Hermione's Suicide

Hermione stared at Dumbledore in shock.

"You want us to help you kill him?" she demanded. "NO!" she yelled. "I won't do it! I'll die before I help you do it!"

"Miss Granger, you don't understand," Professor Abram said softly. "If we don't stop Harry now, he'll become out of control. He'll be the next Voldemort. What we're planning on doing is going to stop that from happening. There is one other who can do the job Harry has been destined to do, and he's a lot more well-behaved than Harry is."

"I don't want to hear one thing you have to say!" Hermione screamed at her DADA professor. "You're the one who came up with this, aren't you?" she demanded. "Dumbledore, you have to see what you're asking!" she cried. "You have to see that by doing this you're taking the life of the best thing to happen to this school since his father's time!"

"Hermione, you must understand that I would not ask this unless I knew it was the best thing for all. We cannot risk the rising of another Dark Lord, and if I can stop that ahead of time, I will."

"Who's to say that this other person you give the power to won't do exactly as you expect Harry to?" she demanded. "Who's to say that whoever is next in line won't turn out the same?"

"I highly doubt Neville Longbottom is capable of the same acts of violence Harry has been known for."

"And I highly doubt Neville is capable of facing Voldemort!" Hermione yelled.

-|-

Harry's heart pounded in his ears as he and Draco entered the top-most chamber of the Astronomy Tower and walked over to the door that lead outside.

"You're going to love it, Harry," he promised. He held his hand out to Harry as he opened the door.

Harry took it and looked at the stairs that lead to the observation level and wondered what it would take for Draco to snap out of whatever spell he was under.

"Look," Draco breathed, his head as far back is it could go. He pointed up at a constellation. "Draco," he whispered. "It's what I'm named after...."

Harry looked up, but not nearly as far as Draco had. He didn't want to put himself off balance or vulnerable to attack.

"Really?" he asked.

Draco nodded and then moved to the edge of the walkway. "Wow," he breathed, looking right over. "Harry, you've got to see this, it's amazing! You can't even see the ground!"

Harry felt himself tremble slightly in fear and refused to walk over to the ledge. Draco looked back at Harry with a curious expression on his face. "Well?" he asked. "Don't you want to see this?"

Harry shook his head. "Draco, don't," he whispered. "Please, for the love of Merlin, wake up...."

Harry felt a sob rise in his throat.

Draco quickly walked up to him and held his arm as he guided Harry to the ledge. "Look down," he said softly, a possessed feel coming off him in waves. His eyes glinted with a maniacal light. Harry felt himself shake in fear.

Draco forced Harry to look over the ledge.

"Draco, please," Harry nearly yelled, crying, terrified, unsure if he would survive the night.

"Harry, can you see the bottom?"

"No," Harry said, feeling the sob force its way out.

"You're not looking hard enough," Draco said, pushing Harry out over the edge.

Harry felt his feet give and he flipped over the edge. He scrambled for a hold on the wall and his fingers caught just before he plummeted to the un-seeable ground below.

"Can you see it now, Harry?" Draco asked.

"Draco, help me!" Harry begged.

"Can you see the ground?"

"Draco, PLEASE!"

"Can you see it, Harry?"

"DRACO!" Harry screamed.

Something flashed in Draco's eyes. Harry's fingers began to slip.

"Draco, I love you!"

"Harry!" Draco bellowed. He reached over the edge and caught Harry's free hand just before the one holding on to the ledge slipped away. Draco worked like mad to get Harry back to safety and held him close as they both cried with relief that Harry was safe.

"I thought I'd lost you," Harry whispered.

"You said you love me," Draco said, holding Harry tighter still.

"I do," Harry said through his tears.

Draco let out a sob. "No one's ever said that to me before," he cried.

"I thought I was going to die," Harry whispered. "I couldn't die without telling you."

"I love you," Draco said, desperately clinging to Harry as though he'd die if they ever let go of each other.

"We failed," Donna said to Dumbledore. "Something happened, I lost the connection."

"We'll just have to try again," the old headmaster said wearily. "This truly is proving to be harder than I imagined."

"Do you think Harry knows something's going on?"

"Not likely," Dumbledore said, confident in his words. "Even if Draco does say that he was bewitched, Harry will probably assume it was a Death Eater who had bewitched him."

"I hope you're right," the Defense professor said softly. "Otherwise we may need to find yet another way of going about this."

"We do not need Hermione. In fact, I'm beginning to wonder if her decision isn't exactly what was needed to help us."

"What happened to you?" Harry asked once they were in the safety of the Gryffindor tower. The common room was deserted, so Harry and Draco took a seat next to the fire.

"I don't know, it's all a blur. I remember that Snape told me that Dumbledore needed to speak to me and that he thought you might have been in trouble. Since you weren't at dinner, I...I jumped to conclusions I guess. Next thing I knew, you were dangling from the edge of the astronomy tower and I did the first thing I could do which was grab you before you fell to your doom."

Harry sighed and rest against Draco's shoulder. "I'm glad you snapped out of it when you did," he sighed.

"Did you know?" Draco asked.

Harry nodded. "I knew."

"Then why the hell did you follow me?" Draco demanded, standing. "If you knew I was under a spell, why the hell did you follow me? You had to have known that something was going to happen!"

Harry nodded. "But I had to snap you out of it, and the only way I could have done that was to go with you."

"Must you always put yourself in danger to save others?" Draco sighed as he sat back down, wrapping his arm around Harry as Harry nestled into Draco once more.

"I put myself in danger to save those I love," Harry said softly. "It's a natural instinct for me, I guess. If I had just walked away and left you alone, you would have kept trying and I couldn't risk putting anyone else in danger. I went to save you, and hopefully not die in the process."

"Then you did what you set out to do," Draco said, staring into the fire.

Eventually, they fell asleep in each other's arms.

"Whoa, did you know?"

"Uh-uh. Did you?"

"I knew they were friends, but.... Are they gay, do you think?"

"No, Harry dated Cho Chang and Malfoy dated Pansy Parkinson. You know that, Parvarti."

"Well, yeah, Lav, but that was like...two and three years ago."

"Alright, alright, break it up, people, there are things that need to be done! Such as breakfast and morning classes! Leave them alone!"

Harry's brow furrowed in confusion. He felt someone stir beside him and opened his eyes to see the entire common room full of people staring at him and Draco.

His mouth formed a comical 'O' as he realized what was going on. He shook Draco awake.

"What?" Draco mumbled.

"Err...you need to wake up, love," he said. "We've got an audience."

By lunch everyone had heard that Harry had called Draco "love" and had come to the conclusion that they were dating. This had yet to be confirmed by the two, but when the news reached Professor Abram she knew exactly why her spell had broken over Draco. She hadn't taken into account that there may have been an emotional connection between the two of them and thus her spell was not strong enough to keep Draco under her control.

They couldn't use Draco again.

Harry knew that Dumbledore was the cause of Draco's behavior the night before, and because of that, he lost whatever trust he'd had left for the man. He thought it would be obvious that he knew, but every time he looked up at Dumbledore, the man smiled at him, eyes twinkling, as though nothing were wrong. Harry was beginning to wonder how much Dumbledore really knew and if he suspected that Harry knew at all.

It seemed odd to Harry that they would have gone for Draco. Harry didn't think Dumbledore knew how close they were. He had been, in fact, suspecting that they would continue to use Ron for whatever purpose they had intended Draco for. Harry strongly suspected that they wanted him dead, and a fall from the Astronomy Tower would look like suicide to anyone who didn't know better.

If only he could convince Ron....

Ron, however, would have nothing to do with Harry, not after what he'd seen this morning. Harry would be forever grateful to Ron for breaking up the crowd, but the look in Ron's eyes when Harry saw his face was unbearable. There was a look of pure hatred in Ron's eyes and it made Harry wonder if they had already gotten him under their spell.

"Harry?"

Harry snapped out of his thoughts and looked up at Draco as he sat down on the grass.

"Hmm?" Harry asked.

"What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking that Dumbledore's trying to have me killed and that his next pawn is Ron."

"You're probably right," Draco agreed, looking out over the still surface of the lake. There was eerie calm about the evening that had Draco on edge. He couldn't explain it, but he jumped at every small thing.

"What is it?" Harry asked.

"I don't know," Draco muttered.

Harry yawned.

"Go to bed, Harry," Draco said. "You didn't sleep much last night."

Harry nodded and stood. "I'll see you in the morning then?" he asked.

Draco nodded. "Bright and early," he said softly, giving Harry a kiss. "Now go to bed."

"Love you," Harry said as he began to walk away.

"Love you too," Draco answered.

Draco watched Harry go.

"How sweet," said a voice behind him. "But since when do Malfoys know the meaning of the word love?"

Draco felt something hit him in the back of the head. He was unconscious before he hit the ground.

When he woke next, he was staring at himself. It wasn't him, but it certainly looked like him.

"What?" he mumbled. He tried to rub his eyes, but found that his arms were chained.

"Awake are we?" the imposter asked.

"Who are you?"

"Draco Malfoy," the imposter answered simply. "Or at least I am now. Listen, thanks for helping us out, you have no idea what you've done for our cause. Getting so close to Harry...." The imposter began to laugh insanely. "Oh, boy, this is perfect! I couldn't have planned it better myself. Oh, wait, I did plan it. Well, not you and Harry, but what I'm going to do to you. Do you have any idea what I'm going to do?"

Draco shook his head, no longer groggy. In fact, he felt more awake than he had in a very long time.

"I'm going to break you up," the imposter said. "I'm going to make Harry feel so low that he'll kill himself. It'll be perfect."

"Harry'll see through it," Draco said, finding it hard to breath. "He's on his guard already, he'll see through what you're doing and he won't fall for it."

"Oh, but he already has!" the imposter cried. "Don't you see? We used you first just in case, but now that we know what you and Harry are.... He's not guarded around you any more. He thinks that since we've used you once, we won't use you again!"

Draco shook his head. "It won't work."

-|-

Dear Diary, 3.15.97

I now know for sure what they plan to do with Harry. They want to kill him. They want Ron and I to help them kill Harry. I can't believe it! There's something else going on here, I know it!

Dumbledore says that he thinks Harry is going to become the next Voldemort or something worse. He says that Harry's too uncontrollable, that he can't be trusted, that he can't be stopped.... He says that they've figured out a way to transfer the powers of the Boy Who Lived into someone else. That someone else is Neville Longbottom.

Personally I think it's a horrible choice and I don't know how they even came up with it. Neville is afraid of his own shadow for crying out loud! There's no way he can face Voldemort and defeat him, he'd freak out and lose before he even got the chance!

Why is Dumbledore even considering this? Has Abram done something to him? Has she got him under her control? What is gong on? This is NOT normal! This is NOT Dumbledore!

When she and Dumbledore were talking to me today, it was like they weren't even the people they are in public. Abram was...bound, set, and determined to make sure that Harry saw death before he became of age, and Dumbledore backed her up! I've never seen Dumbledore agree to a more insane plan. I've never seen either one of them.... Merlin, please help Harry.... Please make sure he lives to see Voldemort destroyed, if only because he deserves it more than anyone else does.

Hermione