Big Update #5

A/N: This story's credit is all due to J.K. Rowling's creation of this brilliant world, I hope you enjoy my rendition of it.

The Great Hall, Hogwarts

The Great Hall was filled with happy, chatting students as the room slowly filled up for breakfast. Overnight the school had undergone its customary Christmas makeover and now the hall was filled with massive blue spruces and garland. This year Flitwick had enchanted the ceiling to fall from the ceiling. It would slowly disappear as it reached lower down. Each tree was covered in thousands of icicles that clinked together with the slightest touch filling the room with what sounded like bells.
Ginny was resting her head on Harry’s shoulder as they talked quietly and waited for the others to show up. There was only four more days until school let out for winter break and everyone seemed overly eager to go and see their families. After the Prophet ended up writing on the several murders and break-ins, including Fudge’s, there was a certain amount of constant paranoia that all students had adopted. And Harry saw that today was no different when he heard the familiar screech of owls and noticed everyone stop what they were doing to make sure they weren’t getting a letter. Harry however was hoping for just the opposite and was relieved when he saw Hedwig’s telltale white plumage. She circled the Gryffindor table once then landed gracefully on the table.
Harry gave her a piece of his toast from his plate and took the envelope from her beak. Just as he hoped it was from Lupin.
Harry had realized after running into him at the ministry that they had barely kept in contact over the last three months; feeling guilty for not talking to his godfather he had written him a long letter explaining a lot of what had been going on at Hogwarts. Opening the envelope Harry deflated seeing only a small amount of writing on the parchment. But upon closer inspection he smiled, the text said Messr. Moony to Messr. Potter. He instantly recognized it as a subtle hint to the Marauder’s Map. Harry tapped his finger on the paper murmuring I solemnly swear I am up to no good. Just like the map the ink spread from the small text to fill the page with Lupin’s words.
Harry,
First off good work on cracking the code, I was a little worried the hint would be a little too vauge.
Secondly let me apologize for not writing to you, just as you said yourself, I have been somewhat busy right now. With the war now going full force I have been forced to work many more operations for our group than last year.
I’d like to say that everything is okay out here, I mean outside of Hogwarts, but as your little trip to the Ministry might have showed you, it is not. The ministry is in utter turmoil, and while Minister Bones is doing a great job I am more than a little nervous when it comes time for the election next month.
Even with this spell I cant tell you what I’m doing right now in this letter in case it gets intercepted, but needless to say it is of great import to everyone involved in the ministry.
I am glad to hear that you and Professor Flamel have been making some progress with the intricacies of the Heartbond. I am even happier that you and Ginny have now grown even closer together and that the bond did not draw you too close too quickly.
Now onto holiday break, if you get this the day I send it then tomorrow you’ll be heading home. I will actually not be at Snuffle’s home, in fact no one is there as of now due to the jarring breaks in our defences lately. So, I have already arranged for you and Emmaline to head to the Weasley’s and I will join you there the next day. I have a feeling that you will have no problem going with your Ginny, and you can also get some of your Christmas shopping done.
Now I need to send this now before it gets light enough for anyone to see Hedwig take off.
Moony

Harry smiled and folded up the letter and placed it in his pant’s pocket, and kissed Ginny on the cheek.
“What was that for Mr. Potter?” Ginny had never been kissed by him in such a public place, but she was not complaining.
“Well it seems that Moony is stuck somewhere working for our friends, but he said that Emma and I were going to go spend the holidays with you guys.”
Ginny beamed and kissed him on the cheek back, “Well of course you were. You didn’t think I would let you stay at that house all alone. Plus, my mum would go mad knowing that somewhere there were kids who didn’t get to have some of her food. Plus I think it’s a good idea that Emma has at least a fun Christmas, it’ll be hard enough for her without having to stay in Snuffle’s house.”
Ron came up from behind them holding Hermione’s hand. “Thanks for saving us seats mate, I need to fill up before the big snowball fight.”
“Do you ever not fill up, Ron?” Hermione asked as she sat in the seat next to Ginny.
“Guess what Ron? Lupin just sent Harry a letter telling him that he and Emma are going to go to our house for holiday!”
“Thas-gray-may!” Ron choked out in-between bites of toast.
“You should go tell Emma Harry, she probably need a bit of good news,” Hermione urged looking down the table at the group Emma was sitting in. Everyone around her was laughing and joking and it seemed that Emma was laughing too, but occasionally her façade would break and her sorrow would become evident. For the past few weeks they had tried everything to make her a bigger part of the group especially after the discovery of the second part of the prophecy but she had insistently spent much of her time with kids he own age. The had all agreed that if it helped her cope then they would let her be with her friends, but they were always ready to come in and help her if she had am emotional breakdown. For a 12 year old she was dealing with the loss of her only parent amazingly well.
Harry approached Emma’s end of the table and tapped her on the shoulder. She turned around with a small smile on her face although it was fairly easy to tell it was really a masquerade. “Hiya Harry, what’s up? I can’t believe the decorations, I hope we get to have ones like this.”
“Yeah these ones are brilliant aren’t they? That actually what I wanted to talk to you about. I got a letter from Lupin telling me that we were going to head to”
“The Weasley’s house, right?” Emma completed cutting him off mid-sentence.
“Uh, yeah, exactly. How did you know that?” Harry asked taken slightly by surprise at her rather quick response.
“I’ve been writing Moony every couple ’a weeks. He’s really funny to talk to and his letters are long. It’s nice to have someone to talk to.”
Harry was split between two different emotions; one of happiness for Emma that she had found a person to talk to, and one of envy, Lupin was writing her but not him?
“Great! Well then make sure to be packed and ready to go tomorrow morning, the train leaves really early.” Harry said lamely, trying to hide some of his disappointment.
“I’ve already packed most of my stuff up, I’ve had a lot of free time,” Emma said, her cheerful façade slipped once again and Harry saw a young girl who was absolutely terrified to be alone. But, once again, she recovered and plastered her smile back on.
Harry sighed but forced himself to smile, “Great, well we’re gonna’ have a little while to go gift shopping when we get there so try and think of some things to get people.” Emma nodded gave him a big smile and returned to her conversation with the other first years.
“Everything okay?” Hermione asked as Harry sat back down.
“Yeah, its just Emma is always forcing herself to be happy. I think that if she keeps it up and never releases all that sorrow she might just burst. That’s what happened to me, and I ended up inflating my dear old Aunt. At least she’s been writing to Moony.”
“Well that’s something Harry. If she’s writing him, even if it isn’t about her mom, she’s able to talk to someone. That’s why I wrote in my diaries for so long. I probably still would but Tom sort of scared me a little too much for me to be picking up a diary anytime soon.” Ginny said comfortingly, trying to joke with him a little to get his spirits back up.
“I guess it’s helping, I just feel somehow responsible for her. I don’t want to just leave her abandoned like I was.”
“Harry Potter! Ginny said sternly, “Joy dying was not your fault! Voldemort, Lucius, Bellatrix and the others are responsible for her death. None of these deaths are your fault Harry, war is horrible I know, we’re in the middle of it, but you don’t need to blame yourself for the whole bloody thing.”
Harry looked up at her with his deep green eyes then kissed her very briefly on the cheek, and whispered, “thanks Gin’, I’m so lucky that I have you here to remind me why I’m still fighting.” He then looked over to Ron and Hermione and clapped his hands together. “Well then, who’s ready to go outside then? I want to make sure Slytherin doesn’t beat us in the snowball fight.”
Harry grabbed Ginny by the hand and pulled her out of her seat and out to the snowball fight.
The Holiday Feast, Hogwarts
“’Ello Harry, Merry Christmas!” Hagrid said as he shook the snow off his massive jacket, “How are ya’ Ginny, Ron, Hermione?”
“Hagrid! What have you been up to? I haven’t seen you for a week?” Hermione asked, dodging his flapping jacket at the same time.
“Ah, well that’s because I’ve not been ‘round, been doin’ some work for the headmaster.” Hagrid bent down and whispered conspiratorially. “But it looks like I made it jus’ in time fer the meal. I need to go talk to the headmaster but I’ll talk to ya afta’ words, I have a present for you all.” He winked then walked up to the teacher’s table.
They saw Hagrid go up to Dumbledore and whisper to him, Dumbledore showed a brief smile then patted him on the shoulder. Hagrid took his seat and Dumbledore stood up to begin the feast.
“Only four months have passed in this school year and yet so much has passed already. This year has posed us with many different struggles, but it was not unforeseen. This war is now beginning in earnest, and before we sit down to our wonderful holiday meal, I want to urge you to enjoy your break and cherish every moment you have with your families; this is a season for cheer, so please, make the most of it. Now, enjoy your feast and have a splendid holiday break!” He clapped his hands together, snapping some energy back into the room that had been sucked out of it by his speech. A second later the tables were filled with mounds of food; turkey, ham, roast beef, rolls, shepherd’s pie, mince pie, mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, and seemingly endless Butter Beer.
“Wow, the elves really seem to have outdone themselves this time. Isn’t the holiday feast just a normal meal and the people staying at school have a big one on Christmas?” Colin Creevey asked from across the table.
“Yeah, but I was talking to Flamel and he said that there weren’t going to be any students staying over holiday this year, apparently our parents want to spend as much time with us as possible. I guess Dumbledore just decided to make a big going away dinner because there isn’t going to be a Christmas dinner,” Harry said.
“Well stop talking and start eating mate! It’s like we get two Christmas dinners in a month” Ron said enthusiastically as he grabbed the nearest pitcher of Butter Beer.
“Yes commander!” Harry saluted jokingly in reference to his position in the D.A. and grabbed the other pitcher.
The next hour was filled with jokes, laughter and sounds of cutlery scraping on plates as for just a little while everyone forgot about the war going on all around them.
As the night wound down the plates and food disappeared and were soon replaced with cups of hot chocolate for each person.
“I’ve always enjoyed a nice cup of hot chocolate before I go to bed on these brisk winter nights. Now enjoy your drinks and finish, or for some I daresay, start, packing for tomorrow’s train ride home. And remember to enjoy your break and spend this time with your family and friends.” Dumbledore said his eyes showing both grief and nostalgia.
Some people stayed and chatted quietly while others did indeed go to their houses to pack, Ginny and Harry were about to do the same when Hagrid appeared next to them carrying what would at first glance appear to be a ball of newspaper. “Glad I caught ya before you headed to bed, Merry Christmas ‘Arry” he said thrusting the package at him. Harry took it and by Hagrid’s urges opened it. The ball of paper turned out to be the wrapping on a leather wand holster.
“Wow, this is brilliant Hagrid. Thanks!” Harry said genuinely. The leather was deep brown and had intricate designs and runes etched all across the belt.
“I was hoping ye’d like it. I have been talkin’ to Alastor, that’s Professor to you guys I s’pose, and he said you’ve takin’ to duelin. I figured it’d be a good gift to get ye seein’ as how you always seem to find yerself some kind of trouble.”
“It really is great Hagrid, and you’re right about the trouble, I just hope there isn’t much more waiting for me. You’re going to stop by the Weasley’s for Christmas aren’t you?” Harry asked.
“Of course, how could I miss Molly’s cooking. Moody and I have duty in the morning so it will be later in the evenin’”
“Great, well I’ll give you my present then, I need to pick it up at Diagon Ally anyways.”
“Take care of yer’selves Harry, you too Ginny and you too Ron and ‘Mione. I gotta get going, one of tha unicorns is about to have a foal so I need to make sure it isn’t too cold for her” Hagrid said cheerfully as he pulled on his giant coat once again and headed into the billowing cold outside.
“Well I’m stuffed and tired, I need to pack my stuff though so I think I’m going to head up to my room,” Ron said giving a huge fake yawn and stretching his arms.
Hermione smiled at him for a moment then spoke suddenly as if just catching on, “you know what, I have a lot of packing to do also. I have loads of books I need to return to the library also. I think I’ll head up with you” Hermione said taking Ron’s hand, “’night Harry, ‘night Ginny” she added then walked away with Ron up the stairs.
Ron looked over his shoulder about midway and then turned back and kissed Hermione on the cheek as they continued upwards.
“Harry, did I just see my brother wink at me?” Ginny asked nervously.
Harry just smiled, “come on Gin’ I have loads of packing to do, and I need to go to bed.”
Ginny laughed at his impression, “well Mr. Potter maybe I can help you then, lets go and see” she said in her most seductive voice and she took Harry by the hand and led down the hallway to their room.

Hogwarts Express, Somewhere in Scotland
The mass of students on board the train seemed to be much more talkative than ever before, it seemed even busier than the train ride at the start of term.
For their part Harry, Emma, Ginny, Hermione, Ron, Neville, and Luna were sharing one of the compartments and were chatting cheerfully about anything and everything. They were all still recovering from the prank that Emma had just pulled on Ron which involved his hair suddenly completely disappearing from everywhere on his body and being replaced with what appeared to be spaghetti.
“I would swear you’re a Weasley Emma, you’ve got the trickiness of my brother’s and you can get away with it like my sis, plus you have my good looks,” Ron said, ripping huge chunks of his spaghetti hair off.
“You’re right, except for the whole part about your good looks, and I think a cave troll has better manners than you,” Ginny retorted.
“Well we’re working on that aren’t we?” Hermione said in a tone that seemed almost maternal.
“Is that what were you two working on last night, loads of books right?” Harry asked causing both Ron and Hermione’s faces to burn bright red in embarrassment. Luckily they were saved any more embarrassment by the knock of the old witch who sold snacks.

The Caucus Mountains, Russia
“Wormtail, Lucius, remove the body and leave me be. I have work to do.”

Hogwarts Express, Somewhere in Scotland
Harry stood up to open the door for the lady, stepping over a precariously perched chessboard and the maze of feet. He reached for the door and swung it open right when his legs gave out completely. His momentum still going forwards he crashed into the trolley of sweets and knocked it over. His head hit the edge of it tearing a large gash down the side of his face.

The Caucus Mountains, Russia
More…Voldemort hissed as he poured all his malice into the connection between him and Harry. Over the months he’d noticed it closing but felt that he owed Harry a little reminder he had not forgotten about him. He focused his mind even more, making his magic a fine needle, poking, jabbing, and prodding. He was dissecting Potter’s mind from the inside. He heard the boy screaming but he also heard something else, another voice, one he remembered from long ago.
“Weasley,” he hissed as he recognized the voice. Something was wrong with it though, it was in Harry’s mind too, and it was growing louder.

Hogwarts Express, Somewhere in Scotland
“Harry!” Ginny screamed and jumped up out of her seat sending both Crookshanks and the chessboard flying. She ran over to the now screaming and writhing Harry and took his hand. “Harry! Come on Harry wake up, come on! Please come back, come on, open your eyes.” She continued to shout to him, half hysterical half pleading. She had never seen one of Voldemort’s attacks personally but she had heard enough about them that she knew that was what was happening now.
She never let go of his hand as he continued to squirm on the floor, blood was now flowing freely from the huge gash on his face. “I won’t let you have him Tom, let him go this fucking second. He’s mine Tom you better leave him damn well alone!!!!” She screamed as she gripped his hand even harder. All of a sudden a huge burst of pain came over her, it felt as if she had just been hit a brick wall on her broom. She now heard a voice though…

The Caucus Mountains, Russia
“It’s hopeless little girl, I WILL KILL HIM and then I WILL KILL YOU and your ENTIRE BLOODTRAITOR FAMILY!” Voldemort now screamed outloud. He had been just as startled when his connection broke into the red head’s mind too. Something was wrong though, it wasn’t getting easier, Potter and the girl’s minds should be worthless by now, but just the opposite was happening, it was getting more difficult to hold the connection; the hole was shrinking ever smaller.
Hogwarts Express, Somewhere in Scotland
Ron, Emma, Neville, Luna, and Hermione all tried to pry Ginny off of Harry, or at least stop her from shaking. She was now convulsing so badly that her arms were being cut on the broken glass of the door.
“Stop it!!! Stop it!!! No, you can’t kill him you can’t, don’t!” She screamed even louder.
Ron pulled out his wand raising his arm to cast a stunning charm to try and stop the connection. Hermione grabbed his arm, “NO! We can’t the connection is all that’s keeping them alive right now, we can’t close it.”
Harry was now lying still in a growing puddle of blood, but Ginny’s movements were growing even more chaotic. “Harry, come on HARRY!” She screamed the loudest yet, her body going limp as the scream died. She fell ontop of Harry unconscious.

The Caucus Mountains, Russia
“HARRY!” Voldemort involuntarily shouted in sync with the girl and was thrown across the room. His head hit the wall his skull cracked hard against a sconce, splitting it open. His mind reeled from the after effects from what had felt like being hit with the cruciatus. Tom lifted a hand to feel the cut, of course there was no blood, but the hole was sizeable. For the first time Lord Voldemort felt something he hadn’t in the past three decades, doubt.

Grimmauld Place, London, England
Molly Weasley was going about her usual business in the kitchen, orchestrating the chopping of carrots as she stirred the pudding on the stove. She was whistling, and in a particularly good mood today because she new that in just a few hours she would have her whole family back safe and sound, even it it was only for a few days. The violence had been growing slowly but surely over the past few weeks and she was glad to be able to know that she would be able to know where her children were once again.
The wind-up alarm went off over at the oven and she was going over to pull the cookies out when all of a sudden her wand jumped out of her hand and pointed itself in the air straight down. The was a burst of bright light and a blood covered and rather harried looking Lupin appeared in 3D on the floor. “Molly, I need you to contact Madam Pomfrey and Albus immediately. Also get hold of Tonks and tell her to be waiting at home. Harry’s hurt and as soon as we get him stabilized as best we can we’re going to come there so be ready!” His image faded as he turned away to help the others.
Molly paused momentarily, seeing that much blood and knowing that Harry was hurt shocked her, but she was also trying to get over what she had seen briefly in the background of the message. What appeared to be an unconscious and blood covered Ginny was being lifted up by Ron into her seat. Molly couldn’t be sure if that was what she had seen but her motherly instinct told her it was.
This pause lasted only a moment though she knew that if Harry, and possibly her daughter, were hurt then they were depending on her getting the message out to get help.
She grabbed her still hovering wand and started for the floo, intending on calling Madam Pomfrey first. She stopped in her tracks though when she remembered that the nurse was not a member of the Order and would not be able to get to Grimmauld Place. So instead Molly pointed her wand at herself and sent off a quick message urging Dumbledore to collect Madam Pomfrey and get to Grimmauld Place as quickly as possible. She barely had enough time to send off another message to Tonks when she heard a loud banging on the door and she ran off to open it.
She quickly worked her way through the various padlocks and charms finally swinging the door open. In front stood Lupin cradling a bloody and unconscious Harry Potter. He didn’t say a word but just strode purposefully into the house, heading straight for Harry’s room. Behind him was a sobbing Ginny, Hermione and Emma, and a panicked Ron, all of whom were covered in some amount of blood.
Molly pulled the children into the house and bolted the door behind then followed the rest of the group up stairs to the huge commotion upstairs.
Remus had placed Harry on his bed and was starting to gently dab at the large cut on Harry’s head with a rag to try and find where the blood was actually coming from when Tonks came into the room closely followed by both Dumbledore and Madam Pomfrey.
When Madam Pomfrey finally saw Harry she gasped, shocked at the amount of blood but also at how frequently Harry managed to sustain these massive injuries.
“Everyone please stand back we need to let Poppy work,” Dumbledore said in a commanding voice urging Poppy forwards with a hand on her back.
“Tonks would you mind helping we need to make sure we stop the blood flow before we can wake him up,” the nurse asked as she drew her wand and began to take small swaths of the blood away by sweeping it back and forth over his head. Tonks started to do the same thing yet each time they had cleared a spot more blood would cover it up, apparently this was a much larger cut than anyone had anticipated.
“This isn’t working Poppy, we need to find the spot of the cut and Harry has too much bloody hair for us to find it,” Tonks cursed as she wiped more blood away.
“I agree, he’s lost a lot of blood as it is.” She paused as if considering something then raised her wand higher, “well its much easier to grow hair than it is to grow blood.” She then dropped her wand down muttering evanesco, suddenly all of Harry’s hair disappeared from his head leaving him bald.
“Bloody hell,” Tonks murmured as the full magnitude of the injury came into view.
A massive long cut started right below his right eye, crossed his scar, and worked its way well up to the top of his head. Madam Pomfrey pointed her wand at his forehead and said episkey. Slowly the top part of the cut began to close itself, and by using the charm several more times the cut finally closed up all the way down to his eye.
Madam Pomfrey then once again used evanesco, this time successfully, to clear most of the blood from Harry’s face. Finally after most of the blood was off she turned around and looked at the headmaster who had been patiently waiting by the doorway. “I think he’ll be okay headmaster. He has lost a large amount of blood so he should drink a lot of water and probably should stay in his bed for at least the rest of the day. His unconsciousness has come from his body shutting down while trying to keep him from bleeding out. Give him an hour or so and he should wake, if not just floo me and I will come back and check on him.”
Dumbledore smiled, “thank you Poppy. Needless to say I think you will hear from Mr. Potter soon enough, probably to thank you for his excellent new hair cut.”
As Madam Pomfrey left Harry’s side Ginny replaced it, quickly sitting beside the bed, kissing him quickly on the cheek. “Harry your okay now, you home and your family is all around here. I promise I wont leave here until you wake up.” She whispered quietly in his ear when her mom and dad went to talk to Dumbledore.
Two hours had passed and still Ginny was holding Harry’s hand humming softly to fill the silence. She was starting to think about calling Madam Pomfrey again when she felt Harry’s grip tighten around her hand. Excitedly she leaned in closer as his eyes began to open and a smile formed on his face.
“Harry, I’m so glad you’re up…” she paused taking note of his grin, “why are you smiling?”
Harry just kept smiling and then kissed her quickly on the lips. “I’m just so glad that I’m lucky enough to come awake to you. What happened by the way? Last thing I remember is that we were on the Hogwarts Express getting snacks, and now I wake up and my head feels like I’ve been beating me head against a stone wall.”
Ginny smiled softly, still enjoying the kiss, “well you were going for the snack cart when Voldemort decided to give you a wake up call. You hit your head on the cart and fell to the ground. I haven’t seen one of your attacks but I knew what they were so I tried to talk to you, try to keep you awake. I could see you were fighting him but the weirdest this was that I could feel myself fighting him too, and at one point well…I think I actually heard him. After a while you did manage to fight him off and then Lupin took you here where Tonks and Madam Pomfrey were able to…..” at that moment Ginny broke down and threw her arms around Harry weeping, “Oh Harry! I was so worried, I had never seen you look in that much pain before, and there was blood everywhere. I just wanted to help you end it, for the first time in my life I thought I could actually kill someone to stop him from hurting you, I was so scared I was going to lose you.” She whispered the last sentence, making it sounds almost guilty.
Harry wrapped his arms around Ginny, breathing in her sweet smelling hair. “Gin’ I promise I wont leave you, I will stop the death eaters and then kill him. And finally then I’ll be normal and we can get married.” Harry whispered into her ear as they embraced.
Ginny gasped at his last words, pulling back suddenly.
“Gin’ what’s wrong, did I say something wrong?” He asked panicked that he’d said something that scared her.
“No Harry, it’s just I never thought that you liked me that way. I mean I know we’re bonded but that doesn’t mean we have to get married.”
Harry smiled, then kissed her on the cheek, “Gin’ I have a feeling that even if we weren’t bonded I still would have ended up with you. I love you Ginny Weasley and someday I do want to marry you.”
Her heart leapt at his statement, for some reason for this whole time they had been bonded she had held back some fearing that one day Harry might move on and find a wife or someone else even though they were bonded. “ I love you too Harry, I was so worried that you would feel like this whole thing was forced on you because of the bond.” She bent down and kissed him gently on the lips.
They were silent for a moment, just enjoying each other’s company when Ginny started to giggle, then forced herself to stop.
“I’m sorry I shouldn’t be laughing but you look so funny,” she admitted once again a laugh escaping her.
“Why do I look funny? I’m mean I don’t think being covered in blood is exactly funny, unless you’re a happy vampire or something,” Harry asked getting more nervous as Ginny continued to laugh.
“Well I don’t think I can describe it, can you make it to the bathroom?”
Harry nodded and got up hurriedly anxiety growing over what possibly could be making her laugh so much. He had to use the bed for support as he got out but walked the few steps to the bathroom following Ginny into it. She turned around still smiling, “you might want to grab hold of something. I have a feeling you’ll be giving Madam Pomfrey an earful.
Harry looked into the mirror and nearly slipped to the floor. Where this morning there had been a full head of hair now there was nothing, even his eyebrows and eyelashes were missing. “What happened! I’m as bald as a bludger.”
Ginny cracked up again at Harry’s comically outraged face and his newly bald head. He scowled at her again as he rubbed his head as if searching for the hair. Then stopped as he looked in the mirror more closely, “oh damn.”
“What’s wrong?”
Harry fingered his scar wincing from the pain of the freshly healed cut. “Something’s wrong, my scar usually doesn’t look like this, see its really thick up top and now’s it’s even longer now it goes all the way to my eyelid now. What did Pomfrey say, will I be stuck with a bigger scar now? That’s just great, now that I’m bald and have a bigger scar every one’ll know I’m the great Harry Potter,” he said sarcastically rubbing his face.
Ginny wrapped her arm around Harry comfortingly, whispering, “shh… come on Harry. It’s just hair, it’ll grow back, you can let it grow even further this time.” Then she leaned in closer and whispered, “plus the scar makes you look rugged, like you got in a duel or something.”
Harry smiled, “thanks Gin’ you really do know how to make me feel better. I think I need to sit down though; my head is still hurting me. What if we go downstairs and sit in the study, I don’t want to be in the bed again.”
He took Ginny’s hand and walked down the stairs to the main level where everyone else was waiting after leaving Ginny to watch after him.
They were all surprised when they heard Harry and Ginny laughing as they walked down the stairs. Mrs. Weasley met them at the bottom of the staircase and was obviously not too pleased.
“Ginny, you were supposed to watch after him, not force him to walk down the stairs. How are you Harry dear, are you sure that you can stand. Maybe you should go sit down again, I don’t want you to hurt yourself,” Molly said dotingly, anxiously looking over him as if he might collapse all of a sudden.
Usually Harry would have rebuffed such attention but recently he had begun to accept Molly and Arthur as his new parents and knew that she saw him as one of her won. “I’m fine Molly, just have a little bit of a headache. But I think that that may be from my new hair cut, I mean it definitely gets a bit chilly now.”
“I think I am the one at fault for that Mr. Potter,” Madam Pomfrey said appearing in the hallway shortly being followed by Dumbledore and the others. “I can’t say I’m pleased that you’re up. You took quite a hit to the head Mr. Potter.”
“I’m sorry Madam Pomfrey, I just didn’t feel like spending more time in my bed, especially now that it’s winter break, I promise I won’t do anything too crazy though. Do you know what will happen to my scar?” Harry asked her.
“I was going to tell you when you woke up, of course I thought you would be out for quite a while longer.”
Dumbledore came forward, “Why don’t we do it over lunch, Molly has been working on it for quite a while and I would hate to let it go to waste.”
As everyone filed into the kitchen Lupin came up to Harry and hugged him. When he pulled back he had tears in his eyes, “I’m glad you’re okay Harry. I can’t tell you how bad it looked on the train, I thought that you were going to…”
Harry stopped him, “You wouldn’t have let that happen Moony. We’re here for each other Moony, you’re my only family I have left.” Lupin smiled sadly and took him by his shoulder and led him into the kitchen.
Soon everyone was sitting around the table eating some of Molly’s hearty soup with freshly baked bread and Butter Beer.
“Well not that we are all sitting down I think owe you an explanation for the current state,” Madam Pomfrey said. “When you arrived here you were unconscious and bleeding profusely as your clothes demonstrate, we were unable to locate the bleeding do to the mess it had caused with your hair therefore we were forced to remove it to fix the cut which turned out to go alone most of the right side of you head. As for the scarring that you see there it should go down in time, much of that is swelling. I am afraid that there may be some residual effects from it, mainly near where you current scar is and maybe some higher up on your forehead. This, once again, does not seem to be an ordinary scar. Something that happened during your fall changed it, massive amounts of magic would be required to do such a thing however, not just hitting your head against a cart.”
Harry looked at Ginny, Ron, Emma, and Hermione before looking at Dumbledore who nodded in acquiescence. “Er…well I didn’t just trip. I fell because Voldemort somehow broke into my mind again and started to do what felt like a cruciatus curse on me through the link. I could see him in his dark room, focusing all his hate on me. I think I would have broken if it had gone on for much longer, but something happened. Somehow Ginny managed to help me fight him; somehow she too got into the battle and helped me push Voldemort out. The last thing I remember is yelling then feeling Ginny collapse on top of me.” Harry said, speaking mainly to Dumbledore.
“Bloody hell…” Ron exclaimed, “Sorry mum. ‘Mione you were right about not breaking the link. I bet that if you had Harry would’ve had a much harder time throwing Voldemort out of his mind. I bet it was a shock to him when you showed up in his mind Gin’.” Ron said proudly gazing at his sister who for the second time now gone up against the Dark Lord.
Ginny’s face was not as jovial as it had been originally and Harry could feel the stress that was building up inside of her as she finally began to go over the encounter she had just had.
Dumbledore too seemed to notice the interplay and spoke up, “well Harry I do think that Poppy is indeed correct in assuming that this too is some form of magically formed scar. I doubt there will be any effects of it but do not expect it to ever entirely heal. If you’d allow me I’d like to occasionally stop by this break, Tom’s actions permitting, and further instruct you on Occlumency. I dare say we can improve on some of the more fragmented lessons you received from Professor Snape.” He said, his eyes glinting in the lamplight, half in amusement, half in sorrow. “But for now I am afraid I must excuse myself. Poppy once again I must urge you not to divulge your knowledge of this place, it must remain secret. I know you have knowledge of the Order but have yet to join. I am hoping that during the next meeting you might join us, I do believe we may have more use for you as the coming war gains strength.”
“Of course Headmaster, I would be honoured. The only reason I have yet to join was due to my fear that if I were incapacitated I would not be able to care for the students, who, if Harry is any gauge need me more than ever.” Madam Pomfrey said genially.
Dumbledore smiled then bade everyone a goodnight as he took a handful of floo powder and disappeared into the kitchen fire.

The Living Room, Grimmauld Place, Later That Evening
Harry was doing as Molly and Madam Pomfrey had instructed and was laying on one of the newly reupholstered couches that was near the fireplace. Ginny was curled up next to him, reading a book on advanced chaser techniques. The rest of the group was busy hanging ornaments and various other decorations around the house in preparation for Christmas. Harry was smiling as he watched Emma help battle a box of tinsel with Lupin, at that moment the tinsel was winning covering both of them in the silvery stuff.
Ron and Hermione were helping Molly unpack the various ornaments and place them strategically on the tree. Ron was spending as much time as possible with Hermione who was due to leave to her own home early tomorrow morning. She had already flooed her parents and apologized for not being on the train. Ron had begged her to stay but she had explained that she hadn’t spent Christmas with her family for the past years and felt that especially these days, it was important to spend as much time with them as possible.
Harry looked back over at Ginny and smiled, the fire was casting a warm glow on her cheeks, giving her red hair an even more entrancing look. He was so glad that she had agreed with him after his proposition to marry. He had been thinking about it a while, but until that moment he hadn’t been sure. But now that he knew her own feelings he immediately knew it was the right decision. The next thing on the list was to return to the vaults and look for a proper ring to give her.
As he continued to work on the details his eyes began to droop as the toll from the day’s events finally took effect. A moment later he drifted off into dreams as he picture himself walking down to a beautiful red head in a flowing white dress.

Harry’s Bed Room, Grimmauld Place
“wowie look at his hair, what happened to it?” a little voice asked.
“Looks like one of Fred or George’s pranks backfired, he should jinx them,” another said humorously.
“I like it, it makes him look…” another voice added.
“…distinguished.” Another offered.
“Yes distinguished, thank you Hermione.” Ginny’s voice echoed around the room, it was light and cheerful, drawing Harry out of his sleep. He sluggishly opened his eyes to find himself surrounded by his friends, he pulled his sheets up high to his chin out of embarrassment.
“Oy, your up Harry. Good thing too, the Ministry car is waiting to take Hermione to her parents. We figured you’d like to say goodbye so we woke you up,” Ron’s freckled face held back a smile.
Harry looked at Ginny questioningly, “what is it this time Gin’ did my nose switch with my mouth or something?”
Ginny cringed, “I think that once again you’ll just have to see it. Come on, get up.” She grabbed his hand and hauled up out of bed and into the bathroom. “Look,” she said handing out his glasses.
Harry put them on and looked up into the mirror. This time he did actually have to grab a hold of something to stop from falling. His reflection was just like what he had seen yesterday except this time he had a full head of hair. It was not the same in colour or length to that which he had had just the day before. It was just as messy but this time was much shorter, giving it a more manageable appearance. The most shocking part of his new head of hair however was the large blonde streak running across it exactly where the scar had been the night before.
He saw Ginny and the others grinning in the reflection and groaned, running his hand through his new hair as if to check that it was genuine then leaned over the counter rubbing his forehead. “Great, this is just bloody brilliant.”

Grimmauld Place, London
The next day Harry and the others were getting ready for the planned day out at Diagon Alley to buy Christmas presents for everyone. Hermione had left the day before to many tears and hugs from everyone involved. Ron had actually had enough foresight to give her a flower and a kiss as he wished her a Merry Christmas. Later that evening she had flooed to let everyone know that she had made it home safely and was enjoying her time catching up with her parents.
This morning Molly was being her usual panicked self and was going over the escape plans for the fourth time that morning as they finished up an early lunch.
“The escort should be in position at around one o’ clock, they’re meeting us at Fred and George’s, are you sure all of you are ready? Harry do you feel well enough to go out today?” Molly asked as she fussed with Ginny’s hair trying to put it in a braid.
“I’m sure Molly, the biggest problem right now is my new hair.” Harry said, rubbing his short but still unruly hair. All of yesterday they had tried various methods to make the now prominent gold streak in his hair disappear.
Fred and George had been most enthusiastic about helping solve the problem, arriving during lunch and bringing with them a huge crate of various makeup products.
“No funny business,” Fred said when Harry gave them a questioning look.
“We swear,” George added adding a butchered attempt at the scout’s honour.
“We figured that we owed it to him…”
“Being our financier and all.” George said.
“We would never want him going out in public like this…” Fred said pulling the first bottle.
“It would throw business off…”
“Now let’s start!” They both said at the same time.
The rest of that afternoon was spent in near hysterics as they tried every form of magical beauty product the twins had laid their hands on. At one point Harry’s hair had turned bright chartreuse and had the form of a small goblin. Another potion that Ginny was eager to test was one that ended up removing the gold patch along with all the rest of his hair and turned his forehead into a perfect map of England.
In the end the only product that seemed to do anything turned out to be one of Fred and George’s own, it was called Shockingly Sick Sniffles, which apparently was supposed to give the drinker sneezes that sounded like thunder. When applied to the hair however it turned his hair a very dark brown including the gold spot, the only downside was that whenever he touched it small sparks of electricity would shock him or anyone around him.
Harry rubbed his hair once again, thankful he had been able to wash the stuff out of his hair and without being shocked. “I guess I will just have to live with it right now.”
“It looks like you have a lightning bolt on your hair,” Emma said who seemed to have enjoyed playing with his hair, especially when she had gotten hold of the rubber bands and put his hair into braids.
“I guess that’s my theme now that my scar’s bigger too, I wish whoever’s trying to keep our trip today secret the best of luck. By the way, who is our escort?” Harry asked Lupin, who was helping Molly finish up the dishes.
“I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Dumbledore asked for Kingsley and Tonks to guard us today. There will be some additional trainees around learning the ropes of an escort.”
“Great, all Kingsley’ll do is try and ambush us. Offensive Light Magic is really getting out of hand these days, everywhere I go I now check for an attack, I think Moody’s starting to brainwash us” Ron said sarcastically.
“That’s why we take it though don’t we? Quick, what’s the most important thing Emma?” Ginny teased with the now well known joke.
“CONSTANT VIGILLANCE!” she bellowed in her best imitation of Mad Eye, which ended up sounding more like Dobby with a head cold.
The clock on the mantel chimed nine as Molly placed the last dish on the dryer. “Well then all, I don’t suppose we can put this off any longer, lets line up and get ready to floo to the Leaky Cauldron. Now remember if any of us get separated-”
“….head to Fred and George’s and floo to the house. Yeah mum you told us three times already,” Ron recited tiredly as he lined up in front of the fireplace.
Mrs. Weasley gave him a motherly cautionary glare but then walked to fireplace and grabbed the pot of floo powder. “Remus, you should go first, then Ron, then Emmaline and Harry. I’ll follow up last.” She opened the lid and handed it to Lupin who took a handful and threw it into the fire and shouted “Weasley Wizard Wheezes!” and disappeared a blink later. Ron and Ginny both followed suit without incident. Harry then grabbed hold of Emma’s hand and took a fistful of the sandy powder.
“Okay Emma, I know you haven’t been on this before but just close your eyes and hold on to me. It doesn’t hurt,” Harry added seeing the apprehension in her eyes, “the fire actually feels good, like your running your legs in the river.”
Emma nodded nervously then stood upright and steeled herself, gripping Harry’s hand even more tightly. Harry threw the powder and shouted, “Weasley Wizard Wheezes!” Instantly the world spun out of view, knocking them around until they were thrown out of the appropriate fireplace.
Harry let go of Emma as he slid out of the fire, slipping on the ashes and knocking over a stack of boxes in the process. He got up quickly, dusting off his clothes, “Hey, I fell because of the ashes. I mean there was a whole pile of it where I landed.” He said defensively when he noticed Ron, Lupin, and Ginny’s smiles. He heard Emma giggle behind him and turned around to see her standing up perfectly straight and clean.
Molly soon came out of the fireplace too and stepped out cleanly into the storage room hearth. Harry mouthed the word practice in response to Ginny’s continuing smile. “The escort is supposed to meet us right at the entrance. Try to ignore them as much as possible, we’re trying to maintain a low profile and talking to Aurors certainly would make people curious.” Mrs. Weasley said in a cautionary tone right as the door burst open and the two red-headed twins stepped through the doorway.
“Merlin’s beard! We have intruders George” Fred said in mock horror.
“Yes we do! Why would we ever let anyone so scruffy or ugly into our beloved shop?” George added pointing to Ron and drawing his wand.
“We must fight for our lives lest our shop falls!” Fred said gallantly waving his wand around.
Fred followed his brother’s actions and began to utter a curse simultaneously with his brother, only they only getting through scrib… when their hair suddenly turned a puke green colour and grew several feet longer. Both stopped suddenly in shock holding their piles of hair.
Lupin started laughing first as he made his way out the store room door and past the two shell shocked brothers, their mother too just smiled and followed him out.
As Harry walked out with Ginny, Emma, and a smug Ron he whispered, “ you have to be careful these days, never know who might be able to do wandless magic,” leaving the twins gaping at him holding their seemingly endless piles of puke green hair.
The group met up with Kingsley and Tonks according to plan and started their day heading to Gringotts to get money for the various presents everyone would have to get. Harry withdrew some money from his own account and also some from Emma’s, he had arranged it with Lupin’s help to set up a fund for Emma while she was still going to Hogwarts so she could have an allowance and pay for her education. After everyone had gotten what they needed at the bank they headed back out to go shopping.
It was decided that Kingsley and Lupin would escort Harry and Ron while the girls would be escorted by Tonks and Molly, this way they could shop for each other a lot more easily. Ron and Harry both agreed to stop at the Quidditch supply shop first revelling in the newly updated Nimbus 2002 designed by Krum himself. Harry bought Ron’s gift there, a limited edition print of the Chudley Cannons signed by the whole team. He had to fake immense interest in a calendar titled The Hottests Men of the Year in their Birthday Suits! While he had the store clerk wrap the poster for him.
Next the small group headed to Flourish and Blott’s. Harry had suggested that Ron look for Hermione’s gift there because she loves books and that he should get her a really specially one, maybe a first edition or a rare one.
The interior of the store was damp and had the smell of rotting leaves. Every conceivable surface had a book on it, there were even manuscripts dangling precariously from the chandelier. While Ron went to the owner and asked for suggestions of a good book Harry and Lupin wandered the aisles, occasionally pointing out interesting titles.
“Grystrifinkta and I-How to overcome tickle charm addiction. Hmmm… never thought you’d want to get addicted to that charm. Hey maybe we could find a book about curing flobberworm warts, or better yet just The Monster Book of Monsters. I think it’s about time I gave my Aunt and Uncle a real wizard Christmas gift, something that any normal person would love. What do you think Moony?”
Lupin laughed as he continued to scar the shelves, “knowing them it certainly would make for a more exciting Christmas morning. I do like what you’re thinking about however. Don’t tell Molly I’m encouraging you but I think a little taste of real magic culture is just what the Dursleys need. Why don’t we get them a potions kit, who knows maybe your cousin could find a cure for his stupidity.”
Harry laughed even harder, enjoying the company of Moony who had been the mastermind behind most of the Marauder’s famous pranks. “I think I may have an even better one. When I was looking for my other pair of trainers I stumble into the attic but found Kreacher instead. I had completely forgotten about him, I guess I sorta had just hoped Buckbeak had eaten him or something. Anyways, it turns out that he has to obey me because I am still the owner of Grimmauld Place, so I just told him to shut up and stay in the attic. He didn’t seem too upset with that, looks like he had found another portrait of Sirius’ mum and was talking to her when I walked in.”
“Well Harry I must say I am happy to know that even though you hate the creature you do not wish him ill will. What if I knew of a better place to send him, one that at least would be killing two birds with one stone?” Lupin said comfortingly but still had a dangerous glint in his eyes.
“Send Kreacher to the Dursleys?” Harry asked, voicing his own plan.
“Great minds think alike Harry. I think they could enjoy his cheerful presence, especially your Aunt Petunia.”
“Well then sounds like a plan, I’ll have Ginny help me tie a little Christmas bow on him and we’ll send him on Christmas Eve.” Harry said laughing even harder now as they headed up front while Ron was paying.
It turned out that Ron had found a perfect gift, it was a first edition leather bound copy of Transfiguration and Transformation. A book that Ron knew Hermione had been reading voraciously as their classes to become Animagi drew closer.
They left the book store and headed towards the pet shop where Harry and Ron ended up buying Emma a small black owl that they arranged to have delivered with its supplies the day before Christmas.
Next Harry, Ron, Lupin and Kingsley went to a small shops named Margaret Odd’s N’s and Things. The store was poorly lit and huge glass cases loomed down from overhead, each one meticulously filled to the brim with random things.
Ron found a cleverly charmed tea kettle for his mom that not only would whistle when ready but would sprout small legs and move itself off the stove while doing an Irish jig.
Harry spent what felt like hours in the dusty store but finally found a present for Hermione, and Mr and Mrs Weasley. Hermione’s gift was simple but quirky; it was a small metal contraption that you could attach to books or scrolls and when tapped with your wand would light up so you could read at night. Molly and Arthur’s gift were actually antiques the storeowner had showed him. It was a supposedly designed by the same magician who created the clock that tracked their various family members.
It was a set of two small circular boxes with numerous dials on it and if tuned correctly would be able to act as a form of communication between the two, displaying a small image of the person on the other line. Harry thought that although they were expensive it would be nice to have one at Grimmauld Place and one at the Burrow.
Harry bought both items and had already gotten Lupin and Ginny’s after sending a request from Griphook earlier in the month.
Satisfied with their purchases and with Ron getting his hunger for dinner they decided to meet up with the girl’s at Fred and George’s to head back home.
Harry had been pleasantly surprised all afternoon by the relative lack of recognition he had been receiving, even with the new gold mark. He didn’t realize why so few people recognized him until their walk back down the main street. He had noticed that there had hardly been any people in the stores all day and was even more surprised when he noticed the street to be that way. They had been so set on finding the gifts that they had missed the overwhelming silence that enveloped the usually boisterous alley.
“I’m glad we’re leaving before it gets dark. It’s creepy not having any people here, I know Fred and George said business was a little week right now but I didn’t think it was this bad. I guess people are getting more and more frightened now that things are happening.” Ron said grimly as he inspected one of the ministry posters on the window as they waited for the girls to return.
Molly, Ginny, Tonks, and Emma all looked exhausted and were carrying double the amount of bags Harry and Ron were. As they entered Fred and George’s shop Ron gave Harry a nervous gaze as he nervously weighed his own bag in comparison to Ginny’s.
“Well look who’s back…” a still green and long haired Fred said coming out of the back.
“Caution brother, he may be armed this time” an equally altered George added drawing his wand once again on Ron.
Without warning this time they started to move their wands in an incantation only they didn’t even get out the first syllable when there was a crack and the hair on both of the twin’s heads began to vanish. At first they smiled triumphantly believing it was returning to normal, only after it started to get below an inch long did they start to panic, grasping in vain at their vanishing hair.
Once again everyone else started to laugh at the twin’s reactions, both feeling frantically for any remnants of their hair.
Their mother just continued on as if nothing happened hugging them goodbye and inviting them to dinner the following evening. Kingsley and Tonks waved goodbye and disapparated off to the ministry to write up their reports.
The rest just followed the now morose twins to the back storage room. Once again Lupin went first then Ginny and Ron. Harry grabbed a handful of floo powder from a bag Mrs. Weasley held out. As they were walking to the fire Harry smiled at the twins, “I think you look good without hair, be careful though it’s really easy to catch a cold if you don’t wear a hat. See you tomorrow!” Before they could say anything he threw the powder into the fire and took hold of Emma’s hand shouting “Grimmauld Place!” Once again the world spun out of view and into a whirl of colours and noise.

Big Update #4

A/N: This is all J.K. Rowling's work I am just writing in her world to entertain myself and hopefullly all of you.

Great Hall, Hogwarts
The news of the coup had spread everywhere. That was the only thing being discussed the next morning at breakfast. There was little information on what had actually occurred, and what they had heard was distorted horribly due to its constant retelling and elaboration.
At one point Harry and the others heard a story depicting a giant flame breathing demon dragging a screaming Fudge out of his office and into the main hall where he was barbequed.
Many of the students were also afraid that something might have happened to their parents in the turmoil. A huge amount of people had someone in their close family who worked in the ministry.
Needless to say when the owls flew in this morning there was much more commotion than there usually was. Hermione twiddled her thumbs nervously as she watched the delivery owl glide over to her seat. It landed softly and hooted. Hermione tore the paper out of its grip and stuffed the two knuts into its pouch.
In the nearby vicinity everyone crowded around her as she unrolled the paper. The front page was typed all in huge purple capital letters.

FUDGE FORCIBLY SACKED!
MINISTRY IN TURMOIL
WIZENGAMOT ANNOUNCES NEW INTERIM MINISTER
HEAD OF THE DEPARTMENT OF MAGICAL LAW ENFORCEMENT
AMELIA SUSAN BONES
D.A. Meeting, Hogwarts
The room of requirement was bustling with activity as the entire D.A. settled into chairs arranged in the magically enlarged room. This was to be the night where the different groups were split into their command squadrons. Harry and the others had been taking notes as the different groups and last night they had worked out six different squads, each one with two offensive fighters, two defence, a runner, and a medic. Upon Ron and Hermione’s learning of the prophecy they had changed it somewhat due to the new piece of information that was if the D.A. was really going to fight Death Eaters then they would probably be doing it to give Harry enough cover to fight Voldemort uninterrupted.
They had fought over the new change in strategy all of last night, Harry not relenting until after Hermione had explained that the D.A. now finally had a purpose, and that they had all willingly signed up to help fight Voldemort. This way they were actually helping to put an end to him once and for all.
Harry looked up from his seat at the front of the group, Hermione and Ron were chatting anxiously as they reviewed the squad assignments. Ginny was next to him, she was chatting with Neville about a new healing charm she’d learned from Madam Pomfrey. Harry looked at his small, beaten up watch and stood up deciding it was time to start the meeting. As soon as he started to get out of his chair the room went silent, everyone here was eager to hear their new group assignments. They would be training with the every week now instead of their larger group.
“Okay guys this is the big night, we’re going to split up into the squads. Before we do let me say something, and I know it sounds a bit like I’m channelling Moody but bear with me…This is your family, these are the people you’re trusting your life to, you have to learn to work as a group or else you will fail. Dumbledore told me once that Tom’s best weapon was spreading chaos and distrust; he is right. We need to stick together, there really isn’t another way that we’ll be able to do anything to stop Voldemort or his cronies.” Harry surveyed the group then looked over to Ron who had the list.
Ron nodded, then stepped up, “Righto, well all that stuff Harry said is right on, the people we’re about to pair you with will be the people who’ll watch your back out on the battlefield. Now each squad will have a colour that will be their squad sign, each squad will also report to either Hermione or I. Now let’s get started…” Ron unfolded the parchment and began to read off the group assignments. No one said anything; there were no moans of discontent or cheers of happiness. Harry realized for the first time that the people in the D.A. were not kids anymore, they were adults; young people forced to grow up in a world that held innumerable uncertainties. The groups started to form as Ron read off the list and pointed to where they should meet. Soon everyone had been split into their individual squadrons and were talking eagerly amongst themselves. Harry stood up held up his hand for quiet and then started talking, “Great, well these are your squadrons, like I said you will have to learn to trust them, you have to learn to work together.” He looked down at his watch, “Well it looks like we have a little bit of time for some questions or comments. Anyone…?”
There was a small amount of commotion in one of the groups, a moment later a young Hufflepuff was pushed up front by the group. He stuttered for a moment trying to find out what to say. “I…well we I guess…we think that we should get a new name for the new D.A. I mean we’ve changed everything else why not the name, also that way we can talk about it without people know what we’re doing.”
The group nodded in approval, so did Harry, Ron, Ginny, and Hermione. “I think that’s a brilliant idea, it makes sense also, we’re not just a training club anymore. Does anyone have any good ideas for names? Just shout them out.”
“Potter’s partners!”
“Tom’s nightmare!”
“Harry’s Helpers!”
“The Kid Brigade!”
“Hogwarts’ defenders!”
“Merlin’s army!”
Hermione wrote all of them down, and by the end there was a list of about twenty different names.
“Well looks like we have a big selection, I’ll read them off again and raise your hands for the one you like the most.” Harry read them off, to his surprise “Harry’s Helpers” received the second most votes with “Merlin’s Heroes” getting the most. “Well it looks like you guys liked Merlin’s Heroes the most. If that’s the one you like then it is official, we will now be known as Merlin’s Heroes.”
“Okay well that’s all guys, have a good weekend and we’ll set the meetings for each squad on the coins this Sunday so keep an eye for them.” Ron said dismissing the kids.
Harry turned around to face his friends and was grinning.
“What’s going on Potter, why do you have that huge grin on your face like it’s your birthday?” Ginny teased, tickling him on his ribs.
“I’m smiling because for the first time since I’ve heard the bloody prophecy I think that we might be able to do something about it.”

The Ministry of Magic, London, England
To say that the ministry was in chaos would be an understatement. Right now the only thing that had any form of regularity were the random yelling matches that were taking place in the hallways as Madam Bones took control and expelled all of Fudge’s cronies with people she trusted.
Half of the offices were completely shut down to these purges and paperwork had now started to simply pile up outside of the closed office doors. There was also an increased Auror presence throughout the ministry that the Wizengamot had ordered as they declared the coup. Everything had been turned upside down, and Madam Bones was having trouble reining things in.
Dumbledore walked down the hallway flanked by Lupin. They were heading for a meeting with the new Minister of Magic to meet about the new government and the protection of the Ministry itself.
Dumbledore and the others walked up to the Minister’s office, the door was wide-open and huge stacks of papers and scrolls were falling off of the secretary’s tables. From inside the office there could be heard a commotion echoing around the room. “Donald! Where the Merlin are those draft papers? I set them down for just a minute and now they’re gone. I need those damn papers Donald before the headmaster gets here!”
Dumbledore smiled and walked into the office, “I am afraid we will have to do without those papers Amelia.”
The minister’s frazzled head popped out of the office and smiled, “Oh I hope you did not hear that Headmaster. Please come in, come in. Hello Remus, how are you?”
“I’m doing very well Minister, how are you holding up?” Lupin asked kindly.
“Well you can tell its not going as smoothly, Fudge left us with little to go on. And please call me Amelia, I am just doing this for the people.”
“Thank you, I will Amelia, should we get started now?”
They went into the office and Dumbledore conjured two chairs amid the piles of papers.
“Well Amelia, first off I would like to thank you for volunteering for this rather loaded job. I know that I can’t stress to you how important that the ministry stay strong in these dire times. I am hoping to find a way that the Order may be able to help you maintain some sembalance of control here at the ministry.” Dumbledore said, at the same time conjuring a pot of tea and three cups.
“Thank you Albus” Amelia said, accepting the cup, “I couldn’t agree more about the importance of protecting the ministry. Although I just don’t know how to do it, even with the Order helping we are still dangerously thin on protection. Vol…Voldemort simply marched in here this summer, and that was with a fully functioning, although inept, government. I simply cannot see how we are to stop him Albus, from the reports we’re receiving he’s gathering a huge amount of supporters…some say more than the first time.”
“That is precisely why we must present a strong, unified front, if we cannot manage to bring the ministry back to full force I am afraid that we may not be able to stop him this time. I do have a solution to the security problem however, unfortunately it will mean moving out of your office for several days.”
“Of course, of course, I want to ensure the safety of the workers and the government. What are you planning?”
“Well I was hoping to use Remus to oversee the fortifications, seeing as I will be needed at the Wizengamot to repeal many of Fudge’s antiquated acts. I’m not sure you know this but Hogwarts has the largest house elf population in England and they possess the perfect skills to help secure this building.” Albus said smiling as Dobby appeared next to him with a flash.

Nicholas Flamel’s Office, Hogwarts
“Again!” He shouted and threw another spell at an exhausted Harry.
Harry barely got his head around when he saw the next spell shooting towards him. His wand was laying on the ground several meters away, not enough time he grimaced to himself. Harry panicked and threw his arms up in front of him to try to stop it from hitting his face. He squinted his eyes shut and waited for the impact of Flamel’s spell. None came, all he heard was a crash and the tinkle of broken glass. He lowered his arms cautiously to find Flamel staring at a broken tea kettle next to him.
“Very good Harry! Very good!” The old wizard said clapping his hands together. “You almost got me that time, barely managed to bounce the spell away, unfortunately the tea kettle doesn’t appear to have fared as well. Do you know how you conjured that shield without your wand Harry?”
Harry shrugged, waving his wand causing the broken teapot to rebuild itself. “I ‘dunno, I guess you caught me off guard. I was pretty desperate, all I thought to do was to throw up my arms so they would take most of the hit.”
“Well it worked, your magic reserves seemed to have kicked in when it knew you were in trouble. Professor Moody told me that this has happened with you during some of the more intense training sessions you had?”
“Yep, but those were different, it wasn’t a shield, most of the time I either can just cast really strong spells with my wand, or, well I start glowing.” Harry said as he twiddled his wand in his hands. Over the past weeks Moody and Kingsley had been increasing the difficulty of the courses as Harry became better and better at controlling his new found power. Dumbledore had been told of the development but had stayed away from the young boy, not daring to anger him any further than he already was. He had left Harry’s training in the hands of Nicholas Flamel.
“These things are not at all different, in fact they’re all caused by the same thing, the Heartbond. I would not be surprised if your friends started to gain a greater aptitude for certain branches of magic just as you are. I have been fortunate enough to read some the older texts in the Hogwarts vaults that are miles below us right now. In one of these tomes I found a study done by an ancient philosopher about the Heartbond. It took me quite a while to find the proper charm to translate the ancient Gaelic but when I did it filled me in on a lot of things that I think you’d be interested in. I’m afraid the charms placed on the vault wont allow any of the manuscripts to be taken out but if you wanted to we could go down there so I could show you what I’ve found.”
He nodded vigorously, “That’d b brilliant! When do you think wed be able to go? I’m free right now.”
“Well I have a class a little later but if you really do want to we can head down there right now, let me just grab a cloak, it gets cold down there.”
A moment later Harry followed Flamel out of the office and through a confusing maze of stairwells and hidden pathways. Several moments later they were standing in front of a wall in a hallway Harry had never even thought existed. There was something odd about the hallway they were standing in. From what Harry could tell every square inch it was covered in miniscule writing, it was carved deep into the stone yet the letters and words flowed as if it were written in ink.
“If you’ll stand right behind me I’ll open up the archives. Oh and Harry, it would be best if people did not know that this place existed, much of what is kept here is believed to have been destroyed. It is one of the few things we have to keep ourselves in the race against Voldemort.” Harry nodded solemnly and Flamel smiled. He waved his wand in a complex motion infront of him the only noise coming from the swishing of the wand. As he continued this motion, gradually speeding up, a light seemed to emanate from the walls. Only as Harry watched more intently did he realize that the light as actually coming from the letters themselves, each one slowly growing brighter and brighter. Soon the whole hallway had turned from poorly lit to overwhelmingly bright. The intensity died down, but the hallway was still covered with the glowing words. When Harry knelt down to inspect what they said he realized that it wasn’t in English, in fact he struggled to find a single word that was recognizable.
“This writing’s in Gaelic too, Salazar Slytherin had the Chamber of Secrets, Godric Gryffindor had the Archives. Albus only found it a few decades ago, he stumbled upon it after hearing an ancient portrait babble on about it. Now just take a step back so the door can open,” he said gesturing but never taking his eyes off the wall in front of him. He raised his wand once again and ripped it straight down. The effect was immediate, the wall snapped open, the two sides of the wall slamming against the adjacent walls with a snap!
Nicholas smiled and walked into the hallway, torches burst to life in front of them.
Neither of them said a word as they proceeded, the reached a seemingly endless spiral staircase which Flamel motioned to. Harry set his foot down on the stone step and it immediately began to drop, but Flamel was already on behind him so he had no choice but to stay on. The stair did not fall away, it simply started to glide downwards guided around the centre post by and invisible hand; it was a wizard’s version of an escalator. So they began their descent into The Archive.

The Ministry of Magic, London, England
Hundreds of miles away the ministry was the farthest thing away from the peaceful reverence Harry and Nicholas had just entered into. Under the supervision of Lupin the ministry was undergoing a complete overhaul security wise. The house elf’s had assumed the job of construction workers.
There was also the now near constant influx of new prisoners being transported to what was supposed to be the temporary holding pens. Due to the overthrow of Azkaban these were the only secure holding pens that the ministry had the use of. The house elves were working feverishly on constructing a new one but even the best estimates held the completion of it to be a few weeks out. At the moment two Aurors stood guard outside of the main entrance, each one was next to a panic button that would close down the entire area until Dumbledore could come and unlock it.
Today the two guards were very tense due to the new prisoners they had just received. Less than 30 minutes ago they had gotten two top priority prisoners, both of which had been captured by the Aurors last night after they had tripped several wards around Gringotts. The holding pens were now completely closed off as an added precaution. The two guards were too absorbed in their own nervous thoughts that they didn’t notice the slight flicker of the torches around them and the black robed figure approaching them with a steady gait.
Within moments he was upon them, neither had a chance to say a thing, their windpipes being crushed by and invisible hand. Both dropped to the ground paralyzed. The figure whipped his wand out of his cloak, holding it gently in one of his pale white hands. Using a spell he had just been taught Lucius moved his wand gracefully, practiced, a moment later the metal door simply melted to the ground. He smiled, the Dark Lord always knows.
He performed the same spell on two more doors, finally reaching the actual holding pens. There were shouts of glee, clapping, sobs, Lucius ignored them all; time was short. He spun around finally locating the two prisoners he needed, one was a small rat of a human, another a taller lankier figure. “Wormtail, I can’t say I’m surprised you managed to find yourself in prison, this is the fourth time the Dark Lord has had to rescue you?”
“Second!” He spat, dusting his tattered robes off with his silver hand, “are you going to get us out of here or not Lucius.”
Malfoy continued as if he hadn’t heard Wormtail’s jibe, instead he stared right at the other figure as he continued, “Mr. Fudge, yet another person I love to see in prison. You were caught with Wormtail I assume, trying to regain the Dark Lord’s trust? Earn some recognition?” He straightened his hair out, then drew his wand on the former prime minister. “I am afraid the Dark Lord no longer requires your service, yet you know too much, that is why he has sent me here, good-bye.” And with that Lucius waved his wand yelling avada kedavra at the same time. The old man slumped to the ground of the prison floor, lifeless.
Lucius waved his wand again and the metal bars melted to the floor, “Come Wormtail, let that be a lesson to you to never lose your value.” With that the two Death Eaters marched out of the holding pens and into the main entrance of the Ministry.
No one noticed the two dead guards until ten minutes after Lucius and Wormtail had marched out of the building.

The Archives, Hogwarts
Deep below Hogwarts silence reigned supreme. The entire caver echoed with each of Harry and Flamel’s steps. When they had reached the ground level the entire room illuminated itself. Harry was thunderstruck. In-front of him were millions of books on huge soaring metal frames, each frame was held up by huge metal chains that ascended into the blackness above. The enormity of the archives put the library to shame.
“These, Harry, are the great Archives of Godric Gryffindor, collected from all over the wizarding world. No two books are the same; many are thousands of years old. The one I want to show you is over here, it’s on the table so we can actually read it.
Harry followed the professor to one of the ancient drafting table that lined the hallways between the shelves. On it was a massive leather bound book, each page was painstakingly written in what appeared to be gold in. Each word glittered in the light of the torches. The first page had Heartbond embossed gaudily on the cover, underneath it was the author’s name, Bruadair Fionnlogh.
“From what I can discern it is around three thousand years old, and actually is a firsthand study on the Heartbond and its effects on a couple who it is set upon. So far all I have been able to gather is the last name of the couple: Dubhshlaine. As for why they received the bond I am not sure but it is well documented. From the first few chapters I’ve managed to read it would seem that you and Miss Weasley are in the begging of the middle stages of the bond, you have long passed the necessity for proximity, and from what you have told me you can occasionally feel each other’s emotions.
I think that you are in the stage of magical growth, both of you are gaining strength with your spells, some it seems you can even do wandless. As time goes on it should grow.” Flamel turned to the next page to a covered in a diagram of what appeared to be the four elements surrounding a single white point.
“What is that?” Harry asked intrigued by the drawing and its somehow familiar symbology.
“Oh that, well lets see, it says The Five Elements.” Flamel scratched his head, “That can’t be right there’s only four…”
“Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire, we’ve learned them during potions for balancing potions. I’ve never heard of a fifth,” Harry asked, running his finger over the white spot in the middle. “Wait! It says something, its in silver ink so it’s hard to see. Lumos!” He said moving the wand right to the spot.
At first it was difficult to see but it slowly appeared as his eyes adjusted to the intense light. It was a single word, written in beautiful cursive with silver ink. It was a word Harry recognized from the earlier pages. It was Dubhshlaine. “I think I found the last name of the couple who was being studied. It is Dubhshlaine right? Any idea what that means?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know that much Gaelic but let me try the charm I’ve been using on it.” He pointed his wand at the parchment and gave it a simple flick. The Gaelic handwriting seemed to drip off of the page and was replaced with English. Harry lowered his wand once again to the paper, this time the Name hit home, he felt as if he’d just been hit in the gut. As he stumbled away Nicholas leaned inwards, using the light of Harry’s dropped wand to read. The flowing silver script now read Potter.

The Archive, Hogwarts
Harry stood there completely stunned, Potter reflected in the light of the wand. A moment ago he and Flamel had just translated the book containing the history of a couple that were bonded. Shockingly their last name turned out to be Potter. “How can this be right? I mean these people were my relatives? What would they be my great-great-great-great-great grandparents?”
Flamel took a moment to compose himself, surprised himself at the name on the diagram. “This book was written at least a thousand years ago. So they would be much older than that. Also they are probably not directly related to you, more like a far removed uncle. The Potter family has a well-known pure blood lineage so we would probably be able to track your family line back to them. What I am more interested in Harry, is why your relatives were bonded themselves. If the date is somewhat right then the only conflict around that time would be the one that Merlin himself was involved in.”
“This summer Dumbledore told me that Merlin was bonded with Gwendoloena during some war that was going on. Why would my relatives be bonded if Merlin was already?” Harry asked as he examined the diagram with the four elements.
“There is very little known about this bond Harry, that is the reason I wanted to show you this book in the first place. For the next few weeks we will be meeting down here and study this book along with the several other documents I found about the Heartbond. If we are going to learn how this will help you and Miss. Weasley.”
“Sir, before we go could you maybe copy this page for me? I’d like to study this some more.” Harry asked pointing to the page he’d been staring at so intently.
“Harry, no one except you and I know that this book even exists…”
“Professor, please. I know how important it is to keep all of this secret but I really would like to study this, I swear to you I will just show it to Ginny, Ron and Hermione.” Harry said, “and before you ask, yes, I can trust them. They know everything I know so either way they’ll figure out about this place and I would like for them to be able to help me out just a little bit.”
Flamel looked down at the page, then back up to Harry as if judging how much harm it would do for this page to get out into the public. Finally he sighed and waved his wand, muttering a incantation at the same time. Instantly an exact replica of the page appeared on the table. Harry smiled and rolled it up carefully.
“Let’s get going upstairs, it will be dinner soon” Flamel said leading the way up to the real world again.

Hogwarts, England
Harry had just gotten out of the Archive and was heading upstairs to show the others the diagram he had gotten when he heard a huge roar from the Offensive Light Magic classroom.
“THEY GOT AWAY! THEY WALKED INTO THE MINISTRY? WHO’S DEAD?...BLOODY HELL!”
Harry could recognize the distinct yells of Mad Eye Moody all the way down the hall and rushed to the classroom to figure out what had happened.
Inside the room it was chaos. Moody and Kingsley were in the middle of what was supposed to be a class. On the far side of the classroom however there was a rather harried looking Auror whose head was poking outside of the fireplace. Moody was now running, or doing the best he could, across the room to get his cloak to go to the ministry. The kids had never seen Moody this angry and were all cowering in the corners.
“Professor what’s going on? PROFESSOR!” Harry had to shout over the commotion, still neither of them recognized he was there, “MOODY!” he shouted in a last ditch effort to get Mad Eye to hear him before leaving. It worked and he spun around on his wooden leg.
“Professor, what is going on? Who’s dead,” Harry asked as he shoved his way through the mass of 2nd years.
“Can’t talk Potter, I’m needed at the ministry. Talk to the headmaster I’m sure he can tell you.” Moody limped past him to the fireplace.
Harry bristled; even now he resented being kept out of the loop when it came to the war, especially when it most concerned him. “Moody, tell me what happened or I’ll just go to the Ministry myself.”
Moody turned around and stared at him, both his eyes were focused on him, his jaw was slack. Behind him Harry could hear the children whispering in wonder. Harry, confused at the sudden lull in the commotion looked around until he saw one of the children pointing at him. He looked down at his hand.
It was glowing. More precisely, he was glowing. Just like the last time he was radiating a golden glow from his skin. As he stared at his hand his heartbeat and breathing returned to normal, and the glow started to fade away.
After another moment of silence Moody regained his composure and turned for the fire. He tossed some floo powder at the fireplace and stepped in, barking “Ministry of Magic!”
Harry shouted to stop him but he was gone, Kingsley was standing at the other end of the room getting his cloak to leave too. “Kingsley, do you know what is going on?” Harry asked, slowly inching towards the fireplace.
“Sorry Harry, like Moody said, you should ask the Dumbledore if you want to know what’s going on.”
Harry shrugged, reaching the hearth of the still burning fireplace, “The headmaster doesn’t tell me anything anymore. I won’t be long, and don’t worry…I know how to handle myself.” With that Harry grabbed a handful of floo powder and threw it in the fire. Kingsley moved to stop him but he was too far away. Harry stepped into the tickling flames and shouted, “MINISTRY OF MAGIC!”

Arithmancy Classroom, Hogwarts
Hermione had just finished calibrating her calculations and was arranging the final weight on her scale using he wand to levitate it gently into position. “Almost there, come on…” she muttered to herself, her tongue sticking out in concentration. The small platinum weight moved onto the top of the pile and settled, finally calibrating the precise scale.
Hermione looked up from her work with a smile, she raised her hand to get Professor Vector’s attention. “Professor I’m do…”
The rest of the sentence was drowned out by a loud alarm bursting to life in the classroom. The claxon wailed through the room, bouncing off the walls and building upon itself until it was just a numbing roar coming from the room. Hermione’s perfectly balanced scale fell to the floor, scattering the dozens of small weights all over the floor.
Some of the students tried to run from the room but when they opened the door they found that the usually ornamental suits of armour were now blocking the entrance with their pikes and shields. The students turned to Professor Vector, but she looked just as perplexed by the events.
The sirens stopped suddenly and the room returned to its usual silence, a moment later the voice of Dumbledore took its place.
“Students and faculty, the alarm that just went off was a ward that was newly placed over the school. It is designed to cordon off the school, making every level and section impossible to breach. By going into lockdown we can stop the movement of potential hostile figures. Do not be alarmed however at its employment right now, it was a false alarm triggered by a floo transport. I apologize deeply for this rather…loud test of our alarm system.” The voice stopped and the suits of armour returned to their usual spots along the wall.
“You heard the Headmaster, it was just a test, now let’s get back to the measurements needed for determining the magical properties of the thestral,” Professor Vector said picking up parchment that had fallen off of her desk.
Hermione was sitting back down at her table when there was a loud crack to her left. She turned to she what it was and came face to face with a large set of glistening eyes. “Dobby?” Hermione asked, taken aback by his sudden appearance.
“Yes Missus Hermione. Dobby is here, was sent by Mister Dumbledores Missus. He wants to see yous up at his offices. He told me that his favourite candies are mint galleons.” Dobby bowed deeply then snapped his fingers before Hermione could ask a single question.
She looked over to Vector for permission, she just waved her hand in dismissal. Hermione crammed her books into her bag and rushed out of the classroom.
She dashed up the stairways rushing to Dumbledore’s office. She had a bad feeling that the alarm and Dumbledore wanting to meeting with her had something in common.
As she spun around one of the corners she nearly ran smack into Ginny. “Ginny! I’m so sorry I almost ran you over, where are you going?”
Ginny was completely out of breath, but managed to gasp out “To Dumbledore’s, Dobby told me to go up there.”
“Dobby told me too, what do you think happened?” Hermione asked as they kept running higher up to the Headmaster’s office.
“I have no bloody idea, but I did feel something weird right before the alarm went off. It felt sort of like I was using a portkey except it wasn’t as strong. Mint Galleons” she said as they finally reached the gargoyles flanking Dumbledore’s office. They bowed ever so slightly and the door slid open and the staircase began to rise.
When Ginny and Hermione came to the office they found Dumbledore sitting there drinking a cup of tea, the door was wide open and when they entered he turned around and smiled softly. “Ah, Miss Weasley, Miss Granger, if you want to sit down I’m sure that Mr. Weasley will be here…”
Ron burst up the stairway at the same moment, he clutched at his sides breathing heavily. “Was’a matter?” He managed to get out.
“Well the alarm that went off just a few minutes ago was infact the ward that ensures Harry is within Hogwarts boundaries. Kingsley just flooed up to me to explain that Harry followed Professor Moody out of the castle through the floo system to the Ministry of Magic.”
“Why would he do that? He knows better than to leave himself out in the open,” Ginny said, touching her stomach slightly as she remembered the uncomfortable feeling right before the alarm went off.
“Well there was an incident in the ministry this morning. Actually catastrophe is a better way to describe it. It appears that several Death Eaters marched into the Ministry unopposed and sprung several of their comrades from the detainment cells. There was also a murder…” Dumbledore took another sip of his tea, “two new prisoners were brought in yesterday, one was Pettigrew and the other was Fudge. Today the Death Eaters only freed one prisoner, that was Pettigrew. Minister Fudge was killed. No, not by us Miss Granger, one of the Death Eaters killed him in the cell.”
“Why was Fudge there in the first place, I mean no one liked him but was he Death Eater?” Ron asked.
“Well he was detained by the Order when during a secret meeting with Wormtail in Knockturn alley. Fudge was carrying several scrolls which contained sensitive security information for the Ministry of Magic. That is the reason why I sent Remus and the house elves to reinforce the ministry. The most troubling part of these events however is how easily they were able to get into the ministry. I had placed the wards on the Ministry just yesterday, some of them were stronger than the ones here at Hogwarts. Yet somehow, they got through them. They weren’t destroyed, they weren’t moved; somehow the Death Eaters just walked through them.” Dumbledore stood up stiffly from his seat and stared out his window. For the first time in their entire time talking with the headmaster he sounded genuinely worried. “I am afraid that we may be fighting a loosing battle.”

The Ministry of Magic, London
Harry walked out of the fireplace dusting off his cloaks with a wave of his wand. He was the only person in the massive main entrance hall, it was illuminated just as brightly as the last time he came here only the whole place seemed to be deserted. He hear the echoes of what seemed to be an argument coming from one of the faraway halls.
As he approached it the shouting became discernable. It took him a moment but he recognized it as the voice of Charlie Weasley.
“Yes Minister Bones, gone! We couldn’t fight because we had no damn idea that Death Eaters could get through our wards; they weren’t put up by a two year old you know, Dumbledore himself installed them!”
Harry walked into the hallway to find not only Charlie, but Mr. Weasley, the interim minister Madam Bones, Moody, and the most startling of all, Percy. Percy stood separated from the others and had a rather harried, stunned expression on his face. They didn’t notice Harry’s arrival and just continued to talk.
“Charlie, you said that they just walked in? There wasn’t an attack, something they used to shatter the ward?” Amelia Bones asked, fiddling her wand in anxiety.
“All I know is that only a dozen grunts of Voldemort’s managed to get into the preserve and kill ten of us before we even knew what was going on. I can assure you that by the time you do get permission from the Romanian Prime Minister to send Aurors there they will be long gone, along with the dragons.” Charlie nursed a bleeding head wound with a wet flannel.
Moody’s eye had been fixed intently on Charlie as he was talking but now it was back to wandering and soon enough spotted Harry in the corner. “Potter,” he growled jerking his head to the doorway.
Everyone swirled to find Harry standing in the doorway.
“Er, hi. Are you alright Charlie?” Harry asked awkwardly.
“Harry! What are you doing here? The Ministry is not safe right now, you must go back to Hogwarts.” Arthur said, closing the gap between them quickly.
“According to what I just heard and what’s been happening for the past few weeks I don’t think that really anywhere’s safe right now. I mean for all we know Tom could just break through Hogwarts’ defences too.” Harry said defiantly.
“There is no way for them to get into Hogwarts Harry, you know that. Dumbledore’s only added onto the wards, they are thousands of years old.” Percy said, speaking for the first time.
“Yah, well I bet that Dumbledore wasn’t the first wizard to put wards up at the Dragon preserve either, I mean Professor Binns told us that place had been around for hundreds of years.”
“I’m surprised that you remember something Binns told you let alone that you listen in that class. Either way Hogwarts is perfectly safe from any attack He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named throws at it.” Percy shot back.
“Potter, you need to leave. Ill lead you back to the fireplace,” Moody said grasping Harry’s right shoulder firmly.
Harry shrugged it off and sidled to one side of the hall, “Not yet Professor. Minister Bones, what happened? I heard something about someone being killed, who was it? Was Voldemort here?”
Percy was the only person in the room to flinch at the mention of his name. “Typical,” Harry muttered under his breath, glaring at Percy; Ron’s brother who had caused so much anguish within the family.
“Mr. Potter, I know that your life has been affected by Voldemort more than probably anyone else. I also know about your certain penchant for getting into what are best described as life-threatening conflicts in the search for the truth. Therefore I am torn on what to do. If I were to tell you what just occurred here and in Romania would you please return to your school with all due haste?”
Harry nodded, he knew when to take a bargain and when to hold out. In this case he decided it was probably the best way to at least figure out what was going on.
“Well from what we’ve managed to gather so far just a few hours ago there was a simultaneous attack on both the Ministry holding cells here, and the dragon reserve. Charlie believes close to a dozen Death Eaters killed ten of his colleagues where here two guards were killed along with the former Minister of Magic.”
Harry started, “Fudge? Fudge was killed. Why was he in the holding pens?”
This time Arthur spoke, “Fudge was brought in with Wormtail earlier yesterday after some Aurors broke up a meeting between the two.”
“He was not charged with anything,” Percy said rather feebly.
“Shove it Percy,” Charlie said, “well anyway Fudge was captured. And today they came back and got Wormtail but killed Fudge. He probably lived out his worth, I mean he’s too visible to do anything and has lost all his power. Malfoy couldn’t use him anymore so neither could Voldemort. And at the same time another group came and sealed up my research lab, I barely managed to get out before the whole place burst into flames.”
“Sounds like Voldemort’s finally putting his plan into action, or at the very least gearing up for a war. The silence is over that’s for sure.” Moody added quietly. “Come on now Potter, time to go before the Headmaster sends out a search party.”
This time Harry allowed himself to be led out of the room and towards the fireplace. Moody pulled out a small pouch from his travelling cloak and poured some floo powder into Harry’s hand. “Go head right back to the Headmaster’s office, I’m sure he’ll be wanting to know what you’ve been up to.” He then turned around on his clawed wood leg and limped away. Harry tossed the floo powder into the fire and stepped in.

The Caucus Mountains, Russia
“Do you have good news Lucius?” Lord Voldermort hissed as his faithful servant walked into his chambers.
“I do my Lord, your plan worked flawlessly,” he said, stepping over the sleeping Nagini. “Not only did we walk straight into the Ministry unopposed we managed to kill two birds with one stone. Once again I have retrieved Wormtail for you, and we ran across another piece of fortune. When we entered the cells Fudge was sitting at the back cowering like a child.”
“Did you say goodbye for me?” Voldemort said, his face showing what could possibly be a smile.
“Of course my liege,” he bowed low. “I have even more news, the additional attack today was a success also. They should arrive here within the end of this week. Also our next attack will be on the 24th, just in time for a little Christmas cheer.”
“Very good my faithful servant, you have pleased your master. What of your son though, where is he on his new mission?” Voldemort asked, reclining into his stone throne by the fire.
“I received a report from his just yesterday, it is difficult for to contact him due to the distance and time difference. From what I have heard though Durmstrang is a very different school from Hogwarts. They teach the dark arts, they instruct the students in proper duelling, it is a school worthy of true purebloods. He should have no trouble in gathering fellow students to the cause. He will not fail you my lord.”
“He better not Lucius, or else he will not be the only Malfoy paying the price of failure.”

Headmaster’s Office, Hogwarts
Harry arrived in a heap on the floor of Dumbledore’s office. He stood up quickly, dusting his robes off quickly as he made for the door, not noticing the Headmaster, Ron, Hermione, or even Ginny until he heard a small cough from behind him. He turned quickly, stumbling backwards as he did so but managing to stay upright.
“Hello Harry, I was curious to see when you might notice there were others in the room” Dumbledore said with a smile.
“Harry are you alright, you look a little shell shocked. Where did you go? I could feel that you had left but I couldn’t figure out where to.” Ginny asked, standing up to offer him her chair.
Harry waved her off, “I’m fine Gin’ just a little stirred up. I was at the Ministry with Moody, Professor Moody, sorry. Turns out there was another attack on top of the one at the ministry itself. The dragon preserve that Charlie works at was attacked also…don’t worry he’s perfectly alright except for a little cut on his forehead. Seems that they managed to strip the place of its wards too.” For the first time ever Harry saw what seemed to be surprise on the headmaster’s face.
“Why would they want to break into the dragon preserve? I mean dragons are strong but you can’t control them even if you could get them out.” Ron asked.
“There have been other things we believed to be near uncontrollable, the giants, the dementors; yet somehow Voldemort has found a way to bring them into his ranks. I believe that he has found a use for these dragons, did Charlie say how many were taken?” The headmaster asked.
“No, apparently he had just arrived at the Ministry the same time I did. They weren’t sure about what was going on.”
“Well I will have to look deeper into the actions of today. As for now I just ask you Harry to have a little more restraint next time you think it wise to let your curiosity take you on a field trip. The wards were set off today because of you passing through the floo,” the headmaster saw Harry’s expression darken, “no, no Harry. It was not tracking you at all. The reason the wards were tripped was because of the amount of magic that was going through them. We already have discovered some of your rather unique powers due to your rather large magic reserves and I am sure we have not seen the last of them. Now I believe it is time for lunch, so if you will allow me I shall be going to the Great Hall.” The headmaster stood up and the others followed suit. They followed him down the staircase and into the hallway; there they veered off in the other direction to go to Harry and Ginny’s room to talk.
Ron was the last in and as the door clicked shut behind him he burst out, “Harry, what in Merlin’s name is going on right now. For the past months nothing has been going on, and now all of a sudden it seems that Tom has found a hobby in breaking and entering. These things seem too random to make any sense. First Draco escapes, then Joy is killed, then Fudge is killed, and now they break out who knows how many dragons! All Hermione and I have done today is try to find something to explain what he’s doing…” Ron paced back and forth as he rambled on.
As Ron continued to talk a thought came to Harry. Maybe there is something in common. Charlie said the Death Eaters walked straight through the wards, so did Moody about the break in at the ministry. The wards failed every single time, they weren’t destroyed they just didn’t work, that has to be it. “Hey guys, I think I found out what all these attacks have in common. Charlie told me today that the Death Eaters were able to just walk through the wards like they didn’t even exist. I think that’s what is going on. I’ll eat my hat if I’m not right that Voldemort has found a way to get through the wards without using brute force.”
“But they were put up by Dumbledore himself, I’m pretty sure he knows what he’s doing when it comes to setting up defences,” Hermione chimed in.
“But suppose that Tom did find a way, that means that he practically has a key to every locked or warded place. Nothing can stop him from just walking onto campus now and challenging Dumbledore to a duel.” Ron said nervously.
“Have you still not read Hogwarts a History? You’re reading every war book I can find but you won’t read about the school itself. It says that there are not only wards around the school that each headmaster is required to add to; there is also much deeper magic at work, it comes from the elements themselves. It protects the school and its occupants even when the other forms of defence are down.” Hermione said, quoting from the book almost word for word.
“Well if that’s true then I guess we don’t have to worry as much about the school, but what about everywhere else. I mean anywhere that is believed to be protected is probably wide open now. Ron I think it might be a good idea to step up the squadrons’ training schedules to twice a week, just to make sure that they’re well trained before we all go away for Christmas break. Ron, you, Ginny and I have just less than two weeks to try and give them as many defensive skills as possible. Meanwhile Hermione could you and Emma look for any information of what could possible even remotely succeed at breaking through wards?”
“Sure, but I doubt I’ll find much on it. Good wards are thought to be invincible. Maybe you could talk to Flamel about it. I’m sure that he’s probably heard of something over his lifetime” Hermione said as she stood up to get started.
“Yeah I guess I will, I’m meeting with him tonight before Quidditch anyways.” Harry said.
“We’ll see you at dinner then,” Ron said then followed Hermione out of the door.
After they left Ginny went into the bedroom and sprawled out on the bed, she rubbed her eyes and yawned.
“Tired?” Harry asked as he walked into the room too.
“Yeah, my whole body is sore from Quidditch and leaning over books for too long. This year is a lot harder than I thought it would be.”
Harry sat down on the side of the bed and collapsed next to her. He rolled over sideways so he could look her in the eyes. “Well I promise it’ll get better. Anyways you’ve got me, ‘Mione and your brother to help you out.” He brushed a tangle of red hair out of her face and poked her nose playfully. “Gotcha!”
Ginny giggled and poked him back on the nose, “Gotcha back!”
Harry laughed as she started to tickle his ribs, causing him to erupt in laughter. After finally begging for mercy Ginny stopped, still laughing at from Ginny’s relentless tickling attack.
“I give up please just stop tickling me. You have found my weakness!” Harry said breathlessly.
“Fine, I am in a good mood, I will let you go,” Ginny said in a mocking superior tone.
Harry sat up on the bed, “I will not go, not until I have defeated you.”
“How do you plan on doing that Sir Potter? You do not know my weakness.”
Harry smiled wolfishly as he got closer to her, “Oh yes I do. I’ve known about it for a while.”
“Well then what is…” Ginny was interrupted as Harry kissed her. As they laid back in the bed and the kiss deepened Ginny knew that he had indeed found her weakness.

The Archives, Hogwarts

Harry was once again deep inside the chambers of Godric Gryffindor’s archives. Tonight he and Flamel were researching deeper into the diagram that they had found earlier. So far they had turned up very little except due to the overwhelming size of the archives. Flamel was still trying to find out how the books were indexed so they could find a way to at least guess where a book on a certain topic might be located.
Harry returned to their table with another stack of promising documents. He unrolled the first one and started to read. It was about some arcane system for carving stonework from what he could make out from the drawings. He sighed and placed it aside. Opening the next leather bound book he saw an intricate drawing on the front page but using the translation charm he was disappointed to learn that it was a history on some obscure wizard of the 1200’s. Groaning and rubbing his light starved eyes he tossed that book on top of one of the other innumerable stacks.
Flamel came out of the adjacent aisle with another stack. He too looked slightly exhausted and sat down heavily in his seat. “How about a cup of tea Harry? I’m starting to get a little overwhelmed by all this reading.”
Harry nodded in an agreement, “sounds great, let me try something though.” Harry stood up clearing a spot on the desk. He rolled up his sleeves and ruffled his hair. Closing his eyes he raised his right hand and then closed his fist tightly. He heard a stifled gasp and then a large crash of metal on stone. He opened his eyes and saw Flamel standing up out of his chair trying to whisk several books out of the way of a progressing puddle of hot tea. Harry pulled out his wand and shouted evanesco! The puddle of teas disappeared, but so did the table causing the piles of books to crash to the bottom.
“Oh-ho! Well there, looks like we had some tea there for a while. Very well done Harry, I haven’t seen anyone your age be able to perform any semblance of controlled wandless conjuring. This is certainly another one of your newly developing traits. Would you care to try some more of it?”
“Sure!” Harry was eager to but was afraid that after the last little fiasco Flamel wouldn’t want him to do anything more. “What do you want me to do? I haven’t tried anything but I’ve been picking some examples of how to do it in these books we’ve been reading.”
“It seems that is an added benefit of having to manually search these books. Even I have been finding small bits of information I haven’t even heard of before. Let’s see for starters why don’t you make us a new table?” He stepped back and nodded encouragingly.
Harry once again closed his eyes and balled up his fist. This time instead of envisioning a tea kettle he imagined the old table back where it was. He could feel the magic going to his fist and then exiting. He opened his eyes to see the table flicker in and out of existence then completely disappear. His shoulders slumped.
“Harry that was spectacular, for you to even bring such a thing into existence, for however long a period shows that your powers are growing. The only thing its lack of staying powers tells us is that you need to continue to train your magic reserves. That means you will need to start using your magic as often as possible. Just as muggles train for races by doing small bits of exercise over a long time period to build up stamina so do you.” He waved his own wand and a new table appeared and the books settled themselves back into their towers.
As Harry was sitting back down he remembered telling Hermione and Ron that he’d ask him about the wards. “Um sir. I know this is a little off topic and all, but today I went to the ministry and heard Mood… Professor Moody and Charlie Weasley talking about how the Death Eaters just walked through the supposedly impervious wards. I was just wondering if you know what could be doing this?”
“I won’t lie, I’m surprised you haven’t asked me this earlier. The simple answer is no, there is no possible way that he could be breaking into these wards. But the problem with that statement is that it is inherently wrong. It has become an accepted belief that wards are invincible, meaning nothing it is set to deter can get inside of it, that is not entirely true. What a ward does is use an opposite but equal magic force to repel any opposing magical force, in our case Voldemort. That means that if he pushes against the ward’s magic it will push back just as hard thus resulting in a cancelling effect. Now there is not evidence saying that someone or something can get through a ward, but I do know that there is a division of the Department of Mysteries working on just that. I suppose that there could be a very remote chance that Voldemort has beat them to the punch and has found a way to disrupt the shields’ functionality. If so then he has just stripped us of one of the few defences we have left to use. But come now that is enough dismal talk right now, let’s get back to work on some of that conjuring!”

The Room of Requirement, Hogwarts
Harry walked into the room last, locking the door behind him. All of Merlin’s Heroes, or just the Heroes, as it was now being affectionately called, were assembled in the room divided by squadron. They had only been training in their individual groups for less than three weeks but their improvement was very noticeable. Tonight’s meeting was about the recent escalation in attacks and what to work on after returning back from the winter break which was in only five days.
Ron walked to the front of the group, everyone fell silent. Ron had been growing more and more credibility as the year progressed, he was starting to show quite a keen intellect for military strategy. With Emma acting as his assistant he was starting to amass a huge collection on military books and information. Ron was also starting to teach Emma chess and she was starting to actually play against him, every time coming closer and closer to actually beating him.
“Well everyone this is our last meeting before we go off for holiday break. I want to remind you how important it is for everyone to practice. Even if you cannot use your magic keep in shape, recite the spells, try and learn some new ones; but also have fun. There is now a war going on and who knows, this might be one of the last peaceful holidays we have in a while, so enjoy it. Now I think that Harry has a small gift for all of you.” He smiled as Harry came up carrying a large wooden box.
He set it down heavily and reached inside pulling out what appeared to be a necklace. “This is called a bloodstone.” He said holding up the pendant to show off the stone.
The necklace was a fine silver chain with a dark blood-red stone affixed in the centre of the mouth of a blue phoenix. The stone seemed to consume the light around it instead of reflect it, an inner radiance possessed it.
“This is not just a gift though, there is in fact some useful items to this. Just like your coins these have a protean charm on them to alert you to anything. Hermione, Ginny, Ron and I have the master ones that allow us to set dates or times, but all of them have a panic mode that activates by you tapping it three times with your wand, this will cause all of the pendants to warm and pulse. The figure is a phoenix, and the colour of the phoenix is the colour of your squad.
I chose the bloodstone because of its slightly magical properties. While it won’t block a spell it does absorb some of its power, which might actually save your life.
Please wear these all the time, if this requires you to put a cloaking charm on it do so, but please wear them. If anything happens just send the panic message and we will try to do something. Now if you want to come up in squadrons I’ll get you yours and then you can all head out early,” Harry started to pull out small piles of small boxes each labelled a certain colour.
It took a few minutes to distribute all of the necklaces but when they were finally all handed out Harry went over to Ginny, Ron, Hermione, and Emma who had been waiting patiently on the side as the crowd died down. He carried with him four of the small boxes.
“These necklaces are a little more unique, take a look” he handed each of them a box.
Each one was a small silver disk with five gems inlaid in it. Around the perimeter was a blue sapphire, a red ruby, a pale grey amethyst, and a blackish cat’s eye, and in the center a white diamond.
“Harry these are amazing! Where did you get these, I mean you didn’t tell any of us that you were making these.” Hermione asked as she unclasped hers and handed it to Ron to put on her neck.
Harry smiled, “well I’ve been working with Flamel on conjuring stuff and that’s how I made the chains but everything else I had help with from Dobby. He’s pretty amazing at metal work, claims his great grandmother was a goblin or something. Anyways, we’ve been working every night for a little while. Do you recognize the discs from anything?” He asked as he helped Emma put hers on.
“It’s from that piece of parchment Flamel gave you.” Ron said.
“Yep, I figured that with finding out how we’re actually represented as elements in the prophecy we might as well use it for something.”
Ginny smiled and pecked him on the lips, “Thanks Potter.”
“Oy, get a bloody room, or at least stop snogging her in front of me.” Ron said flinching.
“Well I would have to say the same after seeing you and ‘Mione yesterday” Ginny shot back. She had encountered them kissing in empty hallway that was the shortcut to their room just yesterday.
Ron flushed and stopped saying anything. Hermione just laughed and took ahold of his hand. “Let’s go Ronald we can go have a nice dinner.”
“Come on Emma, Gin’, we’ll go down also. I’m starving!” Harry said as he took Ginny and Emma’s hands and walked out of the Room of Requirement.