Harry was standing at the edge of the Black Lake trying not to shiver. It was just above freezing, but he wasn't stripping down to a swimsuit like Fleur and Krum. At least not yet. And he certainly wasn't gawking at Fleur either- okay, maybe just a little bit. He was a healthy, mostly normal teenage guy after all. But Pansy wasn't there to glare at him, so he could get away with it.
The judges had made their spiel, a whistle was blown, and the second task of the Triwizard Tournament was under way. Harry drew his wand to use the summoning spell and then had to wait.
He didn't pay much attention to Krum, who had disappeared under the surface. Fleur had cast the bubblehead charm before heading into the lake. Harry had done his best not to stare after her, but she did have some very, very impressive curves.
The sound of one of the school's rowboats zooming across the water in his direction drew his attention. Harry guided it in slowly to the edge of the lake and then got in before blasting away from the shallows with an unfocused banishing charm. It was something that had taken him some effort to get down, but thankfully he'd had nearly a month to practice once their plan was decided on. Pansy had suggested using the boat, as she was not interested in having to swim any more than absolutely necessary.
For his part, Harry typically loved getting to play with his girlfriend in or near water but having to spend an hour or more fighting the frigid lake, and part of that time with an unconscious passenger, was definitely not something he wanted to try.
Thus, he was now speeding along the water's surface with the occasional banishing charm to give him velocity or redirect his aim. The tracking charm seemed to be working just fine as it was pointing him to the middle of the lake, where Myrtle had told him the merpeople's village lay.
While Harry had a few minutes to kill, he thought back to the lesson professor Flitwick had given them on the Fidelius charm. He had been forced to focus on preparing for the second task, but once that was done, Harry was planning on using it to hide away his accidental murder of Rita Skeeter.
As the book they'd found had suggested, the Charms Master confirmed that the true difficulty of the spell lay not only in the amount of willpower and focus necessary to shape the spell but also the effective 'size' of the secret to be hidden. Flitwick had demonstrated on a quill of Harry's. He snapped the quill and then cast the Fidelius to hide away the knowledge of what had happened to it. Despite both of them seeing the action occur, neither he nor Harry could recall that fact until Pansy informed them of the secret. It was such a small and rather frivolous use of the charm, but it demonstrated its effects quite clearly.
Once the secret was restored, it also showed just much the difficulty of the charm could vary. According to professor Flitwick, one of the most common usages of the spell was to hide away a building. While a decent student could probably hide something like the fate of a broken quill, it would take someone much more powerful to hide away a home like what his parents had done. According to Flitwick, he doubted more than possibly half of the staff would be able to do so.
When pressed on which half, their jovial teacher had made them guess which ones would likely not be able, smiling as he said that he wanted to test their abilities to reason.
Harry immediately suggested that it would be beyond Hagrid, which the professor confirmed, as well as Trelawney, the fraudulent Divination teacher that Hermione still occasionally ranted against.
Pansy guessed that professors Vector, Sprout, Sinistra, and obviously Binns all wouldn't. Professor Flitwick told her she was only correct on three of her guesses. She responded by saying that Binns was obviously correct and that she had heard Sprout mention that Charms had been one of her worse subjects (something Harry did not know), but she was unsure which of the other two was wrong.
Harry speculated that professor Vector's field of Arithmancy was much more focused on the theoretical side of magic, and thus deduced that Sinistra was the one who would have the ability.
Flitwick was so pleased by that answer that he gave Harry five points for the use of logic.
That annoyed Pansy a bit, so she then supposed that neither the librarian Madam Pince nor Mr. Filch, who she knew to be a squib via Harry, would be able to cast the Patronus.
The Charms Master responded by giving her five points for not overlooking some of the staff who were not teachers.
Harry then guessed that the Muggle Studies professor would also be among those who were not able to do so.
At that point, professor Flitwick affirmed that he believed Harry was correct about professor Burbage.
As for the rest, apart from himself, he knew for a fact that the headmaster as well as professor McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey were capable of it. He was not willing to put anything past Mad-Eye Moody, and he was fairly certain that professor Slughorn was capable as well. Flitwick said that the old Potions Master was much more accomplished than his appearance and affable demeanor suggested. Finally, professor Babbling had been researching the ability to try to create a runic array capable of something similar for years, and thus Flitwick knew that she had a fair amount of skill with the charm.
Harry was looking forward to asking her about it, but he was pretty sure that he would be able to take care of their Skeeter problem without any further instruction. He had been able to replicate Flitwick's example with the broken quill, so as soon as the weekend arrived, he was going to do just that.
That brought to mind his wonder at why they were once again holding one of the tasks in the middle of the week. At least Harry was not going to have to deal with an Astronomy lesson. He wasn't looking forward to freezing late at night after freezing that afternoon in the lake.
Especially since he wasn't going to be able properly celebrate passing the second task probably until the weekend. Pansy's period had just started earlier that week, so she had promised to make it up to him later.
Honestly, he was so worried about her being used as his hostage in this stupid task that he was going to be happy just knowing she was safe and sound, back in his arms. Harry had not slept well the night before- after all, it had been more than a year since he had not had her next to him in their bed.
Luna had helpfully had two strong cups of tea waiting for him at breakfast and a couple of slices of toast that she nearly had to force him to eat. He was going to need his energy, and Harry knew that she was probably right, but his nerves just were not cooperating.
He smiled to think of his friends, all of whom he had warned about how boring that day was going to be. Parvati had told him that she and Lavender would keep Luna company while he was busy. Hermione was going to be reading, naturally. He had cast warming charms on them all before heading down to the water.
Finally, Harry set aside his thoughts and focused back on his task. Letting his mind wander had helped quite a bit at pushing down the stress, but the tracking charm was showing that the first part of his goal was complete.
He slowed the boat and was thankful for the relatively mild weather. Sure, it was cold and cloudy as usual, but the wind was calm and there were no storms so the boat should hopefully remain roughly where it was. He pulled off his robe, shoes and clothes, leaving him only in his swimming trunks. Wand in hand, he cast the bubblehead charm and a warming charm on himself as well.
He looked down into the murky water. This part was going to suck. No time to waste though.
Harry screwed up his courage and threw himself over board.
'Holy fucking shit that's cold!'
Even the warming charm did little to help, so he tried reapplying the spell and felt slightly less awful. Harry lit his wand and forced himself to start swimming down.
The water was dark and murky only ten or twenty feet from the surface, but he had to keep going.
He wished he had been able to talk Madam Pomfrey into teaching them more healing spells. Strangely enough, Luna had been some help, as she knew a charm that healed relatively minor injuries such as broken noses or toes.
It had hurt like a son of bitch the afternoon when they set about practicing, as Harry was unwilling to subject either Pansy or Luna to the pain. He figured that if he could live through the nearly daily beatings of Dudley's gang, then he could grit his teeth to make sure they could each master the spell.
And it had certainly been good motivation for Pansy, who had the spell nailed down on only her third attempt. Harry struggled a bit more, but then trying to heal your own broken toe through the pain was probably always going to be more of a challenge. Still, he managed it eventually.
Luna had greatly admired Harry that day. Not only for his determination and endurance, but for his willingness to show off that he was quite possibly even more nuts than she was.
He really loved that girl- she had a way of making him laugh even when he was in a lot of pain. He had to face the fact that she was right about him being sort of crazy though. Harry had to admit that he had been something of a maniac when he had asked Moody to cast the Cruciatus spell on him so he could know what it was like.
He wasn't sure if he should feel better or worse at still thinking that maybe it had been a good idea when he thought it over later on.
Harry just kept swimming down, letting his thoughts drift, and after a few more minutes he saw the village of the merpeople. Many of them were gathered in the center, singing the same eerie song from the egg. Just a bit further on, he saw an enormous statue of a merman with three figures tied to its tail.
He sped up as much as he could. There was Pansy, floating in the murky green light of the water.
For a moment, she looked as if she was dead. His heart raced as the panic set in while he swam over to her. He was going to have to murder Dumbledore after all.
But once he reached her, Harry felt a pulse and looking around, he realized that all three of the hostages were in some sort of enchanted sleep. One of the other two was Fleur's younger sister that he remembered from seeing at the beach the summer before. Her skin looked even more pale in the dark water at the bottom of the lake, but her hair seemed to almost shine, a silver blonde halo floating all around her head.
The other hostage was likely Krum's younger sister. There was an obvious resemblance, which made Harry feel bad for the girl. He might have been a bit biased, but that brow ridge of Krum's always made him think of cavemen. At least the girl didn't have a thick unibrow.
He looked back at Pansy and fired a spell to cut her loose so he could get them out of this awful ice-cold water.
Just as he turned a large fast moving fish collided into his side and knocked him several feet away from her. Harry spun around and saw Krum, the clumsy fucking bastard, had turned himself into a sort of half-shark and had just bit through the rope that was now stuck in his maw, dragging his hostage away. The partial fish transformation had given him a great amount of speed, and within seconds, he was far enough away that Harry had lost track of him.
Unfortunately, Harry then turned to see a much greater complication. He had been knocked into the younger Delacour sister who had been awoken by the impact. And even worse, she was clearly not able to breathe as she looked completely terrified.
He immediately cast a bubblehead charm on her. The girl was still shocked so he mimed at his own bubblehead charm to show that he was able to breath with the help of the spell, and after a moment of feeling her own face, she started to calm down.
When Harry turned to swim back to Pansy, a small hand reached out and grabbed onto him. Fleur's sister might have been relieved by his spell, but she obviously did not want to be left down there alone.
The merpeople had all backed off after Krum had smashed into his side and were not looking like they would be of any help. Fleur still wasn't in sight either.
Harry held up a finger, trying to convey that he needed just a moment. She let go of his hand but still looked afraid. He swam over to Pansy, wrapped an arm around her with his wand at the ready. Thankfully, the contact did not cause her to wake up. He then pulled her back over to the little French blonde.
He waited what seemed like a few minutes more, but the water was freezing and he was more than ready to get this damn task over with.
'Fuck it,' he thought as he cast a spell to free the Delacour girl from her tether as well. Harry swam closer and motioned for her to grab onto his left hand. It was going to be fairly cumbersome to try to make his way back to the surface towing both girls along on one side, but he was definitely not going to put his wand away until he was back in the boat.
They began the climb. Swimming straight up from the deepest part of the lake took several minutes, but thankfully, it also avoided pretty much any creatures other than a few small fish that went far out of their path.
Minute after minute, they slowly made their way up. Thankfully, the younger Delacour was a fairly good swimmer, so between the two of them, they were able to make decent time, and with Pansy in the middle it wasn't actually as awkward as Harry had feared.
Things started to brighten and only a moment later they burst up out of the water. Harry turned for a moment as he heard both girls coughing. The boat was maybe fifty feet away, not bad all things considered.
"This way," he called as well as giving them a tug of his hand. Harry made sure the girls were swimming in the correct direction and he followed just behind them.
When they reached the boat, he held onto the side to try to steady it as Pansy and the little blonde climbed in. She was speaking rapidly in French and Harry was having trouble understanding her between the chattering of her teeth and the water sloshing all around him. He pulled himself up last and hit them all with a round of drying spells.
"Dobby!"
The little house-elf was worth his weight in gold that day. Not only did he have the two largest towels hot and ready for them to wrap up in, but he shortly returned with mugs of hot cocoa. Since they had an extra passenger, Harry made sure she had one of the towels, which completely engulfed the smaller girl.
It wasn't going to be any hardship for him to snuggle up next to Pansy. Extra body heat anyway.
Once they had all gulped down the hot cocoa, Harry said "hold on" in French and fired off a banishing charm behind them, propelling the boat back towards the shore.
The trip back to shore was uneventful other than the little French girl who couldn't stop giggling while Harry spent most of the ride making sure his girlfriend was really okay by snogging her until his nerves finally fell back into a state of equilibrium. When he could pull himself away from Pansy, he fired off another couple of banishers until they were near the shoreline.
"Gabrielle!"
Harry heard a faint screaming that eventually he could understand as Fleur shrieking for her sister once they were close enough. She ran right up to the boat while they were still in waist deep water, her arms going around her sister frantically. The two girls were speaking French rapidly, but he had trouble following it because he was just so relieved that none of his usual bad luck had turned up. Harry closed his eyes and buried his face in Pansy's hair.
"I told you it would be alright, Harry," she cooed as she stroked his back with her left arm, the right one still clutching the now no longer warm towel around them. He realized that he was shaking- his nerves were still a lot more frazzled than he thought.
"I bet I know what you'd like to do now," he whispered.
"Really?"
"The same thing as me. Soak in a nice long hot bath."
She laughed and the carefree sound did a lot to help. Harry tried once again to relax.
"Are you sure that's all you want to do?" she asked in a low, teasing voice as the little boat was being guided to shore.
"For now."
Harry disentangled himself to see what was going on. Fleur was lifting Gabrielle out of the boat and onto the shore. He took in the appearance of the French champion and it seemed that maybe there was more than just a pretty face to her after all. She had numerous cuts and scratches covering her body but was heedless of everything but making sure her little sister was safe. He then caught a bit of their conversation and realized that the younger of the two Veelas was telling a tale of being rescued by Harry Potter, her personal hero, from the terrifying underwater monsters.
Apparently, the story books had come true for Gabrielle Delacour.
Madam Pomfrey and the judges had come over to see their return. The healer was checking over the two French girls so Harry relaxed and waited for a few more moments. He saw a merman sticking his head up above the surface and speaking that harsh, screeching language to professor Dumbledore and Barty Crouch.
"Alright you two, get over here," Pomfrey ordered. Harry smiled at her as she looked more harried and angry than he was used to. It looked like he definitely wasn't the only one who had not enjoyed the day's 'festivities.'
Harry helped Pansy out onto the shore first and then followed her. Madam Pomfrey gave them each potions to take, and for once he enjoyed it, as it warmed him from the inside out. After the frigid winter lake water, he almost asked for seconds.
She waved her wand around Pansy first before turning to Harry.
"You're actually alright for once."
"It's a miracle, I know." Harry gave her a grin while the healer rolled her eyes.
"You keep this up, young man, and you might actually make it through an entire year without ending up in my infirmary."
"But wouldn't you get lonely?"
Harry's smirk was interrupted as he was spun around.
"You saved 'er! My Gabrielle," Fleur grabbed him in a hug and then kissed both of his cheeks. "'Ow can I ever repay you?"
"Uh..."
Now, Harry was able to throw off the Imperius curse without any problems and usually Fleur's allure didn't affect him, but at the moment her breasts were pressed firmly up against him and she was not trying to control her abilities at all.
It could have been worse. He was still cold enough that he didn't get an immediate erection, and even that might not have been as embarrassing as Ludo Bagman who was openly drooling while staring at her.
"It's alright," Harry began as he tried to focus on anything other than Fleur Delacour, turning to Pansy who was smirking at him.
"I don't really need-"
His girlfriend cut him off by clamping her hand over his mouth.
"I'm sure we can come to some sort of arrangement later, once we're all able to speak in a calmer setting." Pansy let go of him then and Harry just nodded along.
"What she said."
"Of course," Fleur replied smirking at Harry's deference.
They were then interrupted by the judges, who began to announce the scores for the task.
Krum had done well as far as the time went, and received no penalty for his "accidental" collision that caused the problems for Gabrielle Delacour. Harry was dubious about that, but since he came out of things unscathed, the Bulgarian's actions were only something to ponder later. He would definitely be keeping a close eye on him for the final task.
Fleur received half the available points despite being unable to get past a swarm of Grindylows. Harry heard her mutter about not deserving any, obviously taking her failure pretty hard, and she was left in last place.
Harry received the maximum amount of points for not only returning with his own hostage within the time limit but also for rescuing Gabrielle when she was endangered.
The crowd once again cheered loudly for the Hogwarts champion, who was now firmly in the lead, but Harry felt like he was ready to collapse.
Luna had been the first one over to congratulate him, followed quickly behind by many of his classmates and the rest of the quidditch team. Their words of praise were nice but Harry had trouble focusing on any of them as the group all headed inside and up towards Gryffindor tower.
Luna at least seemed to understand his behavior and she gave him a small hug before going off to her own dormitory. She whispered something to Pansy as she left.
The Gryffindors immediately began to celebrate, while Harry just felt like collapsing.
Still a bit damp and cold, he was able to convince everyone to let him go warm up in the bath before he would feel up to joining them.
Honestly though, he knew that wouldn't be enough.
He did manage to thank Dobby as he and Pansy headed for the bathroom though.
She could tell how overloaded Harry had been by everything that happened that day, so Pansy got the water ready and helped Harry out of his wet clothes before guiding him to sit down in the tub.
As she undressed herself, she saw the look in his eyes was not the playful lust she was used to but a tired desperation.
"Are you alright?" she asked, and his only response was to nod dully. Climbing into the bath in front of him, she was not surprised when his arms immediately wrapped around her and pulled her body tight against his- but she was when she heard him begin to sob.
"It's alright," she cooed, using her own arms to hold onto his. "Everything's alright, Harry. Just let it out, and try to relax."
She felt him nod again and for a couple of minutes Pansy just waited, softly stroking the backs of his hands that had clutched so firmly onto her as if he was afraid that she would slip away. She didn't think this would have affected him so strongly, but then she had been placed into an enchanted sleep so Pansy hadn't even had a chance to worry.
Harry could do nothing but worry. And it had clearly taken a lot out of him.
Once he was somewhat under control again, Harry tried to speak.
"I just- I just can't stand the idea of losing you," he exhaled deeply. "I don't care if the task was supposed to be safe. When I saw you down there, under the water, I lost my mind for a moment. It looked like you were dead, and I nearly had a panic attack. I was ready to go kill Dumbledore. It was like something out of a nightmare.
"But then I found you had a pulse and the world was right again." Harry chuckled mirthlessly to himself for a moment. "I think the headmaster was right."
"About what?"
"He said he feared what I would do if something happened to you, and I don't think I would be sane anymore if you died. I'd probably just start killing people. Trying to go out in a blaze of glory or something."
"Let's just plan on neither of us dying then."
"Okay." Harry sighed. "I don't think I'm in much of a partying mood, but I probably should put in an appearance."
"Luna asked me to send her a message via Dobby when you felt up to being social."
"I should probably thank her for taking care of me at breakfast."
"Oh?"
"I felt like death warmed up. She had two cups of tea waiting for me and was somehow able to get me to force down a couple of pieces of toast."
"You must be hungry then," Pansy snorted. "I am too, now that you mention it. I haven't eaten all day."
"I'm more in the mood for just sleeping," Harry replied.
"Really? I wouldn't think you'd be that tired; it's still the middle of the afternoon."
"I didn't get much sleep last night."
"I'm sorry, Harry."
"It wasn't just the worrying- I'm so used to having you in bed with me that trying to fall asleep, even once I was drowsy, I just couldn't get comfortable. You should be prepared for me to be extra clingy tonight."
"I'm sure I'll be able to handle that."
"You'll have to be my Pansy bear."
"Pansy bear?"
"Like a Teddy bear, you know?"
"No, I don't."
"Oh, um, well it's a really common toy in the muggle world. Sort of like a doll, only an animal, stuffed and fuzzy. They're most commonly for small children. Dudley used to sleep with one. Well, a series of them really, because he tore them up, like everything. Stupid fat bastard."
"I see. We do have stuffed animals like that, but bears aren't particularly popular. Magical creatures are much more common, obviously."
"Obviously," Harry drawled out, and they both began to giggle.
"We can take as long as you need before we go out there."
"Thanks. I'll be good in a couple of minutes, I think. Let me splash some water on my face and get some clean clothes on and I think I'll be at least semi-functional."
"There's our champion!" yelled out one of the Weasley twins as soon as the door opened and the crowd assembled in the Gryffindor tower let out a massive cheer as Harry and Pansy emerged from their quarters.
Normally, Harry would have been at least marginally accepting of everyone coming around to shake his hands, clap him on the back, and whatnot, but that afternoon, he kept a firm hold of Pansy, his arm wrapped tight around her waist. She understood and knew she would have to keep a close eye on him. Once Luna arrived, she could probably help too, but Harry was obviously not at his best.
After a couple of minutes the throng spread back out. Pansy felt something tugging at her arm and looked down to see Dobby pointing over to the entryway of the tower. She nodded in response.
For once, she was actually glad to see Granger. Not that she would have ever admitted it. Pansy steered Harry over to her and whispered in his ear that she was going to go let in their visitor before pushing him towards her. Granger didn't disappoint, grabbing Harry in an enthusiastic hug. He looked distracted enough that Pansy felt like it would be okay to leave him alone for just a minute.
"Thank Merlin you're here," she said as she let Luna inside.
"I take it you need help cheering Harry up? He was not himself this morning without you."
"Exactly. You're the best, Luna."
"Thanks."
The two girls slid through the crowded room until they got in sight of Harry still talking with Hermione, and very quickly the blonde Ravenclaw glomped onto his side, eliciting a smile from him. Pansy exhaled as their best friend once again acted as a tonic to one of his bad moods- it was nearly impossible to stay grumpy with Luna around.
If she was going to get a chance to be social over the next few days, this was going to be it. Pansy knew how Harry would want to spend as much of the weekend as possible, so she might as well take advantage of Luna's presence while she could.
She made her way over towards Parvati and Lavender, who were sitting at a small table together. The way Lavender was giggling while not-so-surreptitiously pointing towards different guys around the room was not surprising, but the fact that she had a piece of parchment and quill in front of her was.
"What are you two ladies up to?"
"I was telling Parvati about a couple of related games, um, muggle games that is," Lavender answered. "One is called fortune teller, which I thought Parvati would like, but parchment is too hard to fold up like paper, so I was going to teach her how to play something similar."
"Want to join us?" Parvati asked. "That is, if you can leave Harry alone long enough."
"Sure. Luna will keep him entertained for awhile." Pansy sat down across from them. "What's this game called?"
"Well, in the States it's called MASH but they call flats apartments over there. So, we'll just call it Manor Flat Shack House," Lavender explained as she wrote those four terms across the top of the parchment in front of her. "Now, you can have different categories, but we'll go fairly simple since there's only three of us playing. There will be four different things, and each of us gives one choice, alright?"
"Okay."
"Parvati's first. So, name a guy you might want to marry."
"Harry," she immediately blurted out.
"Completely shameless, Patil," Pansy smirked.
"How about Anthony Goldstein next," Lavender suggested, letting out a slightly nervous laugh.
"Ugh," Parvati replied. "He'd be better for my sister."
"Well, you get to pick what you really want and the two of us get to pick choices that you wouldn't like as much."
"So, that's how it's played?" Pansy asked with a wicked grin. "Crabbe."
"That's just mean," Parvati groaned.
"You expected something else?" Pansy retorted.
"Fine, what's next Lavender?"
"Next, we give a number of children you might have."
"Okay, I'll say two."
"Then I'll say three. Pansy?"
"Seven." She chuckled at the look of horror on Parvati's face.
"One of us should have chosen a Weasley for her to marry then," Lavender giggled. "Alright, next, we pick what you want to be. Like a career or whatever."
"Hmm, how about a fashion designer," Parvati suggested. "The boring robes most wizards and witches wear are just awful."
"Oh, that would be so fun." Lavender let out a happy squeal. "Let me think...
"I know! It's in the muggle world, but Divination has made me think that it would be pretty easy for a witch to be a fortune-teller. Lots of muggles want to believe in things like that, hoping that some sort of magic can predict their futures."
"Interesting. How do you know so much about muggles, Lavender?" Pansy asked.
"My mother is a muggle born, so I've spent a lot of time in the regular world. My older sister and I grew up around our muggle cousins, and we went to primary school together."
"That makes sense."
"Your turn Pansy."
"Right." She closed her eyes and thought for a moment before a hilariously terrible idea came to mind.
"Harem girl."
Parvati let out a groan while Lavender laughed again.
"With that outfit," the blonde giggled at her blushing friend.
"That's what you get for all the 'Harry's harem' rumors."
"I'd wear it for Harry," Parvati teased back at Pansy's smirk.
Lavender cut in, worried that the other two girls were going to get angry at each other.
"Okay, next thing, I don't know how well the numbers would translate to galleons, so we'll just say the final category will be whether you end up rich, middle class or poor. Now, the last thing we do, I'm going to draw a spiral. Parvati close your eyes and tell me when to stop."
She didn't wait too long, and Lavender then began marking off every eighth option.
"You will have seven kids," Lavender chortled.
"Middle class on wealth."
"You'll be a harem girl..." Much giggling ensued.
"For Crabbe!"
Parvati made retching sounds as Pansy joined Lavender in laughing at their friend's misfortune.
"But at least you'll get to live in a manor," Lavender finished, trying to console Parvati.
"More rooms for me to try to hide from Crabbe, I guess."
Pansy looked across the common room at Harry and Luna who were examining some sort of sweet that the Weasley twins were offering them. A moment later, they both popped them in their mouths and were replaced by two enormous canaries. Several people began laughing as the Harry and Luna birds were tweeting melodiously at each other.
"I'm surprised you're not over there with him," Parvati said.
"He's in good hands with Luna," Pansy replied. "Besides, you probably won't see much of either of us this weekend."
"Lucky bitch," Parvati grumbled.
"You know it," Pansy answered with a smile. "He's being social, taking part in the celebration. That's easier for him without being attached to me for the moment. And for some reason, I enjoy spending time around you."
Lavender let out a nervous giggle at that but Parvati just nodded while throwing an arm over Pansy's shoulders.
"Probably because you know that I'm terrified you would kill me in my sleep if I stepped over the line."
"Yes, well sort of," Pansy answered with a thoughtful look. "You're right in a way, but actually, I would wake you up first so you would know why I was killing you."
Lavender gasped at that but Parvati just snorted.
"I shouldn't have expected anything less. Who wouldn't be ridiculously protective of Harry?"
"It's one of the reasons Luna is a better friend for him than Granger," Pansy added. "Oh, I know Hermione cares about Harry, but I doubt she has the stomach for any real violence."
"But you think Luna does? Really? I just don't see it," Lavender argued.
"You know how all of us can see the thestrals now, right? Well, Luna already could. Her mother died right in front of her. That changes you. I know Luna just seems like this sweet, strange girl, but you have to remember that Harry was the first friend she ever had. Imagine that someone tried to take him away from her and then think what she would be willing to do to stop that from happening."
"I can see that," Parvati agreed. "She is very attached to the two of you. My sister told me how most of Ravenclaw is wary of upsetting her after Harry threatened those girls last year. The prefects keep a closer eye on things now too. Apparently, they had been pretty hands off until last spring. Padma said she saw him telling off one of them last year that same day."
"She got to see Harry getting all angry and protective over Luna?" Pansy raised an eyebrow. "Then I'm surprised that it's only one of you Patil girls wanting to throw yourselves at him."
"Padma and I are different people." Parvati could only shrug. "I probably would have been turned on by it, but she found him intimidating. That sounds like a good thing to me."
"Me too."
"I think this is why I'm not interested in him anymore. You guys are way too serious," Lavender admitted.
"People have tried to kill Harry," Pansy replied. "We have to be serious."
"Ugh, isn't this supposed to be a party?" Lavender complained. "Let's play again, you two can help decide my fate. Just no picking Crabbe, since Parvati's going to marry him."
The three girls all laughed at that as Lavender started writing again on a blank piece of parchment.
"Have fun this afternoon?" Pansy asked later that evening, once they were back in the privacy of their room after dinner.
"More than I thought I would," Harry allowed. "Luna makes it hard to stay upset. The Weasley twins helped out a lot too."
"I saw you talking to them."
"Yeah, they have invented a few different joke items, like those canary creams you probably saw Luna and I eat. For as bad as they do in most of their classes, they are brilliant in a way. It's too bad they had Snape for so many years; from what Slughorn has said, they're some of his best students."
"It's too bad that anyone had to suffer under Snape for any amount of years. The only thing that evil bastard ever taught was that the next generation of Death Eaters could get away with anything because the people in charge were fucking idiots."
"Now that's something we can definitely agree on," Harry chuckled as he started to get undressed. "But let's not talk about any other crap tonight."
"What do you want to do then?" Pansy gave him a saucy little grin, kicking off her shoes. "I could probably think of a couple of things I could do to make you feel better."
"Let's just go to bed. Today has left me completely exhausted."
"Are you sure?"
"For once, I just need to know you're there beside me. I don't feel up to anything fun. Besides, aren't we another day or two away before you're ready for that?"
"Yes, but I could take care of you tonight in other ways."
"I appreciate the thought, but I just feel awful right now." Harry laid down in the bed and a moment later Pansy climbed in next to him. "You know I'll demand we spend most of the weekend making love anyway, right?"
"I was counting on it."
"Then we should probably get plenty of rest so we'll have enough energy."
Pansy sat up enough to lean down over him and initiate a kiss that soon turned into a snog. A desperate, needy snog, with his arms pulling her close.
"I love you, Harry."
It turned out to be a very good thing that he had insisted they go to bed early. Harry woke her in the middle of the night having the most violent nightmare she had seen that wasn't directly tied to the Dark Lord.
She had a good idea what it was about though based on him moaning her name. He didn't even come fully awake, but she held onto him and whispered into his ear, trying to calm him back into a peaceful sleep. It worked after a couple of minutes, but it left Pansy wondering about just how badly Harry had been rattled by the second task. He had been so cool under pressure for everything else she had seen thrown at him before.
She was going to have to keep this knowledge as quiet as possible. Nothing good would come from some Death Eater deciding to go after her and thereby exposing Harry's weakness. It would just lead to him acting reckless, which would be more likely to get him killed.
It reminded her of Sirius in a way. She should probably do more to give him a chance as he and Harry seemed to have a similar vulnerability.
Pansy drifted off back to sleep trying to think of some way to get rid of more Death Eaters before they became a bigger problem.
As predicted, very little was seen of Harry and Pansy that weekend. But there was one thing they did that none of the school gossips would have had any idea about.
"Dobby, are you sure you can do this?"
"Dobby will take care of his family," the little elf insisted.
"I just want to be sure that it will work without any problems," Harry said, trying to clarify things. "I trust you, Dobby, I'm sure you know that by now. But has anyone used a house-elf as a secret keeper before? What if it hurts you or doesn't work?"
"Only one way to find out," Pansy argued. "Dobby says he can handle it, and I believe him, Harry. He wouldn't want to try this if he thought it would leave him unable to take care of us, right Dobby?"
"Right miss Pansy!"
"Okay," Harry said, throwing his hands up. "Forgive me for wanting to be careful.
"Let's make sure we've got everything ready then. You've got the note, be sure to put it away somewhere safe but also somewhere that you can get to it if you need to let one of us in on the secret. Okay?"
"Okay, master Harry!"
"Alright, then let's do this." Harry took a deep breath as he held his wand, focusing on the secret of Rita Skeeter's accidental bloody end in that very room. With only the three of them knowing anything about it, hopefully this would not take too much out of him. It was Saturday night, so he would have all of Sunday to recuperate if necessary, but Harry was looking forward to celebrating getting past the second task a lot more with Pansy that weekend if everything went right.
He took one more deep breath to steady himself then began the incantation and focused on shrinking the secret down and placing it inside his ever trustworthy little friend. The magic left a tangible impression on the very air around them as the spell was cast and a light coalesced in front of Dobby before seeping into him, leaving the room in shadow as Harry finished.
He fell forward onto his knees and gasped for air. Whatever he had just done, Harry felt an enormous drain. It was reminiscent of when he was learning the Patronus spell.
"What happened?"
"I'm not sure," Pansy answered, looking around the sitting room of their quarters. "Dobby, what's going on?"
"Dobby has taken care of his family," the elf replied with evident pride.
"Okay. I feel kind of weak though."
"Master Harry should sit down and rest. Dobby has made tea and it should be almost ready."
"Tea sounds great," Harry said as he slumped down onto the couch. Pansy curled up and coaxed him into laying his head in her lap.
"Dobby, you've done a great job looking after us," Pansy said. "We've been talking about what we could do for you. Something like a gift, but neither of us really knows enough about house-elves to know just what you might really want."
"A gift? Like at Christmas time?"
"Yes, like that. We want to do something special for you," Harry added from the comfort of his girlfriend's lap.
"Dobby has an idea but doesn't want to make work for master Harry."
"That's alright, just tell me what it is."
"Dobby wants a fish."
"A fish?" Harry sat up as the elf had brought over the tea tray and was starting to serve the three of them. "Do you want a fish to eat or like a pet?"
"A pet for Dobby. A fish for Dobby to take care of," he added in a hopeful voice.
Harry looked at Pansy and they both smiled. This was something about the little guy that they at least kind of understood.
"I like that idea, Dobby. Why don't we all pop back to the flat tomorrow? The muggle world has all sorts of pet stores, and we should be able to find everything you would need for a pet fish and something to keep him in."
"We could even get two fish," Pansy suggested. "If you want Dobby, we could get a male and female fish of the same type, and then they might have a little fish family for you to take care of."
"Miss Pansy is the greatest witch in the world!"