The Arcs of Destiny

Chapter II:

Break Through

'Or am I standing still

Beneath a darkened sky

Or am I standing still

With the scenery flying by'

-Jewel, Standing Still

Hermione ran all the way back to the hotel. She intended to find out what happened back in the alley soon and fast. Instead of taking the elevator, she ran up the stairs as fast as she could, stopping on the fourth floor landing and gasping for breath. Sweat trickled down her forehead, but instead of brushing the beads away, she opened the landing door and ran down the hall to the suite. She threw open the door, surprised that it wasn't locked and ran in, nearly knocking over her father who was getting ready to also go for a run.

"Oh, sorry Dad!" Hermione apologized over her shoulder. "Didn't see you there!"

"Well, that was obvious," Xander Granger called back, grinning. Hermione ran into her bedroom and pulled open a drawer underneath the bed where she had stored all of her books for school. She took out four books at a time and brought them into the living room. Elizabeth was sitting on the couch drinking coffee and watching Hermione, amused.

"Any more books you need to carry and I'd say you were Superwoman," Elizabeth said, smiling.

Hermione paused on her way back to her room. She wondered if that was what she was after doing what she did to the man in the alley. Deciding to test out her strength, she walked back to her room and gathered eight large books into her arms. At the looks of the books, one would think they were very heavy but they weren't, at least for Hermione. She brought all eight books into the living room with no problems (except that she didn't know where she was going since the books were blocking her view of the floor) and tipped them onto the table in front of her astonished mother.

"After what happened this morning, I wouldn't rule that possibility out," Hermione confided, scratching her head. She sat down on a chair across form her mother and explained what happened in the alley.

"What do you think happened?" Elizabeth asked, concerned.

Hermione shrugged. "I don't know," she answered. "But I promise you that I will find out, even if it is the last thing I do."

"Don't say that," Elizabeth said, shivering. She got up and walked into the kitchen to refill her cup. "It gives me the creeps. Besides, it won't be the last thing you'll ever do."

Hermione sighed and then started sorting through the books she had brought out. "I'm hoping one of these books will give me some idea as to what-" she stopped herself from saying 'I am'. "-happened," she said finally.

Alexis came bounding in then and Elizabeth didn't have time to worry about her eldest daughter. Hermione looked down at a book she was holding and flipped open to the first page, immersing herself once again into a book she had already read many times before. 'Just in case I missed something,' she thought and ignored the pang of jealousy of Alexis in her heart.

*****

At 7 o'clock in the morning back in England, an alarm clock rang in Harry's bedroom. Harry groaned and turned over on a hard floor. Surprised, Harry bolted into a sitting position and looked around wildly, wondering if he had fallen off his bed again. Then, he caught sight of the sleeping form in his bed and memories of the night before came flooding back to him. He groaned again but this time not from waking up. He was stuck with Draco Malfoy until school started. How was he going to hide this from the Dursleys?

The alarm kept buzzing and Harry crawled to the bedside table to punch the sleep button. Draco rolled over towards the window, mumbling something unintelligible. Harry shook his head and crept to the door, opening it a crack. Vernon and Petunia's door was already open and so was Dudley's. Sounds of crackling bacon drifted up the stairs from the kitchen. Harry inhaled deeply, taking in the smell. He closed the door soundlessly and turned around. Draco was starting to sit up, yawning and stretching. He sniffed the air and licked his lips.

"Mmm," Draco said, getting out of bed. "Now that's what I call a breakfast!"

"What?" Harry asked, incredulously. "Are you out of your mind? You can't go down there! Only I can. The Dursleys will never let you stay here."

Draco shrugged nonchalantly and moved towards the door, but Harry blocked him. "Let's test out your theory then," Draco challenged.

Harry shook his head. "Why?" he asked.

"Why?!"

"Why should we? And keep your voice down!"

"Because I'm starving!" Draco answered. "I haven't eaten since yesterday morning. Now, I don't know about you, but after not eating in a long time, I'd jump at any chance of eating food. Are you with me or not?"

"Well, it would be nice if you slept in a different room," Harry commented, thoughtfully.

"There you go," Draco concluded happily, pushing past Harry to open the door. He stepped out into the hall before Harry stepped in front of him.

"What would I say?" Harry whispered, trying not to alarm the Dursleys who were all downstairs. "'Yes, this bloke right here is my arch-enemy. He's going to be staying until school starts. Oh, and pass the cheese!' C'mon! They'd throw you out before you'd say 'Hogwarts'. Not that'd be a bad idea."

"Then threaten 'em," Draco said, trying to push past Harry again, but failing. "Say that you'll turn them into toads, it always works."

"They already know that I'm not allowed to use magic during the holidays," Harry said, shaking his head.

"Well, I can't think of anything," Draco said, irritably. "I don't know what goes on in your personal life. I'd rather be eating right about now because, in case you haven't noticed, I'm starving!"

"Quiet!" Harry paused, thinking about Sirius. Then, he turned around and walked down the stairs and into the kitchen with Draco following, happily.

When Harry walked in, all the Dursleys ignored him. But when Draco walked in, the plates in Petunia's hands fell to the floor with a loud crash.

"Who is h-he?" Petunia asked, pointing a shaky finger at Draco who smiled innocently back at her.

"WHAT BUSINESS DO YOU HAVE IN BEING HERE?" Vernon yelled at Draco, getting up from the table so quickly that his chair fell over. Draco backed away nervously, his smile disappearing, and Vernon turned to Harry. "YOU! YOU ABNORMAL-"

"If I were you," Harry cut in calmly, the hint of a smile on his lips, "I would let him stay. You know who I can summon if you don't obey. I'm sure the neighborhood would love to see Dumbledore knocking on your door wearing purple robes with very long white hair. I mean, a hundred and seventy-year-old person would surely stick out."

Everybody was sticking to his words frightfully, even Draco, who looked just as surprised as Dudley that Harry was actually threatening Vernon. Those two probably thought that he would never be able to do it, even if he had before. Harry smiled inwardly, happy to prove that he did have a back-bone when it came to matters outside the Dark Lord.

"I could also write to my godfather," Harry continued, sitting down at the table for added effect. His next words were also directed at Draco as a warning. "You know he would do anything to keep me happy. However, Draco will stay in this house until school starts." As an after-thought, he added with a slightly twisted smile aimed at Draco, "He could also work for room and board if that will please you."

Draco looked outraged at this but bit back his comments towards Harry. Vernon considered this, a vein popping out on his forehead. After a moment's silence, Vernon left the kitchen to fetch a storeable chair for Draco and brought it back, putting it right next to Harry's chair. Then he said, "Deal."

Harry relaxed although he would have rather that Draco left and bothered someone else. Draco sidled around Vernon cautiously and slid into his chair and grabbed some bacon.

"Thanks," Draco whispered after a while. This statement startled Harry since he had never thought that his school enemy even knew the meaning of the word.

"You're welcome," he whispered back reluctantly and the two boys ate their meal in silence.

*****

It was 2 am when Ginny suddenly woke up. She had been sleeping peacefully on the beach when something suddenly disturbed her conscience. She looked around, trying to figure out what it was, then realized that she had been sleeping on a rock until early morning.

The moon hung above the trees and Ginny, seeing as it was probably her only chance to draw the night into her drawing, snatched up her pencil crayons and her drawing that had fallen off her lap while she was sleeping and began to draw the night scene. The frogs hummed and the moon slowly drifted across the sky, the trees casting long shadows on the ground.

When Ginny had finished, she leaned back to examine her work. Making sure that she had completely finished her drawing, she took out her wand and prodded the canvas with it, muttering, "Tempus sketio." When she was satisfied that the spell had worked and that the drawing would change to show what the lake looked like during a specific time, she gathered her pencil crayons into a box and put her drawing under the crook of her arm, heading for home.

The forest was dark and dense with only a little bit of light from the moon seeping through the trees. A sound like leaves crushing together came from Ginny's left and she froze, her ears pricked for anymore sounds. Hearing nothing, she kept walking, the dewy grass crunching under her feet.

She came upon a path that led to a bush. Seeing no harm, she pushed her way through the bush until she came upon a clearing, the light of the moon covering every inch of it and almost blinding her eyes. There was movement beside her and suddenly a boy stood in front of her. As soon as her eyes became accustomed to the moonlight, she gasped.

"Harry!" Ginny cried. "What are you doing here? You're supposed to be in England."

Harry grinned and took hold of her arm and steered her towards the river. "Drop those here," he said, grabbing the drawing and her pencil crayons out of her hands and dropping them in the clearing. "You can get them later."

"Wha-" Ginny tried to say but Harry cut her off with a finger to her mouth.

"Shhh," he whispered. "I wanna show you something down by the river that I think you're going to like."

"Uh, okay," she whispered back. Harry steered her to the right and it wasn't long until they came to the river. Its bank was muddy and slippery and its water was very deep. There was a tree growing out of the bank that leaned over the water's surface, its branches just skimming the river flowing by. The water was moving slowly from the lake and the moonlight glittered off its surface. "Well, what is it? I don't see anything special here."

She turned to Harry and was surprised by the cruel looking smile on his face. Then he leaned towards her and grabbed hold of her arms, throwing her into the river.

Ginny splashed head first into the water and she held her breath like her father taught her to. Her body sank quickly to the ground and she kicked upwards, breaking the surface and gasping for air.

"Harry, what was that all about?" Ginny asked, startled at his violent action.

Harry was sitting on the tree growing out of the bank, smirking. He suddenly leaned down and grabbed hold of Ginny's head and pushed her under the surface. Ginny held her breath again and flailed her arms, trying to grab hold of Harry's hands, but everything happened so quickly that she found herself sinking down to the bottom.

****

The house was dark and eerily quiet when Ron woke up suddenly in the middle of the morning. He felt like someone was pulling him awake and he sat up quickly, swinging his legs off the bed. He got up and opened the door to look across the hall at his sister's bedroom. The door was still open. He crept into Ginny's room and saw that the bed was still made.

"Gin?" he called uneasily. No answer. The tugging was pulsating now. It was like Ginny was calling out to him, needing to be found. He went back into his room and grabbed a sweater and his wand. Then he ran out the door silently and followed the tugging sensations.

Finally, he had reached the clearing that Ginny had previously been in. Several times on the way, he had went in the wrong direction and had to double back when the tugging became persistent on another direction. He walked to the edge of the clearing and discovered Ginny's drawing and pencil crayons laying discarded on the ground. The drawing was beautiful. It showed a lake with the sun starting to rise. Ron looked up and found that the first few rays of the sun were starting to peak out above the tree tops.

The tugging became insistent now and Ron gathered everything into his arms. He stumbled onto a path that wound through the dense trees, occasionally tripping over rocks and fallen trees with moss growing over them. Finally, he came upon the river. There were footprints in the muddy bank and the tugging suddenly stopped. It dawned on him that Ginny could be drowning in the river. He dropped Ginny's stuff in the grass by the bank and dove into the water, keeping his eyes open.

The water was murky and spotted with mud. Little yellow fish darted away from Ron as he swam down. He spotted a crouched and shadowed figure on the sand and he picked it up, bringing it to the surface. He lay Ginny's drenched body in the grass and immediately checked her breathing. There was nothing so he started to perform CPR on her, calling up the lessons their father had taught the whole family when he found the Muggle instructions on one of his raids in the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Department. He checked Ginny's breathing every minute.

"C'mon Gin, breathe for me," Ron said, deeply panicked. "You gotta breathe for me."

Suddenly, Ginny's eyes popped open and she started to cough out water, her breathing coming in ragged gasps. Ron, paralyzed with relief and happiness, hugged her so tightly that she had to punch him on the arm. He let go of her and saw that she was crying.

"Thank you," she whispered. "If it weren't for you, I might be dead right now."

"Hey, at least you have something to be proud of," Ron whispered back. "You nearly died and came back to life thanks to me. Now if you could die another three times, you could beat that Buffy girl that Hermione and Harry talk about, if that makes you happy."

Ginny giggled, then sobered. "I saw Harry here," she said.

"But that can't be possible," Ron told her. "Harry's back in England."

"I know, but I saw him," Ginny protested. "He looked exactly like Harry and he had the same voice. But he was so cruel. He pushed me into the river and when I came back up for air, he pushed me back down."

"We'll phone Harry when we get back home," Ron told her. "He should be awake by now and I'm not about to believe that the person you saw was Harry. Harry is too unlike that so it must've been someone who looked just like him."

Ginny nodded and got up, somewhat unsteady. Ron steadied her and they walked back to town silently, Ginny proudly holding her drawing.

When they got back to Mellowside, Ginny and Ron made their way to the park where two gazebos stood. The town was already waking up and several witches and wizards were out for a run through the park. The pair walked up into a gazebo and kept walking towards the railing. It was much like the ticket barrier at King's Cross Station back in England. The gazebo railings separated the Muggle and wizarding towns that lay on top of each other cosmically. By going through the railing, a wizard would find himself in the Summerside gazebo. Ginny and Ron went through the railing and into the Muggle gazebo where many more Muggles were getting ready for the workday than wizards. They stepped out of the gazebo and went to the phone booth that Arthur Weasley had pointed out when they first arrived in Summerside.

"Do you have any Muggle change?" Ginny whispered to Ron. Ron shook his head and looked around. A young woman was about to pass by and Ron took his chance and stopped her.

"Excuse me, do you have any change that I could use?" Ron asked.

"Sure, how much do you need?" the woman asked, a bit suspiciously, and dug through her purse.

Ron looked back at the telephone which had the costs posted on it.

"It would be long distance," Ginny whispered. "So 25 cents."

"25 cents," Ron relayed back to the woman. She nodded and produced a coin from her purse.

"Here you go," the woman said, smiling. "Hope that's enough."

"Yeah, thanks," Ron said, taking the coin. The woman walked away.

"Some nice people around here," Ginny commented when Ron put the coin in the slot like the directions said.

"I hear a 'much unlike Harry' coming on," Ron said as he dialed the Dursleys' number. "I'm telling you, Gin, it wasn't Harry."

"I know what I saw and the person looked exactly like Harry," Ginny retorted. "If you don't believe me, try almost dying. If Harry does say that he wasn't here and has a logical reason for not being here, then maybe I'll believe him."

"Alright," Ron said nonchalantly. The phone kept ringing making Ron more nervous than he already was. "Harry, pick up this one," he whispered into the telephone, willing for Harry to go to the phone before one of the Dursleys picked it up.

"Hullo?" Harry said on the other end of the line.

"Harry?" Ron asked, ecstatic.

"That's me," Harry said, confused. "Ron, what are you doing calling me on a Muggle telephone?"

"Er, faster," Ron answered. "Anyways, Harry, have you been anywhere in Canada this morning?"

"No," Harry told him. "I've been here with a perfectly good reason. Malfoy's here."

"Oh, okay," Ron said, not really catching what Harry had just said. When it fully dawned on him, he yelled, "WHAT?" Ginny jumped beside him and gave him a curious stare.

"I know," Harry said. "He came in the middle of the night and I just let him stay out of good charity. The Dursleys have also agreed to let him stay as well."

"Why would you, of all people, let Malfoy stay in your house?" Ron asked.

"I don't really know why," Harry replied, defensively. "It just sorta happened."

"For how long will he be there?" Ron asked, thinking Harry was crazy.

"Until the summer ends," Harry answered. "Look, Ron, I have to go. The Durlseys will kill me if they find me on the phone. Bye."

"Bye," Ron said weakly. He looked at Ginny who looked almost outraged.

"Did I hear what you just said correctly?" Ginny asked.

"Yeah, guess who is staying with Harry until the summer ends?" Ron asked her.

"Malfoy is staying with Harry?!" Ginny nearly shouted.

"That's what I said!" Ron said, a shadow of a grin on his face. It soon disappeared with his next words. "It's crazy, isn't it? Harry is too brave and noble for his own good. I would've thrown Malfoy back out onto the street, that bastard belongs there and-"

"Well?" Ginny interrupted.

"It wasn't Harry, Gin," Ron told her. "Malfoy is his alibi, so it must've been someone else that you saw. We should owl Hermione and ask her."

"Call her, like you did with Harry," Ginny suggested.

"I don't have her phone number," Ron said, exiting the phone booth. "Plus, I don't have any change."

"Yes, you do have her phone number. I saw it!"

"I did, but I lost it," Ron told her impatiently. "C'mon!"

The pair made their way back to the gazebo where they went through the railing with Ron muttering, "I still can't believe that bastard is with Harry."

*****

It was 3 pm in Australia when the Grangers returned from another tour. Hermione hadn't found out what happened in the alley yet and it was tugging on her conscience insistently. She had read through all the books she had brought out from her bedroom before Xander suggested that they go eat lunch and go on a tour.

"Anyone want ice cream?" Xander asked as Hermione sat on the couch and gathered up her books.

She shook her head. "I gotta do my homework," she said. Really, she was going to look through her books once more but her father didn't know what happened in the alley that morning.

"I do! I do!" Alexis shouted and Xander picked her up.

"Alrighty then," Xander said, smiling at Alexis. "Liz?"

"No, I'm fine," Elizabeth answered. Xander and Alexis walked down the hall and Hermione heard the door close behind them. Elizabeth walked into the living room from the kitchen. "Homework?"

"Well, Dad doesn't know yet," Hermione replied. She leaned back in frustration. "I've looked in these books a hundred times and I've found nothing that will help me."

"Maybe the answers aren't in these books," Elizabeth told her, sitting down on a chair.

"I'm not exactly going to go down to Hogwarts just for a bunch of books," Hermione said. "Besides, I've probably read them all in the library anyway."

"We don't have to go to Hogwarts," Elizabeth said calmly, despite her daughter's current mood. "Surely, there must be a website you could look at to find any information. I mean, what happened this morning seems like it belongs outside the reach of the Wizarding World."

"That's true!" Hermione said happily. "Mom, you're a genius!"

"I don't know about genius," Elizabeth said, a smile forming on her lips. "Albert Einstein, maybe."

Hermione laughed and ran over to her father's laptop. Turning it on, she waited anxiously for the laptop to load before going onto the Internet and onto a search engine. She typed in Dark magic and a list of websites popped up. She searched each website on the list but came up with nothing. Xander and Alexis came home while Hermione was searching and it wasn't until late that Hermione finally got off the computer. The family had already had dinner and were about to watch television when Hermione dejectedly plumped down on the couch. Alexis, who was sitting on the floor, yawned and sat on the couch next to Hermione, laying her head on Hermione's arm. Hermione smiled and put her arm around her sister.

"Nothing?" Elizabeth asked, sitting on the rocking chair with a cup of coffee.

"Nada," Hermione complained. Then, she told her father and sister what had happened.

"Blue clouds?" Alexis asked, her eyes wide in interest.

"Blue and white clouds," Hermione told her. "And then they got dark and went into me." She sighed.

"Maybe we should watch some comfort TV shows," Elizabeth suggested. "Buffy? Charmed? Gilmore Girls?"

A light bulb went on in Hermione's head and she exclaimed, "Buffy!"

"Buffy it is," Xander said, standing up but Hermione stopped him and explained.

"No," she said, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer! Her powers are identical to mine. Which means I could have slayer powers!"

"But how could you get a slayer's powers?" Xander asked.

Hermione thought about that before finally answering. "The demon man, or whoever he was, probably did a spell that brought out the powers, out of the girl who was probably a slayer herself. He had to kill the girl to get the powers but I was closest to them so they went into to me instead. It all makes sense."

"I don't want to know what kind of spell he did," Elizabeth commented.

"He didn't actually kill the girl, did he?" Alexis asked, her eyes fearful.

"Uh...no," Hermione said, trying to think of a way to say that the girl did die but not hurt Alexis' feelings. "He did another spell on the girl which put her safely in a far away dimension, probably called Turgon."

Alexis smiled and Xander announced that it was time for Alexis to go to bed. After she had been tucked in, the rest of the family sat in the living room to watch a rerun of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.