Harry Potter and the War of Souls

Chapter 16

In Harry's honor

About a week after the Quidditch match, Harry was on his way to DADA class when he was cornered by at least five Slytherin students, including Theodore Nott and Blaise Zabini. He couldn't read their expressions and wondered if they were here to get revenge for the DADA duels (which Gryffindor had handily won), or if they were merely looking to replace Draco's role as his personal enemies. But it wasn't that at all.

Theodore Nott stuck out his hand to Harry and said, "I didn't get a chance to talk to you after Hogsmeade. I'm sorry about what happened."

Harry cautiously shook his hand but said nothing.

"I only casually mentioned the dueling contest in a letter to my dad. He suggested Hogsmeade would be a great place to try to catch you because you'd be more relaxed there. I didn't know - I had no idea he would use what I told him the way he did."

Harry shrugged. He still wasn't sure what to say.

"What my dad does, well that's who he is. That doesn't make it who I am. And what Draco did last spring and even Professor Snape, well they don't represent all Slytherins."

"Yeah, okay," Harry finally said.

"There's more," Zabini said, stepping forward to stop Harry from leaving. "You saved Rachel from those dementors. She's kind of a favorite of ours and it would have been terrible to lose her. We all want to thank you, and want you to know that, well, it made a difference to us what you did. From now on, you need anything, there may even be some Slytherins willing to help."

"Thanks." Harry nodded at each of them, and as they parted to let him through he saw Ron and Hermione passing him in the hall. They were walking unusually fast and didn't appear to have noticed him. "Wait up!" Harry called, but although Hermione glanced back briefly at him, Ron continued on, still trying to say something to her.

"What's wrong?" Harry asked, catching up to them.

"Ronald thinks I still have feelings for Viktor Krum," Hermione spat out, "which I don't!"

"I saw you looking at him," Ron said. "I saw you get all dreamy and mushy in your eyes."

"You didn't see that because that wasn't happening. Honestly, Ron. He only waved at me and I waved back. If I'm nice to any other male on this planet, you think I'm falling for them!"

"Not any male," Ron said. "Him. Don't you think it's obvious why he had a standing application here at the school? He wanted to get near you."

"He wanted to teach flying."

"Why? His career as the world's greatest seeker wasn't getting him anywhere? Open your eyes, Hermione. He wants to get you back."

"Yes, well if you treat me like this, he will." Hermione tossed her hair away from him as she turned sharply into the DADA classroom.

"Whaddya think?" Ron asked Harry after she left. "Am I going crazy?"

"Not at all," Harry said. "If I were Krum and wanted Hermione back, I'd do the very same thing."

Ron and Hermione remained this way for most of the next month. Harry wasn't sure if they'd broken it off or not and had no intentions of asking them, but he figured with the way they were fighting, they were still together. At one point, Hermione tried to get Harry to argue her case to Ron, but he stopped her short, saying, "I can barely manage my own relationships. Don't get me involved with yours."

He wished he could get them to stop fighting so they could all concentrate on the bigger issue. The plan had been for them to handle the question of the lake and Inferi. They knew a horcrux was down there, they just needed a plan to get it. Instead of sitting together and working out the details, however, he had either Ron or Hermione with him and never both.

"I wish Dumbledore were here," Ron said once as they were studying in the library.

Obvious though the statement was, Harry still looked up and said, "Well, yeah."

"No, I mean, the merpeople were listening to Dumbledore's funeral, remember? He was friends with them. If there's a way to get past the Inferi, they'd know it and he could ask them."

Harry nodded. "I'd ask them myself, but my last encounter with them didn't exactly end on friendly terms."

"Well someone else at Hogwarts must be on good terms with them," Ron said, then his eyes widened. "How about Hagrid? He's on good terms with everyone."

Exactly twenty minutes later, Ron and Harry found themselves sitting around Hagrid's table as he poured them a cup of tea. "The merpeople, eh?" Hagrid said. "I can't think yer up to any good if yer askin' about them."

"That's not the point," Harry said. "Can you talk to them?"

"Well sure, if you can find 'em. They don't come up very often anymore. What did you want me ter tell 'em?"

Harry put his cup on the table and looked Hagrid square in the eyes. "I want to know if there are Inferi down there, and if so, how I can get past them."

"Are you ravin' mad?" Hagrid asked, spilling nearly half his tea as he set his cup down. "Yer not gettin' in water with Inferi. Nuttin' in the lake could be worth it."

"Maybe something is worth it," Ron said. "Now can you ask them?"

Hagrid grunted and rolled his eyes. "Yer crazy, you two. What's Hermione got to say 'bout this, cause I can't think she'd like this idea."

"Hermione's coming with us," Harry said. "And we are going in so if you want to help us, you'll talk to the merpeople and ask if they know a way around the Inferi."

Hagrid stroked his beard and finally said, "Okay, okay, I'll talk to 'em, soon as I can find one. Promise me yeh won't go in the lake 'til then."

"We promise," Harry said, then standing up he added, "We'd better go now. We had to skip one class to talk to you and Hermione will get after us if we miss another."

"Away with yeh!" Hagrid said scoldingly, but Harry thought behind his thick beard he detected a slight smile.

At breakfast the next morning, Hedwig dropped an envelope on Harry's lap with a parchment that looked similar to the one Hedwig had last brought. He turned away from Neville who was sitting next to him, then carefully opened it.

"The deaths today are in your honor," it read.

Harry closed it quickly and felt a nausea rising in him.

"Harry, you look pale. Are you okay?" Hermione had been reading her morning copy of The Daily Prophet but set it down as her eyes went from his face to the note. "What does the letter say? Who's it from?"

"I've got to talk to Professor McGonagall." He walked from the Great Hall and made his way up to her office. He had no idea what the password might be and strongly doubted it was anything like "lemon drops" or "treacle tarts."

Harry leaned against the wall and looked at the note again. Anymore, it seemed that there were deaths everyday. Why make today about him? He stood up again as the revolving door began to open and Dennis and Colin Creevey walked out with arms around each other for comfort. They passed without seeing him, although Harry thought he heard Dennis mumble, "I just can't believe it."

He took the opportunity of the opened door to run up the stairway. He paused at her door, making sure it was quiet inside, then knocked and heard a firm, "Enter."

Harry walked in and saw Professor McGonagall sitting at her desk, her head in her hands. When she saw him, she stood and said, "Mr. Potter? I wasn't expecting you."

"Who were you expecting?"

"Oh, well I suppose it doesn't matter to tell you. You'll find out soon enough. It's been a bad morning, particularly for Gryffindor House. There were several murders soon after midnight. Two of our former Gryffindors - you remember Katie Bell and Alicia Spinnet - they were killed while flying home from a birthday party. All of the Creevey family are gone but the two boys here at school. Viola Hutchinson, one of our innocent first years, she lost a little brother and her father. Padma and Parvati should be here at any time. Their maternal grandparents were killed as well as an uncle and some cousins. Their parents are deciding now whether to bring them home and move the entire family to another country until this war is over."

Harry sat in a chair, stunned.

"Now what can I do for you, Mr. Potter?"

He reached for the note in his pocket, and was only a bit surprised that it had disappeared. Realizing how stupid and self-involved he must sound, he blurted it out as quickly as he could. "There was a note for me just now with the morning owls. It said the deaths today were in my honor."

"In your honor? Who was this note from?"

Harry shrugged. "It wasn't signed."

"Well, either it's a terrible prank or it's from our enemies."
"That's what I thought too. Professor, is there anything particular about this date, to Voldemort, I mean?"

McGonagall lowered her eyes and took in a deep breath. "Tom Riddle first came to Hogwarts when I was a third year, did you know that?" When Harry shook his head, she continued. "He was a Slytherin and I a Gryffindor, but he was such a strong and brilliant person, everyone in the school knew who he was. He slipped once in the mud, right in front of me. I couldn't help but laugh a little. He stood and glared furiously at me then said words I shall never forget. He said, 'You wouldn't laugh if you knew what happened to the last girl who laughed at me.' It wasn't until after he emerged as the Dark Lord that I learned what he had meant. While Tom was still in the orphanage, a muggle girl named Marie Meriwether had one laughed at him because he had fallen and hurt himself. She was later found dead at the bottom of a cliff. Everyone thought it was an accident."

"But it wasn't an accident," Harry said.

"I've always believed Tom Riddle had some part to play in her death. And that girl died on this date, exactly sixty years ago. I've always remembered that because of his threat to me."

"Voldemort and I are both orphans," Harry mumbled, almost to himself. "And now today, if there are so many deaths of Gryffindor families-"

"The fact that you are both orphans means nothing more than if you both preferred Butterbeer to pumpkin juice." McGonagall held out her hands in a show of despair. "What if there is a significance to the happenings today, Mr. Potter? Will you brood over it? Will you torture yourself for deaths you did not cause and could not have prevented? I believe you find enough trouble on your own without taking blame for things over which you have no control."

Harry stood, feeling like a scolded child and yet somewhat better. "But what should I do about the note?"

"Do? There is nothing you can do, except to prepare yourself for the day when you will face our enemies, because I daresay you will. Now I need you to leave. I believe the Patil girls are waiting for me outside."

Harry scooted past them on the stairs, not daring to meet their eyes. He could tell by their silence that they were anticipating bad news, but they could not be prepared for what was facing them.

"Where did you go at breakfast?" Hermione asked him as she walked up beside him on their way to potions class. "And what was in that letter?"

Harry shrugged off her question. She would soon hear the news about the deaths in the Gryffindor families and that would be tragic enough without adding to it they were because of him. So changing the subject, he asked, "Any improvement between you and Ron?"

"He's being childish. I've told Viktor that our relationship is over and he's respected that. He wishes Ron and I the best."

Harry bit into his tongue. Viktor no more wished her and Ron the best for their relationship than he wished to have warts appear on his nose.

"Anyway," Hermione continued. "I've had some thoughts about the Inferi. I thought you and I and Ron could spend some time tonight talking them over."

"Sure," Harry said as they rounded the corner into class. "Tonight."

Ron seemed elated when Harry told him Hermione wanted to get them all together to discuss plans for the lake. "This'll get us talking again," he said. "By morning, everything will be back to normal."

Normal, Harry thought, was for Ron and Hermione to be in the middle of some sort of spat. It was when they were getting along that things seemed unusual. But he nodded and as they first sat down together that evening, he thought Ron may have been right. Hermione sat beside him with their shoulders touching as she laid out a few of her ideas.

"I was reading up on Inferi in a book which indicates the Petrificus Totalus spell will have a momentary effect on them, but it's not enough for us to get past all of them. I thought about having us apparate under water to that exact location, but since we don't have an exact location, this would be difficult."
"Harry and I asked Hagrid to talk to the merpeople about this," Ron burst out.

Hermione paused as if she had been about to say something else, then she turned to him. "That's actually a pretty good idea. I'd thought about them but decided since they couldn't do magic they weren't likely to be very helpful."

"But maybe they know something we don't," Ron said. "This was my idea."

It would have been the perfect moment for Hermione and Ron to come together again, until she said, "Whatever we decide as a plan, Viktor could be very helpful to us in the lake."

Ron's eyes widened. "Oh, had a long talk with him about horcruxes, did you?"

"Of course not, Ron. I haven't said a word to him about it. But after all, he probably knows that lake as well as anyone - remember he swam it several times while he was here for the tournament. He could probably help us."

"No," Ron said flatly. "Because if he helps us we have to tell him what we're doing and that can't get out to anyone, right Harry?"

"Of course not," Harry stated. "But at the same time, we can use all the help we can get. Let's come up with a plan first. Then if we need him, we'll tell him."

"We won't need him," Ron said between gritted teeth. "I'll come up with a great plan myself and I guarantee we won't need him."