At What Price? Alternate Scenes

Kisses of Fate

 

It was the first day back in Divinations, and Ron remembered more than ever why he disliked this class so much. Miss Trelawney’s airy voice carried across the dark, stuffy room and grated on his ears, "We will begin the year studying the ancient and mystical Tarot. The Tarot helps us to examine the twisted skeins of fate in small matters. Sometimes answering questions we weren’t even aware we were asking." Ron sniggered to as Harry made physical joke about the look on Draco Malfoy’s face when Fred slipped him a Canary Cream on the Hogwart’s Express.

"Mr. Weasley, how brave of you to ask that we examine your own future. The skeins of your fate are inexorably bound up with those of your friend Mr. Potter, perhaps we can find out why." Nearer the fire Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown both squealed with delight as Ron groaned, rising from his chair. Harry’s look was all innocence as Ron shot him a warning glance.

Ron sat down across from Ms. Trelawney; her eyes were magnified several times by her thick glasses. She blinked and Ron could only think of owl watching. With a word she summoned her Tarot deck from wherever she had hidden it, she then set it in front of him. "Cut the deck Mr. Weasley, your own mystical powers will align the cards to the question you wish to have answered." Ron followed her directions without enthusiasm, wondering how he had gotten himself in this mess in the first place.

Just to annoy Ms. Trelawney he cut the deck into five separate piles and them stacked at the points of the pentagram. Her eyes widened, if that was possible, as he laid out the stacks. "Mr. Weasley, you are indeed deeply troubled by a question of great importance, let us begin this most important reading." Her voice was self important and comically mysterious. She re-stacked the piles and began to lay out the "Wizard’s Cross." A cross five cards high and five cards wide, intersecting in the middle with a double card.

Her hands trembled, Ron assumed with anticipation, as she flipped the top card "The Fool," at this there were several snide remarks about the room. Ms Trelawney continued, "a decision of great importance is in your future." She lifted the beautiful ceramic plaque and flipped the card underneath it, "the controlling aspect is the Hanged Man, the fact that the card is upside down indicates that it is a question of betrayal." Several ooh’s and aah’s issued from around the room.

"Coming down we explore your likely path of decision. The seven of swords here indicates uncertainty, and the Empress indicates action. Given this combination you will be unsure of what to do until the moment of truth and then you will act without thinking."

"And that would be different from normal, how?" Seamus Finnigan quipped from an armchair near Harry; Dean Thomas also chuckled at the joke, ignoring the daggers being stared at him by Ron. Harry smiled to himself behind his hand; it was kind of like Ron.

"The left branch," Professor Trelawney stressed, trying to talk over the quiet laughter in the corners, "will show us the root of the problem." She snapped up the inner most tile turning it face up, "the eight of cups inverted, denial" she intoned. "Something you refuse to admit even to yourself." She reached for the outer card and turned it face up. Ron read on it "The Lovers" under a picture of a man and woman embraced in a deep kiss.

‘Not so bad’ he thought to himself.

"Well normally young people like to see the lovers, but in this case their inverted status means this will be a decision born of jealousy, beware Mr. Weasley that you do not covet for the wrong reasons." Her stern voice snapped Ron from his complacent reverie.

"The right branch will tell us the timing of the question, when will it be asked, and answered." Tentatively she reached for the inside card; she raised it towards herself and then laid it down gently. "The Knight of Swords, your decision is imminent Mr. Weasley, though the repercussions will not be known for some few days, perhaps a fortnight as indicated by the seven of pentacles." Professor Trelawney drew a deep breath and paused, Ron was sure for dramatic effect.

"Lastly, the upper branch indicates the subject of the question. The inner card shows us the Queen of Pentacles, when we are talking about subjects, this would indicate she is born under the third quarter of the zodiac, most likely a Virgo." She reached slowly for the final card. Ron was amazed to discover that he actually was very curious to find out what the last card was. He hoped for maybe even an insight into the crazy web that the owl-eyed woman had woven.

"The final knot in this tangled skein of yours Mr. Weasley," she lifted the plaque ever so slightly towards herself, a look of smug knowing crossed her face "reveals herself as the Queen of Wands." Parvati nearly choked at the reading, and Lavender Brown snorted most derisively at the idea of Ron and any woman given what she had heard about the Yule Ball the year before.

"Your decision will be regarding love and a woman, one whom you are jealous of. You will act rashly, and betray someone’s trust." Ron noticed out of the corner of his eye Lavender and Parvati were whispering animatedly between themselves. She spoke now to the entire class. "Your homework for next class is to do a reading of someone else and share the results in class." With that dismissal, the sound of scraping chairs and hastily gathered books were heard throughout the small, stuffy room.

Ron remained seated for some few moments as class cleared out. He looked intently at the Queen of Wands on Trelawney’s deck. She had light brown hair and brown eyes, yet all the other decks he had seen pictured the Queens as dark haired women. "You coming?" Harry asked from the portal leading down.

"Be along shortly, I’ll catch up with you at lunch," Ron answered distractedly over his shoulder still staring at the spider web of Tarot cards laid out before him.

After some few minutes Ms. Trelawney turned to Ron, "the Queen of Wands awaits you." Her voice was mysterious and knowing.

"Rubbish and poppycock," Ron muttered to himself as he rose from his seat. He stalked to the portal and shimmied down the ladder. Turning, he saw her. The sun streaming through a window set her hair alight as though it was a glowing aura. One elbow was leaning against the wall propping up her head, her opposite hip thrust out causing her black robe to lay against the curves of her body very nicely. She didn’t look quite as good now as she had last year at the Yule Ball, but she still took his breath away. The Yule Ball, she had been with Viktor Krum then, Ron felt the jealousy surge through him.

"But Viktor’s not here now," said some voice deep inside his head. Ron stood ogling her form for some few seconds before she stood, turned, and faced him. She beamed a pleasant smile at him and Ron felt his knees go weak. What to do? What to say? How to say it? The questions came like speeding bludgers, none of which he had any answers for. She walked towards him, he noticed, not for the first time, that he liked the way her walk made her robe swish back and forth.

A look of consternation crossed Hermione’s face as she approached him, "You OK Ron?" Her voice was sympathetic as she continued. "Harry told me that Trelawney decided to make you the day’s guinea pig for Tarot reading. I tried to get him to tell me about it but he said he slept through most of it. It doesn’t matter, it’s all rubbish anyway."

"Uh huh" Ron nodded dumbly in agreement.

"You sure you’re OK, you look like someone hit you with a stupefy spell." Her voice was music in his ears, her eyes like stars in the night as he stared into them.

"I, er, um, well, yeah, I, uh," Ron found his tongue had suddenly become detached from his brain. He tried desperately to put together a coherent sentence but he couldn’t even put together a full thought. It was then that he acted, he moved quickly and without thought. Something, somewhere deep in his brain raised his right arm and caused his hand to extend, palm up. The heel of his hand came to rest on the soft skin of her face, just under her jaw. Her left ear lobe lay between the knuckles at the base of his ring and middle fingers. His fingers entwined themselves in her hair, which reminded him of the saw grass that had grown in the fields behind The Burrow, dry and light, but not unpleasant.

Ever so slightly he pulled her head to his right, that something inside him urging him to lean forward and lean his head to the left. This all happened in the space of an eye-blink and neither could possibly be prepared for it. Ron pressed his lips to Hermione’s; the electric shock of their touch reawakened his brain. "What the Hell am I doing!" He thought to himself, but that something inside him refused to let her go. He noticed her eyes were wide open in shock, or was it terror, he couldn’t be quite sure.

It was the sound of breaking glass that snapped him back to his conscious self. Hermione had dropped her books, as had he, and one of the ink bottles broke open spilling its liquid contents on the stone floor.

Ron backed away quickly, aghast at what he had done. He could feel the hot blood rush to his face and across his scalp turning his skin redder than his hair in embarrassment

"Her, I, uh, well, uh," he wanted to apologize, to explain, to confess his unspoken love, to be far away from here. This last desire his body understood, and was able to do. Unable to speak Ron bolted down the hall, leaving his books in a pile outside Professor Trelawney’s Room. Ron dashed the tears of embarrassment from his eyes as he ran blindly through the halls like a comet with no known destination.

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Hermione stood transfixed in the hallway. She was shocked beyond thought or movement. After a couple of moments Ms. Trelawney descended the ladder. "The Queen," she mumbled to herself, "more likely the shrew, playing those boys off one another like that. I’ve half a mind to leave you standing there like that until you come to your own senses. Ah well, avarice will cloud the inner eye, and this was for a purpose beyond my understanding." She snapped her fingers in front of Hermione’s face, causing her to blink several times.

"I, uh, where’s Ron?" She looked around as though roused from a deep sleep and saw Professor Trelawney standing there. She looked down and saw her books in a pile on the floor and another pile in front of her, a broken bottle of ink on the floor next to them. She looked back up at Professor Trelawney who was now looking insufferably smug and self-righteous.

"The spirits were right about you. The Queen, indeed." Her voice was arrogant and cruel. "Perhaps you should come up and let me see just how tangled the fates of you and Mr. Weasley are?" There was nothing pleasant or inviting in her voice. "Just as the spirits said, he was undecided, but bold. Now you have played out your little game and the jealousies and betrayal will begin. You should be proud of yourself Miss Granger, the spirits know you well."

As the owl-eyed woman spoke Hermione fished out her wand, "Accio" she growled pointing at the books on the ground, which snapped up off the ground and into her hands. "Scorius" she snapped out as she pointed the wand at the ink spill, which simply evaporated.

"The spirits indeed. Any sideshow charlatan can read Tarot cards. Good day Professor." Hermione turned on her heel and stalked away. As soon as she exited the hallway leading to the North Tower Hermione felt a kind of peace and lassitude fall over her.

"At least one of them noticed," she thought to herself as she strode to the great hall, "but now what do I do?" Given Ron’s behavior from the year before she wasn’t surprised by his feelings. She was more than a little shocked by his action though. "His lips were strong and firm, he was decisive" she thought to herself dreamily as she ran into a suit of armor. "Oh come on girl, it wasn’t even that good of a kiss," she said out loud to nobody. Then she started chuckling to herself as she thought of Evie thinking about Rick O’Connell in "The Mummy." She wound her way down to the great hall.

"Where’s Ron?" She and Harry asked each other at the same time.

"Thought he was with you," Harry replied matter-of-factly. His look was at once concerned and amused, "you look like somebody hit you with pole-axe."

"Ran into Ro- one," she replied distractedly. She settled down and began to eat, not paying attention to anything on her plate. "Harry, what happened in Divinations today? I think it might be kind of important. Professor Trelawney was very nasty to me up there. She called me ‘the Queen’ and was talking about betrayal and jealousy, saying the spirits were right about me."

Harry choked on the bite of potatoes he had just put in his mouth. Taking a drink of pumpkin juice he swallowed hard and looked at her. "She called you what?"

"The Queen. Does it mean something to you Harry?" Hermione seemed to be genuinely curious. Harry relayed as much of Ron’s Tarot reading as he could remember.

As he finished, Hermione stared at him in open-mouthed shock. "Harry, what am I going to do? Ron likes me."

"And…?" Harry left the question hanging.

"Well, I don’t know." She blushed slightly and they discussed it for as long as they could get away with and not be late for class.

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Ron sat pensively in the overstuffed chair, watching the entry portal. His muscles were taught he was ready to bolt up the stairs at the first sign of anybody coming through the door. He jumped at the slightest creak in the floor. He wasn’t sure if he imagined the shock in touching her lips, or if it was real. Either way it was electric enough. He smiled to himself; given the chance he was going to have to do that again.

Maybe next time she’ll be a little more receptive.

"I caught her off guard." Ron replied defensively.

Whatever you say, maybe they all act like that.

"She didn’t slap me for it," Ron said out loud.

"Slap you for what?" Lavender’s voice shocked Ron right out of his skin. He hadn’t heard her come in. Ron jumped out of the chair and ran up the stairs to his dorm room.

"Stupid git," he berated himself once he was inside the safety of the room. "What were you thinking Weasley? How are you going to face her now? What’s Harry going to think of you? ‘A question of betrayal’ the thought came unbidden into his mind. "Bloody Hell."

Ron flung himself down on his bed and closed the curtains. He lay there for a long time alternately thinking about the way the sunlight had illuminated Hermione’s hair and how he had probably screwed up the two best friendships of his lifetime.

"Ron?" It was Harry’s voice. Ron suddenly realized he had no idea how long he’d been lying there tormenting himself, but he was pretty sure that he didn’t want to face Harry right now. He lay there silently hoping Harry would just leave. He hoped this would all look better tomorrow, under the light of a new day. "Ron, Hermione wants to talk to you, she’s kind of upset. Not that she’s mad, she’s just, you know, well she wants to talk to you." Ron heard the dorm room door close as Harry left.

"I was right, I’ve screwed up everything now." Ron felt miserable ‘be careful that you do not covet for the wrong reasons.’ Ron replied to the darkness, "or the wrong things." Ron rolled over and buried his face in his pillow. He wanted to die.

"Ron, Ron get up. C’mon you’re gonna be late for Charms." The combination of Harry’s voice and his shaking Ron awake broke through the mental fog Ron was in.

"What? What? Where am I? What time is it?" Ron’s eyes fluttered open and he saw Harry standing over him.

"Oh God," he tried to turn back over and escape Harry’s penetrating gaze. "Just curse me now and get it over with."

"Out of bed you git, you’re gonna be late for charms if you don’t get a move on." Harry grabbed a robe out of Ron’s trunk and threw it at him. "You miss another class and McGonagall is gonna come down on you like an angry hippogriff."

Suddenly Ron was wide-awake. "I missed Transfiguration yesterday, didn’t I?"

"It’s OK, we covered for you, said you had gotten suddenly ill after Divinations. Told her you were probably from breathing all that incense. McGonagall bought it, but I can’t guarantee it’ll happen twice." Ron pulled on the fresh robe, ran his fingers through his hair and scooped up his books without even thinking about it. He also didn’t notice the new bottle of ink on top of the books. Ron looked at Harry with a look of horror on his face that dissolved into self-revulsion.

"Harry, I- I’m sorry. I betrayed you." Ron bolted from the room and ran to charms. He slipped in just before class was due to start and took the most isolated seat he could find. He made sure it was by itself so that Harry wouldn’t feel obligated to sit next to him. The seat also had the advantage of being behind Hermione so that he wouldn’t have to see her staring daggers at him all class long. He was quit sure she would if she could see him.

Ron saw Harry come in and ducked down as far as he could into his books hoping Harry wouldn’t see him. Fortunately Hermione had saved Harry a seat and the two of them talked animatedly all through the activity part of class. Ron noticed that Hermione kept looking over his way, but every time he looked back she turned away. He was pretty sure she was saying some fairly awful things about him.

After class was over Ron scooted out with a large group of other students and managed to bypass Harry and Hermione. He headed for the transfiguration room so that he could find out what he had missed the day before. He actually hoped for a detention so that he wouldn’t have to endure Hermione’s anger that evening.

"Mr. Weasley, feeling better today?" Ms. McGonagall’s eyes penetrated him and he was sure she could see the lie imprinted on his forehead.

"Yes ma’am. I, uh, need to find out what I missed yesterday." His voice was shaky and quiet.

"Miss Granger has your homework, I had assumed she would have delivered it to you yesterday."

"Well, uh, that’s kind of the hitch, can I just get it from you?" McGonagall lowered her square spectacles on her nose and looked at him over the rims. Ron felt his palms start to sweat, he was sure she was going to ask him to explain.

"Very well, give me a 500 word essay on the difficulties of transfiguring complex machines and turn it in at the beginning the next class period." Secretly Ron exulted; it would give him a perfect excuse to lock himself away somewhere. His stomach rumbled and he realized he hadn’t eaten in over 24 hours. He turned and left the classroom with a heartfelt "thank you" and headed to the great hall.

When he walked in he saw that Harry and Hermione were sitting much closer to the doors than usual, ‘probably waiting to ambush me’ he thought to himself. Harry noticed him first and said something to Hermione, she looked up. Ron was fairly sure she wasn’t glad to see him, and the fact that she didn’t smile confirmed it for him. His stomach flipped over and suddenly he wasn’t hungry anymore. He turned and ran from the Great Hall.

The bell rang announcing the end of lunch and Ron headed down the hill to Hagrid’s Hut for Care of Magical Creatures. He really hoped Hagrid had something that Hermione would find interesting, or at least keep her occupied. Ron dreaded what was coming. He knew that Hagrid was going to assign him to work with Hermione and Harry, they always worked together. He got lucky though, Hagrid was having them work with Gnomes today, and Ron knew about dealing with gnomes. "This won’t be so bad" Ron thought to himself, he would just make sure that he de-gnomed an area far away from Harry and Hermione. "So far, so good," Ron lied to himself as he managed to duck out ahead of the others again. If Ron was honest with himself, he was pretty miserable from the isolation of his friends.

He headed straight for the library and got to work on his essay for McGonagall, figuring he would just sneak down to the kitchen later and filch some food. He quickly scribbled his way to over 700 words for his essay. Ron thought painfully to himself, "if Hermione ever consents to speak me again I may just have to thank her for…." As though the thought of her name could somehow summon her, Crookshanks hopped up on the table where Ron was working and started to meow, rather loudly.

Ron hissed, "Shut up Crookshanks, she’s gonna find me if you keep that up." Crookshanks looked at him as though he understood, and then began to meow even louder. Ron scooped up his parchment and quills and ran out of the library. His stomach growled like a vicious dog, so he headed for the kitchens.

Ron approached the picture that hid the access to the kitchens without seeing anybody. He reached up and tickled the pear and the painting swung open. "Figured you’d get down here sooner or later." Ron jumped at the sound of Harry’s voice. Looking around he saw Harry’s disembodied head floating next to the wall, his hand reaching out of seeming nothingness. Ron burst down the stairs to the kitchen, Harry hot on his heels.

"It’s good to see you Mr. Ron Weasley," Dobby’s voice was unmistakable, "but where is Mr. Harry Potter sir? Everybody knows that where one goes, so does the other."

"I’m right here Dobby, can you grab Ron something to eat, he hasn’t had anything in two days that I know of." Several elves brought over a tray stacked with sandwiches and pickles while another brought over a pitcher of pumpkin juice and glasses.

"Ron, you might as well sit down and talk to me, because you can’t go anywhere until you do." Ron slumped down onto a bench pumpkin juice in one hand, sandwich in the other. Harry had strategically placed himself between Ron and the door.

"I’m sorry Harry. I betrayed your trust." Ron spoke mostly into his chest but Harry managed to catch most of what he said.

"Betrayed my trust?" Harry’s voice was incredulous. "Says who?" Harry lifted his own glass of pumpkin juice to his lips.

"Professor Trelawney," as soon as he said it, he realized just how stupid it sounded. Harry laughed, pumpkin juice shooting out his nose. Ron turned a bright shade of red. Harry grabbed a napkin and tried to blow the pumpkin juice out of his nose.

"You colossal git, is this about that stupid Tarot reading? "When have we ever taken anything she says seriously?" Harry looked at Ron as though he had lost his mind.

"But it all fit," Ron stammered. He plowed ahead then, "I made a decision, it was rash and unthinking. It happened right away. I’ve known since last year that I liked Hermione, even if I wouldn’t admit it. I came to that decision because I was jealous of Viktor, and the kiss she gave you at the train station. I figured, since she had kissed you the two of you would be an item. And then I kissed her and she was shocked, so I figured surely I had overstepped my bounds and was, well, kissing your girlfriend." Ron was pleased to see that Harry didn’t laugh at him, it helped.

"We need to get you out of that class, I think the incense is starting to mess with your mind." Harry took another gulp of pumpkin juice, "Ron, Hermione and I are not an item, nor are there any plans for us to be an item. If you want to pursue that with her, by all means do. However, that’s going to be a little hard to do if you keep going out of your way to avoid her. Besides, what do you think she was doing up in that hall anyway?"

"Coming to see you."

"No, otherwise she would have left with me. I’m not going to tell you what she has told me, you have to ask her yourself." Ron opened his mouth to say something. "I told you, you’re going to have to ask her yourself," Harry interrupted him. She and Crookshanks were out looking for you this evening, you might want to see if you can find her, she’s been looking for you for a day and a half now."

"Really?" Ron was so shocked he dropped the half sandwich he was holding.

"Yes Ron. She wants to talk to you. If you don’t go find her and talk to her I’ll tell her you did it on a dare, and that you don’t like her. I’ll tell her and everybody else that you like," Harry paused and thought for a second, "Pansy Parkinson."

"You wouldn’t!" Ron shouted. Harry just looked at him. "OK, I’ll go find her. You wouldn’t really tell people that I like Pansy Parkinson would you?" Ron sounded a little disgusted by the whole idea.

"Wanna find out?" Harry looked at him and raised his eyebrows. Ron didn’t want to find out.

"OK, I’m going. Oh, and thanks Harry." Ron shoved the sandwich in his mouth and grabbed another. "Thanks Dobby" Ron mouthed around a mouthful of sandwich. Ron hurried up the stairs and then came back down again to retrieve his forgotten books and another sandwich. "See ya'," he called back over his shoulder as he headed up the stairs, whistling tunelessly to himself.

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Ron wandered into the library. Madam Prince gave him a look that could have chilled polar bears. He smiled at her and stopped whistling. To himself he muttered, "Hi Hermione, I’m really sorry about yesterday. I like you, a lot, but I understand if you don’t want me doing anything like that again. If you want, I’ll start hanging out with Fred and George if it will be uncomfortable having me around. I just want you to be happy." Ron ran these lines over and over again in his mind as he looked around the library for Hermione.

Then she was there, in a back corner behind two bookshelves. He couldn’t see her, she was buried behind a pile of books, but Crookshanks was sleeping on the table. Crookshanks lifted his head and stared at Ron. Ron put his finger to his lips hoping Crookshanks would be quiet while he approached. Amazingly, the orange fur ball laid his head back down on the table and began to swish his bottlebrush tail back and forth.

Ron stepped very lightly, hoping to sit down, say his peace, and if necessary, leave. A creaky floorboard betrayed him. Hermione’s head snapped up and she saw him approach. She didn’t look pleased as she stood up; Ron’s heart sank.

"Hermione, I, uh, er, I’m a, er" for the second time in as many days something had severed the connection between his tongue and his brain. Suddenly all he could think of was running. If he ran away, she couldn’t send him away. Fred and George were fun to hang around with; he’d get by. This time it was Hermione that acted though. Her hand shot out and grabbed the front of his robes.

"Not this time you don’t." Hermione raised up on her toes, this was necessary because Ron had grown several inches over the summer, and kissed him soundly. His head spun, this was much better than the first time. Her lips were soft and sweet. He noticed a slight fragrance about her hair that reminded of sunshine in grassy fields. Then it was gone. It was brief, too brief in Ron’s opinion. She lowered herself back down.

She looked at him sternly, and her voice became serious, almost threatening. "Ronald Weasley, how dare you give me that pathetic excuse for a kiss and then abandon me to Professor Trelawney? If you ever pull another trick like that again and I’ll make you kiss Crookshanks." The cat hissed loudly at the mere suggestion. "Now, come over here and give me a proper kiss. Then you can explain what that was all about while you write your essay for McGonagall." Ron was only too happy to oblige her.