Chapter Ten
When Harry awoke the next morning, he laid in better for several minutes, his mind tracking through the events of the previous day. About a minute later, he finally remembered why he had slept so fitfully the night before: he had slept with Hermione.
Harry sat up in bed, panic suddenly flooding his system. Hermione wasn't his first. That had been Parvati followed by one girl in South Africa and another in Argentina, both during brief moments of weakness when he had returned to training after one of his many break-ups with Parvati.
But those had been simple situations. He knew that there was no long-term relationship with either of them. Obviously, he had hoped for something long-term with Parvati, although it was becoming more and more evident that wasn't going to be in the cards for them.
But this was Hermione. Hermione had been his best friend since he was eleven. More than anyone, she had believed in him, always. The only major spat in their friendship had come when she had gotten his Firebolt taken away during his third year, a scenario where he had clearly been in the wrong.
There were no real excuses that could be made for what had happened. Neither of them were drunk; neither of them had been Confunded or magically affected in any way. Hermione had been very clear about giving Harry every opportunity to stop.
He had chosen not to do so. Considering a person's most basic instincts, it wasn't surprising. Hermione was an attractive woman; there was no point in arguing with that. By the time that Hermione gave him the choice, she was already straddling him, her dress riding up to reveal skin that Harry hadn't seen and had certainly never felt before.
But Harry knew that trying to blame their tryst on his animal instincts was a lie. He'd been given a choice and he had made it. Clearly, Hermione had made the same choice. Now, what would happen moving forward? Would they do it again? Was this a one-off thing? Were things going to be weird between them? Harry found his mind flooded with questions, questions that he knew would be answered only by speaking with Hermione.
However, before he could do that, he noticed a letter on the table next to his bed. It was from Arthur Weasley, asking to meet with Harry. Harry imagined that Arthur wanted to scold Harry for his treatment of Molly the night before. Still, he wasn't going to turn Arthur away, which meant that he was going to have to put all thoughts of his sexual escapades with Hermione on the back burner for the moment.
An hour later, after Harry had showered and eaten a quick breakfast, Arthur arrived at Potter Manor. Rather than take Arthur to his office, Harry chose the study where they could sit in a pair of armchairs that overlooked the forest outside his home.
When they sat, Harry could tell that something was bothering Arthur, something that caused him to hesitate before he spoke.
"I'm sorry for creating a scene at the wedding," Harry said. He wouldn't apologize for what he said, but he would admit that doing it in the middle of a wedding party was a bit over the top.
"Don't worry about it," Arthur replied. "You didn't start it."
Harry realized that he had misread Arthur's apprehension for anger with him. Instead, it appeared that the person that Arthur was angry with was not Harry, but his wife.
"Molly's mother and father were never particularly supportive of any of their children," Arthur explained. "They didn't approve of me. They didn't approve of Fabian's wife and had Gideon had the chance to get married, I imagine that they wouldn't have approved of her either. As a result, Molly has...a bit of a blind spot for her children. She's aware of it and most of the time, she's able to push past it, even when she disagrees with what her children are doing."
"Like the joke shop?"
"Exactly," Arthur confirmed. "She was proud that they were using their talents. I think she just wished that they were using those talents for something a bit more reputable. When Percy joined the Ministry, Molly was so happy. Bill and Charlie were their own men from such an early age. Percy, when he was younger, before he went to Hogwarts, he always wanted to go to work with me. When he first got his job at the Ministry, we went to work together via Floo every day for the first few months. Then, Percy found his mentor in Barty Crouch and something about Percy changed. He stopped coming home. He worked fourteen hours a day, seven days a week."
"We all know what happened next. Fudge and Dumbledore spent the year after Voldemort's return in a cold war and Percy chose his side. I know that the two of you have never really recovered from there. My own personal relationship with Percy is getting better, but Molly acted as if nothing had ever happened. All she wanted was her son back."
As Arthur spoke, Harry reflected on just how old he looked. He was only just over fifty years old, but he had also spent more than half of those years in a war of some kind. Additionally, he was the father of seven children, two of which were Fred and George, which Harry imagined had to prematurely age you.
Still, Arthur looked tired. It was clear that he was trying to hold everyone together, to keep his family, including all of its adoptive pieces, from falling apart.. Harry had known a great deal of good people and great men, but in Harry's mind, none would ever compare to Arthur Weasley. He wasn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination. He was prone to trusting authority a bit too much for Harry's liking and he didn't always curtail some of Molly's (or his children's) worst tendencies, but there was little doubt in Harry's mind that he did everything that he did out of love for his family, the same way that Molly did.
He was just a bit more diplomatic about his methods.
Honestly, it was what made Arthur and Molly so perfect for each other. They were different people, even all these years later, and yet, they were united in their primary concern: the wellbeing and success of their family.
"After the wedding last night, I talked to Molly. She admitted that she was disappointed that you talked to her the way you did. But when she told me what she said, her disappointment with you quickly turned to frustration with me when I agreed with you."
"Agreed with me about what?"
"Your assessment of the Minister of Magic."
Harry could tell that Arthur was fighting a war inside his own head. This was his son that he was talking about. His son, a Weasley, was the Minister of Magic. Based on years of evidence, that should have been impossible and yet, Percy had made it happen. Arthur, who so strongly believed in supporting your family, should have been doing everything in his power to make sure that Percy remained Minister.
And yet, here he was, telling Harry that he agreed with his belief that Percy needed to be removed.
"I'm sorry, Arthur."
"As am I, Harry," Arthur said sadly. "He wasn't ready. In the aftermath of Godric's Hollow, so many of our leaders were either taken from us or blamed for Voldemort's reign. In any other situation, Percy wouldn't have been the Minister for decades. Instead, he was in charge of the country before he turned thirty."
"It's not an excuse."
"No, it isn't," Arthur admitted. "In either case, I came here today to discuss the next phase of your plan."
"My plan?" Harry asked in confusion.
"Harry, you are actively seeking to remove the Minister of Magic. I trust that you have given some thought to who might replace him."
He hadn't if he was being honest. His primary concern had been Percy. Arthur had a point. It wasn't enough to remove Percy if they just replaced him with someone who was worse. Considering all of the planning that Harry had been doing over the last few years in order to defeat Voldemort, it was a stunning lack of foresight.
"Who did you have in mind?" Harry deflected.
Arthur, who had clearly noticed Harry's reluctance to directly answer the question, gave Harry a smile that made him look more like the twins that Harry was used to.
"I have my own thoughts," Arthur said, "but I would like to know who you think might be a good choice."
Harry thought for a moment, knowing that he was doing more to give away the fact that he hadn't really considered it. In the end, he came up with some names, although he was forced to think out loud while doing so.
"I'm not particularly interested in another few years of Amelia Bones as Minister of Magic."
"Neither is the Wizengamot," Arthur replied. "She'd never pass the vote."
"Good," Harry said. "Dumbledore wouldn't do it and is too old. Do you want the job?"
"I don't. In either case, I'm one of the less politically active members of the Wizengamot and we're in the process of removing my son from that same office. I don't necessarily think that my name is going to be one that anyone is going to support."
"I'd support it."
"Well, I appreciate your support," Arthur replied. "Now, you've given me a lot of names that won't work. Any that will?"
Admittedly, the list of people that Harry would have supported was far shorter than the list that he wouldn't have supported. However, two names immediately popped into his head.
"I know you won't take the job, but what about Bill?"
"Bill?" Arthur asked, a bemused smile on his face. "You mean my son, Bill? The one with the dragon fan earring and a ponytail?"
"I mean the one who is the most successful human at Gringotts in the last several centuries. The one who is respected and intelligent and would do a good job of ensuring that relations with the goblins improve while also aggressively pursuing the Death Eaters."
Arthur had clearly not even considered the thought of his oldest child replacing his third-oldest child.
"He's young," Arthur said. "I mean that as a compliment. He's obviously not as young as Percy, which could be an advantage. He's less interested in power."
"And he's the kind of person that everyone can get behind," Harry added. "There's not a single person that I know that doesn't like Bill, or at the very least, respect him. He's a member of The Legion, which should get him some decent support for the job right off the bat."
"There's just one problem."
"And that is?"
"He'd never go for it," Arthur smiled. "While I believe that Bill likely agrees with my assessment of Percy's abilities as the Minister of Magic, he'd never agree to replace his brother directly. Additionally, you'd have to drag Bill to the Ministry of Magic kicking and screaming. He likes working with the goblins. They're more direct than we are."
He knew that Bill was a longshot, but Arthur had laid out good reasons for why Bill would never have considered the job. That left him with two significantly more controversial candidates.
"What about Hermione?" Harry asked, a strange sensation lingering at the back of his mind at the mention of her name. "I know that she was considered when Percy was selected."
"She was considered to placate people that wanted a more aggressive pro-Muggleborn candidate. As someone who was relatively close to the process, she was never truly considered."
"Why not?"
"Well, first off, she was nineteen at the time," Arthur chuckled. "Second, she lacked more than a few months of Ministry experience. She was nominated almost entirely on her connection with you and the support that she garnered within The Legion."
"What about now?"
"She's still incredibly young for a Minister of Magic, although not that much younger than Percy had been when he had been appointed. Her status has gone nowhere but up in the last few years with her work in the DMLE."
"Plus, she's brilliant."
"There's that," Arthur replied. "In fact, that's probably the biggest argument in her favor. She's clearly bright and has an unusually high understanding of the political environment. However-"
"There's a however?" Harry asked. "What's better than being smart and political?"
"I said that she understands the politics of the Ministry. What I didn't say is that she adheres to it. Remember, this is Hermione Granger we're talking about. She is both well aware of how intelligent she is and is also aware of how stupid others are and she's not afraid to leverage that. Additionally, she's aware of it, but the general consensus is that she despises the politics of the Ministry."
"Shouldn't everyone?"
"Maybe, maybe not. In either case, there will be some that will reject her solely because she's unwilling to play the Ministry's game."
"Which is how we ended up with Percy."
"Yes," Arthur said, although Harry noticed some tension in his jaw as he replied. For a moment, Harry had forgotten that he was talking with Arthur Weasley, the father, instead of Arthur Weasley, the Wizengamot member. Thankfully, Arthur didn't seem offended by Harry's comment, but that didn't mean that he wasn't bothered by it.
"Do you think that Hermione would pass the Wizengamot?" Harry asked directly.
Arthur sighed. "I don't. Give it another few years. Knowing Hermione, she'll have changed the politics of the Ministry to fit her liking and then she can be Minister of Magic for two decades."
"Don't give her any ideas," Harry replied. "There is one other person that I'm considering. What do you think about Penelope Clearwater?"
That, above everything else that Harry had said that day, was clearly the most surprising name that Harry had thrown out. The look of surprise on Arthur's face was combined with that same smile that reminded him of the twins.
"You're really dead set on changing things, aren't you?"
"As you said. What's the point of changing things if we aren't changing things?"
"Well, Penelope Clearwater would be a change," Arthur admitted. "She's what Hermione will be in five years. She's not as smart or as subtle as Hermione, but she's probably the loudest Muggleborn advocate in the Ministry."
"And she's very willing to play politics," Harry added. "She's already stated that she's willing to move for the vote of no confidence."
"But only if you're willing to support her, I assume?"
"You'd be correct."
Arthur leaned back in his chair and looked off into the distance.
"Penelope is dedicated to changing the balance of power at the Ministry. As you've already noted, she's a bit more willing to "play the game" than Hermione is at the moment. The thing that she'll never tell you is that she's not necessarily the most...honest person."
"What do you mean?"
"Let's put it this way: last year, Percy asked her to rally support for legislation that he was sponsoring which would have added some taxes on imported brooms. This was when she was still working for the Department of International Magical Cooperation. She did as Percy asked, but she did so by implying to certain members of the Wizengamot that their legislation wouldn't get considered if they didn't support the broom legislation."
"Why?" Harry asked. "Was this bill that important?"
"Not particularly, no. The increase in taxes would have only accounted for a .001% increase in income for the Ministry. But the increase in resulting prices would have encouraged people to buy British-built brooms. It was good for local business and two of the major broom manufacturers, Firebolt and Cleansweep, are both run by Muggleborns. Once she knew that, she decided that the bill would pass. In the end, she was reprimanded for her actions, but then almost instantly promoted to her current position."
"Falling upwards, huh?"
"That's pretty much the long and short of it, yes," Arthur replied. "And that's the only example that we know of and it was for a largely unimportant bill. She certainly supports everything that you do, probably more so, but I wouldn't be surprised if she used some less than reputable means to get what she wanted."
"So you're saying that she's corrupt?"
"I don't know that I would go that far. Do I think that she's taking money or making promises to people in exchange for their votes? No, I don't. Do I think that she's perfectly willing to politically punish people who don't agree with her? Absolutely."
Honestly, that didn't sound too bad to Harry as long as it meant balancing the power in their world. While he would have never endorsed someone who was individually benefiting from their legislation, he wasn't against endorsing someone who would punish those that opposed her, especially if the opposition were Death Eaters or, at the bare minimum, those that tacitly supported them.
He could tell that Arthur wasn't necessarily on board with that idea, but Harry wasn't sure if that was because he was considering who was replacing Percy or because he didn't like Penelope's politics. Harry knew that Arthur supported pro-Muggleborn legislation, but it was distinctly possible that he wasn't quite as willing to tear things down in order to rebuild as Harry was.
"You haven't addressed the most popular candidate for the job," Arthur said softly.
"Who is that?"
Arthur gave him a knowing look. "You."
The idea that Harry would be considered for Minister of Magic was outrageous. First, he was about as apolitical as any person he knew. He didn't believe in "playing the game" and if Hermione's tendency to ignore the unwritten rules of the Ministry would disqualify her, then Harry's name should have been removed from consideration before anyone even had the thought. Second, he had absolutely no interest in the job. There were better and more interested people for the job. All of the people that he had mentioned, even Amelia Bones, was a better candidate for the job.
And yet, Harry knew that Arthur was right. He knew that his name alone made him a viable candidate and more than likely, if Harry wanted the job, much like Dumbledore before him, all he had to do is reach out his hand and take it. He knew that and he hated it.
"No," Harry said bluntly. "No chance."
"That won't be an answer that some people will want to hear," Arthur replied. "For years, you've stood up to Percy. There will be some that will expect you to replace him."
"So they can watch me fail too?"
"For some? Yes. But most of them believe that you are the person that can promote the change that they wish to see."
"I do want to help, but I'm not going to be the person running it. Not now and likely not ever."
"Still, you should be prepared to explain why you're not willing to do it. At the very least, Dumbledore had the excuse that he was running Hogwarts."
"And I'm trying to stop Voldemort. I think people will forgive me for admitting that I'm a bit too distracted to be worried about taxes on foreign-made brooms."
"Of course."
Arthur stuck around Potter Manor for a few more minutes before he left to go meet Percy for lunch. Harry couldn't imagine what it was like for Arthur. To go from plotting to remove your son from office one minute to sitting in front of him the next. If he knew Arthur, Harry was sure that he would be very upfront about what he was doing. Percy was certain not to like it, but Arthur was too honest a man not to tell him.
Harry spent the next few hours lazily going through his notes. It was a Sunday and he wasn't particularly inspired to work, but tracking down Voldemort was a full-time job and that, in his case, included weekends.
However, just after lunch, his work came to a screeching halt when out of nowhere, the window at the far end of his office magically opened. Moments later, a bright red fireball came through it. In any other instance, Harry would have been immediately ready to defend himself.
But Harry recognized the core of the fireball as it landed on his desk. Eventually, the flames disappeared, leaving Fawkes, Dumbledore's pet phoenix, standing on his desk. Harry had received a few letters from Dumbledore since their return and this was often how Fawkes entered his office. But the moment Harry saw the bird, he knew that this was different.
First, there was no letter in its grasp. Then, there was the bird's general posture. Normally, even on the days closest to its Burning Day, the bird stood tall, proud of the work that it did for the great Albus Dumbledore. Today, its shoulders were hunched over and its head hung low. Tears flowed freely from its eyes.
There was no doubt why the bird was here: Albus Dumbledore was dead.
Harry took a moment to process this information. His relationship with Dumbledore hadn't been easy, especially after Sirius' death, but he had little doubt that Dumbledore had done everything that he had done with Harry's best interest at heart. He'd been wrong about what that meant more than once, but his genuine affection for Harry couldn't be doubted.
Harry stood and made his way around the desk. As Harry's hand approached the phoenix, Fawkes lowered his head into Harry's hand and made a noise so soft, so mournful that Harry couldn't help but shed a tear. This was a familiar, a friend so close and so dear to the elderly wizard that its bond couldn't be described using any terminology that one might use for their pet. Fawkes was not a pet. In all honesty, he had probably been Dumbledore's closest friend. He knew Dumbledore's secrets. He had quite literally carried Dumbledore's burdens and, in one particularly memorable instance, Dumbledore himself.
Outside, Harry heard the call of his own snowy owl and a moment later, Hedwig came through the window, landing next to Fawkes. Harry had always thought of Hedwig as more than just a bird and this proved it. Hedwig had heard the cry (for there was no better word to describe it) of his fellow familiar and came to him, providing a shoulder for the other bird to cry on.
Harry smiled at Hedwig, who gave him a pointed look towards the window. The implication was clear: you have work to do. She was right. Harry knew that Dumbledore was dead. The only question that remained was the method of his death.
Harry quickly sent a Patronus to the members of the SAF, telling them that they were needed at the Ministry. An hour later, Harry and the rest of the SAF landed on the front lawn of Dumbledore's seaside home. As of yet, Harry hadn't told them what they were doing there.
"This was the home of Albus Dumbledore," Harry said softly, his voice almost overwhelmed by the sounds of the waves in the distance.
"Was?" Hermione said.
"Just over an hour ago, Dumbledore's phoenix came to my home. Fawkes had been instructed to come to me in the event that Dumbledore had...passed away."
The reaction from all of them was immediate. There were no more than a dozen living witches and wizards in all of Britain who hadn't been taught or gone to school under the tutelage of Albus Dumbledore. There was no wizard, not even Harry, more important to the country and to hear that the legendary wizard, who had been eclipsed in life only by the Founders of Hogwarts itself, had passed away was a terrible weight that was suddenly placed on all of them.
After Harry gave them all a moment to collect themselves, they entered the house. Harry led them to Dumbledore's bedroom. As expected, they found Dumbledore lying in his bed. If not for the fact that his chest wasn't rising, he might have just been taking a middle of the day nap. But Harry knew better.
He also knew, after a quick look around the house, that not all was what it seemed.
"Dumbledore's office is down the hall," Harry said softly. "He's been looking into some of the things that we've found. Let's get everything back to Potter Manor. From there, you lot can go home. We'll convene tomorrow morning at nine at the Manor to assimilate his research into ours."
It took about an hour to get everything from Dumbledore's office to Potter Manor. While the rest of the SAF took care of that, Harry sent an owl to the Ministry and let them know of Dumbledore's passing. In less than fifteen minutes, someone from the Ministry had come and collected the body to begin preparations for what was sure to be the largest funeral in the history of wizarding Britain.
Once everything was back at Potter Manor, Harry dismissed the members of the SAF with two exceptions.
"Ron, Hermione: can you two stick around?" Harry asked. For everyone else, Harry imagined that it looked perfectly normal. Harry was extraordinarily close to Dumbldore and he wanted his two best friends to stay with him while he mourned.
While they weren't necessarily wrong, that wasn't the truth about why he wanted them to stay.
The only person that had looked bothered was Parvati. She gave Ron and Hermione a rather cold look as she walked out of the room. Harry had intended to talk to her that day, but Dumbledore's death was the current priority. His time to speak with Parvati would come eventually.
Once Harry was certain that everyone else was gone, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small vial. Instead was the strange ethereal liquid that was easily recognized as memory.
"You two want me to trust you with everything," Harry said. "I'm trusting you not to pass this information along to everyone else."
"What information?" Ron asked.
"Dumbledore didn't die in his sleep," Harry said as he drew his wand. With a flick, a cabinet on the far side of the room opened and Harry's Penseive (the same one that had formerly belonged to the Headmaster) floated across the room and landed on his desk.
"How did he die?" Hermione asked.
"We're about to find out," Harry said, pouring the contents of the vial into the basin. Almost immediately, the formerly murky liquid of the Penseive shifted to resemble Dumbledore's office, albeit from a spot on the ceiling.
Harry stood up, grabbed the edge of the basin, and thrust his head forward. The moment his face touched the surprisingly cold liquid, he was suddenly dragged from his office into Dumbledore's office, landing in front of a seated Dumbledore. A second later, Ron and Hermione landed next to him.
"I do not like that," Ron said as he shook his head. The sensation of using a Penseive was strange, one that Harry had never quite gotten used to, even though Dumbledore had forced him to use it dozens of times during his training so that he could relive previous training sessions. It had been an invaluable tool, being able to watch himself, but it never was something that he was truly comfortable with.
The office itself was exactly how Dumbledore had left it. Dumbledore himself sat in the center of the room, silently staring off into the distance. Somewhere deep inside, Harry realized that this would be the last time that Harry would ever see Dumbledore alive.
"Hello, Harry," Dumbledore said suddenly. "I imagine that Mr. Weasley and Miss Granger are here as well. At least, I'm hoping that you've chosen to trust them with this information."
"Is he talking to us?" Ron asked.
"Sort of," Harry replied. "He left this memory as a message."
"As of ten minutes ago, all but one ward on the house has been removed. I've done what I can to reinforce the final one, but I lack the stamina to keep up with him. I have little doubt that after all these years, he has finally come for me, just as you suspected."
"Just as you suspected?" Hermione asked, her eyes fixed on Harry. Harry ignored her.
"Since time is short, I will be quick. I have a theory about what Voldemort is trying to do. All of these rituals seem to indicate that he's looking for a way to increase his power. However, there is no reason for Voldemort to need the amount of power that these rituals would grant him access to. The only person that he fears is you, Harry, but that doesn't explain the sudden interest in these rituals. This is not just about beating you, Harry. He needs this power for something, something that he wouldn't be capable of doing without it."
"Unfortunately, my time has run out before I could answer that question. The task now falls to the three of you. Why does Voldemort need this power? Once you discover the answer to that question, you'll know how to stop him."
In the background of the memory, a sudden explosion could be heard in the distance. Dumbledore looked in the direction of the sound.
"I wish that I had been able to see you conquer him. You have become something that not even I would have imagined. Just remember: your power is nothing without those around you. Trust them, love them, and you will succeed in all that you do. I am so very proud of you, Harry, and I know that your parents would be as well. Now, farewell. Don't mourn for an old man dying. That is, of course, the natural order of things."
Suddenly, Harry felt himself sucked from the memory and a moment later, he was back in his office with Ron and Hermione, both of whom were glaring at him.
"Explain yourself," Hermione growled.
He didn't want to, but he knew that he needed them to understand what had just happened.
"As we traveled around the world, Dumbledore had a theory about what Voldemort was doing," Harry said as he took a seat at his desk. "He wouldn't tell me what it was, not until he was certain. That's why we came back here."
"You said that you came back because Voldemort was here," Ron replied.
"We did. But we also came back to lure Voldemort into the open," Harry said. "Dumbledore said the only way for him to be certain what Voldemort was doing is if he could see a scenario where he should have been acting. We'd been back in England for about five weeks, waiting for something to happen, when we got word about New Hogsmeade."
"Five weeks?" Hermione said in shock. "You'd been back a month?"
"Yes, but that's not important right now. What's important was that we made a big deal about my appearance. I was very clearly there. If Voldemort was ready to take me down, he would have showed up."
"But he didn't show up."
"Exactly. Dumbledore was certain that Voldemort was working on something more complicated than just getting more powerful. But we couldn't know that for certain unless we could get a measure for exactly what Voldemort wanted. So, Dumbledore has spent the last two months anonymously leaking information about the SAF to Purebloods."
As expected, this information did not particularly go over well.
"What!?" both Ron and Hermione shouted simultaneously.
"We needed information!" Harry argued. "We needed to know if Voldemort was ready. If he was, he would have ignored the information. If he wasn't, he would have started begging for more. Soon enough, Dumbledore was being inundated with requests for more information."
"Which he gave them?"
"Not exactly," Harry replied. "He gave them more information, but most of it was misinformation. He said that the SAF was nowhere near finding the root cause of Voldemort's actions, but that Dumbledore himself already had it figured out. He told them that we were secretly working together, using the SAF as a cover to make it look like we knew less than we did."
"That's exactly what happened," Ron pointed out.
"No, it's not. Dumbledore might have learned more than we did, but the information that he got was from the SAF, not the other way around."
"How did Voldemort find Dumbledore?" Hermione asked.
If Hermione had disliked the story thus far, he knew that she was really going to dislike this.
"Dumbledore...leaked his location to Astoria Greengrass. He told her that he had Voldemort's plan figured out and that all of the information was in his safe."
"He did what?" Hermione growled.
"Wait, the safe was full when we got there," Ron added.
"Yes, it was," Harry replied. "The safe had a spell placed on it. If anyone opened it other than Albus or myself, then a stack of false information would appear rather than the actual information. That's not the important part. The important part was that it's clear that Dumbledore's information had reached Voldemort's ears."
"And it got him killed!" Hermione shouted. "He had to have known that doing what he did would put a target on his back!"
"He did. In fact, he was well aware of that when he decided to do it. He knew that there was a high chance that it was going to lead to his death. But, we needed to know where Voldemort was at. Now, we know. If he were ready, he would have ignored Dumbledore."
"Instead, he killed him!" Hermione roared. "I can't believe that you would go along with this. You let him die!"
"He was already dying," Harry replied. "Quite literally, in fact. The Healers at St. Mungo's guessed that he only had a few more months to live anyway. Now, instead of dying slowly in his bed, his death meant something. Now we know that we still have time before Voldemort is ready."
Harry could see that Hermione didn't buy that logic at all. That logic didn't make Harry feel good, but it made sense. Dumbledore had sacrificed everything and now they knew just how prepared Voldemort was. If Dumbledore had been healthy, there was no way that he would have ever agreed to such an exchange, but Dumbledore hadn't been healthy for years.
Hermione stalked to the other side of the room, huffing and puffing as she went. Meanwhile, Ron turned back to Harry.
"What was in the safe when Voldemort opened it?"
"A general summation of the information that Voldemort had taken and some possible applications," Harry replied. "Nothing particularly valuable to Voldemort, but just valuable enough for him to think that he got all of Dumbledore's research. He'll eventually realize that it's not enough, but it will take him a few weeks to get through it all. By then, hopefully we'll have learned more."
"Hopefully?" Hermione scoffed as she threw her arms into the air in frustration and walked to the far end of the room, mumbling what was certainly a string of highly edited curses at him under her breath.
"Do you think that I wanted to do this?" Harry said as he rose to his feet. "Don't you think that I considered every possible way to not do this?"
"Mate," Ron said tenderly, "we've seen you get out of pretty much everything. It's tough to believe that you couldn't have wormed your way out of this.'
"It's not tough to believe!" Hermione shouted from across the room. "It's impossible to believe. You felt bad when you killed Bellatrix fucking Lestrange, but you just let Dumbledore give himself up so that we could get a little information?"
Harry was stunned. He'd heard Hermione swear before; she wasn't a saint, after all. But she rarely did it and she had never done it at him. Harry stood, fixed in place as he stared at her. Hermione did the same on the opposite side of the room, each of them confused by what had just happened.
Even Ron picked up on the tension in the room and realized that it was about more than just Dumbledore.
"Whoa, Hermione, is everything alright?" Ron asked. "I know that you're mad at him, but I've never heard you talk to him like that before."
Hermione's head snapped towards Ron and she looked as if she was about to fire back at Ron in a similar manner. However, before she did, she stopped herself. Instead, she closed her mouth and stood with her eyes closed, silent.
"I didn't want to do this," Harry said, pleading with Hermione to understand. "But Albus was dying. He only had a few months left anyway and the Healers said they were not going to be comfortable."
"So you sacrificed him to Voldemort?"
"No, haven't you been listening?" Harry asked. "He sacrificed himself. Albus only told me that he had leaked his information after he had already done it. I begged for him to move. I told him that he could come live at Potter Manor or Grimmauld Place. I told him that his life wasn't worth the information that we would get. Do you know what he said?"
"Probably something relentlessly noble," Hermione said with a scowl.
"More or less," Harry chuckled. "He told me that if his death served any purpose at all, then it would be worth it. He said that he was going to die anyway, so he might as well dedicate his death to the same pursuit to which he had dedicated his life."
Harry finally moved, walking directly to Hermione. He stopped only a few feet away from her and waited until her eyes finally came up and met his.
"That man is the reason that I'm alive today. If I beat Voldemort, he'll be why. He taught me everything I needed to know about magic and dueling and all the while, he encouraged me to be a good man. More times than not, I've failed him in that regard. The last thing that I wanted was to sacrifice the man who gave me a chance to succeed, a chance to live, but Albus Dumbledore isn't the kind of person that you say no to. Once he decided what he was doing, that was it."
"You could have stopped him."
"I could have," Harry admitted. "The way his body had betrayed him over the last few years, I could have easily Stunned him and taken him, Merlin knows where. But I respected him too much to do that. Albus knew what he wanted and because of him, we know that Voldemort isn't ready yet. We know that we have time, even if it's just a little bit. He didn't die in vain."
Hermione stared at him. From this close, he could see the frustration on her face, but he could also see the pain that she was feeling. She might not have been as close to Albus as he was, but losing Albus Dumbledore was still a big deal for everyone in the wizarding world and Hermione was closer to him than most.
Off in the distance, a clock chimed five times. Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw Ron look down at his watch.
"You got a date?" Harry teased.
"Actually, I do," Ron admitted, his face turning bright red. Despite the fact that they were several years removed from Hogwarts, Ron still blushed like a schoolboy anytime he had a date.
"Get out of here," Hermione said. "Tell Susan we said hi."
"How do you know it's Susan?"
"Well, you were at Ginny's wedding with her yesterday," Harry pointed out.
"Oh. Right," Ron replied. "Yeah, I'm having dinner with Susan."
"Then tell her we said hello," Hermione repeated.
"Will do," Ron said and with a turn, he was gone, leaving Harry and Hermione alone for the first time since the previous evening. For a moment, Harry thought that she was just going to leave. Instead, she turned and walked to the far end of his office, looking out the massive windows that overlooked the gardens of Potter Manor. They were large and unkept, but Harry could imagine that, one day when all of this was over, he might be able to take the time to make them beautiful again.
"I'm sorry for swearing at you," Hermione said, her eyes fixed on the gardens below.
"It's fine," Harry replied as he joined her. "There's a first time for everything."
"Yes, I suppose there is."
Harry waited for a moment, wondering if Hermione would address her comment. When it became clear that she wasn't, Harry spoke up.
"So, about last night…"
"Can we not do this right now?" Hermione asked.
"Why? Do you regret it?"
"No, I don't regret it," Hermione said. "It was decent enough sex between two consenting adults. There's nothing to regret and nothing to talk about."
"Really? Because it seemed like you were weirdly upset at me."
Hermione turned to him. "I was weirdly upset with you because you threw Dumbledore to the wolves and then expected us to be alright with it."
"I never expected anyone to be alright with it," Harry argued. "I was explaining what happened. I'm not alright with it. But it happened and now the only thing that we can do is move on."
"That's easy for you to say. You got to make that decision. For the rest of us, we just get to accept it."
"I understand that you're frustrated," Harry replied. "I don't know what else to tell you. But I would like to talk more about last night."
"Why?" Hermione asked bluntly.
"Because it's going to change things."
"It doesn't have to," Hermione stated. "We had sex. We're not suddenly in a relationship and we aren't madly in love with each other. We were both stressed and having sex was as good a form of stress relief as any other."
"I'm just saying that I don't typically fuck my best friend when I'm stressed."
"Neither do I. That was the first time for that."
"The first time?" Harry asked. "Are there going to be other times?'
"Do you want there to be other times?"
Harry had no idea. On one hand, he knew that he wasn't likely going to be able to separate himself from sex with Hermione as well as she had wanted. On the other hand, the sex had been pretty good for the first time and on a couch. He couldn't help but admit that he had already considered other places where he had Hermione could sleep together.
Still, it all came back to whether Harry could continue doing this casually.
"I don't know," Harry finally admitted, unable to reconcile the two sides of himself.
"Me neither," Hermione agreed. "I'm not against the idea, but there would have to be rules."
Of course there would have to be rules. It was sex with Hermione Granger. It was anything with Hermione Granger. There were always rules. Almost all of those rules could be broken at the drop of a hat, but only when Hermione deemed it absolutely essential to do so.
"What...what kind of rules?" Harry asked, doing his best to sound casual. He failed, of course, but he tried.
"Well, we wouldn't be dating."
"I know that we're not dating. That's kind of the point, isn't it?"
"I mean, that's the rule: we're not dating. If you want to go on a date with someone, you don't have to ask. If I want to go on a date with someone, I'm not asking."
"Are we doing this?" Harry asked suddenly. "Like we were talking kind of hypothetically before, but now you're coming up with rules?"
"You tell me: are we doing this?" Hermione asked. "I know that I could use the release every so often and you have enough stress built up in your system on a daily basis to fund every psychoanalyst in London. It could benefit both of us."
"Wouldn't it be weird?"
"The only person making it weird, Harry, is you."
"That's because it's weird."
"What about it is weird?" Hermione asked.
"What do you mean?"
"You keep saying that 'it's weird.' What about this whole situation is weird?"
"All of it?" Harry said honestly. "You are Hermione Granger. You're my best friend and last night, I shoved you onto the couch and fucked you until we both came."
"Yes, you did," Hermione said simply. "You can pull my hair a little bit next time."
"What!?"
"A little rough is fine, but that's pretty much the limit."
That was enough for Harry.
"How are you so calm about this?"
"Because, while you were out training to defeat Voldemort, some of us spent our time here, becoming adults. I've slept with all of my boyfriends except Nathaniel. I've slept with two or three people who I wasn't in a relationship with. I'm not a slut or a whore because of it. I am a woman and I like sex. I had sex with you last night, because I wanted to and because I thought you would benefit from it. For someone who was clearly less experienced than I was, you were pretty good, although you could be just a little less afraid that I'm going to break at a moment's notice. I'm calm about this because I know you, I trust you, and you made me come, which is rarer than you might think. Now, are you interested in doing this again?"
Harry didn't even hesitate.
"Yes."
"Then there will be rules," Hermione replied with a smile. Harry had seen that same smile on her a thousand times before. It was the one she used whenever she was feeling particularly in control of a given scenario. In the past, Harry had thought that it was charming, a way for her to clearly show when she was in control without appearing controlling.
Now, he couldn't believe how much that same smile turned him on.
"Fine. There will be rules," Harry conceded. "Rule one: we're not dating. Rule two: we don't stay the night."
"But I spend half of my nights in the guest room," Hermione pointed out.
"And you'll keep going to the guest room," Harry said. "We're not dating and the last thing I need is for someone to arrive early for a meeting and see you walk out of my bedroom."
"Then, I guess rule three is that we're not telling anyone?"
"Do you want to tell anyone?" Harry asked.
"Not particularly, no. Molly gave me enough grief when Ginny let it slip that I had slept with Michael Corner."
"You slept with Michael Corner?" Harry asked.
"I was horny and we were both drunk," Hermione said, rolling her eyes. "Listen, the last thing I need is a sit-down chat with her about taking advantage of her poor foster son."
"Given how Molly feels about me right now, I'm doubting that's how that conversation will play out, but the point remains valid. Any other rules?"
Hermione thought for a second.
"No, no more rules, but one thing we both need to be clear about. We're both consenting to this. That means that if either of us wants out and any time, then that's that. We walk away and we remain friends. Above all else, we remain friends."
It was admittedly the one concern he still had about this whole setup. They had ended up approaching the subject rather head on, but some day, one of them would find another person and this would stop. Would things just go back to normal even though Harry knew which positions Hermione liked? Could they go back to normal if Hermione knew just what to do to make Harry finish in record time?
Hermione was right that the stress relief was something that he needed and if it had been anyone else offering that relief, he knew that he would have accepted without a second thought. But this was Hermione. If things went wrong, then the person that he had come to depend on more than anyone else would suddenly be stripped from him and it would likely be no one's fault but his own.
Still, there was something at the back of Harry's mind that was encouraging him to jump off the metaphorical cliff. He'd never had much of an opportunity to live a free life. Now, he had the chance but with someone that he trusted more than he trusted himself, someone that he knew would never try to hurt him.
"We remain friends," Harry repeated, tacitly agreeing to their secret pact. Hermione smiled at him. This was the smile that she used when she wanted to show joy, pure and simple. There were no alternate motives behind this smile. This smile was rare, shown only to those closest to her and only at times when they were being completely vulnerable with each other.
This was about as vulnerable as Harry had ever been with another person and Hermione knew it.
"Good," Hermione said, unable to wipe the smile from her face. "Now, I want you to fuck me on your desk."
"Excuse me?"
"I've always had a fantasy about you fucking me on this desk."
"You have fantasies about me?"
"Harry, don't be an idiot," Hermione said, rolling her eyes. "You're the same age as me and you keep yourself in good shape. You'd be a liar if you said that you didn't have any fantasies about me."
On that account, she was absolutely correct. Harry wasn't particularly inclined to tell her that now, although he was certain that if this situation lasted long enough that Harry would have more than enough time to tell her all about the things that he had imagined her doing.
However, just as Hermione sat on the desk, Harry saw movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned towards the motion, his wand already raised high. At the end of his wand stood a man that Harry had thought that he'd never see again. His skin was just as weathered as it had been the last time that Harry had seen him.
But the most jarring aspect of the man were his eyes or rather the lack of eyes where they should have been.
"Vjosa?"
"Harry Potter," Vjosa said softly as he pushed Harry's wand to the side, "we need to talk."