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SIYE Time:10:34 on 29th March 2024
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Easter Eggs from Mum
By swishandflick

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Category: Alternate Universe
Characters:Albus Dumbledore, Harry/Ginny, Hermione Granger, Luna Lovegood, Ron Weasley
Genres: Angst, Humor, Tragedy
Warnings: None
Story is Complete
Rating: PG-13
Reviews: 23
Summary: Ever wonder what would have happened if Harry and Ginny had never been interrupted in the library by Madam Pince? Albus Dumbledore discovers it may be very important indeed....
Hitcount: Story Total: 8162







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A/N: A small portion of the dialogue in this story is quoted directly from "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix." No more than one hundred words are quoted from any section and reproduction has occurred solely for the purposes of enhancing the artistic merit of this fan fiction. The author recognizes J.K. Rowling, Bloomsbury, and Scholastic Books as holding full rights to this material. No copyright infringement is intended.


Harry looked at her. Perhaps it was the effect of the chocolate — Lupin had always advised eating some after encounters with dementors — or simply because he had finally spoken aloud the wish that had been burning inside him for a week, but he felt a bit more hopeful….

- J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, page 654 (U.S. Edition) [ellipsis in original]


Another long summer night had slowly drawn to a close and the sun had finally set behind his window, but Albus Dumbledore made no move to light the candles over his desk. The setting sun cast a low light over Fawkes, who sat uncharacteristically on top of his desk, his curious black eyes staring up at his master. The headmaster knew what he was watching. He could feel, as Fawkes could see, a lonely tear falling slowly down his cheek. He made no move to wipe it away and watched as it landed on Fawkes’ back. Fawkes moved his feathers back and forth as though to absorb it.

It wasn’t the first time Dumbledore had sat in his office like this that summer. He told himself he had been thinking and plotting. Indeed, with the acknowledged return of Lord Voldemort, the wizarding world was expecting no less of him. When he was with others, he managed to seem strong, for their sake as much as for his, but when he was alone, he allowed himself to admit he was weak and shattered and he allowed the pain of his own fear and failure to spring forth.

Dumbledore had felt fear so many times in his life it seemed like an old friend. But he had always mastered it. He knew that he was valued in the wizarding world for his wisdom. But he knew that it was really his courage — the mastery of fear - that had truly helped him to achieve anything he felt proud of. And now he had let that courage slip.

He should have told Harry about the prophecy many years ago. At least then he would have understood that Voldemort wanted him, why Voldemort wanted him. Perhaps then he would not have succumbed so easily to his trap. Perhaps then, an innocent man would not have died.

Part of Dumbledore wanted to say that he was being too hard on himself. Would knowing about the prophecy have really stopped Harry from going after Sirius? Granted, yes, he would have been more likely to suspect it was a trap, but if he truly thought Sirius had been in danger…. Perhaps it was really Severus’ fault after all. In spite of what he had told Harry, Dumbledore knew that it had been unconscionable for the Potions Master to let his own personal feelings get in the way of his judgment, and he dearly wished he did not have to rely on Snape as much as he did, particularly now.

But somehow Dumbledore still felt, as he had so many times since the events in the Ministry of Magic, that this was missing the point. In reality, he was in no position to castigate Snape. It was his own love for Harry, and fear of what the burden of the prophecy might have done to him at such a young age, that had impaired his own better judgment. And for the first time in his long life, Dumbledore had failed to keep that fear under control.

And yet Dumbledore still could not tear himself away from the world of “what if’s.” And so his eyes turned to the left of his desk. A short cauldron with a silvery liquid played his own distraught reflection back to him. It looked like a bit like a pensieve, and worked a bit like one, too, but Dumbledore knew that it was not. It was something far more powerful. Something that few in the wizarding world knew anything about; something that was a product of a magic so powerful that it would be incredibly dangerous were it to fall into the wrong hands. Dumbledore had used it in defeating Grindewald; he had had to; the stakes had been too high. He had been loathe to use it since then but now it seemed he had little choice.

For the potion Dumbledore had prepared inside the cauldron was the Elixir of Choices. Its magic was a powerful form of Divination that took the user not forward to the future but back into the consequences of the past, into all the alternate worlds that might have been formed had different choices and actions been made along the way.

And he had prepared the mixture to tell him one thing: what was the last choice that could have averted the tragedy in the Department of Mysteries? Who had made it and why?

Dumbledore had finished the potion several nights before but each time he had stared into it thinking up all manner of excuses why he should enter into the painful truths it concealed. And now he had finally grown too thoroughly disgusted with his own fear to stop himself from entering. On this night, he would not hesitate.

Ignoring a cautionary cry from Fawkes, Dumbledore extended a shaking hand toward the silvery liquid and felt himself plunged upside down into the world of what might have been.

Dumbledore hoped the Elixir would take him nowhere, showing that no paths could have led anywhere other than to the Department of Mysteries that night. He feared it would show him one of many encounters he had with Harry over the years when he could have told the boy the whole truth, but refrained from doing so. He did not expect to find himself standing in the school library. Nor did he expect to see Hannah Abbot and Madam Pince standing over a pile of books. What could they have possibly had to do with Harry and Sirius? Was there something Dumbledore didn’t know about? His hope and fear replaced by an intense curiosity, Dumbledore looked closely at the scene and watched it unfold.

Dumbledore recognized at once that this was a relatively recent event. The Hannah he was looking at was not the little wide-eyed, short, pony-tailed girl he had remembered from her first years, but the tall and gawky adolescent she had now grown into. Dumbledore leaned forward further and looked carefully at the titles of the books she was trying to check out. He could only make out the cover of the one on the top of the stack which read N.E.W.T. Potions for O.W.L. students: What You’ll Wish You Would Have Learned Earlier.

“Oh, dear, oh, dear, Hannah,” Dumbledore tutted under his breath.

So that was it; the O.W.Ls were upon them. He was watching a scene from sometime toward the end of the term that had just past.

It seemed that Madam Pince couldn’t stamp the books fast enough for Hannah who kept adding the pile on the desk from the one in her hand. She was clearly in a rushed and frazzled state and the books were perched on top of one another with increasing disorder and precariousness. Dumbledore knew it was only a moment of time before they collapsed and cascaded down on Madam Pince’s side of the desk.

But at the last second, Hannah seemed to notice what was about to happen and reached out a hand to stop the books from falling.

Madam Pince snapped her head down quickly to where Hannah was now restraining the books.

“I wouldn’t have thanked you if those had fallen on my foot, you know,” she snapped. “You’re very lucky they didn’t.”

“Oh, I’m awfully sorry, Madam Pince,” replied Hannah.

She ran a quick hand through her hair which stayed there frozen as the scene stopped before Dumbledore’s eyes. He didn’t need to be told what it meant. He was looking at the Nexus of Change: the point at which a different outcome would not have led to Sirius’ death. But for the life of him, he could not find the connection. He would have to look on.

The part of Dumbledore that was still inside the Elixir flicked his wand again. The scene rewound before him and this time, the scene played on into an alternate reality: this time, Hannah was unable to stop the books from falling. Madam Pince let out a great howl of pain as N.E.W.T. Potions fell on her foot.

“I’m sorry about that, Irma,” he muttered under his breath.

But Dumbledore’s attention did not remain long on Madam Pince. He could not convince himself that either she or Hannah had anything very directly to do with Sirius’ death. There must be something — or someone — else in the library.

Free to move about in the alternate universe that he had set in motion, Dumbledore did not take long to find out. At a desk in the corner, but within eyeshot of the front desk, sat Harry. In the seat across from him, a package of chocolate Easter Eggs on the table in front of her, sat Ginny Weasley.

“You’re not supposed to have those in the library, Ginny, you know that,” muttered Dumbledore to himself. “I wonder….”

***

There he was. Sitting by himself, pretending to study, but no doubt hiding and moping, his new favorite past-time. Ginny repressed a surge of impatience as she reached Harry’s desk. She tried to remind herself that this had not been the best of years for Harry: he had been attacked by dementors, nearly thrown out of Hogwarts, banned from the Quidditch team, visited by Voldemort in horrible dreams, and, worst of all, as Hermione — who Ginny had discovered far too late could never keep anything secret — had told her, had his hand sliced open by that vicious toad Umbridge in one of her detentions earlier in the year.

And so that by the time Ginny sat down in front of Harry, her impatience had returned once again to profound sympathy. But that did not mean she was going to let him get away with feeling sorry for himself all the time. And these past few days, he had seemed to get worse. Harry had retreated into a deep shell which he would let no one into. And worse, his closest friends Ron and Hermione, who should have understood him best of all, had simply bought into his flimsy excuse that he was overwhelmed by the amount of studying he would have to do before taking his O.W.Ls.

In reality, Ginny suspected Harry’s recent downturn had nothing to do with any of the things that had made her sympathetic to his situation. She had not failed to notice that it had closely coincided with a recent row he had had with a certain Cho Chang. Tired of him moping around, Ginny had decided she would come to see him on the pretense of giving him his Easter egg. She could have asked Ron do it, of course, and part of her feared he might wonder why she hadn’t. But while Ron was taking Jack Sloper up to the hospital wing, she had been given the package by one of Umbridge’s Inquisitorial Squad. She decided to take the eggs to Harry herself and hopefully get the chance to have a good talk with him.

Harry didn’t seem to notice her approach. He was pretending to study but Ginny could see that he wasn’t really looking at any of his books. She noisily dropped her elbows onto the table but Harry still did not move.

“I’ve got something for you,” said Ginny, undeterred. “It’s Easter Eggs from Mum.”

But still Harry said nothing. It seemed as though the entire world had disappeared around him.

“Harry, I’m talking to you, can you hear me?”

“Huh?”

Harry finally looked up. It seemed he truly hadn’t noticed she was there. She thought of remarking it was fortunate it hadn’t been Draco Malfoy sneaking up to his table, but then she thought better of it. If Harry was going to open up to her, it wouldn’t do to bruise his ego further.

“Oh hi,” said Harry, obviously trying to put on a falsely cheerful front. His books had been sprawled across and the table and he pulled them toward him. “How come you’re not at practice?”

Ginny sighed. Now, there was something she didn’t want to think about.

“Practice is over,” she explained. “Ron had to take Jack Sloper up to the hospital wing.”

“Why?”

“Well, we’re not sure, but we think he knocked himself out with his own bat.” She sighed again. “Anyway, a package just arrived, it’s only just got through Umbridge’s new screening process.”

Ginny placed the box of Easter Eggs up onto the table.

“It’s Easter eggs from Mum,” she explained, for the second time. “There’s one for you. There you go.”

Ginny took one of the larger eggs and handed it to Harry. She figured he needed it.

Ginny expected a false smile and an expression of gratitude, but instead Harry seemed to stare at the chocolate as though he had never seen anything like it before. A moment later, his cheeks flushed deeply red and he seemed to be trying to swallow something. He wouldn’t look at her suddenly, as though he didn’t want her to see….

Ginny felt her own cheeks turned red. It looked like Harry was about to cry. But why? Part of Ginny could help but feel hopeful, though. Perhaps she was going to finally get through to him after all.

“Are you okay, Harry?” she asked, as quietly as she could.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” replied Harry gruffly, but he still continued to stare down at the Easter egg. Ginny leaned in further to try to look at his eyes but Harry just lowered his head further as if to stop himself from doing so. Ginny was not really sure what to say next but she quickly decided, as she often did in these situations, that the best thing to do was to speak her mind. It was obvious to her that the Easter egg was the present Cho might have given him but didn’t. And she wasn’t going to refrain from saying so.

“You seem really down lately,” she told him. “You know, I’m sure if you just talked to Cho — ”

“It’s not Cho I want to talk to,” said Harry suddenly.

For a minute, it looked as though Harry was going to lift up his head to look at her, but he continued to stare down at the Easter egg. Still, his words had been less significant than the manner in which he had said them. Ginny couldn’t help but think that she was getting to the truth of the matter, though she still wasn’t sure where it would lead her.

“Who is it, then?” she asked, her eyes still trying to find his.

“I….” Harry suddenly looked up and around the library. Ginny wasn’t sure why but then she realized he was trying to make sure they weren’t overheard.

“I wish I could talk to Sirius,” he muttered. “But I know I can’t.”

This was not what Ginny had expected but yet she still found she believed him. Her mind started to work very quickly. No doubt Hermione and Ron would have called their best friend mad; perhaps that was why he was telling her. But Ginny’s own mind was quickly swimming with a hundred ways she could make his wish come true. She realized she was staring almost hypnotically at Harry, her mind far away, and that he had broken the uncomfortable gaze by reaching into the package and pulling out a chocolate egg. More to ease the tension that because she really wanted any, Ginny began eating one, too.

“Well,” she said, “if you really want to talk to Sirius, I expect we could think of a way to do it….”

“Come on,” said Harry dully. “With Umbridge policing the fires and reading all our mail?”

But, in her own mind, Ginny was already well past that obstacle. “The thing about growing up with Fred and George,” she told Harry, “is that you sort of start thinking anything is possible if you’ve got the nerve.”

Harry stopped eating the chocolate then and for the first time since Ginny had sat down at the table, he looked her directly in the eye. The tears that had been forming on his eyelids were no longer concealed from her. There was a very strange look on his face, part of it was hope, Ginny realized, but part of it seemed like something else, a look she had never seen from him before. Ginny felt the shivers running up her body again, as though it was coping with something her mind refused to confront. Her heart began to beat faster as they continued to look at each other and she was sure that her face had turned red again. Ginny could see that he was grateful — very grateful in fact, and she hoped she would not let him down. But there was something more than that and Ginny found herself feeling uncomfortable. She was grateful when there was a loud crash from somewhere behind her. She turned around to see Madam Pince howling in pain. It looked as though she had been stamping Hannah Abbot’s enormous pile of books when several of them had fallen down from the desk onto her toe.

“You idiot girl!” Pince cried, her face shriveled up like a beast’s.

“I’m awfully sorry, Madam Pince!” Hannah kept saying.

Madam Pince stopped shaking her toe long enough to look up to see if anyone was looking at her. She briefly caught Ginny’s eye before they both quickly looked away. Ginny turned back to the table and gasped as she realized that her sitting body barely obscured the chocolate eggs. She looked over at Harry and could see that he was thinking the same thing as her.

“Damn, I forgot!” she said.

“We better get these out of the way before she sees them!” Harry replied.

Trying not to look back guiltily in Madam Pince’s direction, Ginny quickly grabbed the box of chocolates and stuffed them under the table. They then looked back at each other and breathed a sigh of relief.

“That was close,” Ginny said.

There was a sudden lull in the conversation. Ginny found herself suddenly anxious to find something to say.

“I — ” she and Harry began at the same time.

Ginny smiled. “I — I — look, Harry,” her voice dropped to a whisper again. “I’m sure we can think of something. But why — I mean, why do you want to talk to Sirius?”

Harry looked up at her again. He seemed surprised she had asked the question. For a moment, Ginny thought that he would actually answer her but then he looked around again furtively and back down at the table.

“I — I — well, it’s, it’s sort of private.”

“Oh…. OK.” Ginny tried to conceal the disappointment in her voice. But then she thought of something else. “Maybe we should talk somewhere else? I don’t have anything to do before supper and I don’t think Ron will be back yet. Would you like to go for a walk?”

“No… I.” Harry looked up for a moment but then back down at the table again. “It’s — it’s all right. I don’t really want to….”

Harry’s voice trailed off. He wouldn’t look up from the table again now. The chocolate egg was no longer in front of him but Ginny couldn’t help but think it was still sitting there in his mind. Part of her knew she should leave now and try to smuggle the eggs out with her but she couldn’t leave Harry sitting like this. She watched him closely again. He was still trying very hard to swallow. She wasn’t sure whether he was trying to conceal tears of pain or tears of relief but she couldn’t bear to watch him continue to struggle. She touched the top of his hand very lightly with her own and leaned in closer.

“Harry,” she whispered quietly. “No one’s watching us. Please don’t feel ashamed to cry in front of me.”

As soon as the words left Ginny’s mouth, she knew she had gone much too far.

Harry quickly got to his feet and slammed his chair hard against the bookshelf behind it. Ginny did, too, though it did little to make her feel any less shorter.

“I’M NOT GOING TO CRY!” shouted Harry, tears now running down his cheeks. “NOW PLEASE, PLEASE JUST GO AWAY AND LEAVE ME ALONE!”

Ginny stood looking back at Harry, her mouth slightly open. The sound of limping footsteps emerged quickly from behind her and Madam Pince’s shrill voice began barking in her ear far louder than Harry’s had.

“What do you think you’re doing, Mr. Potter?” she exclaimed. “Keep your voice down! The library is no place for your histrionics! And what’s this?”

Ginny’s heart sank further as Madam Pince’s eyes traveled to the ill-concealed box of chocolate eggs under the table.

“Chocolate in the library!” she screamed. “Out — out — OUT!”

Madam Pince whipped out her wand and charmed Harry’s books, bag, and ink bottle to chase him and Ginny from the library, whacking them repeatedly over the head as they ran.

***

Ginny sat down by herself in the top row of the Quidditch stands. She had come out for some practice and some fresh air. Their final match against Ravenclaw was in two days and Ginny still wasn’t sure she was good enough to beat Cho. But when she’d arrived, she’d found that she wasn’t alone. There was someone else in the air, flying around on her brother’s Cleansweep. When he saw her, Harry swooped down into the stands. They looked at each other for a moment. Harry was still panting from his flight. Then Ginny said:

“Won’t you be in a bit of trouble if Umbridge finds you out here?”

“Well, I haven’t actually been banned from flying, just playing on the team.”

“She did lock up your broomstick.”

“That’s true enough. I doubt if she’d be pleased to find me out here. I’d better go in and get back to studying.”

They exchanged a weak smile. Ginny felt disappointed that they wouldn’t be able to talk for longer. But then Harry still seemed to stand there and then finally, without either of them acknowledging it, he put the broomstick down and sat next to her.

There was another moment’s pause. Ginny wanted to talk but she had the feeling she should let Harry say something first, even though she wasn’t sure what he wanted to say.

“I — I’m sorry,” said Harry finally, not looking at her.

“For what?” asked Ginny, genuinely surprised.

“I — I’m sorry I shouted at you in the library. I know I shouldn’t — it seems I shout at everyone these days.”

“None of us can really understand all the things that you’re going through, Harry, but sometimes it helps to talk.”

“I — I know, it’s just, well,” Harry finally looked across at her. “Thank you for telling Fred and George about Sirius. They — they — well, I got to talk to him.”

Ginny nodded. “Yeah, they told me.”

They sat for a little longer in silence, then Harry got to his feet.

“Well, I — I suppose I better be going, Umbridge and all.”

Ginny smiled. They shared another weak wave and Ginny watched as Harry walked out of the stands at the top. She didn’t know why but she still felt very disappointed and decided she wasn’t in the mood to fly after all. She waited a few minutes longer, then walked out of the stadium herself.

***

“But Harry — what if your dream was — was just that, a dream?”

Harry felt as though his insides were going to explode? Why couldn’t they just understand him?

“You just don’t get it!” he shouted back at Hermione. “I’m not having nightmares, I’m not just dreaming! What do you think all the Occlumency was for, why do you think Dumbledore wanted to prevent me from seeing these things? Because they’re REAL, Hermione — Sirius is trapped — I’ve seen him — Voldemort’s got him, and no one else knows, and that means we’re the only ones who can save him, and if you don’t want to do it, fine, but I’m going, understand? And if I remember rightly, you didn’t have a problem with my saving-people-thing when it was you I was saving from the dementors, or,” he turned to Ron, “when it was your sister I was saving from the basilisk — ”

“I never said I had a problem!” Ron replied heatedly.

Harry felt a momentary pang of regret as he realized that what Ron had just was indeed true, but he was far too concerned with making his point to Hermione to back down now.

“But Harry, you’ve just said it,” said Hermione fiercely. “Dumbledore wanted you to shut these things out of your mind, if you’d done Occlumency properly you’d never have seen this — ”

“IF YOU THINK I’M JUST GOING TO ACT LIKE I HAVEN’T SEEN — ”

“Sirius told you there was nothing more important than learning to close your mind!”

“WELL, I EXPECT HE’D SAY SOMETHING DIFFERENT IF HE KNEW WHAT I’D JUST — ”

The classroom door opened. Harry, Ron, and Hermione all looked up in surprise to see who had just entered. Harry suddenly realized that his shouts had probably carried far out into the corridor and anyone could have heard him going on about Umbridge. His indignation turned to fear turned once again to relief as he saw Ginny enter the room, followed closely by Luna, who as usual looked as though she had drifted in by accident.

“Hi,” said Ginny uncertainly. “We recognized Harry’s voice — what are you yelling about?”

Harry paused. Ginny’s question made feel extremely irritated. The last thing he needed was more people involved in this and more talk when what was really needed was action to save Sirius. An acerbic remark danced on his tongue but there was something about the way Ginny was looking at him that reminded him of the day he had been flying, and how he had sat down next to her when he had really been meaning to leave, or the look she had given when she had touched his hand in the library, and suddenly his anger seemed to fade.

But not his sense of urgency. They needed to save Sirius and they needed to save him now. Every single minute counted.

“I haven’t got time to explain,” he replied brusquely, but without the anger he had shown to Ron or Hermione. “Just — just — please, something very awful has happened and we need to sort it out fast!”

“Well, then, maybe we can help!” Ginny persisted.

“If Stubby Boardman is in trouble, I’m not going to rest on the sidelines!” declared Luna.

Harry felt his head start to throb. It got worse when Hermione said:

“Wait, Harry maybe they can help! Listen, we need to establish whether Sirius has really left headquarters!”

“I’ve told you, I saw — ”

“Harry, I’m begging you, please! Please let’s just check that Sirius isn’t at home before we go charging off to London — if we find out he’s not there then I swear I won’t try and stop you, I’ll come, I’ll d-do whatever it takes to try and save him.”

Harry felt his anger return in full force. “Sirius is being tortured NOW!” he cried out. “We haven’t got time to waste — ”

“But if this is a trick of V — Voldemort’s — Harry, we’ve got to check, we’ve got to — ”

“How?” Harry demanded. “How are we going to check?”

“We’ll have to use Umbridge’s fire and see if we can contact him,” said Hermione, who looked positively terrified at the thought. “We’ll draw Umbridge away again, but we’ll need — ”

“Wait!” said Ginny.

Harry looked across at her.

“That’s far too dangerous!”

“Can you think of a better idea?” demanded Ron.

“Yes! Well, I can think of one possible one.”

She looked across at Harry hopefully. In truth, he felt beside himself at all the time this was wasting, but something made him still want to listen to Ginny, far more than he wanted to hear Hermione’s suggestions, at any rate. Harry could also see she was afraid he would just shout at her again and that made him feel guilty enough to keep quiet, at least for as long as it took to hear her idea.

“What was that package that Sirius gave you the day you left Grimmauld Place?”

Ginny’s face was red but she seemed buoyed by her success in finishing a complete sentence without being shouted down, which neither Ron nor Hermione seemed to have accomplished to this point in the conversation. But having heard the whole sentence, Harry did not find himself in much of a mood to indulge her further.

“WHAT?” he exclaimed. “How do you know — ”

“I’m really sorry, Harry,” said Hermione sheepishly. “I know you took us into your confidence, but I felt certain that we could trust Ginny — ”

Harry groaned very loudly.

“Look,” said Ginny, undeterred. “Hermione said Sirius told you that it was a way if letting you know if Snape was giving you a hard time!”

“Yeah, so?”

“Well, what if it’s some way of communicating with him? Then we wouldn’t have to risk going to the fire! And, w — well, if he has been kidnapped, then maybe it can help us get him out!”

Harry did not say anything. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that Hermione was looking back and forth between him and Ginny. He imagined she was wondering what it was that made him listen to Ginny when he wouldn’t listen to anyone else. But then finally, she herself spoke up.

“Oh, but Harry, that could be even more dangerous! If we can just find a way to get you to Umbridge’s fire again! I’m sure we could use Ginny and Luna as — ”

“No,” said Harry decisively. “Ginny’s right. It might be able to tell us how to get to where Voldemort’s holding him. It’s worth a try, anyway.”

***

The sun was hot as Harry walked toward the Quidditch pitch, his newly freed Firebolt in hand. He could see from where he was standing that there were several people in broomsticks flying over the top of the pitch. Looking down, he saw that one or two students were in the lake, swimming with the Giant Squid. He was about to make his way to the Quidditch pitch when he noticed a figure in the distance, sitting on the edge of the pond. Though she was far away, Harry could not mistake the long red hair. Harry was surprised to see Ginny on her own and he felt that least he could do was go over and talk to her. Maybe she wanted to go flying, too.

Ginny seemed preoccupied as he approached. She was skipping pebbles into the lake. Harry had to say “hello” twice before she heard him.

“Oh, hi, Harry,” she said finally, her face brightening.

“Hi, er — sorry, I — I just wondered why you — well, I can go if you want to be — ”

“No, sit down, please, Harry!”

Ginny gestured to a space on the large stone she was sitting on. Harry looked at it for a moment, as though unsure it could fit both of them comfortably. In truth, something made him feel uncomfortable about sitting very close to Ginny but when she beckoned him a second time, he sat down somewhat awkwardly next to her.

Ginny didn’t say anything for a moment, but continued skipping stones. Harry cleared his throat cautiously.

“So I suppose I should thank you again. I mean if it weren’t for you, well, I would never have talked to Sirius a — and I would have believed all the things Voldemort was putting in my head. And then who knows what might have happened.”

“So Fudge believes Dumbledore now?”

“Yeah, yeah, I just came from talking to Dumbledore. He told me — well, I don’t know, I — ”

“I understand, Harry, you can’t tell anyone.”

“Right,” said Harry, a little gruffly. He cleared his throat. “Well, anyway, when Sirius found out, he told the others. They found a whole load of Death Eaters and Voldemort himself waiting for me in the Ministry of Magic. But they expected me and not a whole load of Order members. Fudge was there and he saw Voldemort and so he believes Dumbledore.”

“They didn’t catch Voldemort, did they?”

It was not a question.

“No,” said Harry, looking down. “He got away. But they caught most of the Death Eaters, including Lucius Malfoy.”

“I’ll bet Draco’s furious. Did Sirius go along?”

“No, Dumbledore made him stay put in the house. I don’t think he was happy about it.”

“But at least he’s all right.”

“Yeah, thanks to you.”

“Oh, I don’t know, Harry.” Ginny shrugged. “I think Hermione’s suggestion might have worked. After all, you talked to Sirius in the fire before.”

“Yeah, well, maybe, maybe not. Who knows? This way, I know I can talk to him whenever I need to so Voldemort won’t be able to get at me like this again.”

“All’s well that end’s well,” said Ginny, still looking a little distracted.

“Yeah, I wish I’d have been there, though. Still, it’s probably better that I wasn’t. That’s just what Voldemort wanted.”

And now I know why, thought Harry, but he didn’t think he could tell Ginny what Dumbledore had told him in his office. He wasn’t sure he would ever be able to tell anyone about the burden he now faced.

“Still,” Harry went on, as much to quiet his own thoughts as to communicate with Ginny. “I — I think Hermione was right about one thing: I do have a ‘saving-people-thing.’ I think Voldemort knew about that; that’s why he wanted me to go.”

But Ginny shook her head. “No, you don’t, Harry,” she said, almost to herself. “If you had, you wouldn’t have spent the last four years pretending you’d never rescued me from the Chamber of Secrets.”

Harry felt as though his body had turned into a block of ice. His throat tightened to the point of asphyxiation and he began to feel more terrified than when he’d been standing in front of Voldemort preparing for a hopeless duel with the Dark Lord. What ever had made her say that, now, after all this time? Harry suddenly seemed to be sitting far too close to his best friend’s sister.

A horrible, queasy silence suddenly passed over the two of them. Harry suddenly felt that he would have been happier if Ginny had kept talking about the Chamber of Secrets rather than bottle up completely. Perhaps he should say something. What he really wanted to do was leave. He was still casting around in his mind for an excuse when the two swimmers drifted over toward their direction. Harry felt his heart pound in relief when he saw that it was Seamus and Dean.

“Oi!” Seamus cried out.

Harry waved to them, a little too enthusiastically.

“Come and have a swim with us!” shouted Dean. “The water’s wonderful!”

“Well, actually, I was just going off to fly,” said Harry.

“Ginny?” asked Dean.

Harry looked over to see that Ginny was blushing slightly. He wasn’t sure why.

“Maybe,” she called back, after a moment’s pause. “The water looks nice. How long are you going to be in?”

“I dunno,” replied Dean. “A while yet, I sup — ”

His sentence was ended as Seamus came behind and tackled him, in a mock imitation of the Squid. Ginny giggled and watched as they disappeared. Harry waved after them and then began to feel anxious again. At least Ginny had said she wanted to go swimming. Perhaps he could use that as his excuse to disappear.

“Is Dean going out with anyone?” Ginny suddenly asked.

“Oh — what?” said Harry, a little non-plussed.

“I just wondered.” Harry looked at Ginny and found that her eyes were still trailing after the bare-chested Dean. “He’s just a little dishy, that’s all. I’m sorry, I suppose I shouldn’t have asked you. But whenever I talk to Hermione, it seems half the school finds out.”

“B — but,” Harry protested. “I thought you were going out with — ”

“Michael?” said Ginny. She shook her head. “Not anymore. I just came back from talking with him.” Ginny began to throw pebbles into the water again.

“Oh,” said Harry, suddenly understanding why Ginny had been sitting by herself. “Oh, I’m sorry, I — ”

“It’s okay. We broke up a few weeks ago, in fact. I just — well, I just talked to him to find out whether — but, anyway, it turns out he’s seeing someone else now. So I guess it’s all over.”

“Oh,” said Harry, for what he realized was the third time. “Wh — who he’s going out with now, then?” he asked, and immediately wondered why he cared.

But Ginny turned to him and smiled a little mischievously. “Oh — someone in his own house, and just as depressing as he is.”

“Yeah — so who?”

But Ginny just smiled again and this time, Harry understood.

“You don’t mean?” he said, his eyes widening.

Ginny nodded. “Are you upset, Harry?”

“No,” said Harry, and he realized he meant it, too. “No, he’s welcome to her.”

“They’re both very depressing, aren’t they?” said Ginny, looking back out to the lake. “I couldn’t put up with it, anymore. He was just awful after Gryffindor beat Ravenclaw in the final. I had to break up him after that. I hate depressing people.”

“Yeah,” said Harry, and then with more conviction. “Yeah, so do I.” A part of his conscience began to tug at him after he’d said it, though. Cho had had every right to feel horrible after Cedric had died. But then how had he felt? And why did she always have to try to find ways to make herself so miserable? And then there was that horrible sneak friend of hers —

“Of course, that wasn’t the real reason.”

Harry’s thoughts about Cho came to an abrupt halt. “It wasn’t?” he said, realizing he sounded a bit stupid.

“H — he, well — let’s just say he wanted to do something I wasn’t ready for.”

This time, Harry was not quite so dense that he didn’t realize what Ginny was talking about. But he still didn’t see why she should want to tell him. He felt very awkward again and he was still trying to think about how to respond when Ginny suddenly burst into tears.

“Oh, H-h-h-harry,” she said. “I-I-I wish I could tell you w-w-what happened to me in the C-C-Chamber. Th-th-there were t-t-t-terrible things, things I-I-I-I’ve never told anyone about, b-b-but I’m sure I could t-t-tell you. I-I-I’ve always know I-I would someday.”

Harry still wasn’t sure what to say but he knew that he couldn’t just let the conversation pass in silence. Why did girls always want to cry in front of him? Though somehow, as anxious as he felt, it still seemed easier to be sitting next to a crying Ginny than a weeping Cho. Slowly, cautiously, but without realizing he was doing it, Harry snaked his right arm around Ginny’s shoulder. She didn’t resist and after a moment, she put her arm around his back and leaned her head against his chest. The top of her hair tickled the bottom of his chin and Harry suddenly noticed how silky and soft it was. He held onto her more tightly. Suddenly, it seemed that the rock they were sitting on was just the right size for both of them.

Ginny cried into Harry’s chest for a little while longer. Then, she lifted up her face to look at them. Harry suddenly remembered one night when he had seen them reflected in the fireplace back at Grimmauld Place, and he suddenly knew why he had spent so much time staring at them then.

“Don’t be afraid to say anything in front of me, Ginny.”

They both laughed suddenly as they remembered back to their time in the library, and Harry’s statement seemed more than a little ironic. But then both grew serious again.

“Not today, Harry,” said Ginny, her eyes not leaving his. “But one day, I hope.”

“Well, why don’t you come flying with me, then? Or do you really want to go for a swim?”

Ginny looked back at the lake for a moment, but then her gaze returned to Harry.

“I’d love to go for a fly. I think I can make my excuses later.”

“Come on, then; we’ll back to the common room and get your broom.”

***

Dumbledore watched as Harry and Ginny got to their feet and began walking back to the school together. He waited long enough to see them look at each other several times before Ginny finally slid her hand into Harry’s. Then he turned himself back out of the Elixir. To have lingered longer would have been to stay to watch things he had no business seeing. And he knew enough now.

Fawkes continued to watch him as he replaced the Elixir in an old cupboard at the corner of the office which disappeared into the wall as soon as he had closed it. He hoped he would never have to use it again. He should have known long ago that the chanciest of circumstances sometimes bred misfortune. Sirius’s death was no doubt a tragedy, but there could be many more in this war, and Dumbledore was needed to stop that happening in the future, not to dwell on what might have been the past.

And yet, after seeing what it had taken to save Sirius in that alternate world he had visited, Dumbledore couldn’t help but feel some hope. After all, events had a way of following each other around, even in different realities, love even more so. Perhaps Harry and Ginny had still more Easters left to share and maybe, on those future occasions, they wouldn’t be interrupted. After all, there were still many lives yet to be saved.


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