Harry cried-off going to Beaumont Hall on the evening of his birthday, mostly because Pansy had managed to dig up some history from Triple-F's genealogy.
Another team meeting was called and Kingsley made another appearance. Harry didn't fail to notice that Nev perched rather protectively on the edge of the desk that Pansy was sitting at. He smiled to himself.
Pansy nervously told them that she had uncovered that Triple-F's bloodline definitely ran back to the old Pureblood Finches line. They were one of the considerably wealthier Sacred Twenty-Eight families, unfortunately, the bloodline died out in the 1900s when Tarquin Finches' only child was a Squib. Turned out, Tarquin Finches was Triple-F's Great-Great-Grandfather and Triple-F was the first in four generations to inherit the magic of his ancient bloodline. Pansy pushed a piece of paper across the desk to Neville who smiled reassuringly at her before reading aloud: 'Although they did not align themselves with Voldemort, the Finches had a long history of Pureblood mania that continued through the Squib line too. The family has only associated itself with the upper-classes on British society in both the Muggle and the Magical World. Justin's boast at school that he had his name down to go to Eton exemplifies this privileged upbringing, Eton College for Boys in Windsor, London, is the school favoured by British royalty, landed gentry and aristocracy, conservative politicians, and the upper-classes. Since returning the Wizarding World, Justin Jnr had been attending certain Pureblood fanatical meetings over the past four years since the Battle of Hogwarts.'
'And we're only just finding this out now?' said Robards.
'We've only just got a dedicated Researcher for the Department,' Harry snapped.
'Point taken,' said Robards contritely.
There was silence in the meeting room as everyone digested the information and what it meant for the investigation.
It was after some careful deliberation that Hermione spoke up, 'I think it might be worth considering whether Triple-F is trying to raise sympathy for the victims in a kind of reverse psychology kind of way. It may be that by using half-bloods and Muggleborns to do his dirty work, he thinks people will start to frown upon their tactics and side with Purebloods, thus creating fractions and potentially another war in the long run. Of course, disreputable families from Voldemort's inner circle would be more expendable here. I was wondering, with the Minister's permission, if I might be temporarily seconded to the case, I think, if I look through the newspaper archives, we may find press 'releases' as such that relate to the incidents. If they portray the attacks in a consistent way that's sympathetic to victims then it may give us the answer to that question.'
Kingsley nodded.
'Ah,' said Bill, 'I can help there too, I did notice that there were several payments from the Dombey account to The Daily Prophet and one to The Wizard's Voice. I wondered why. It would make sense if what you're saying is accurate, Hermione.'
Pansy tentatively raised a hand. 'I have something else,' she said quietly. 'I spoke to Hugh Rambures in the Department of Mysteries, I wondered if there were any prophecies... and apparently so. Normally we wouldn't be able to access it but Justin requested access a few years ago so the Prophecy is recorded as read. It said: Pureness will only be delivered by the flame which his own hand creates; death lies in the hands of a saviour.'
Harry frowned, 'why do they always have to sound so fucking biblical, bloody implied cleansing by fire...' There were a few confused faces but he didn't bother to explain. Of course, the reference to a 'saviour' wasn't lost on him either and, with Mione's point in mind, it was clear that Justin saw himself as some sort of Saviour-figure, cleansing the Wizarding World of those that tarnished the good name of the Sacred Twenty-Eight and Wizard-kind. He mentally growled to himself, surely, he thought, surely the few seers that existed could avoid the term, he hated it and the implications, but he supposed it was some sort of poetic licence gifted to true seers, that and the fact that these obscure prophecies never quite made sense until after the event.
The meeting didn't finish until late and as people rushed off home, he found Draco waiting for him in the reception area under the fierce glare of the department's receptionist. Harry apologised profusely, told him off for waiting, and took him, Nev, Alex, Angelina, and Pansy for a curry to celebrate both his birthday and the break-through on the case.
In fact, Harry managed to avoid going to Beaumont for some time. He didn't admit to anyone but he felt overawed by the whole thing and there was a certain amount of denial occurring.
His first excuses surrounded his birthday and seeing his family. What with a promised visit to Minnie's, and one vaguely unimportant engagement or another and his Sunday lunch at the Burrow, the time to visit slipped away. However, for the first time in years, Harry didn't feel the pull to go walking in the Wiltshire hills, but he supposed he didn't need to now, he guessed what was calling him.
On the Saturday morning, having found out Pansy's address in north Croydon from her work-file, he Apparated nearby with the indefinite plan of inviting her for a coffee with him and Teddy while Draco was doing his morning surgery.
He was surprised. Pansy lived in a very muggle, rundown block of flats covered in graffiti tags over every reachable surface. More ghetto than luxury. He was grateful to be wearing jeans and a hoodie and not Wizard wear and he clutched Teddy tight to his torso, unwillingly to release his secure grip on the boy. He was also glad to have Hercules by his side but he still cast a Disillusionment Charm to avoid garnering attention and took the piss-stinking stairs up to the fourth floor two at a time, not wanting to linger. He didn't fail to notice the used needles discarded in dark corners.
He knocked on the blue metal door, its paint peeling, and waited, looking down on the concrete garden below and the rundown tenements. He wanted to take Pansy out of this immediately but was painfully aware that his hero complex was running amok and the woman's pride was something he'd have to play carefully.
There was no answer, despite the second knock, and he peered through the broken letterbox into a tidy but sparse flat. A discreet 'Homonoculous' revealed no one was home.
'She's out!' snapped an older woman from the open door of the next flat, a cigarette hanging from blood-red lips and her dyed bright-orange hair protruding from beneath a headscarf. 'Wha'd yer want?' She said, her eyes roving over Harry greedily.
'Just calling on my friend...' he mumbled. Teddy slipped behind his legs, holding on tight.
'She ain't got no friends,' she said suspiciously. 'Not never 'ad one since she moved in 'ere as far as I knows. An' I knows everythink wot goes on 'ere.'
'Well, if you see her, tell her Harry called around.'
'Might. It'll cost yer though... but I can give yer somethink in return. Nice 'andsome young man like yer. The boy can wait inside so long 'e don't touch nothing.'
'No thank you,' Harry said politely, trying not to visibly shudder at the implied offer. 'She knows where I live if she wants to find me, I'll be in all day.'
She harrumphed and slammed the door in Harry's face.
Pansy didn't come calling at Grimmauld Place so he assumed she didn't get his message especially as she didn't mention it on the Monday when she got to work.
Sunday proved an interesting experience. It was good to see Ron again. Harry missed not having him around despite the whole complex situation with Mione.
Of course, there was the expected awkward questioning about the whole 'Lord' thing which he tried to brush away. Arthur took it in his complacent and relaxed stride but, of course, he was there at the meeting when it was announced and he knew how Harry felt about the whole situation. Molly fussed and was terribly excited and dropped Ginny's name into the conversation hopefully at any given moment. Ginny rolled her eyes. George teased him, mercilessly. Ron stayed quiet and Harry felt guilty; sometimes it was a little like a game of 'Top Trumps' with Ron and, every time, Harry seemed to score higher without actually wanting to play.
Perhaps that was what made things a little bit more strained than usual. But, also, it was never too far from his mind that he'd slept with Mione all those years ago and that was something Ron could never find out about. It was, therefore, something of an uncomfortable jolt when Ron reached in his pocket, withdrew a folded front page of The Daily Prophet, and handed it to Harry as the two of them were lounging in the garden drinking Butterbeer and watching Teddy on his training broom after lunch. Teddy absolutely idolised Ron and as a professional Quidditch player... well, it's not hard to imagine.
'Gonna explain, mate?' Ron said as he scratched at Hercules's ear who was laid with his head against Ron, ever hopeful of attention.
It was from the Friday morning edition, a full-blown image of Harry and Hermione in Diagon Alley on the way to Gringotts, he held his arm protectively around Mione as they pushed through the throng of press reporters. The headline blared 'IS IT OFFICIAL? ARE LORD POTTER AND MS HERMIONE GRANGER ABOUT TO ANNOUNCE THEIR ENGAGEMENT?' The article went on to discuss their long-lasting friendship, dredged up their 'past' from Rita Skeeter's false reports, and generally sold the whole thing as a romantic love story that was destined to be. The article gleefully reported how they went to Gringotts and then to 'The Smoky Dragon' together for lunch.
'Fucking tossers,' Harry muttered.
There was no mention of Draco. In fact, it took a bit of concentration and practice before Harry could pick him out from the Disillusionment Charm he had obviously placed on himself. Harry couldn't help snorting fondly as he found Draco's pointy aristocratic features half-hidden, partly by the charm, partly by the way he stooped, his head lowered. The way he held himself was far removed from the arrogant posturing of his school days.
Harry looked up to find Ron watching him closely. Ron had sat up, awkwardly crossed-legged with long limbs and too much muscle, though he looked surprisingly vulnerable. 'Are you in love with her?' he asked. 'Will it work, you know, with you not being soulmates...' Ron's voice was very quiet.
'...Ron, no...' he tried to interrupt.
'...maybe things change, maybe we're not soulmates anymore. Maybe I really fucked things up...'
Harry was horrified, it looked like Ron was actually going to cry.
'Ron! We're not together! Merlin, we went out for my birthday, for lunch, as friends. Draco was with us too. If you look really closely, he's under a Disillusionment Charm just behind us.'
'Malfoy! What's that slimy git doing going for lunch with you two?'
Harry tried not to smile but sometimes he wondered if Ron had taken one too many Bludgers to the head during Quidditch. He honestly had the attention span of a Crup puppy. 'You know Draco's changed; you saw that, commented on that after the battle. But something's happened. I'm helping him out.'
'What's happened?' Ron asked suspiciously.
'I can't talk about it, there's an official investigation at work, do not mention it to anyone, Ron, it's not idle gossip.'
'Aright mate, blimey!' He grinned though. 'Does that mean we're back to how you were about Malfoy at school again?'
Ron had that way of sideswiping Harry, lulling him into a false sense of security with apparent idiocy and suddenly being pinpointingly accurate in his analysis of matters. Harry felt the blood draining from his face. Wasn't that exactly what he was doing by picking Draco as Hercules's vet, by moving him into his house, by involving him in his inheritance... Not that Harry exactly needed to stalk Draco with him living in his house. He decided to keep that piece of information to himself for the moment.
'So, you and Mione?' Ron asked quietly. 'Not a thing?'
'No,' Harry said abruptly.
Ron sighed. 'I know you never approved of what I did, what I've done. I know you never will. But I couldn't, Harry, I couldn't do it. I can't tell you how scared I was when it happened and it hit me that this was it. I was eighteen and suddenly my future was mapped out, there was to be no one else, just Mione for the rest of my life and chasing more dark wizards. I couldn't do it. It felt too much, too soon, too grown up. Like the world was closing in on me. We'd lost our childhood, Harry, and I needed to escape...'
'You broke her heart,' Harry said harshly.
'I know' he said sadly. 'I broke mine too but I can only blame myself for that. Once I turned away from her, well, it felt like a one-way path that I couldn't reverse out of. I don't know what to do, I've fucked this up so badly and I don't know how to repair it... It's no consolation, but there hasn't been anyone for a long time...'
'Why are you telling me this?' Harry knew he was being short but they'd come, over the past few years, to a silent agreement that they didn't talk about Mione. Things got too tense, too quickly.
'You need to understand, Harry. I want you to know. I need your forgiveness as much as Hermione's.'
Harry looked into Ron's cloudy blue eyes and saw the sorrow he was holding, the unhappiness, the tears always at the edges, and he wondered why all his friends were so fucked up. He knew really; it was the war. The war had done this to them all. He sighed. 'What do you mean for a long time? You're always photographed with someone, wasn't there a new one last weekend?'
Ron tapped the page from the Prophet which had fallen to the grass between them. 'It's like this; all absolute bollocks. The team managers love it because it gets the Chudley Cannons in the news again. I'm their media whore, Harry. So, I get seen in public, get my photo taken, and go home alone.' Ron was nervously playing with the hem of his jeans. 'I'm quitting,' he said.
'But you love Quidditch. You love the Cannons. It's your dream job.'
'Yes, but not like this, not life like this. If it was Mione by my side. If I'd done things differently, I'd carry on, but I can't. Something needs to change and it starts with me.'
Harry watched Ron slump and he reached out to take a firm grip on Ron's forearm, a sign of companionship between them. 'What are you going to do?'
Ron shrugged. 'Go to therapy!' he half-laughed. 'I need to face things.'
'Have you told your mum?'
'No, I'm too scared to, she'll be so angry when she finds out about Mione, what I've done...'
'She'll forgive you; it might take time but you need to talk to her.'
'What shall I do about Mione?'
'You want her back?'
'Yeah, as soon as I left, I wanted to undo everything...'
'Ron, that was four years ago...'
'I've been running scared. I didn't know what to do. And she scares me a little, you saw how she punched Malfoy for just being a git. I deserve far more than that. And the longer I left it, the deeper the hole got.'
'And it's taken until now? Merlin!'
'Look, I know I'm not the sharpest tool in the box but...'
'...I know, Ron. Life's a bloody mess sometimes. The truth is I don't know what you should do about Mione. All I know is it's going to take time for her to trust you again and don't expect me to act as your go-between. This is all your own doing. But let me tell you this, if you break her heart again, you won't need to worry about her right hook because I will fucking kill you and no one will be able to find the body.'
Ron gulped. 'I believe you, mate.'
'So long as you know.'
'I know.' He paused. 'I've been to see your mum.'
Harry raised an eyebrow, studying his oldest friend in surprise. Minnie hadn't said anything when he went to visit for his birthday. He watched Ron swallow nervously.
'She's offered me a job; Madame Hooch's position...'
Harry smiled, he remembered now that Minnie had said Rolanda was retiring. He hadn't thought about Ron but it made a lot of sense. He imagined Ron would be really good at teaching and the kids would love him.
'I saw the post advertised in the paper. So, I start in September as the Quidditch teacher at Hogwarts.' He said it in a way that suggested he was still getting used to the idea. 'I told your mum, you know, everything. Blimey, I'm a bloody lobotomised fuckwit. I didn't mean to, I just ended up blurting everything out in my interview. She's like that, isn't she?'
Harry snorted, imagining how mortified Ron would have been as he sat in front of Minnie with her straight lips twitching fondly at the embarrassed Ron spewing out his love-life problems. She, of course, would have loved it, feeling honoured that Ron felt familiar enough with her to share his troubles, but Harry didn't need to tell Ron that. 'Well, it's good she gave you the job. You can't have left too bad an impression.'
Ron snorted too. 'She alright, you know.'
'I know. I've been trying to tell you that for years.'
'She still fucking scares me, nearly as much as Mione, even if she is your mum. I'm going to write to Mione, to explain what's going on and to tell her what I'm doing to change. I don't expect she'll want to see me. But I'll wait. I still love her, Harry. I've been such a bloody cockjockey...'
'You can only give her time, Ron. Show her you're amending your ways, that you're taking steps to change and to solve the issues you've been running from, and then it's up to her.'
'Thank you, mate,' Ron said quietly. 'And you? Do you believe me when I say I'm sorry?'
'Ron, I know you've been unhappy for a long time. It's been clear in every photo I've seen of you in the press. I know you well enough to see that. I'm glad you've finally admitted it. Perhaps this is just another way of putting the war and all that shit behind us, this is all part of us healing. All I want is to see Mione happy again so don't push her and don't hurt her again.'
'Thanks,' he said, barely audibly. 'I won't hurt her...'
It was a strange feeling for Harry, it left him conflicted. He so desperately wanted Mione to be happy and to be with her soulmate again. But he couldn't yet be sure if he trusted Ron not to do another runner. And then there were his own feelings involved. With his distrust of Ron came a selfish bitterness that he would have to sit on the sidelines and watch Mione being taken away from him. It had been just the two of them for such a long time.
He reluctantly accepted the challenge of a game of chess from Ron but couldn't properly concentrate, a strange sort of jealousy rearing its monstrous form as Ron looked decidedly happier already. After being beaten soundly in half the usual time, he made his excuses and Teddy and Harry Apparated back to Grimmauld Place with Hercules, pausing only at St James' Park to offer Hercules a good run around.
***