17 ch 17

I walked into the third corridor, late to the first 'real' meeting of the now named 'DA'. It was not intentionally, in fact, I made it a point to always be on time, which for me usually meant fifteen minutes early.

My rising anxiety for Harry made for a terrible time finishing homework. While the finished product took up a lot of my time, and didn't meet my usual standard, it was more than good enough for a good mark.

I stepped into the same room that housed Fluffy in my first year to see much much fewer people than I expected. All of them were in my year and a few from the year above us. I even spied Blaise listening attentively, although he was without his normal companions.

It makes sense that not all of them would make it to the first meeting. The word will spread and then more will come. I thought looking around the room.

One face peeked out of the crown and noticed my arrival, his had obviously been expecting me. I couldn't remember if he was in the first meeting or not. Theodore Nott has a forgettable face.

Harry had already taken charge and was holding a shield spell in the air in front of him.

"Let me say it again, intent. Practice the wand movements and pronunciation all you want, but what really matters is that you want to protect yourself, or your target." His eyes flicked to mine as he continued. "Split up into pairs, one attacking, one defending."

Everyone starting pairing up like he asked but most were spending time talking and not casting.

Lack of motivation. I remarked to myself watching the scene passively.

"Need a partner, Weasley?" I heard someone ask to my right and I berated myself at being caught off guard.

"I've already mastered the spell, I'm mainly here to help." I retorted looking at Theodore as he stood apart from me.

"Good, you can help me then." He bit back quickly.

I gave him a smirk and nodded my head in acceptance. "I want to see how it's done first." He spoke but instantly I knew the purpose of this switch in roles.

He's going to test me? To see if I really can protect him. My mind told me as I saw through the lame excuse.

I nodded my head once again in acceptance. "Of course."

My wand found its way into my hand and I tried to remember the last time that I consciously completed the act. It's become like breathing, I don't even think about it anymore.

My wand spun in my hand as I manipulated it with my fingers, deciding to show off. His wand rose and my magic reacted.

A bright silver flooded the room as my shield materialized, all while I kept my wand twirling in my hand. There were two reasons why I did this. One: to show off. Two: to make a point.

Intent is everything.

A red light impacted my shield and dissipated against it weakly. I let the shield drop, thinking he was done and would want to swap roles. I was wrong.

His wand moved again and I vaguely recognized the beginning wand movement as something that could mean a broken bone or boiling blood.

Two students behind me. I recognized as my brain went into overdrive and quickly discarded dodging the spell.

The spell approached and my wand rose accordingly as I batted the spell into the ceiling and retaliated.

A spell chain rattled off of the end of my wand and for the first time in my short dueling career, my opponent didn't drop. Instead his own shield rose up and rang with three consecutive gongs that could be heard throughout the room.

I quit casting, expecting the duel to be over, in arrogance. Nott had a wicked smile on his face as he began his own spell chain. Every spell was just as dangerous as the one that started this little impromptu duel.

My shield sprang up once again as I moved to my right and closer to him, to close the distance and increase the pace of the duel. His first two spells impacted and were once again absorbed.

I decided enough was enough and my shield dropped as the third spell came. In a display of skill, I deflected the spell back towards his direction. To his credit, he canceled it before it could get close to him but it did distract him enough to give me time to go on the offensive.

A spell that's sole purpose was to burst the ear drums lept from my wand. There was no light to indicate it's trajectory, instead it was a burst of localized sound, directed by the caster. Next I sent a wave of pure force, meant to knock the person over or throw them across the room, depending on the intent. I quickly closed the remaining distance between us knowing it would connect.

He was blown back and landed with a hard thud. He lifted his head up and froze. His smile was gone, mainly because his neck had an ethereal knife extending from the tip of my wand resting on it.

No one moved and I realized without looking that there was no other noise in the room. Everyone had been watching the duel no doubt.

"Had enough?" I asked and immediately realized my mistake.

He smiled the same smile in response and pointed to his ears, where blood leaked down them and onto his neck.

I didn't know what to do, my method of communication thrown out the door. Luckily he decided that we were done with our little demonstration. His hands rose in the universal sign of surrender.

My eyes narrowed and went to his wand. His smile got even wider as he sheathed it in the now visible wand holster on his right hand.

I responded in kind and my wand dropped, canceling my spell as it did. My eyes never left his as he stood up and brushed himself off. He didn't bother saying anything, instead he just turned around and walked out into the hall, on the way to Madam Pomfrey.

What the fuck? I wondered as I watched him leave.

"Well then, a great example of the shield charm." I heard Harry quip behind me. "And an even better duel."

I turned to the rest of the room and was met with looks of mainly awe and respect, with a little confusion mixed in.

I still didn't know what to say, still a little shaken at the spells he threw around in a classroom full of children.

He's lucky I didn't kill him. I thought going back through the duel and realizing a few things. He cast silently, he mastered the shield spell, and it was all a test. His shield spell was a little under my own mastery but it did the job.

"Right, get back to practicing." Harry rang out to the room and walked over to me. "You alright mate?" He asked nonchalantly.

"Yea, just a bit shaken up." I responded. "Did you see the spells he threw around?" I asked back to him.

"No, to tell the truth I missed all but the back half of it. Looked like you had it under control." He shrugged his shoulders as he answered.

That makes sense I guess. I looked down and my hands were shaking as the adrenaline left my system.

"Still on for tomorrow?" I asked him as I clenched my fist.

"Yea, my place or yours?" He asked wondering if we would meet in the ROR or the Chamber of Secrets.

"Mine."

I sat behind the desk that normally occupied my study room in the Room of Requirement, reading the seventh year transfiguration material. More like my eyes were glued to the surface of the pages but my mind was elsewhere.

I am patiently waiting for Harry to get finished with his homework so that we could finally start legilimency on each other. A part of me is excited to clear his name in my head, to stop thinking of him as possessed by Voldemort. The other part is terrified that I am right and the same thing that happened to Ginny three years ago is happening to him.

It was the only thing that I pondered since my conversation with Dumbledore two days ago, and it is driving me insane.

I need answers. I convinced myself.

Luckily I didn't have to wait any more as I heard a knock on the door that I was intentionally keeping materialized at the front of the room. It opened at my command as I stood up from behind the desk and walked to meet him in the center of the room.

"Finish?" I asked him.

"Yea, wasn't that hard. Thanks for letting me see yours." Harry answered as he strutted in and met me in the middle of the room.

Dramatically the room shifted to a new room that I have been using to practice the more advanced spells. The walls and ceiling are covered with massive windows with very thin frames. It shows the world how it would if the room sat at the very top of Hogwarts, which wasn't inaccurate considering its location on the seventh floor.

Currently the sun had just finished setting but still cast rays of light over the sky. The grounds showed still pastures leading up to the black lake. The quidditch pitch stood proudly off to one side and the forbidden forest was just as looming from up here as it was from the ground.

Harry whistled appreciatively. "All this for me?" He asked.

"I've become a bit dramatic recently." I joked back to him.

Two chairs appeared across from each other, both looked sturdy and comfortable and felt the same way as I sat down.

"Who wants to go first?" I asked.

"I think I will, I am not as good as I want to be for Occlumency. I think this might give me a better understanding of it if I know how it's opposite." He reasoned to me.

A fair idea, and one I thought also. I agreed internally.

I nodded to him and prepared myself by clearing my mind and using the techniques in Gellert Grindelwald book. It came to me quickly from months of practice.

Harry wasted no time and drew his wand, we both agreed to understand the basics of the spell before we arrived to save time. I had yet to cast the spell but I am confident in my abilities, as is Harry.

"Legilimens." Harry intoned as his wand flicked.

Flashes of our first year appeared on the forefront of my mind but I didn't bite the bait, knowing that he dangled that particular memory in front of me to get a reaction out of me. He had obviously been thinking about how to succeed at the spell

I felt the probe disappear. "Yes I have." Harry answered.

He succeeded in reading my mind. I berated myself realizing I let my thoughts go at the end of the attack.

"It's the most common way of getting people to think about what you want, throw in a memory to trigger their own." Harry explained as if I didn't know.

"Yea, yea, you got me. Again?"

And so we tried over and over again until I started to get a headache from the mental exhaustion. Eventually the chairs had changed into much more comfortable chairs in response to our desires.

Harry never looked for any personal information, which I was happy about. If he really tried he could have found the memory of his mind ritual and that would have opened up a whole other can of worms. Nor did he dig past the person he knew me as. If he would have been able to get to the knowledge of my 'merge' and past personality ...well that wouldn't be good.

I quickly caught onto the feelings and state of mind required to completely repel him. We went for a while where I had a string of victories in defending myself from him.

Then Harry started to show an extreme talent in the offensive side of the mind arts and he stopped casting with words and then eventually he stopped flicking his wand. It hung by his side as he cast and I knew that he was still channeling magic through it even if it wasn't pointed at me.

But still, it's impressive. I told myself as my own wand leapt into my hand. I instantly became nervous.

What if it's some twisted version of Voldemort? I thought as I looked into the emerald green eyes of my best friend. My mind tortured itself with anxiety for a moment before I reeled in my emotions with the advancements I had made in Occlumency tonight.

I steeled myself for my task. I didn't bother with pronunciation and my wand flicked as I made my will known to the world.

It was a very weird experience being in someone else's head, experiencing their feelings and seeing what they see. It wasn't like reading at all, as it is commonly described.

I broke the connection after I successfully got him to think about Hermione. That also brought feelings that I doubted were purely sibling like in nature, if the embarrassment and lust were to be believed.

"That was cruel." Harry said and I could feel the embarrassment rolling out of him. "I never poked around about Fleur." His tone turned sharper and I immediately felt bad for disrespecting his privacy.

Won't be the last time. I told myself as I planned for the best way to check for any abnormalities. How would you even do such a thing?

The answer came to me and I cast the spell again, his mind was blank and nothing came through. This time sending him pictures of himself to see if he had a reaction to his old scrawny appearance.

Emotion poked through but it wasn't shame or dislike. Instead it was pride at what he has become, and a bit of pity at his old weakness, before...me?

I broke the connection again and tried to process what just happened.

He idolizes me? I wondered confusedly to myself.

I looked to where he sat on his chair. "Not pulling any punches are you?" He spoke up once he got his bearing back.

"You need this more than I do." I told him and I knew I was right. "This might stop the nightmares." I continued.

He made to speak again before deciding against it and nodded. I latched onto it and flicked my wand at him again without any warning.

His mind was once again blank and I could feel it was more stable than the last two times. In fact, he's catching on rapidly. I told myself.

I sent him images of himself at night, rolling around in the dorms covered in sweat in a nightmare. That got a huge reaction out of him.

Disgust welled up in him and suddenly a single picture of a woman, dressed like a muggle appeared. She had red hair pulled up into a ponytail and her face was beautiful. She was also naked, chained spread eagle on a table. Blood marred her most private places and bruises covered her body. Her eyes were lifeless and looked towards the ceiling.

Suddenly a haunting laugh echoed through our minds and the connection broke.

I pointed my wand at him immediately and I expected him to do the same. Instead I found him with his head in his hands as he clutched his hair.

"Bloody hell, mate." Harry whispered from the chair. "You just had to dig that up, did you?"

"What the fuck, Harry? What the fuck was that?!" I yelled out, a spell to end him at the front of my mind.

It's true. My mind screamed at me and I thought about casting before he could react.

"Yea that was my reaction to." He stated lamely.

My brain shut down, confused by the response. "What?" I heard myself ask.

"That was the last nightmare he sent me." Harry responded and looked up to me, finally seeing the wand pointed his way maliciously.

His hands rose in surrender and his face processed the situation. "You think I did that?!" Harry demanded.

"Prove it wasn't you!" I cried out. "Prove it…" I whispered, not knowing how he could prove it in my delirious state. In the back of my head I heard myself and realized I was losing control of my emotions.

I steeled my mind once more, using my new experiences in the night and my months of practice to bring myself back in control with Occlumency.

"I prove I did not rape and kill that woman, so mote it be!" Harry answered me as his wand moved in the air in front of us.

I felt the magic settle on the room, the tell tale sign of a promise on magic itself. Nothing happened and Harry's wand dropped as he looked at me again.

"Believe me now?"

My wand dropped realizing that it truly was a vision Voldemort sent to him. Relief at realizing it truly was my best friend sitting across from flooded through my body as I relaxed.

"Holy shit Harry." I spat out.

"Yea I know." He answered.

"I didn't know he was sending you visions." I told him honestly as I thought Voldy didn't become aware of the connection between them until much later in the school year.

"Ever since the ritual." Harry told me while also relaxing in his seat. "I've been playing with it, it's like a window." He expanded.

I looked up sharply and locked eyes with him, giving him a look that meant 'go on.'

He obeyed. "After the ritual, the nightmares weren't flashes of a few bad deeds, no they got much worse. I was suddenly there, everything was crystal clear, like I was looking through the eyes of Voldemort." He paused and I didn't say anything, knowing that I was getting an explanation for his personality change.

"The night of the ritual, Voldemort knew, he felt it, it was the weirdest thing I have ever experienced." Harry told me. "I figured out a way to shut him out that night, but at night when I'm not consciously blocking him, he sends me presents like that one you saw."

"Red hair, beautiful. He's torturing with women who look like your mother." I spoke aloud without even thinking about it.

"I know. That particular memory haunts me."

"Why haven't you said anything?" I told him.

A raised eyebrow was all I got. "You." He said as if it was the most obvious reason in the world.

"Me?" I wondered and I remembered the admiration for me I felt in his mind earlier.

"Yea. You taught me a lot of lessons last year, most importantly, deal with your problems yourself." He answered.

"How in the bloody hell did you learn that lesson from me?" I asked with a small laugh.

He looked confused for a moment. "Don't think I didn't notice the change mate. Everyone did, we just haven't said anything. It was the night my name came out of the cup, yea?"

Panic enclosed me before I realized there was no way he knew about the 'merge'. He is just talking about the changes in behavior.

I nodded towards him. "Yea, but that still doesn't explain how I taught you that."

He shook his head before responding. "You started studying, started bettering yourself, and I watched while trying to survive the tournament."

"At first it was pride that I refused yours and Hermione's help, I wanted to do it on my own. The whole school was mocking us, you, me, and Hermione. You just shrugged your shoulders at them and focused on yourself, I followed your lead again. A couple months go by and suddenly you are a top student and on top of that you go to the Yule ball with bloody Fleur Delacour mate, three years younger than her!" He laughed at the end of that.

"Then you dueled Cedric in the black lake and won, someone who is, also, three years older. I started to get better grades, and I was leading in the tournament. All of a sudden, I didn't have to rely on anyone else, just myself. All because of you." Harry stopped then. "Then the last task happened and Cedric died, but you gave me Sirius. It set me back a little seeing Cedric get killed, but you and Sirius helped." I nodded motioning for him to continue.

"We started studying but it was still focused on each of us studying what we wanted, individually. I think that matters because I started to love magic, like I never have before."

I interrupted him then. "It's addicting ...the power, the ...well all of it really."

"Exactly!" He agreed.

"Where was I? Oh yea, then the ritual happened and now ...now I realize all of this. The magic I have learned in the past few months has ...opened my mind."

I couldn't agree more.

"I love my friends and family, but I realize that I don't need them to fight for me. I just need them to be themselves, I'll handle the rest." He finished with his tale and then got a weird look.

There was a much longer pause in our conversation then.

"Did any of that make sense?" He said with a laugh.

I laughed with him. "Barely, mate ...barely."

He didn't answer so I decided to continue. "'The bird doesn't worry about the tree branch breaking under him, because his faith isn't in the tree branch. It's in his own wings…'"

Denzel Washington is a saint. I thought paraphrasing the quote.

"Yea, that's what I meant to say." Harry quipped and we were both laughing again.

I sobered up when we finished laughing and remembered that Voldemort and him literally have a connection between their minds. Then I remembered another thing he said.

"Did you say you can block him out?" I asked curiously.

"Yea, Occlumency has really helped too. There is no way he is getting through now." Harry said. "At least, when I'm conscious."

"Does he ever look around in your head?" I asked the million dollar question then.

"He tried, but it doesn't work like that. I think it's much easier for me to look into his than it is for him to look into mine, it's easier to throw him out than it is you." Harry answered. "That's why he just sends me memories to torment me."

"We'll have to come up with a way to protect you at night. Maybe an enchantment on jewelry?" I thought aloud before I sobered up again and continued.

"I have something to confess." I said before I could convince myself not to.

"What is that mate?" Harry asked.

"I thought you were being possessed, something like Ginny in second year." I told him truthfully.

He gave me a funny look then and then it turned to recognition. "Umbridge?" He asked.

"Yea, you acted like what I imagine Tom might have in school." I told him.

"I can see that." Harry replied. "I did enjoy that too much, but no, that was all me."

"Well I can't blame you there. Then I went to Dumbledore, and he made my suspicions worse. That's why I moved our session up to tonight. That's why I was digging around in there so much." I lowered my head in shame, shame that I didn't trust my friend.

"Wow. I've been manipulated…" Harry said aloud. "...but I get it. I understand, no hard feelings mate."

"Thanks, I'll make it up to you. So ..."

"...Hermione huh?"