Was it all enough? - Year 7

Miss Chang said she was in tears as Harry proposed on a deserted beach in the South Pacific. Further research found the couple was staying at an exclusive resort on the island of Bora Bora. Miss Chang said it was the most romantic thing she'd ever seen.

If our readers will remember, Miss Chang was the girlfriend of Cedric Diggory who was mysteriously killed during the final task of the Triwizard Tournament and Harry Potter survived. How the loss of her boyfriend and the ending of Harry's relationship with a vampire ended up with an engagement between the two is a story this reporter would love to hear.

However it happened, the couple seemed extremely happy and Miss Chang was obviously pleased with the exquisite emerald shaped diamond ring. She seemed anxious to have a wedding during the holidays. Maybe she can convince Harry to be a little more available to the press.

"I tried to get her to hide from them but she wouldn't," Harry said re-reading the article.

"Of course she wouldn't Harry! She wants everyone to know. I would if I were her," Hermione said amazed at how naïve Harry could be.

"She's right Harry. Women want to tell the world about this kind of stuff," Sirius said.

"But you would have let me hide from the reporter. At least Cho's happy now," Harry said trying to find the positive in this.

"Aren't you happy too?" Hermione asked noticing Harry's attitude.

"Of course. I would have been just as happy if we had told our close friends and no one else," Harry replied.

"You're really going to do it during the holiday break?" Hermione asked.

"I wanted to wait until next summer. I figured it would be better to wait but she didn't think so. She wanted to do it before I went back to school but I convinced her that was too soon," Harry said.

"You should have some say so in this. Don't let her force you into doing it too soon," Hermione said forcefully.

"Sure Hermione. If I was marrying you and you had your heart set on doing it at some special time, I'd give in to you as well. I just didn't want it to be weird with me still in school and being married."

Harry and Hermione went outside and he spent some time telling her about the vacation and everything. "It sounds wonderful. I doubt I'll ever go someplace like that," Hermione said sadly.

"Of course you will," Harry said confidently. "Just think if we were all still not committed next summer, we could have all taken a trip somewhere. That would have been great. Oh, there is something I have to tell you. When I came back from vacation, Sirius found out about the N.E.W.T. thing."

"Harry! You promised you wouldn't tell anyone," Hermione sounded mad.

"I didn't plan to. I was setting out here at night practicing with some candles and he wanted to know what I was doing. He wouldn't drop it when I just said school work. He demanded to know and to see the book. Sirius said it sounds like Dark Magic and wants to be around when we are studying about it this summer. I'm sorry; he just caught me practicing. He promised he wouldn't tell anyone."

"Fine, I guess it wasn't your fault. As long as Sirius won't tell. Wait..." Hermione stopped and looked at Harry with her eyes getting wide. "What do you mean he caught you practicing? You didn't actually get something to happen did you?"

"Um... Well yeah. Nothing big, just little things. You told me to read about it on vacation," Harry stammered.

"I didn't think you actually would! What can you do? Come on show me," Hermione demanded obviously excited.

Harry got a bunch of candles and lit one of them. He made the flame from one candle hop to each other candle and light them all. Then, he had the flames all combine into one much larger flame and come to his hand.

Hermione was watching Harry when he brought the candles out and lit one. She could tell he was nervous. He sat down and she could really feel the magic around him, it felt really good to her. She watched in awe as he made the little flames move to each candle and then form into one large flame. She saw the flame come toward him and land right in his palm. Ever since that day with the orb, she had this connection with him and could feel the magic all around him.

"Doesn't that burn?" she asked watching the fire burn in his palm.

"Not at all. I can't even tell it's there," Harry said.

Hermione reached out like she was going to touch it but pulled back when she felt the heat. "I can sure feel it," she said.

"How long did it take for you to be able to do anything?" she asked going back to her wanting to learn everything mode.

"By Wednesday I thought little things were happening. Remember, this is all I had to read and there wasn't much else to do. I thought I made some waves and maybe a breeze but I couldn't be sure it was me."

She looked at him for a minute and asked a question she had wondered about ever since the incident with the orb. "When you do magic, can you feel it flowing out of your wand?"

"Um...No, I don't think so. I don't notice any difference. Why, do you?" he asked confused.

"Yes. When I do magic correctly, I can feel it flowing through the wand," she replied.

Harry looked worried. "Maybe that's why you're so much better than me. I don't feel anything," Harry said sounding disappointed.

Hermione laughed but knew better. She had no doubt that Harry was much, much more magical than she could ever hope to be.

"So, do you mind if Sirius works on this with us when he's here? That may mean we have to put off the orb, but I'd rather work on this with you," Harry asked.

"That would be fine, especially since I can't do magic until we're back in school."

Harry picked up his wand and concentrated on Sirius coming out then said, 'Fliari Memeori' to cast the message spell. He and Hermione continued to talk until they heard. "What the hell was that? This thing flies right into me and I get the sudden vision that I'm supposed to come out here."

Harry and Hermione were both laughing until she answered. "That's Harry's message spell. Kind of weird the first few times it happens. We thought you might want to work on elemental magic with us."

"Sirius. Just imagine if you ever bring a woman back here and I'm around. Once you two go to be alone, I could send you messages of all kinds of disgusting things. Or I could send her messages that could really get you in trouble," Harry said laughing.

"If one of those things interrupts any date I might have, bad things are going to happen to you. Very bad things," Sirius said not entirely joking.

They spent the afternoon talking about elemental magic. Hermione had read much more than Harry had and was able to understand much more as well. She would explain things and Harry caught himself thinking 'Oh, that's what that meant.'

Hermione and Sirius were discussing something from one of the books so Harry decided to try some magic out. He concentrated on the wind and instead of saying a spell; he mentally asked the wind to blow harder. It took a minute but then both Sirius and Hermione started looking around since it hadn't been breezy at all a few minutes ago. Harry sat there smiling. "Now you're just starting to show-off," Sirius said.

Harry suddenly remembered something. "I bet Dumbledore can do this. When I was seeing R.J., I asked Winky to setup a nice romantic diner for us on Christmas Eve. It ended up being on the roof of the castle. It was cold and snowing, but we had a path around the roof and where our table was that was dry and warm. I bet he did it with elemental magic. If you stepped outside the path, it was instantly cold and the snow hit you."

"You thought of having romantic diners back when you were fifteen?" Hermione asked surprised at learning something else about her friend.

"Just like his father. James always tried doing stuff like that for the girls he dated," Sirius added.

"Hopefully we can figure this out and I'll try that this winter. That would be great, we could walk around outside and never get snowed on." Harry thought out loud. "You know what I've figured out listening to you two talk about this. I think I can learn much quicker when you two do the reading and I just listen to you explain it to each other."

"You're not still worried about this being Dark Magic are you Sirius?" Hermione asked.

"Yes and no. I don't worry about either of you doing anything. But imagine if a Death Eater became really good at this and could start using fire creatures to attack people. That's kind of scary."

"They teach things in Auror training that aren't pleasant either. Those things could be used to torment and terrorize people just as easy," Harry said flatly.

"I thought it was advanced stunning, healing and things like that," said Hermione looking confused.

"Well that's there also, but there are some things that aren't very nice." Harry replied looking down.

"Why don't you show me a couple?" Sirius asked smiling. "We haven't dueled in a long time."

"And if I remember right, you, Lupin and Moody came out on the losing end. And, that was a couple years ago," Harry said with a laugh.

"Yeah right Harry. Why won't you duel him?" Hermione asked.

Sirius looked at her and said, "He's not kidding Hermione. He beat the three of us at Mrs. Figg's house. But, I've been practicing since then and have my own wand now. C'mon a quick one."

"Ok, but it's got to be quick. We're supposed to be studying. Do you want a protection charm?" Harry laughed which drew a crude reply from his godfather.

They stood up and Hermione started watching intently. She had never seen trained wizards duel before. Sirius and Harry bowed but didn't take their eyes off of each other. They started circling one another and finally Sirius started a curse but before he could finish, Harry Disapparated and apparated next to Sirius and just pulled the wand from his godfather's hand before Sirius knew what happened. "That was pretty quick," Harry laughed, pleased he had beat Sirius so quickly.

"How'd you do that? I was still moving?" Sirius asked.

"Advanced Apparation. Actually it's pretty neat. Want a quick example before we try dueling again?" Harry asked.

It was Hermione that spoke up. "Yes!"

"Ok, you two each take a cup. I'll turn around and you throw the cups into the air at the same time. Yell as soon as you've thrown them."

They each took a cup and looked at each other; then they threw them and Hermione yelled, "Go!" Harry Disapparated then apparated next to the first cup in the air and then did the same for the second cup before finally Apparating back where he started from holding both cups.

"Whoa!" Sirius said. "I didn't know that was possible. I always heard you had to concentrate on the spot you wanted to end up at."

"That's not exactly true. You're still aware of things going on, even when you Disapparate, you just have to concentrate on it. So, I can still see you moving after I Disapparate and can change the destination. Cool, huh? Please don't tell anyone about this stuff. Other than the Unspeakables, you two are all that know."

"Ok, duel for real now," Hermione said wanting to see more of what the two could do.

They bowed again and Sirius cast a couple spells that Harry was able to create a shield for. After Harry blocked a couple more spells, Sirius said, "You can at least fight back."

Hermione could just feel how doing magic like this energized Harry. She could just tell that he really enjoyed it. Sirius was sending advanced spells and Harry didn't even look worried. She could see her friend focusing more and could tell something was about to happen.

Harry quickly cast a localized bind on Sirius' arms, keeping them locked to his side and then used the constriction curse on his throat like he had done on Lucius Malfoy. Suddenly Sirius' eyes got big and he started gasping. Harry summoned Sirius' wand and let the curse off. "I told you, some of them aren't very nice. You're ok aren't you?" Harry asked not intending to hurt his godfather.

"I'm fine! That's not a pleasant feeling at all. I didn't know they taught things like that," Sirius said.

Hermione asked. "What happened? What kind of spell was it?"

"First my arms were bound to my sides and then it felt like my throat was being crushed. I couldn't breathe at all. Pretty scary really, even knowing my godson was casting it." Sirius said sounding a bit miffed.

"You said you wanted to see some things I learned down there. Trust me; they were using those and worse ones on me. Man it was fun," Harry laughed thinking back to his training.

Sirius just started laughing but Hermione said, "I think you're idea of fun is seriously disturbed. C'mon let's get back to elementals."

Harry went inside to get something to drink, which gave Hermione a chance to ask Sirius, "Sirius. When you do magic, can you feel it flowing out of your wand?"

"Of course. That's when you know you've got it right," he replied quickly.

"Harry says he can't feel anything like that. He says it's just always the same." Hermione stopped for a minute and said. "I get the feeling that he's a lot more magical than he thinks. Actually I think he's more magical than almost anyone I've ever known. I don't think he has a clue either."

Sirius thought for a minute and said, "I know he's more powerful that I am. I think Dumbledore knows too. That's why he let Harry move here; so he could have the freedom to explore magic. I can't believe the changes in him since the first time I met you two."

Harry coming back with more drinks interrupted them and they went back to talking about elemental magic until Hermione left that night. She came over a couple more times that week to work on the elemental magic. Sirius hadn't been able to make anything happen. Harry had been practicing and reading about it every day. At first he thought this was going to be a pain, but now he was really anxious to learn more.

Harry spent the weekend with Cho and they made plans to go to Paris the next weekend. That would be the last full weekend before term started. He had received his book list from Hogwarts and only one thing surprised him. In place if Divination, he was to get a book called "Curses Hexes and Pain Spells, level 7". He showed this to Sirius who replied that he heard a new teacher from Durmstrang would be at the school.

When Hermione came over she was beaming about being named Head Girl. A boy named Justin from Hufflepuff was the head boy. As long as it wasn't Draco Malfoy Harry was happy.

"How about I treat you to lunch to celebrate?" Harry said and Hermione quickly agreed. "Sirius, can you come with us? I want to make a little detour and I'd feel better if you came along," Harry said mysteriously.

"What's this little detour?" Sirius asked.

"I want to go to a book shop in Knockturn Alley. The place where Hermione got the elemental books," he said flatly.

Hermione kept looking between him and Sirius. "And why would you want to go there?" Sirius asked.

"I think it would be good to be aware of the other kinds of magic out there. I didn't even know elemental magic existed until Hermione brought these books. That really got me thinking. I don't want to get into any Dark Art stuff or anything, but I would like to have some clue about things. Besides we're supposed to get a book called 'Curses Hexes and Pain Spells' for normal school. You know, Hermione and I could have just sneaked down there, but I wouldn't want to make you mad."

Hermione spoke up, "I could go home quickly and get my cloak. If we keep our hoods up, no one will recognize us. When I went down there most people had them up."

"Fine but only the bookstore. We'll wait for you here Hermione," Sirius said still unsure about this trip. He and Harry went up to get their cloaks and Hermione was back in a few minutes. They all put their cloaks on and pulled up their hoods. Hermione noticed that Harry was at least as tall as Sirius and with their hoods up they made an intimidating pair.

The trio apparated to Knockturn Alley and quickly left the shop they had appeared in. Hermione led the way to the bookstore. There were many unpleasant looking people walking around in this area. When they went into the bookstore, Harry noticed it was much darker and dirtier than the one in Diagon Alley. Once in the store, they each split up and began looking on their own. Harry found a book titled 'Pathways to the Mind' that had chapters about reading minds and thoughts. He picked it up and continued looking. Eventually he found another book on personal security. It had disorienting spells and spells to make you unrecognizable. The one chapter that caught his eye while he was skimming was about a spell to become invisible. Harry took both of these books to the counter and quickly paid for them. He noticed both Sirius and Hermione had bought a book as well. They left and went back to Diagon Alley.

"I like this side so much better," Harry said. "So, what did you get Sirius?"

Sirius looked a little guilty and said, "How about I don't ask you and you don't ask me?"

"Yeah, I agree with Sirius," Hermione added.

This surprised Harry but he was glad not to tell which books he books he had bought. After eating, they stopped into the Twin's shop, which was quite busy. Hermione and Sirius looked around and Harry went to the back to see Cho.

"Harry! What are you doing here?" she said hugging him.

"Just buying some books. Remember, I'm still a schoolboy," he replied.

"Not much longer," she said happily.

"So, we're really going to Paris this weekend?" Harry asked.

"Yes, I can't wait. I'm going to get you a couple more outfits to take. I can't believe this will be the last full weekend before you leave me," she said pouting.

"I told you to come teach something or be a teacher's aid. Having a fling with the teacher would be pretty interesting," Harry said smiling.

Harry went to collect Sirius and Hermione and continue their real school shopping. While buying his real books, Harry bought four fake book covers that read, 'Standard Spells, Grade 7' and gave one to Sirius and Hermione so no one could tell easily what they were reading.

When they got back to the house, they each went to their own chair in the living room to read their new books. Harry picked the personal security one and turned to the section on making yourself unrecognizable. He read the technique over and over and made sure to read the counter spell at least that many times. He pulled out his wand, pointed it at himself and said the spell, "Can you see any difference?" he asked unable to tell for himself.

"In what?" Hermione replied.

"Never mind, it must not have worked," Harry said glumly. He got up and took his book to the kitchen and reread the technique. Realizing he had made a small mistake he tried again. Harry walked back to the living room and said, "Can one of you help me with this?"

He was greeted with a scream from Hermione and by Sirius jumping up with his wand. "Who the hell are you?"

Harry was shocked and threw up his hands. "It's me! Harry! It just tried out a spell and wanted to see if it worked. Who do I look like?"

They both looked at him strangely but Sirius wouldn't lower his wand. Hermione said, "You don't look like anybody I've ever seen."

Harry quickly did the counter spell, "Now, tell me what I looked like before."

Sirius and Hermione both looked at each other and said, "I don't remember."

"Wicked!" Harry exclaimed.

Sirius quickly asked, "What was that spell?"

"I thought you said you don't ask and I don't ask?" Harry joked.

"Ok, maybe we'll swap good ones," Sirius replied.

"Anything good in yours Hermione?" Harry asked.

She blushed a bit and said, "I doubt it." She quickly went back to reading.

Harry read in most of his spare time that week. Studying magic wasn't so bad as long as he got to study what he wanted for how long he wanted. It was just when he had to read hundreds of pages for a history of magic essay that he hated. He had been practicing an invisibility spell a lot of the time but so far had only managed to look more like a ghost. He had learned spells to make other people temporarily blind and deaf.

When Hermione was there, the three of them had worked on elemental magic most of the time. Hermione was really anxious to try out everything she had been reading, especially when Sirius had been able to make a flame move from one candle to the next. Harry had really made progress with fire but didn't demonstrate to Hermione or Sirius. Harry then started focusing on doing little things with wind and water.

Cho arrived at the castle not long after Hermione left on Friday. She had brought a couple new outfits for Harry to take. "Sirius," Cho exclaimed. "Kristi told me to invite you to the club with us on Saturday if you wanted to come?"

"Ah, let's check my date book," he joked. "Looks like I'm free. Also, how could I turn down an invitation from her?"

"Good. Meet at our hotel at 9:00pm tomorrow," Cho replied.

Harry and Cho apparated to the hotel they were staying at. It was a very nice older hotel on the edge of the wizarding community. Cho planned this weekend so the reservation was in her name. The girl at the check-in counter was being polite and quietly helping Cho until she heard another girl scream. "Oh my gosh. It's Harry Potter!"

Cho only caught the 'Harry Potter' part but quickly realized what they said. One of the girls came around and asked Harry for his autograph, which he reluctantly gave her. The girl behind the counter ended up upgrading them to a very nice suite.

The couple quickly unpacked their things. "Our last full weekend together for a while," Cho said sadly. "What do you want to do?"

"This is your weekend Cho. I'm all yours. Whatever makes you happy," Harry said hugging her.

"Kristi told me about a really nice restaurant that we could walk to. She said we wouldn't need reservations if they recognize you. It's so pretty here, let's walk around a while and then go eat," Cho said. The young couple walked along the streets and Harry realized that he liked Paris; it was a very romantic place. They got occasional pointing and people asking for his autograph, but it really wasn't too bad.

After a long walk, they got back to the street where Cho said the restaurant was and saw a crow of people with drinks in their hands waiting to be seated. Cho had Harry go up to see how long it would be. He approached the girl seating people. "Pardon me. Is there any way we could get a table? We're from London and don't have a reservation."

The girl quickly responded, "The wait will be at least 2 hours. You are welcome to..." and then she looked up and realized whom Harry was. "Oh! You're the Seeker! Harry Potter!" Harry saw other people starting to stare now. The girl quickly called someone over who had just stepped away for just a second then returned. "We can seat you immediately. Follow me."

Cho grabbed Harry's arm and followed the girl to a nice corner booth. It was a nice leisurely meal that lasted at least two hours. Most of the staff was watching them after they paid and were leaving. Kristi had told Cho about a nice piano bar on up the street so they walked there. Once again, it was crowded but they were able to get a nice table by themselves. Quite a few people had come over to meet Harry and wanted to buy him drinks. Cho really seemed to like the attention they were getting. The people here were pretty polite so it really didn't bother Harry that much. They sat watching people and talking until early morning before making their way back to the hotel.

The two slept in very late the next morning and after finally getting ready, Kristi took them on a tour of the city. She had a muggle BMW car and was actually very nice to be around the whole afternoon. With both Kristi and Harry walking around, the trio got noticed quite often, even a few times in muggle-Paris. After spending all afternoon walking around, Cho and Harry went back to the hotel to get ready for the evening. Actually Harry had time to take a nap while Cho got ready. She made him wear one of the new outfits she had bought for him.

When Cho finally came out of the bathroom after getting ready, all Harry could say was "Wow!" She had on a form fitting very short emerald green dress. She was also wearing the dragon that Harry had gotten for her.

"It never ceases to amaze me how fantastic you look," Harry told her.

"Just don't forget that when you're away from me for three months," she replied.

They went down to the bar until Sirius arrived. Sirius was dressed very nicely as well. They sat around talking until Kristi showed up. She was dressed in a very tight black leather dress with a silver choker necklace. She hugged each of them and then joined them for a drink. "I'm glad you could make it Sirius. It should be interesting for you to see how popular schoolboy here is. The people at the club really know their Quidditch."

"I think I have an idea how popular he is; it's Harry that has no clue," Sirius joked.

"He still can't believe we get seated in restaurants," Cho joined in the teasing.

"At least people aren't always staring at my scar anymore," said Harry.

"Ready to go? I've got our transportation outside," Kristi announced. Outside was a stretch black limousine.

"I would have never guessed black?" Harry joked.

When they arrived at the club, there was a very long line. A man opened the limousine door and Kristi got out first. Immediately Harry heard people yelling her name and clapping. Sirius came next and Cho followed him. As soon as Harry stepped out, the people became quiet for a second and then when they realized who it was, they really started yelling his name and clapping loudly. This was way more than Harry had expected. He thought the welcome Kristi got was great, but the crowd was even louder for him. Harry didn't know what to do but saw Kristi just ignoring everything so he decided to follow her lead. Cho pulled him and they walked right by the crowd waiting and into the club.

Inside it was a huge place with very loud music and spinning lights. Harry saw Kristi talking to a waitress who quickly led them upstairs into and area where they could look down on the crowd. It was a little quieter up here and Harry could see Cho just beaming and looking out at all the people.

Kristi came over and said, "I told you they'd like you here. Just think of the reaction if just the two of us had arrived as a couple." Harry looked nervously at Cho who hadn't heard and saw Kristi just smile and shake her head at him before sitting down. The manager of the club had come up, hugged Kristi and shook everyone else's hand. Everyone had gone down to dance a few times and had been introduced to many people. Harry was sure he wouldn't remember any of their names.

The group was back up talking and enjoying a drink when he heard. "Ah, France's two best players." Harry turned and saw Kristi hug a man who looked familiar. He was muscular with blonde hair and blue eyes. Kristi introduced the man as "Kevin Weisman", the seeker for Wales.

"We don't see you out much Harry. Don't you like being around your fans?" Kevin joked.

Harry really didn't care much for Kevin. He wasn't as bad as Draco Malfoy but had the same air about him. "Maybe next year. I've got another year of school so that kind of keeps me busy."

"Terrible luck in the finals. Kristi was carrying the team but you came up just a bit short against Krum I saw. Maybe a couple more years of growing will help." Kevin faked a smile as he said this.

Sirius quickly stood up and said, "But of course we didn't see you in the playoffs Weisman."

"Ah, Sirius Black. Is this your bodyguard Harry?" Kevin smirked.

Before Harry could answer Sirius said, "Harry's quite capable of handling himself. I'm his godfather."

"And my date for the evening," Kristi added linking her arm with Sirius'.

"Charming. Harry. You wouldn't mind me dancing with your lovely manager now would you?" he said while looking at Cho.

"Not at all, as long as Cho doesn't mind," Harry replied. He could tell Kevin was a very charming man but thought Cho could handle herself just fine.

Cho followed Kevin to the dance floor.

"He's pretty sleazy," Kristi stated and it was obvious she didn't consider the man a friend.

"Ya think!" Harry and Sirius both replied.

After a couple songs, Cho and Kevin came back up. Harry heard him say, "Think about what I said. Give me a call if you want," Harry saw him had a card to Cho.

She came over and said, "He wants to talk about me being his manager."

"Great Cho. See, I told you that you'll do great," Harry said and didn't notice the concerned look on Kristi's face.

"What's up Sirius? You look kind of bored," Kristi asked noticing Sirius.

"Not my normal kind of place really," he responded honestly.