"Do you think you can stand?"

Harry nodded. If Mundungus Fletcher thought there was anything odd about Harry wearing what looked like a piece of girl's jewellery, he made no comment. As Harry rose slowly to his feet, he saw that there was quite a large crowd of students around him. Reflexively, he clenched a fist around the necklace, realising as he did so, he was merely calling attention to it. He tucked it inside his robes. He wondered if he hadn't been dazed by the force of the spell and had lain in the street longer than he'd thought. It was the only explanation for how everyone had gathered so quickly. At least he hadn't blacked out this time.

He looked at the stunned faces of the students. Malfoy was standing near the front, and Harry saw him begin to smirk, as he stared at Harry's chest. He had to have noticed the gem. Fred and George had come out of Zonko's along with Pauline. Fred seemed to be the only person in the entire crowd who wasn't gaping at Harry. It looked as if his attention was focused on a short seventh year Ravenclaw who was standing nearby. Harry couldn't remember her name.

Harry finally turned and faced Ginny. She was ashen. He felt as if he ought to apologise for revealing her secret, but it really wasn't his fault. He'd acted on instinct.

Viktor Krum, looked to be consulting with the other teachers who had come up, while Mundungus Fletcher addressed Harry once more. "You're going to have to report to the Headmaster. Let's go." Harry wasn't surprised.

"What about…" He indicated Ginny, Ron and Hermione.

"You were the one who was attacked. If the Headmaster wants to speak to any of them, he'll summon them himself."

But Harry wasn't positive that this was entirely true. He'd thrown himself in front of the spell, but he really hadn't been able to tell whom it had been aimed at. The natural assumption was that he'd been targeted, but Fletcher hadn't seen things from the same angle as he had.

He started back towards the school with Fletcher. As he passed next to Malfoy, he heard, "Nice necklace, Potter. Do you have matching ear rings, as well?"

Harry couldn't resist replying. "And you'd be the expert, wouldn't you?"

"That will do," said Fletcher, giving both boys a quelling look. "This is a serious matter."

Harry shut his mouth before he got a detention or lost any points for Gryffindor. Behind him, he could hear the other teachers assembling the rest of the students. It looked very much as if the rest of the Hogsmeade visit was about to be cancelled.

Professor Dumbledore may well have suspected something was happening, for he met Harry and Fletcher at the stone gargoyle. "I'll take Harry up to my office," he said to Fletcher. "You go back down to the village in case you're needed there."

Harry followed Dumbledore up the spiral staircase and through the door. The headmaster regarded him gravely, no doubt taking in his torn robes. Finally he said, "Would you like to tell me what happened in Hogsmeade?"

And so Harry told the headmaster what he could, which wasn't a whole lot, as the entire incident had happened so quickly. After he had finished, Dumbledore took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes for a moment. "I see. This sounds very similar to what happened to you in Diagon Alley last summer. What do you suppose turned back those spells? I have a suspicion you must know."

Harry reluctantly reached into his robes and pulled out the necklace. There was really no point in hiding it anymore. Most Hogwarts students above second year had seen it by now. Dumbledore looked at it sharply.

"Where did you get that?" he asked. He sounded displeased about something.

"It was a birthday present."

"Who gave it to you?"

"Ginny."

"And do you know where she got it?"

"She told me she made it."

Dumbledore looked surprised by this statement. He reached out as if to take the gem in his hands but realised the chain was too short. "Could you take that off for a moment?"

Harry really didn't want to do this. He had no idea if, by taking it off, he would break the magic in it. He remembered back to his birthday and, well, the ritual Ginny had gone through. Whatever went into the magic behind the talisman, it was certainly complicated. "I'm not sure I ought to. Won't I do something to the magic in it?"

"Just what has Miss Weasley told you about the magic in this?"

Harry thought for a moment. "Not very much really. Only that she had made it and not to tell anyone about it."

"But she's told you what it does."

"She said it was a talisman. There seemed to be some sort of complicated spells involved in creating it, but I didn't ask her about them, and she didn't tell me."

"What did she tell you then?"

Harry thought back to the conversation he and Ginny had had in Mr Weasley's shed on his birthday. "Only that she'd heard about talismans because she'd researched them in Defence Against the Dark Arts. And that she looked up a bit more and decided to try it. She never expected it to work."

"I see. Could you stand up for a moment?"

Harry did so, and Dumbledore came around to stand in front of Harry where he could examine the gem without Harry having to remove it. At length he said, "Since you've been wearing this talisman, what effects have you noticed?"

"Well, it's turned back spells twice now."

"Do you know which spells they were?"

"I didn't hear the incantation during the attack today. It all happened too quickly. The time in Diagon Alley, it was Cruciatus." His voice had dropped to a whisper on this last word.

Instead of replying, Dumbledore dropped the gem and turned towards the fireplace. He reached for a jar on the mantelpiece--Floo powder, Harry realised--and threw a pinch of the substance into the flames. "Argus Filch!" he called. Filch? Was Harry going to get a detention? He wasn't even sure what he'd done.

The surly caretaker's head appeared in the grate. "Yes?"

"Have the students begun returning from Hogsmeade yet?"

"Yes, they're beginning to come in now."

"I need to speak to Ginny Weasley immediately. Would you make sure she's sent up to my office as soon as possible?"

Harry's heart plummeted. Not only did it seem as if he was in trouble, but he'd managed to land Ginny in the middle of it too. He gave himself a mental kick for telling her secrets. He had a feeling she wasn't going to be pleased.

Dumbledore turned back to Harry. "While we're waiting for Miss Weasley, I think I ought to explain a few things about protective talismans. First of all, they're extremely rare, working ones are, at any rate. The reason for this is, it takes a special magical talent to create the crystal, or gem, which carries the protective magic. While it's possible to research the methods involved, you need to have the talent in you for it to work properly. There hasn't been a witch or wizard proven to have the talent for over a century."

He paused, and Harry let his words sink in. Now he understood why Ginny hadn't expected the necklace to work. She'd said something very similar to this, as well. "But someone could have the talent and not know it, couldn't they?"

"They could, Harry. It's possible to have the talent and not make use of it, of course. So perhaps it's not as rare a thing as all that, but that's not what concerns me most here. Two things concern me, actually. One is, that Voldemort must surely have deduced by now that you are in possession of a working talisman. He will have certainly worked that out from the events in Diagon Alley last summer, and if not from that, from today's events. He will be most interested in learning who made this talisman for you. He must not be allowed to find out.

"Now the second concern is more pressing. You see, that talisman will protect you from more than just harmful spells. It will also protect you from things of a more insidious nature. Can you please remind me when it was your scar stopped bothering you?" Dumbledore's tone had taken on an edge Harry couldn't remember hearing before now. He sounded… impatient.

"It was around my birthday…" Harry trailed off, as his brain jumped to the conclusion Dumbledore had already reached. "You're saying that this necklace has affected my headaches?"

"Exactly, Harry, and it's imperative that we find out the truth." Harry's heart began to pound as he remembered Dumbledore's decision to leave his European operatives in place, in part based on the information that Harry's scar hadn't been acting up. He felt ill.

"Might I ask you why you didn't tell me about this sooner?"

Harry swallowed. He felt very small and stupid for not making the connection before now. "Well, Ginny asked me not to tell, and she didn't think it would work, anyway."

"But when we last spoke, you knew it worked, and yet you didn't say anything." Dumbledore was not raising his voice, but somehow that made everything worse. Harry could tell he wasn't pleased.

"But I didn't know it would stop my scar from hurting," Harry pleaded. "I didn't know what it was supposed to do. This was Ginny's research project, not mine. I dunno, I just didn't think to ask."

Dumbledore sighed. He suddenly looked older and more care-worn than ever. "What's done is done," he said, and it sounded as if he was reminding himself of that fact. "But I'm going to have to ask you to remove the necklace for a few days to be sure that Voldemort is actually in Europe…"

A knock on the door interrupted the headmaster. At a word from Dumbledore, the door opened to admit a confused-looking Ginny to the room. "Ah, Miss Weasley. I'd like to have a word with you."

"What have I done?" she asked.

"That remains to be seen. Before Harry leaves us to our talk, I need to ask you if it will affect the magic in his talisman in any way if he takes it off for a few days."

Ginny looked from Harry to Dumbledore. "No, it should be all right."

The headmaster looked expectantly at Harry, who reached up slowly and began to undo the clasp. "Just try taking it off for a week or so, Harry, and if there's any sort of warning from your scar you are to report it to me immediately. Do you understand?" His voice was a good deal harder than Harry was used to hearing. He hoped that Ginny wouldn't be in too much trouble.

He nodded and pocketed the necklace.

"Fine, then. After a week I'll leave it up to you if you wish to put it back on. That will be all."

Harry left the headmaster's office, half expecting his scar to begin burning at any moment, but nothing happened. Not even the slightest twinge. He paused at the bottom of the spiral staircase. He wasn't ready to return to Gryffindor Tower just yet. He didn't want to face Ron and Hermione's inevitable questions. He ducked into a nearby classroom to wait for Ginny while he mulled a few things over.

It wasn't long before Harry became restless and began to pace, fingering the necklace in his pocket as he did so. He had a feeling he'd be in here for a while. It seemed to him that Dumbledore would have quite a lot to discuss with Ginny. Harry's stomach churned as he continued to circle like a caged animal. For some reason he was reminded of the animals he'd seen at the zoo on Dudley's eleventh birthday.

Dumbledore's words about the necklace preventing his scar from burning kept echoing through Harry's mind. It was a bit of a relief that his scar hadn't begun hurting the moment he'd removed the necklace, although he was dreading that it might begin doing so at any moment. He told himself that perhaps he hadn't missed any important warnings after all. It had to be true, he hoped it was true. If anything happened to Sirius, Remus, or Ginny's brothers, it would be his fault. He tried to push that terrible thought aside, but it kept popping up again unbidden. It seemed to grow and take on a life of its own. Why hadn't he connected his lack of headaches with the talisman? Why? Why hadn't he said anything to Dumbledore sooner? Dumbledore had asked, and he, Harry, hadn't said anything. Something terrible would happen to someone he cared about and it would be all his fault. Firenze's words came back to him then: "Guard what is most precious". What was more precious than people who were the closest thing he had to a family? He kicked at a desk in frustration. He had to stop thinking that way. It wasn't productive.

But the train of thought he found to replace it wasn't much better. Casting about vainly for something else on which to blame his predicament, he hit upon Ginny asking to keep this all a secret. If it hadn't been for that, he'd have willingly told Dumbledore right away. He tried to ignore for the moment the voice in his head which insisted on reminding him that he'd chosen to comply with Ginny's wishes. Why had she wanted him to be so secretive? She'd implied that it was to avoid teasing from her brothers. But she hadn't said, "Don't let my brothers find out." She'd said not to tell anyone. And he'd listened. She had to have a better reason than that, one that she hadn't told him. He took out the talisman and looked at it. What would it have mattered if he'd told Dumbledore? He thought of what Dumbledore had said about the talent to make protective talismans being rare. She had to have known about that. So why hadn't she just been truthful with him?

A noise in the corridor interrupted Harry's thoughts. It was the sound of the stone gargoyle leaping aside. Dumbledore must have finished talking to Ginny. He didn't stop to consider what sort of questions the headmaster may have been asking her. His own questions were first and foremost in his mind, and he was going to ask them now. He moved to the door of the classroom.

"Ginny!"

She turned. "Harry, you waited for me."

He thought she looked upset, but he couldn't let himself concentrate on that for now. "Yeah, we need to talk. I need you to tell me a few things. Like why I wasn't supposed to tell anyone about this necklace."

She sighed and entered the classroom. "Harry, we've been through all that."

He raised his eyebrows. "Have we?"

"Of course we have." She sounded irritated, but he pressed on.

"I'd like to hear it again."

"I didn't want my brothers to know. I told you that."

"That's not what you said, though, is it? You told me not to tell anyone, and I took you at your word. I want to know why." The last word echoed strangely through the empty classroom, and Harry realised he'd been speaking more loudly than necessary.

"I didn't want anyone to know, all right?" Ginny grated. "It wasn't supposed to work, you know. I didn't expect it to. Do you think I wanted everyone knowing I'd made you a protective talisman?"

"What would it matter if they did know? Especially now? It's not as if we've been sneaking around."

"At the time we weren't together. What do you think people would have made of that then? People like Malfoy? 'Oh, look! There's silly little Ginny!' " Her voice had taken on a derisive tone. " 'Still not over her crush on Harry Potter. Thinks she can get his attention by making him jewellery. Isn't she pathetic?' " She looked away, swiping angrily at her eyes.

Harry felt worse than ever. He hadn't wanted to make her cry. "Ginny," he tried again more gently. "Is that the reason you did this?"

"NO!" she fairly shouted. "I told you why I did this!" Her eyes were flashing a warning at him that he was on very shaky ground. "Why all the questions?" she went on. "Haven't I had to answer enough from Dumbledore already?"

"I have to know what's going on, Ginny. Did you know that this would affect the pain I feel in my scar? I didn't. Not until Dumbledore told me." He held up the gem that had been in his hand since Ginny came out of Dumbledore's office.

"If you didn't know what it did, why didn't you just ask? You're a year ahead of me. I thought you'd have studied this in Defence Against the Dark Arts."

"I haven't. We've had a different Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher every year. You know that." Ginny merely looked at him, and he knew that excuse sounded as lame to her as it did to him. It was becoming more and more difficult to shift the blame for any of this onto her, but he stubbornly continued. "Tell me, Ginny. Did you know it would affect my scar?"

"Of course not! It wasn't supposed to work." She enunciated this carefully, as if he were dull-witted.

He did want to yell at her now, but he refrained. "Ginny, you knew it worked. You've known ever since that day in Diagon Alley." He waited for her to acknowledge the truth of this statement, but she stared stone-faced at him, her lips pressed into a fine line. "Why won't you just admit it works, Ginny?" Still no reply. "Did Dumbledore tell you what it meant? Did he tell you the ability to make these things is rare?"

"YES!" she finally shouted. "Yes, he told me. He didn't have to, though. I already knew."

"So why can't you just admit to it and have done?"

"I don't want it! I never asked for it!"

"Then why did you even try?"

"I couldn't help myself, Harry. There was something in me driving me to do it. I thought I could just make the bloody thing, it wouldn't work, and I could get on with things." She was beginning to sound distressed. "But it does work. There, I've said it. Are you happy? And that just complicates everything."

Harry was sure Dumbledore had warned her of the danger she now faced from Voldemort, should he find out who had made the talisman. Not that he thought she was afraid to face it, but this was still something she hadn't asked for.

"I didn't want any of this," she repeated in a very small voice.

Harry knew how she felt. He hadn't wanted a great many of the things life had dealt him, either. Suddenly all his frustration with her drained away. He reached out to her, touched her shoulder, and she came willingly into his arms. "I'm sorry," he whispered into her hair, and he meant it. He was sorry he'd shouted at her, and he was sorry for how she was feeling.

"Ginny," he said after a few moments. "I'm going to have to leave the necklace off for a while."

She drew back and looked at him. "I know. I was there, remember?"

"It's preventing me from feeling pain in my scar, and right now it's important for Dumbledore to know where Voldemort is. He needs all the help he can get."

"I suppose it's not a very good thing then. The talisman I mean."

"I'd rather not have the headaches, actually. But, well, this is important."

"Were you in a lot of trouble?"

"With Dumbledore?" She nodded. "It's not easy to tell with him, but, yes, he wasn't very happy about things." He hesitated. "I'm not sure how much I'm allowed to tell you, but Dumbledore is trying to find out where Voldemort is, and he can use pain I get in my scar to get an idea how far away he is. I told him I wasn't feeling any pain last month, so Dumbledore thought that meant Voldemort must be far away. But I didn't know the necklace was affecting things. We might have missed something important."

She shuddered visibly. "I'm sorry. I had no idea. I should have never made the stupid thing."

He pulled her close once more. "It's my fault. Really. I had a chance to tell Dumbledore about it last month, and I didn't. But I had no idea it could be blocking the pain. It was stupid of me not to have worked that out."

He felt her tighten her grip on his waist. "Can we just stay here?"

"Why?"

"Because when we go back to Gryffindor Tower, everyone is going to ask a lot of questions, and I'm not in much of a mood for them right now."

"We're going to get hungry at some point, although I suppose one of the House Elves will come in here, and we can ask for food." She laughed a little at that, and Harry felt a bit better to hear her. He hadn't liked rowing with her very much. "We're going to have to tell Ron and Hermione, but we can put them off for now, if we promise a full explanation later on. The others can get stuffed."

*

"I can't believe it!" Ron grumbled. He had just finished supper and was walking back to Gryffindor Tower with Harry, Hermione and Ginny.

"What did you expect, Ron, after what happened today?" asked Hermione.

"I didn't expect he'd cancel Quidditch, too!" Dumbledore had made the announcement before the meal. Due to the attack in Hogsmeade, visits to the village had been cancelled for the rest of the year. That was hardly surprising, but no one had expected Quidditch matches to be cancelled as well.

"Of course he did," replied Hermione. "There's not enough staff to supervise practise. The teachers have enough to do as it is, and Madame Hooch doesn't have that sort of time."

"But it's not fair! We were all set to trounce Slytherin! I couldn't wait to see the look on Malfoy's face when we countered all his strategies."

Hermione put a hand on his shoulder as they walked. "You'll always have memories of last year. No one can take that away from you."

Harry was walking with Ginny behind Ron and Hermione, so he couldn't see the look on Ron's face. It was easy for him to imagine, though. He'd seen that particular expression of satisfaction spread over Ron's features many times as he remembered his first ever victory as Gryffindor Quidditch captain. The match had been very close, and perhaps that had made the taste of victory all the sweeter.

"Besides," Hermione went on, "we have more important things to discuss." Harry and Ginny had promised a full explanation of the day's events after supper, and now they were to the point.

"Shouldn't we go somewhere private for all this?" asked Harry. "I don't think the entire common room needs to hear this." He thought Ginny breathed a sigh of relief beside him.

Ron turned and looked a bit sharply at Harry. "Did you have anyplace in particular in mind?" he asked suspiciously.

"Yeah, actually, I did."

Harry turned aside on the fourth floor, showing them to the storage room. Once they were inside and had shut the door, Ron lit his wand and got a good look around. "When did you find this place?" he asked. "And why didn't you ever tell me about it?"

"Last year, and there was no real reason to, was there?"

"Seems like you might have said something. I mean this is an ideal place to…" He trailed off as realisation set in and he looked from Harry to Ginny. He began to frown slightly.

"Well, why don't we all make ourselves comfortable," Hermione put in before Ron could say anything else.

They sat, and Harry began to tell them about the necklace and how it had turned back a curse that day in Diagon Alley and again in Hogsmeade. Then he told them about Dumbledore and the European operatives. As he spoke, he took the necklace out of his pocket and showed it to them. Hermione was extremely curious about it.

"You made this, Ginny?" she asked.

Ginny hadn't uttered a word the entire time, and now she merely nodded.

"But that means…" Hermione said. "I mean, no one has had the ability to do this for years. Centuries even."

"Yes, I know. Dumbledore told me all about it already."

"But where did you even learn how to do this? This is very old magic. I've seen it referred to, but never found out how it's actually accomplished."

Ginny sighed. Harry knew she didn't want to have to own up to having this talent for some reason. He'd worked that much out. He just hadn't worked out why yet.

"Last year, I did a special research project on protective talismans in Defence Against the Dark Arts. For some reason I was still curious about them once I had all the information I needed for my essay, so I dug a bit further. I was able to get permission to use the restricted section for this project in any case, so I used the permission slip to look and see if I could find anything on how to go about actually making a talisman."

"But there isn't anything, is there?" asked Hermione.

"Yes, there is," replied Ginny. "But the book wasn't in English. It was in some sort of ancient script. I was able to read enough of it to work out the subject matter. After that it was a matter of translation. It took a long time, but I eventually got the directions deciphered."

Hermione merely stared. She'd dropped Ancient Runes at the end of third year when she went back to having a normal time table. She'd kept her dictionaries, however, and had lent them to Ginny on occasion. Now she looked as if she wished she were still taking the class. "But even if you worked out how to do it…"

"Yes, I know, anyone can try, but not everyone will succeed. But something drove me to it. I made it last summer before Harry's birthday. I don't ever want to go through that again." She sounded very bleak.

"That explains it," said Ron. "That's what you were doing out in Dad's shed all that time. Is that why you were so tired?"

"Yes. You don't know what it took out of me. I was exhausted by the end. I can't begin to tell you how much power it took."

Harry didn't know what to say. Thank you hardly covered it. He remembered how tired she'd looked. Now that several months had passed and she had a good reserve of spark and energy about her, he realised just how dull and lifeless she'd been that first day when she'd come to the Dursleys'. The change had been so gradual he hadn't really noticed it, but now that he thought back and compared his memories of last summer with now, the difference was astonishing. He took her hand and squeezed it, but it seemed like so little in comparison to what she'd gone through for him. He wondered again what had motivated her. The reasons she'd given him last summer didn't seem to cover it anymore.

If Hermione was thinking along the same lines, she did not comment. Instead she said, "You were right to try to keep this a secret."

Ron looked shocked. "Did I just hear you right? You think Ginny should have kept this from Dumbledore?"

"No, not from Dumbledore. But she should have kept it generally secret for as long as possible." Ron looked rather blank. "Come on, Ron, think about it. This is a rare thing. Ginny has the ability to make a working protective talisman. There hasn't been a proper jewel-wright in over a century. We're at war. Don't you think there's going to be a demand for this sort of thing?"

Harry's heart sank. Now he understood Ginny's earlier refusal to admit to her ability. He hadn't even stopped to consider the broader implications of all this, but Ginny obviously had. Or at least she knew in her heart what this could lead to. Her words echoed through his head: "I don't want to go through that ever again". It looked to him as if she might not have a choice in the matter if this became known. And now it most definitely could. If Voldemort could work out that Harry possessed a working talisman, others could as well. At least no one beyond Dumbledore and those present in this room knew who had made it. That must not ever become known.

"So what's to be done about all this then?" asked Ron.

"There's nothing we can do but keep this to ourselves," said Harry. "Dumbledore isn't going to tell anyone, and neither will we. We can all agree on that, can't we?"

Ron and Hermione both nodded. Harry didn't have to look at Ginny for her consent. He knew she was desperate to keep this under wraps. "Then we make a pact," Harry said. "If anyone asks what this necklace is, none of you know anything about it. And if anyone asks me, I'll deal with it."

There was little else for them to discuss, and they rose to go back to Gryffindor Tower. Much later that evening, as everyone was preparing to go to bed, Harry called Hermione aside. "Did you notice earlier when Ginny was talking about…" he trailed off, but he was sure Hermione had caught his meaning. "Well, did you notice the way she said she was driven to it?" Hermione nodded. "Ginny has said that to me before. Would you have any idea what that's all about?"

Hermione thought a moment. "Have you asked Ginny about it?"

"Yes and no. I mean I've asked her why she did it."

"And what did she say?"

Although they were already speaking quietly, Harry lowered his voice even further. "She said something about her debt to me. Because I saved her life second year."

"Well, that's probably it, Harry. Don't you remember how Professor Snape was driven to protect you from Quirrell back in first year? Wasn't that because of a life-debt he had to your father?"

"Yes, I suppose so."

"So if the power of a life-debt is strong enough to last beyond the grave, isn't it enough to make Ginny attempt the impossible? And once she'd begun to continue even though she was exhausting herself?"

Harry had to admit that this likely explained it.

"Hey, Potter, what are you doing in the corner with my girlfriend?" Ron's voice came over to them from the boys' stairs, and Harry and Hermione both laughed. "Don't make me come over there and hex you, now."

"I'd like to see you try, Weasley," replied Harry. "Wizard's duel at dawn? My seconds will be in touch with yours."

And with that they all went up to bed.