but it certainly eased him to be flying far above the ground as opposed to being weighed down with all his worries. He let out a deep breath as he gained another several feet in the air, and dived down again momentarily. It was a rush.
In a moment, his sense of peace evaporated as, quite suddenly, he felt his lower leg hit forcefully with a heavy object. He let out a sharp gasp of pain, and slipped slightly from his broom, causing him to dip downwards into the team's practice area.
"Harry, what's wrong?" Ron asked in panic, zooming over to his best friend quickly.
"My leg..." Harry winced. "Something hit it - hard."
"Oaks, did you hit him with the Bludger?" asked Ron angrily.
"No - I swear... it wasn't anywhere near him," Derry replied, watching Harry with worry. Ron only glared at him.
"You three - " he pointed at Derry, Minty, and Ryan, " - keep practicing. Zahira, help me with Harry."
Zahira and Ron floated along side Harry as they eased him down onto the pitch, quickly rolling up his robe leg to take a look at the injury. The entire left side of his calf was bruised black and purple.
"Ugh..." Ron said with a wince. "That looks painful."
"I think he's bleeding internally," Zahira said, eyeing the leg carefully.
"We should bring him to Madam Pomfrey..." Ron said with a sigh, summoning the stretcher they kept in the stadium for emergencies. Harry hoisted himself on with an appreciative nod at the two of them.
"Kadar, did you see Oaks Bludger hit him?" Ron asked quietly, with a dark look at Derry.
"No, I didn't," Zahira answered honestly. "Perhaps it was something else?"
"Like what!"
"I don't know. But it wasn't Derry."
"Fine," Ron gave in reluctantly. "Keep the team out for another twenty minutes, you're in charge."
Zahira nodded and turned quickly on her heel, quickly summoning her broom and taking off into the air with the rest of the team. Ron waved his wand over Harry on the stretcher, gave a small mutter, and Harry lifted with a small bump into the air. They started to move towards the castle.
"Do you have any idea what hit you?" Ron asked.
"No... I didn't see anything. I was just flying, and then - I felt it."
"You certainly did more than feel it, mate," Ron said, looking at the bruised leg and giving a tiny grimace.
"I don't know... maybe Voldemort aimed a Bludger at me, and then hid in the stands," Harry said darkly.
Ron didn't answer, but gave Harry a serious look.
"Listen, there's something I want to talk to you about - but... well, I didn't want to bring Hermione into it. She doesn't think it's a good idea."
"What's not a good idea?" Harry asked, the stretcher giving another small bump as they approached the Entrance Hall.
"I was thinking about my... dream...things," Ron said uncomfortably.
"The memories from the brains?" Harry clarified.
"Yeah. Well... I know that the man who owned the memories was an Unspeakable. He would have known things that we will never find in any library. Things about death..."
"And what do you plan on doing?" Harry asked, suspicious.
"I could go off the potions and the Elimency for a bit," Ron whispered. "You know, maybe I'll see something."
"Ron - "
"And that's not all, Harry. Aurora - the woman in my dreams. She was killed by Ministry Officials. She was probably a Death Eater."
"I don't care; you'll be in a right state if you stop taking your potion. I can't let you - "
"Exactly what Hermione said," Ron responded bitterly.
"What do you expect me to say? Yes, go ahead - by all means, put your mental and physical health on the line for me, Ron!"
"Would you keep your voice down?" Ron hissed. Harry was now clinging onto the stretcher, which was ascending a staircase as well as bumping more now that Ron was distressed.
"Ron - you can't..."
"It's nothing compared to what you're giving up, mate," Ron said with a quiet sadness. "Let me do this for you. I won't do it if you tell me not, too. But please... there could be something there."
"I can't let you do this!"
"I don't want to lose anymore family members to him, Harry. Let me help you."
Harry looked back at him, silent.
“Goodness! Mr. Potter, what happened to your leg?" Madam Pomfrey's voice came from the Hospital Wing as they reached the entrance.
"Well, er... I'm not really sure actually," Harry said nervously. He could usually count on the Hogwarts matron to give him an earful when he arrived in the infirmary with a Quidditch injury. She clicked her tongue and thanked Ron, before moving Harry to a bed and setting about to see what was the matter with him.
"Ron," Harry said with reluctance, just as the tall red-head turned to leave. "Do whatever you need to do."
Ron gave a nod and left.