A Day in Hogsmeade

Fleur walked through the quaint mountain village that had formed up on the outskirts of Beauxbatons over a century earlier, feeling a wave of nostalgia about the weekends she'd spent here with friends when she was a student. She had to pull herself back from entering the delightful sweets shop. She could not find fondant au chocolat like that anywhere in England, and she missed it. But this was not a day for her to indulge her sweet tooth. She'd traveled here for a reason.

She ignored the villagers and Beauxbatons students who attempted to call out to her and made her way into the charming cafe where she and Gabrielle had agreed to meet. She saw Gabrielle sitting at a table with three other girls and chatting animatedly. Her sister's face lit up and her eyes got bright whenever she was in the middle of telling a story, and Fleur smiled to see it. Gabrielle had turned into quite a loner as her veela heritage hit her with both its positives and its negatives, but she'd really bloomed over the last several months. Fleur knew that her ongoing correspondence with Harry had a great deal to do with that.

Fleur's smile dimmed slightly as she thought about what she was here to do, which was break the news to her smitten little sister that Harry now had a girlfriend--two girlfriends, actually, at least as of the last time she spoke to him. He'd met her as she'd requested, but nothing sexual had happened this time. He'd come out right at the beginning to tell her he was dating someone, and he would not be unfaithful. Fleur had handled it with as much grace as she could summon, but the disappointment and regret on her part had been bitter.

If only she'd put more research into Harry's situation, or more importantly the inheritance laws in England. Had she known that Harry could take and was in fact expected to take more than one wife due to his responsibilities as the heir of more than one old house, there would have been no need for her to keep him at arm's length and reject him when he wanted to leave their friends with benefits arrangement behind and start an actual relationship with her.

She could have been honest about wanting him, instead of wasting her time on William Weasley. She could have said yes and started dating him, and when the time came it would have been easy to bring Gabrielle into it. But she hadn't known; she'd thought he would only be able to have one woman in his life officially, and she'd held herself back so that woman could be Gabrielle. But she hadn't known, so she'd turned him down when he wanted to date her, and that had opened the door and allowed others to swoop in and snag Harry for themselves before she could set him up with Gabrielle. Her sister was going to be so disappointed!

Gabrielle noticed her, and her cheerful smile only got bigger. Her younger sister waved at her, said something to her group of friends and then got up to meet Fleur.

"Sister!" Gabrielle said in French when she got close. "It is so good to see you!"

Fleur wrapped her arms around her little sister and pulled her into a hug. "Not nearly as good as it is to see you, Gabby." She was happy just to hug her sister again, but after a moment Gabrielle broke away and nodded at an empty table in the back corner of the cafe. Fleur nodded and followed her over. This was a conversation for just the two of them. She pulled out her wand and cast some spells after they sat down to make sure they would not be overheard.

They started with small talk, Gabrielle talking about her year and the friends she'd made recently, and Fleur answering questions about life in England working for Gringotts. It was pleasant to catch up with her sister, and wonderful to see the strides she'd made over the last several months, but Fleur knew she needed to share the unfortunate news with her. She could only hope that it wouldn't undo all of the progress Gabrielle had been making recently in coming out of her shell.

"I have some news about Harry to share with you, Gabrielle," she said reluctantly. "I'm afraid you're not going to like it."

"Is it about him having not just one girlfriend, but two of them?" Gabrielle asked before she could continue, stunning Fleur. "Because if that's it, I already know about that. Harry and I write to each other a lot, so it came up." Fleur was surprised. It wasn't Harry telling her that was the surprise, but how Gabrielle was responding to it. She'd said it casually, and she didn't appear angry about it at all.

"You seem to be taking this rather well," Fleur said. "I was expecting you to be furious."

"Oh, I am," Gabrielle said, though her voice didn't rise. "You know how big a crush I already had on him, and then I got to know him better through our letters and fell for him even more. Hearing some other witch got to him first had me really depressed at first. But eventually I decided that it was no reason for me to give up. I think I can still win him over."

"He definitely isn't going to cheat," Fleur said, wanting her sister to know what she was up against. Just about any other wizard probably would have been powerless to resist an interested veela no matter whether they were in a relationship or not, but that just wasn't who Harry was.

"It won't be a problem, Fleur," Gabrielle said confidently. Fleur didn't know where she was getting this confidence from, but it was better than her sulking or being angry about it so she decided not to question it. "Have you thought any more about letting me stay with you over the summer?"

"Yes, I have," Fleur said. She hadn't been sure about it at first, but she'd warmed up to the idea. "I'm willing to have you over, and I convinced our parents to allow it, but there are some rules you're going to need to agree to first."

Fleur would have gone on to explain said rules right then, but Gabrielle was too quick for her. She leaned across the table to hug Fleur, and thanked her enthusiastically several times. Fleur smiled and patted her back, ignoring the whispers and stares while she waited for her sister to calm down. Once she had, Fleur continued.

"If you're going to stay in England with me you need to carry an emergency portkey with you at all times, and you also can't go anywhere without either me or a trusted guardian," Fleur said. Gabrielle just nodded.

"That's fine," she said. "I'm not going to England to go see the sights."

"Yes, I'm well aware of why you want to come stay with me so badly, and it has very little to do with me or the sights," Fleur said with a smile. Obviously there was one particular person Gabrielle wanted to be physically closer to, and it was for him that she would make the trip. "I will speak with Harry's guardian about letting you stay over with them a few times during the summer."

That set off a fresh round of thank yous from Gabrielle before her younger sister sat back and nodded, looking determined. "That will help a lot. I need to spend as much time around him and his new girlfriends as possible this summer."

"You want them around too?" Fleur said, surprised. She would've expected Gabrielle to want to get him as far away from the other witches in his life as she could.

"Of course!" Gabrielle said. "As you said, Harry is no cheater, and I also have no intention of trying to sabotage his relationships with them. I want him to be happy."

"Even if that means he's happy with someone other than you?" Fleur pressed.

"I'm not going to let it come to that," Gabrielle said, showing the same confidence as before. "I need to get on friendly terms with them, and show them I'm not a threat to what they already have with him. If he winds up breaking up with them on his own I won't be upset about it, but I can't expect that or count on it. If they're in his life to stay, I just need to convince them that adding me into the relationship won't be a problem."

"So instead of trying to prove your superiority so you can claim him for yourself, you'll try to befriend them," Fleur said thoughtfully. It was not the way a veela would have ordinarily handled a situation like this, as they were quite territorial and possessive creatures by nature, but in this case Fleur thought it probably had a better chance of working.

"Yes," Gabrielle said. "There's no need to fight over Harry. I'll just show them that we can all share him. We can all be friends." She shrugged. "If friendship isn't enough and I need to seduce not just Harry but them as well, I'll do that too. But either way, winning Harry over is what I'm coming to England for."

"I see you've thought this through," Fleur said, nodding in approval. "I'll be more than happy to help you in the seduction as well, as long as I can join in--and as long as you're sure you want to share him with the two other girls."

"As long as they aren't horrible bitches, I'm willing to share him rather than try to steal him for my own," Gabrielle said. "Now let's go! As thanks for letting me stay with you, I'll treat you to some fondant au chocolat!"

--

Harry walked into the Hog's Head arm in arm with Tracey, using his other arm to carry some of the things she'd bought while he accompanied her around Hogsmeade. He didn't think he'd ever been more grateful for shrinking charms.

Daphne had unfortunately had some sort of pressing Greengrass family matter to deal with, so she had stayed behind in the castle. Harry missed her company, but it had still been a great day for him. One of the many benefits of having two girlfriends was that he rarely ever felt alone these days.

"There he is," Harry said, nodding towards a table near the wall where his godfather was waiting for them. Sirius grinned as they approached, and shook Tracey's hand after Harry introduced the two of them.

"You didn't tell me your girlfriend was so lovely, Harry," he said. "How'd you convince her to go out with you? Blackmail?"

"We asked him, actually," Tracey corrected. Sirius shook his head and chuckled.

"Your father had to chase after Lily for about six years before she finally gave him the time of day," Sirius said. "You've got gorgeous girls coming after you instead. If James is watching on, I wonder if he's proud or jealous at being one-upped."

--

Harry did his best to pay attention to what Susan Bones was saying; really he did. But Tracey was making maintaining a polite conversation all but impossible for him. How was he supposed to even pretend like he was paying attention to Susan's story about the shoving match between Zacharias Smith and Michael Corner when Tracey's hand was rubbing his dick underneath the table?

Sirius had said his goodbyes earlier, but before long a big group of students from Harry's tutoring group walked in together, and they'd invited them over. It had been light and joking, and the Slytherin Tracey had put up with it and even participated slightly at first, but after a few minutes she'd gotten bored. Bored Tracey had turned into frisky Tracey, and frisky Tracey was threatening to turn Harry into a drooling idiot.

"Corner really said all of that because of a lost sock?" Tracey said suddenly, her voice loud enough to cut through his distraction. "That's hilarious! Isn't it, Harry?" Harry jerked to attention, realized a few members of their group were looking at him strangely and chuckled awkwardly.

"Uh, yeah!" he said. He had no clue what happened to Michael's sock or what he'd said as a result, but he wasn't about to admit to the group that Susan's story had gone in one ear and out the other because Tracey's hand had been rubbing his cock through his trousers. It hadn't stopped rubbing, in fact. Even now she was stroking him, and she turned her head so only he could see and gave him a knowing wink.

"We should probably leave so I can finish what I started," she whispered, giving his cock a little squeeze for emphasis. He had to fight not to groan out loud.

"Sorry, guys, but I think all the candy I ate earlier is getting to me," Harry said. It was a flimsy excuse, but it was the best he could come up with right now with all of the blood rushing to his groin instead of his brain. "I think I'd better head back."

"Good idea," Tracey said. "I'll come with you." She got up and slid in front of him smoothly, which blocked any of his friends from seeing his cock tenting his trousers as he stood up.

Harry paid their bill with Aberforth and said their goodbyes before making their way out of the pub. Harry was eager to get her back to the castle so that he could give her the hard shag they clearly both wanted, but Tracey wasn't in the mood to wait. They didn't even make it very far away from the Hog's Head before she tugged on his hand and pulled him into a back alleyway.

"I can't wait," she said, and to Harry's amazement and arousal she reached underneath her skirt, tugged her knickers down her legs and put them aside. "Fuck me right here."

It was hot, but it was also insanely risky. Tracey solved that problem without him even needing to bring it up though. She pulled her wand out and cast a couple of spells around the perimeter of the alley, and he recognized them as spells that would grant them the privacy they needed. Sound from the world around them was cut off, and no one would be coming down this particular alley (not that it was a widely visited area to begin with.)

Harry shrugged. There was really no reason for him to refuse now, and he was already horny as hell thanks to her teasing. He tugged his own trousers and underwear down while she turned around to put her back to him and put her hands against the wall of the building to brace herself.

"Give it to me now," she said, and she moaned as soon as his cock was out and he pressed it against her. "I don't want any foreplay." She flipped her skirt up and flashed her bare arse at him. "I need you, Harry."

Apparently their date around the village and the teasing she'd just given him had excited her as much as it had him, because she was just as ready to go as he was. Harry nodded. He considered foreplay anything but a chore, and he loved listening to a woman moan and scream as he used his mouth and fingers on them. But much like Tracey, he was ready to go straight to the business of fucking her. He put a hand on her hip while guiding himself into her, and then he slammed forward.

He went at it pretty slow to start, despite their mutual impatience, but this was just so Harry could admire the sight of her arse shaking from his thrusts for a bit before he began to put even more force behind his hips. Tracey whined and wiggled her hips impatiently.

"Harder," she begged.

"You got it," he said, nodding. It wasn't like plunging into her faster was any great pain for him. He picked up speed and now got to enjoy the sound of his hips smacking against her arse, not to mention how she moaned in response to it. He fucked her at a pretty solid pace, though admittedly it wasn't quite approaching his full potential. It wasn't the sort of demanding snap from his hips that he would usually set when he fucked Pansy, for instance. Tracey wasn't quite used to that sort of aggression yet, and he didn't want to hurt her. Maybe they would get there one day, but for now he was plenty happy just to give his beautiful redheaded girlfriend a solid shag in a little-used back alley in Hogsmeade.

Even with the quick fuck and the lack of foreplay, Harry didn't want his fun to be over too quickly. He exercised restraint and held himself back to prolong the fuck for as long as he could, though this became a much greater challenge when Tracey screeched and tightened around him in orgasm. He very nearly lost it then and there, but after taking an instinctive look around and confirming that Tracey's spellwork had held up and prevented her loud cries from reaching any ears but his, he focused on himself.

"Fucking hell, that was a big one," Tracey gasped. "Shagging in public is even hotter than I thought it would be." Harry could see that her legs were straining and she was struggling to remain upright, which made him think that a change of position was in order. She didn't need to worry about standing tall, because he was going to do all of the work for her.

He pulled out of her only long enough for him to spin her around to face him, lift her into his arms and pin her against the wall. Then he slid his cock back inside and went right back to fucking her. Tracey moaned, getting back into the mood quickly as he shagged her and did all of the work. With him supporting her weight she clung to him with her arms and legs and just let go and enjoyed the fuck.

"Yes, Harry!" she groaned. "Yes, yes, yes! Keep going, keep going!"

As if he needed to be told to do that! Harry kept her pinned against the wall and snapped his hips against her even harder. It still wasn't quite at the level Pansy had grown used to, but it wasn't too far off of that lofty mark. Harry wasn't thinking too much about Tracey's comfort now as he shagged her up against the wall, nor was he all that concerned with her pleasure at the moment. Now he was being selfish and focusing on himself; focusing on the pleasure welling up inside of him. Their date had been fun, and her teasing had gotten him all worked up and ready to unload on her.

He'd barely held on through her orgasm, and he could tell that he wasn't going to be able to hold back for too much longer, nor did he really want to. There would be time to fuck her for longer the next time they were alone in the castle; maybe that would even be tonight after they got back and had dinner. This fuck in the alley of Hogsmeade didn't need to stretch on. It just needed to be enjoyable for them both in the moment, and the sound of Tracey moaning right next to his ear as he fucked her told him that she was right there with him in how much satisfaction she was getting from this.

"Again!" Tracey screamed. Again!" She squeezed him tighter with her arms and legs, and she shook her way through a second orgasm. With how worked up he was Harry couldn't have held on through that even if he'd wanted to, but he felt no guilt in giving in. He'd lasted long enough to make her cum twice, so he doubted there would be any complaints from her as he speared into her one final time and began to cum inside of her. Sure enough, he could see her smile when she felt him finish.

Harry didn't leave Tracey pinned against the building for long after he finished. He soon pulled out of her and put her back down on her feet. Her legs were still shaky, and she stumbled as she tried to take her first steps away from the wall, but Harry caught her and held her steady.

"My hero," she said with a smirk. After a few seconds she nodded. "Okay, I'm good now." He let her go, although he remained on alert just in case she needed his help again. But she was able to support herself now, so as she cleaned herself up he focused on doing the same for himself. He got his trousers down again around the time that Tracey picked up her underwear and slid it back into place again.

"This was a fun day out with you," Tracey said. "I know Daphne wanted to be here, but I'll be honest and say that I didn't mind having you to myself for the day, as much as I love my sister."

"It was a great day," he agreed, leaning in and giving her a kiss. He certainly wouldn't have been upset to have Daphne with them, but that didn't mean it wasn't nice to spend some time with Tracey alone too.

"At least I picked up a little treat at Honeydukes to give her when we get back," Tracey said as she waved her wand around and undid the charms that had shut them off from the world around them.

They were immediately met with the sounds of screams coming from the village.

The contented smile fled from Tracey's face as the sounds registered, but Harry was already reacting before her expression had even changed. Years of training kicked in like they were second nature, and his wand was at the ready, curses and hexes at the tip of his tongue while his eyes darted around. There was nothing to be seen from back here though; whatever was going on had not reached this little back alley near the Hog's Head.

"Keep your wand out and stay behind me," Harry barked at Tracey as he slowly stepped forward.

"Right," she said. Her voice sounded a little shaky, but to her credit her wand arm was steady and her eyes were clear when he spared a glance behind him to check on her.

They stepped out from the alleyway to see that the village was under attack from the Death Eaters, and a fairly large group of them by the looks of it. If Harry had been alone he would likely have directed his spellfire straight into the largest group of them and focused on thinning their ranks immediately, but his top priority right now wasn't fighting the Death Eaters. He had Tracey with him, and getting her somewhere safe took precedence. Plus this was a Hogsmeade weekend; this wasn't like last time, where it had been just him and Professor Flitwick there. There were many students scattered throughout the village, and he needed to think of how best to protect as many of them as he could. Fortunately he hadn't seen any sign of Voldemort himself, at least not yet.

"Let's go back to the Hog's Head," he said. It was still close, and there had also been a good number of students there when they'd left. "Stick close behind me, and keep your wand ready just in case."

"Okay!" Tracey said loudly.

They ran for the pub they'd only recently left. There weren't many Death Eaters between them and their destination, and the few who took notice of them were easily dispatched by Harry. He moved into the pub, remaining in front of Tracey and ready to protect her if necessary.

His eyes took quick stock of the situation inside the inn. There were no students immediately visible in the inn and he didn't allow himself to think about what that might mean. There were more immediately pressing things to deal with anyway, because a group of Death Eaters were already inside. They were levitating a bound Aberforth in the air, taunting him. Three Death Eaters were down and not moving, so the elderly barman had apparently not been subdued without a fight.

Harry's eyes had taken all of this in within the span of a few seconds, but it was not enough time for him to stop what happened next.

"Avada Kedavra!" a familiar female voice spat. The green light hit Aberforth the barman, and the light left his eyes instantly.

Even as he cursed himself for being just seconds too late, Harry went on the attack. The element of surprise allowed him to take all of the surrounding Death Eaters down without a fight, and then he glared at the woman who had just murdered the barman. He stunned and then bound her, but turned away from the revolting face of Dolores Umbridge for now. Both she and Fudge would have hard questions to answer later, but there were more pressing things to deal with right now.

"Let's go check the pub area," he said to Tracey. Her face was white; this was surely the first murder she'd ever seen. But she nodded and followed behind him as he walked towards the other section of the Hog's Head.

Harry heard a shriek from that section, and he walked faster. He couldn't afford to rush in headlong into the unknown, but he couldn't be overly cautious either.

"Oi, you're gonna pay for hurting my friend, bitch!" a gruff male voice said. A nonverbal curse must have followed, because he heard a high-pitched grunt and the thump of a body hitting the floor. His eyes narrowed as he reached the scene.

There was one Death Eater down on the ground already, and a student on the floor as well not far from them, but he dismissed both from his mind for the moment. A group of five Death Eaters were surrounding a cluster of female Hogwarts students, and several familiar faces were among them, including Susan and Padma from his group earlier, as well as Daphne's younger sister Astoria. Another three Death Eaters had their wands pointed at the males on the other side. Their spacing made things trickier for Harry, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle. He went for the largest group first, and was able to take four of the five out with one wide-area attack. The fifth had been too awkwardly placed for that, but Harry still caught him with a stunner before he could really react.

There wasn't as much luck when it came to the three other Death Eaters, but Harry was ready for them. He put up a shield to protect himself and Tracey from their spellfire, and without him giving any direction she took it upon herself to fire a disarming spell at one of them. It didn't work, but it served to distract the target enough that Harry was able to lock the male Death Eater's legs together and make him fall flat on his face. He was knocked unconscious by the impact of his head on the floor.

That left just two rank and file Death Eaters for Harry to deal with, and even with Tracey and the other students to worry about that was still child's play for him. He dispatched them both in short order, tied them all up and then turned his attention to the students that had been trapped in here with them.

His first priority was checking on the student he'd seen on the ground when he came in, and his eyes widened when he realized it was Pansy who was down and not moving. She was just about the last person he would have expected to attack one of the Death Eaters, which seemed to have been what happened based on what he'd heard one of them say just before he got there.

This wasn't the time to worry about how Pansy had gotten caught up in all of this though; her health was all that mattered. He winced when he saw the way her arm was twisted awkwardly. It was probably broken. She was still breathing though, and he didn't see any blood, so that much was good at least. She was probably in considerable pain, but there was nothing to suggest her life was in imminent danger.

It would be up to someone else to actually diagnose and heal her. That wasn't Harry's specialty. But before anyone could help her, or anyone else here for that matter, they would need to be protected. This was something Harry could do, for Pansy, for Tracey and for everyone else who had been trapped in the Hog's Head by the Death Eaters.

"Is anyone hurt?" Harry asked, doing a quick scan of the male and female students who had been split by gender. There were frightened faces, and more than one person had tear tracks on their cheeks, but no one spoke up or nodded their heads. Other than Pansy, no one seemed to have any injuries to speak of. That probably wouldn't have remained the case if it had taken Harry much longer to get there, though he knew that when he had time to reflect later he would be more focused on being too late to help Aberforth. That would come later though. Analyzing his reactions and decisions would wait until after the battle; until after he'd gotten everyone back to the castle safely.

"I want all of you to hide in the bathrooms," he said, taking command of the situation. With Aberforth dead, it was up to him to lead. Many of the students were in his tutoring group, and even those who weren't were willing to follow his lead now after watching him come to their aid. Rather than making a break for the exit like they might have otherwise, they all did as he told them and headed for the bathroom. Only Tracey remained behind, looking like she wanted to offer to help him.

"You too, Tracey," he said. She shook her head, but he wasn't in the mood to discuss this with her. "Trust me. I'll be able to fight more effectively if I don't have to worry about protecting anyone." She still looked like she wanted to stick around, but he cut her off. "Please. I need you to get Pansy to safety. Levitate her with you, please. And be careful--we don't know how badly she's hurt."

Looking over at Pansy seemed to get through to Tracey, who nodded. "Okay, Harry. I'll take her with me. Just be careful, okay?"

"I will," he said. "I'm not going to go rushing off into danger if I can help it." He actually meant it. As much as he would have been itching to take the fight directly to the Death Eaters in different circumstances, he needed to stay here and defend the students in the Hog's Head in case any more Death Eaters showed up.

Tracey levitated Pansy slowly and carefully with her as she followed the others into the bathroom, and Harry went and took up a defensive position by the front door of the inn, preparing to launch an onslaught of spells at any Death Eaters who dared to poke their heads in.

A few minutes passed without any disturbances, and Harry began to second-guess himself. This was the kind of decision he'd been taught to make in cases where it was up to him to protect others, but as Dumbledore was fond of saying, no two situations were exactly alike and so he needed to also be able to react, adapt and trust his judgment. Had he acted too conservatively? Should he have put some defensive protections on the door and then left to go see if anyone else in the village needed help?

After a few more minutes another wave of Death Eaters turned up, showing him that he'd done the right thing after all. There were eight of them in total this time, though he eliminated four right away with a wide-range electricity curse he and Sirius had worked on over Christmas break. The other four reacted quickly and took up a defensive position, which indicated him that these were some of Voldemort's more seasoned fighters. They knew how to fight, and they clearly knew Harry was well-trained too as they weren't underestimating him.

It was a good thing for him that the other students were already out of the way before this group turned up, because it meant he was free to fight without restriction or restraint. He could dodge spellfire without needing to worry about it hitting any bystanders, and that left him free to return fire quickly. He weaved through cover, created shields when necessary and fired spells at random intervals, wanting to constantly keep them guessing. He dropped one man by levitating a chair and dropping it down onto his head with considerable force just before he could cast a spell, and the man next to him was surprised enough by that for Harry to blast him across the room.

A female voice yelped in pain when a mild but fast stinging hex made it past her shield to connect with her wand hand, and after that she was easy prey for a stunner. That left just one Death Eater to deal with, and Harry decided he wanted to keep this one awake and alert enough to interrogate. He fended off the man's desperate attacks, then disarmed him and bound his arms and legs together. The Death Eater tried to crawl away, but he could not make his body move with any speed. Harry didn't waste time playing with him. For all he knew there could be other Death Eaters showing up again any second, so there was no time to waste.

"You're not going anywhere," he said, pointing his wand at the robed figure. He removed the man's mask, but he did not recognize the scarred face. "Tell me why you attacked Hogsmeade. What did you come here for? Did your master send you here for me?"

The man chuckled. "No, Potter, we weren't here for you. We actually already did what we were sent here to do." That made Harry frown. "Shame you showed up here though. I was looking forward to coming here after a fun time terrorizing the village and having some fun with the witches the other boys rounded up. There's nothing like a tight young Hogwarts witch."

Harry glared down at the man, picturing Tracey, Susan, Astoria, Pansy and all the other witches currently hiding in the bathroom. Thank Merlin he'd followed Dumbledore's lessons and stayed here rather than going out and searching for a fight. "You'll never get near any of them, now or ever," he promised.

He was just about to interrogate the man further on what their apparently successful mission had been, how many more of them were in the village and whether or not Voldemort was there personally (he doubted it very seriously, but it never hurt to be thorough.) Before he could do that, though, there were more arrivals in the Hog's Head. Harry relaxed slightly when he saw Dumbledore walk in, along with several people in auror's robes, but he didn't put his wand away. For all he knew the fight was still raging and he would need to charge out to back them up.

"Ah, Harry!" Dumbledore said, smiling when he saw him. "I trust that you were here protecting your fellow students?"

"Yes, sir," he said, nodding. "I had them hide in the bathroom."

"Excellent decision," Dumbledore said, smiling even more broadly, and earning his mentor's praise made Harry smile too. But then Dumbledore looked past him and noticed Aberforth the barman, his body still where it had been when Umbridge hit him with the killing curse.

Dumbledore's eyes closed, and Harry was startled to see tears trickle down his cheeks.