Here's a snippet to give you an idea:
"Here we are," he said, swinging open the heavy wooden door to the Snout's Fair. "And here are Ron and Sirius," he added, nodding to a booth in the corner. "Hard at work."
Ron and Sirius looked quite settled in. There was a half-finished bottle of Goldie's Liquid Curse on the table between them. Sirius was leaning forward, an intense look on his face, speaking and gesturing with manic energy. Ron was twirling his glass on the table, looking a bit bored.
Hermione and Remus ordered Butterbeers and joined them.
"…how to kill something that was never alive," Sirius was saying. "Maybe there's a way to dissolve them. Turn them into smoke." He puffed on the brightly-colored tube between his fingers, and blew out a cloud of spiced smoke. "They're solid creatures. If they exist, then they can be destroyed."
Remus gave Hermione a look, and then slid into the booth, pushing Sirius closer to the wall. "You know those things have terrible side effects," he said, pointing to the sqworm.
"You're joking." Sirius took another puff. "I never knew that. Was that discovered while I was in prison?"
Hermione slid in next to Ron, not sure what shocked her more – the sight of Sirius smoking, or the fact that he'd so coolly mentioned Azkaban. He and Ron must have been closer than she realized. Or else he was very drunk.
"I'm glad you're here," Ron whispered, and kissed her on the cheek. "He won't drop it. I can't get him to change the bloody subject."
Hermione patted Ron on the knee and took a sip of her Butterbeer.
"Tell Sirius and Ron what you've worked out, Hermione," Remus instructed, his voice firm. "I'm sure they'll find it interesting." There was a warning tone in his voice, and Hermione was surprised to see Sirius paying attention to her.
"It's about my parents," she began.
"Really?" Ron asked, tucking a leg under him and turning to face her. "Did something happen? Are they doing better?"
"No, no… nothing like that." She forgot for a moment that Remus and Sirius were listening as well. "I went to St. Mungo's today, and I saw Neville, and I saw his parents."
"And?"
"And he gave me an idea. So I went to see my parents, and ended up having a nervous breakdown."
Ron grabbed her hand. "What happened? You do look tired," he said. "And your hair's more insane than usual."
"Thanks," Hermione answered, reaching back and plaiting her hair. "How's that?"
"I like it the other way," Ron answered. He pulled at a piece of hair that she'd missed. "Put it back."
Hermione smiled at him. She wanted to give him a kiss, but Sirius snickered, reminding her that they were not alone.
"Remus, I love it when you wear your hair like that," he said, mocking Ron. "And those robes bring out the dirt under your fingernails."
"Shut up," Ron and Remus said in unison.
"Right, sorry," Hermione said. She finished telling them about her day.
When she had finished telling them about the spell, and when Remus had backed her up by describing the look of it in the air, Ron leaned back and whistled. "My, my. Did it take you two whole hours to work that out?"
Hermione narrowed her eyes. Was he being a prat on purpose? "Two hours is not a long time, Ron. Delia told me that it's taken her years to discover some solutions. I realize this isn't a huge spell, but it's a huge deal to me, and I thought - "
"You're the worst Thinker ever," Ron interrupted. His eyes were twinkling.
"Oh," Hermione laughed. "Sorry. I guess I am tired. I didn't see that one coming."
"Hold on. That's brilliant." Sirius leaned across the table and pushed the bottle of Liquid Curse out of the way. Ron poured himself and Sirius another shot.
"Well, I thought it was a good idea," said Hermione, feeling pleased. "I just hope it will help my parents."
"So your theory is to suck the fear out of your parents with this spell?" Sirius's eyes had the very hollow look that they'd had in the Shrieking Shack all those years ago. Hermione really could understand why some people still crossed the street when they saw Sirius coming. She wondered if he'd had that look before Azkaban, and suspected that he'd always been a bit mad. "You're saying that the tears turn back on the pain - so are they a force of attack, or do they act as a drain, to draw out all the unpleasantness?"
Hermione nodded. "Both. The spell feeds the energy behind tears straight into the pain, in order to dissolve it, and then the pain can be released, through actual tears, which are the end product of the spell."
"You came up with that," Ron said under his breath, "and it already sounds like something out of a textbook. Next year it'll be on the O.W.L.s and everyone'll be forced to memorize it. You're cursing generations of students forever -"
Hermione elbowed him.
Sirius's eyes turned bright. "The Dementors feed on human happiness," he said. "Perhaps that spell could be manipulated to work on them."
"Sirius," Remus said, moving the glass of Liquid Curse farther away from his friend. "Perhaps we should discuss this at home, and leave Ron and Hermione to enjoy this news in peace. She conceived the spell for a very specific purpose that has nothing to do with -"
But Sirius wasn't listening. "They suck the happiness out of you. And then they take your soul. All those people, all those people in St. Mungo's wandering around that Post-Dementor Soul-Sucking ward. They have no souls."
"That is unfortunate, Sirius, but I don't think - "
"Unfortunate?" Sirius seemed to have forgotten that Ron and Hermione were still at the booth.
"I've never seen him this mad before," Ron whispered to her. "I don't think he'll notice if we make a run for it."
Well, one more snippet because Ginny's a big part of the story too. This is a fun one that doesn't give away much:
"Ask away," he said recklessly, ignoring the stares of disbelief that both Ron and Hermione were directing toward him.
Eloise smiled prettily. "Thanks, Harry. All right, then," she said, checking her parchment and poising her quill. "First question –"
"Is that a Quick Quotes Quill?" asked Ginny suddenly. She had stepped up beside Harry and was pointing to the quill, suspicion written across her face.
"Oh, no!" Eloise shook her curls. "It’s just Self-Inking. Is that all right?"
Ginny considered for a moment, then nodded – but did not step back again. She stayed right next to Harry, her arms crossed over her swimsuit, listening intently. Harry glanced sideways at her.
"Right," Eloise continued. "First question. What do you plan to do, now that You-Know-Who has been defeated?"
"Voldemort," Colin corrected.
Eloise gulped. "Yes – sorry. I’m not used to that. All right – what do you plan to do, now that Voldemort has been defeated? Any job offers, Harry? Career ideas?"
Harry thought, uncomfortably, of the job offer that he had received from the Aurors. If he lied to Eloise about that, Moody would read the paper and know it. On the other hand, if he told the truth, Eloise would surely want to know exactly why Harry had turned down such a significant offer, and Harry didn’t think he could bear to get into it. Normally he would have shut the interview down right then, but knowing Colin and Eloise from their time together at Hogwarts made that difficult. He hated to be outwardly rude to them; he felt a slight panic begin to rise up, as he always did with reporters, and began to gesture awkwardly.
"Well – I don’t –"
He stopped. Ginny had touched him lightly on his side with her fingertips – a quick shock bolted through his center.
"You haven’t made any decisions about your future," she guided, quietly.
Harry blinked. That was a good answer. "That’s true," he said, turning back to Eloise. "I haven’t made any definite plans yet. It’s all up in the air."
Colin grinned. "Well, Harry. You’ve got yourself a press representative," he said, snapping a picture of Harry and Ginny, side by side. Ginny winced visibly and Harry felt queasy, wishing he’d never agreed to this in the first place.
"Up... in the... air..." Eloise muttered, writing furiously. "Oh! Speaking of up in the air, Harry, are you planning to try playing Seeker again?"
Harry started slightly. "What – you mean, professionally?"
Colin clapped Eloise lightly on the back. "Good one," he praised. She flushed a little, which made her even prettier, but Harry hardly noticed. She had just filled his head with visions of professional Quidditch – something he had hardly dared to dream about in the past few years. It had seemed so unlikely, so far away, that he would get to try out for a British team.
"Play Seeker," he repeated, realizing as he spoke that he liked the idea. "Actually, I’d hardly thought about it," he said, honestly.
"But you will, now?" Eloise urged.
Harry shrugged. It wasn’t entirely out of the question. Hadn’t everyone told him that he was even better than Charlie? And Charlie was supposed to have been good enough to play for England. "Maybe," he offered, noncommittally. "I don’t know."
"Well, there hasn’t been a lot of time for you to think about your career, I imagine," said Eloise fairly, poising her quill again and checking her pad. "Which leads me to question two, actually. Did you always believe that you had a future to plan for, or are you surprised to have survived at all?"
Harry felt his stomach go ice-cold at the question. Beside him, Ginny drew in a sharp breath of protest.
"Next question," she said, her voice low and even.
"Oh, come on, Ginny, that’s not so unreasonable – none of us knew if we were going to survive –" Colin began, but Ginny cut him off with a wave of her hand.
"Actually, Eloise, let me see your scroll and quill a minute. I can save you time."
Startled, Eloise held them out to Ginny, who took them and scanned down the list. She made a small sound of impatient anger, and began to cross out questions one after another. Harry watched over her shoulder as she eliminated, "Do you feel your parents are still with you in spirit?" "What is your most difficult memory of the war?" and "Do you think that you will ever recover from your long battle with the Dark side?" Her hand trembled as she put a violent slash through "Your close friends have also suffered terrible losses. How have these affected you?" She glanced up briefly at Harry. He noticed that she hesitated for a split second before looking down again and drawing a line through, "Whom, if anyone, are you currently dating?"
Ginny looked over the roll of parchment once more and then, seemingly satisfied, handed the scroll and quill back again.
No comments:
Post a Comment