Looking Ahead

Looking Ahead

by Leni Jess

When Hermione was home alone with her parents, after they had been so bright on the platform at Kings Cross at the end of fifth year, her mother cried.

Buckets. Floods.

She saw, as she never had before, thinking them adult, self-sufficient, how her parents missed her. How her mother was afraid for her. It never crept into their letters, always encouraging, cheerful, talking about the importance of a good education, and how she was being fitted to use her inborn talents, how she would do well in the wizarding world. The wonderful opportunities, which they didn't understand but were sure awaited her.

Now she knew they feared, always, news their daughter was dead.

When her mother stopped crying she whispered, "Who would tell us, if anything happened to you?"

Shocked, Hermione had answered, "The school. Professor McGonagall -" and remembered how Professor McGonagall nearly died.

Sirius fell through the veil.

Professor Umbridge did dreadful things to Harry, and no one else in authority noticed, to save him from her malice. Except maybe Professor Snape, who hated him, but still took care not to have any Veritaserum when it mattered.

Professor Dumbledore ran away from his school, you could say, and that love he professed for Harry did him nothing but harm.

His friends protected Harry best: Ron, she herself, and the other students in Dumbledore's Army.

How could it be enough? When she looked back, though, she saw it was the pattern.

The Headmaster let Harry do things, let things happen, hoped for the best. Professor McGonagall picked up the pieces, after they lay shattered on the ground, truly sorry, but not able to prevent the breakage.

Professor Snape saved Harry from Quirrell's curse, in first year. He tried to teach Harry Occlumency. If Harry had not angered Snape so much he refused to teach him further, if Harry had mastered it, he would have protected himself from deceit, he might have prevented Sirius's death. No one explained why it was so important for him to learn Occlumency, not even Sirius or Remus. She tried to convince Harry to work harder at it, but his own profound dislike for Snape - no, be honest, that was hatred too - argued louder.

After Sirius died Harry seemed more inclined to listen to her, but he was very sad and sober, when he was not raging at Dumbledore, at Voldemort, at himself, for that death. Ron was quieter; perhaps his particular nightmare in the Department of Mysteries had done that. He still hated Snape too, as Harry did - she herself was not likely ever to be fond of him, but she could probably do him better justice as a teacher and as a member of the Order.

The terrible fight at the Department of Mysteries, coming right after their OWLs exams, sobered all three of them. She had not told her mother everything about that. If she did, she might not be allowed to return to Hogwarts. How fortunate her parents didn't subscribe to the Daily Prophet as she did.

After all that stress her results had been a great relief; Os in all her subjects. Ron's were not good, which was infuriating, when he could have done better. He was not stupid, he just didn't care. It was getting very late to learn to care. She still didn't know Harry's results, more than a week after they all received their owl. He hadn't sent Hedwig to her with a letter once since the holidays began; Hedwig must be locked in her cage again. His dreadful uncle hung up on her when she phoned.

She needed an owl of her own.

Yes. An owl. She could send it to Harry. Her owl would not be caged. It would also be easier to send messages to Ron if she didn't have to depend on his sending her notes first, with silly little Pigwidgeon. Letters sent by the Royal Mail didn't seem to get to Ottery St Catchpole very reliably. Ordinary letters to Harry were not acknowledged; probably they were confiscated before he saw them.

Hermione frowned. She had made a mistake, trying to telephone Harry at night.

She marched downstairs to the phone in the front hallway.

A woman answered - his Aunt Petunia, of course. With careful politeness Hermione asked for Harry. Mrs Dursley didn't sound pleased, but Hermione could hear her calling, and soon enough he was speaking to her.

Five minutes of cross-talk established that Harry's OWLs results were very acceptable. She deplored his casual attitude to working for exams, but he did better than they hoped. He would even be able to take Advanced Potions; he must, of course, if he still wanted to be an Auror.

Harry mentioned that though his uncle was rabidly angry much of the time, he was still afraid of the wizards and witch who met Harry at King's Cross - especially of Moody. Uncle Vernon had no happy memories of Mr Weasley, either, Harry confided, cheerfully. He was allowed to speak to Tonks when she phoned, and Remus phoned once. They both fell silent for a moment, then, thinking of Sirius. Harry moved on firmly. If he still couldn't talk about Sirius, even to her, that wasn't good.

She too became cheerful, and told him she wanted to buy an owl. She would like his help. And Ron's, of course. Ron could get to Diagon Alley with little trouble, probably, but what about Harry?

Harry discussed her project in more detail than she would have expected, but then he did love Hedwig very much. Perhaps he wanted her to love her owl, as she loved Crookshanks. He was interrupted once by his aunt, but apparently won permission to catch the train up to London the day after tomorrow.

Hermione was not sure how to get in touch with Ron. With her parents worried about her safety, using owl post was more difficult. They didn't want her going near anything magical, though they would not say so. She would not be going to the Burrow this summer. Her parents needed her close. She thought she needed more contact with the good parts of the magical world, not less.

Eventually, when her father came home from his surgery, he drove her in to the nearest town that had a small wizarding enclave, including an owl post office.

It was a relief to meet Harry and Ron in Diagon Alley on a fine summer's day, and to see both boys looked well.

Ron was happy, though he complained that his mother hung over him and Ginny like a hen over her last remaining chickens. He had stayed with the twins a couple of times, sleeping over their Diagon Alley shop, and would stay there tonight; it gave him a welcome break from all that mothering.

Harry might not be happy, but he was good-tempered, and paid attention to what they said to him, evidently glad to see them, to talk with them. He said apologetically that he had better buy his books and supplies for sixth year while he had the chance. Hermione agreed she could do the same.

Ron complained, but there was no need to make him follow their example. Mrs Weasley might still not entirely approve of the twins' shop, but she would use its hospitality to ensure he and Ginny had their supplies for the new school year in good time.

Harry thought she should buy a snowy owl, like Hedwig. Ron thought she should buy anything other than whatever kind of owl Pigwidgeon - or Errol, or Hermes - was.

Hermione laughed at them, gently, and pointed out that though Hedwig was gorgeous, a rare and foreign owl would be difficult to fit into a Muggle household. She would need all sorts of paperwork. She would stand out. Hermione wanted a simple, useful, undistinguished owl. She agreed she didn't need a dumb flutterer like Pigwidgeon, likely to be eaten by the neighbour's cat at first opportunity.

If she had an ordinary British owl she could get a licence easily, claiming to be rearing an owl for breeding, to release new members of endangered species into the wild.

"Licence?" Ron asked blankly. "Endangered?"

Hermione rolled her eyes, looking at Harry; he seemed to understand, and to be a little amused.

"Mate, owls don't do as well in the countryside as they used to. Not enough trees with proper holes, I suppose. Too much weed-killer."

Ron looked even blanker, so silently the other two agreed not to try to explain further.

Hermione just said, "Muggles want people to have permission to raise wild creatures in captivity. But you can easily get permission to have, say, a barn owl, if you have a certificate saying it was reared in captivity."

"Barn owls are everywhere," Ron objected. "Why get one of those when you could have, oh, say, an eagle owl? Not a black one, like Malfoy's, but one of those pale-coloured desert ones - Eeylops had one last year, remember?"

"Beautiful," Hermione agreed calmly, "but exotic; I'd have Department of the Environment inspectors on my back the whole time. A barn owl will be fine. They're beautiful too; they're a good size for a postal owl; and they're British. No one's going to be surprised, and I'd get a licence, no problems. Daddy said he'd pay our gardener to build a nesting box in the garage roof; there's room for a flying enclosure. I have proper plans. If I bought a female, and she had owlets - there are other barn owls at school, we could make a project of it, if we wanted - they could be released into the wild."

She smiled. "A few more magical owls in the British countryside won't do any harm."

However, Hermione came out of Eeylops with a male barn owl, just come to maturity. He was beautiful: white facial disk, pale golden orange feathers above and white below, all incredibly soft, the occasional white tip on his wing feathers looking like a flash of light when he moved. He had very respectable talons, though he didn't weigh much; even less than one might expect for something thirteen inches tall. He was interested in everything around him, and disposed to be friendly.

The wizard in the shop promised that he was used to kneazles, so as long as Crookshanks wasn't jealous... Hermione thought he could easily be brought to understand that, while the owl would be useful, he was loved as well as needed. No need to tell Crookshanks that already Sarastro had a piece of her heart.

Ron had never heard of the name; it sounded foreign. Harry wanted to know where she found it.

She settled for, "Sarastro was a wise man - a wizard, maybe, though they didn't say so - in a famous Muggle song story about a hero and a heroine who overcame her wicked mother." Opera didn't seem to be part of wizarding world culture. Not what she saw of it at Hogwarts, any way.

They bought textbooks, and Potions supplies. Hermione convinced Harry to wait until the end of August to buy new robes, in case he shot up even further than the inch he had already put on in the last month. They had far too much icecream, sitting out on the pavement under a colourful umbrella at Florean Fortescue's.

Then they went back to Flourish and Blotts, leaving their purchases at Weasleys' Wizarding Wheezes, to buy some books Hermione had been thinking about. Harry found a book about magical owls, curious now about the difference between them and ordinary ones. Ron bought a book on the history of Quidditch, which Harry would borrow, of course, and a book on herbs for beauty to give to Ginny for her birthday. Hermione didn't think she needed it, but Ron wasn't interested in any of the suggestions she made. Luckily the book had a lot about other uses for herbs.

Hermione dragged them away from the broomstick display in the window of Quality Quidditch Supplies. Harry's broom was still top of the market, and Mr and Mrs Weasley had bought Ron last season's Cleansweep Eleven as a reward for getting his prefect's badge.

Ron sighed, then cheered up, looking round Gambol and Japes Wizarding Joke Shop, wondering whether his brothers had seen the new stock.

He wanted to take a look down Knockturn Alley, saying, "It's daylight; what harm can we come to?"

Harry was even quicker than Hermione to dissuade him. She found later that he had caught a glimpse of Draco Malfoy and Vincent Crabbe down the alleyway. He said they didn't need more conflict, more hexes flying, even though they'd win again. That sounded sensible.

The twins took them out to dinner, but eventually they had to separate, tired, happy, with plans to correspond regularly now each had an owl. Harry was hatching a plot to get Hedwig released from her cage, planning to say that since both his friends had owls now there was no point in imprisoning her. His aunt would probably see the sense in that; she had been wary of crossing wizards, Harry said, since the meeting at Kings Cross.

Hermione caught her train loaded down with books, potions ingredients, Sarastro in his cage, a bag of owl treats and other supplies, a sturdy leather glove and shoulder pad, and a few other things she had picked up. The backpack that had been such a nuisance on the journey up, flapping emptily on her shoulders, now came in handy.

She talked to Sarastro all the way home, and the other people in the compartment didn't seem to think her odd, though they might have done if they heard what she said. Just a plain, bushy-haired girl talking to a pet bird because she was lonely. Nothing strange about that.

For the last five weeks of their holidays all three exchanged letters, though Harry and Hermione wrote more often than Ron. A new wizarding family had moved in to the other side of Ottery St Catchpole, with twins a year younger who, like him, were Quidditch-mad. At last he had someone to play with. Hermione was amused to hear, from Ginny, that she was allowed to join in, to make it more like a real team. They couldn't have a Snitch, of course. Ginny played Chaser, and said she was careful not to get too many goals past Ron.

Harry didn't write about his relatives, or Sirius, or say much about Remus's one visit, but he did write a lot about Tonks. Their walks and talks, the things she told him about Auror training, her tales of Moody's erratic past and still colourful present. Hermione thought that Tonks seemed very interested in Harry. Maybe she was simply being friendly. She was like that, after all. Hermione hoped that he just liked the company.

It was too early to talk to Harry about it, but Hermione knew that he was hers. One day he would know it too. Long before that Tonks would understand, or would be told. He had forgotten about Cho now. If he was attracted to Tonks instead, it wouldn't matter.

Harry didn't need disagreements over that kind of thing now, or even to have to think about it. Not when he had Sirius to get over, Remus to mourn with, Dumbledore to resist, and Voldemort to destroy.

He wasn't going to do anything real, not until all that was over. Later, when the world was a good place again. Then, if they were still alive, she could do something about it. Then, there would be time.

Ron would probably complain, but she could handle Ron. Harry needed to be happy, and she would manage that, too.

~~The End~~