I was debating with myself on whether to tell Ginny and Blaise about the memory I had. As much as I trusted both of them, I was pretty sure telling them this would only fuel their theory that Rhine was the one using my body. I was not ready to accept that theory, not yet anyway. However as much as I denied this theory, the fact was that when I read Rhine's book : The Dark Edge of the Seer's mind, all the evidence seemed to point to her. On page 3 of the chapter "How to deal with the curse of a bound Eye." There was a passage that read:
"Being a Bloodbearer can be both an advantage and a disadvantage. To those whose blood and power is bound to a dead Seer (the Binder) by choice, it is an advantage as they get to use the powers of not one but two great Seers. This can lead to the ability to see the entire future, and not just segments. It may also lead to the ability to change both the past and the future (This can only be done by pureblood, third generation Seers who have undergone grueling amounts of training and must strictly be between the great grandmother and her great granddaughter.) However these types of soul practice were banned centuries ago and very few know the art of performing it. The more common curse of the bound Eye, whereby the Bloodbearer has no choice in the binding of power, is the most painful as, if it is performed correctly, the Binder has to wait until the Bloodbearer reaches the age of Magic which is usually 7 to 9 years old and can take over their body completely. The Bloodbearer is in a sense dead now. However in some cases the Binding may be incomplete at the time of the Binder's death. As long as all the sacrifices are done, when the Bloodbearer reaches the Age of Magic, the Binder comes alive in her body, the process can be very painful for the Bloodbearer and may even be fatal. As the Bloodbear grows into her powers, the Binder's power over her also grows often leading to Blank memories in which the Binder takes over the body. Using her powers may become exhausting for the Bloodbearer, as she begins feeling the emotional toll of two seers and may often lead to mood swings, self harming, going crazy, lack of sleep, making her a danger to the community, the Binder may also contact her in various ways. (Creating a Blood covenant with another can help manager her behavior. Turn to page 24 to learn how to make a Blood covenant.). As the Binder grows stronger, the victim starts to develop certain of her characteristics, parts of her appearance, most commonly eye colour, also she may develop certain significant body marks and slowly she begins to tap into the Binder's memories. At this point, neither the binder nor the Bloodbearer are in control, there is nothing they can do. This means that the person becomes both personalities and can be either of them at any time unless she learns control. Control is very hard to attain and it can only give the Bloodbearer dominance over her body, not total power over her body. Some bound souls have been known to converse occasionally and make decisions together, to live at peace in one body but with most it is a struggle, mostly because when the Bloodbearer dies, the Binder gets total ownership of the body and lives on, therefore, Bloodbearers do not live very long, most of them never come of age. Legend has it that it is possible for the Binder and the Bloodbearer to live in different bodies if another sacrifice is made. Whether there is truth to it, remains to be seen."
I knew according to this segment, Blaise and Ginny's theory could be correct. However the one thing that I was sure of was that my mother was never a death Eater therefore she never had a Dark Mark. I decided that I really needed to contact Rhine in order to get to the bottom of this.
The following weekend was a Hogsmeade weekend and to avoid going to Hogsmeade with Blaise, I had to tag along with Ginny and Michael Corner, thank goodness I had Terry Boot and Anthony Goldstein to talk to on the way to the Hog's head where Hermione was having the first meeting with Harry's DADA "class". I walked in with Anthony Goldstein, Michael Corner, Terry Boot and Ginny, followed by a tall skinny blond boy with an upturned nose whom I recognized vaguely as being a member of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team, and bringing up the rear, Fred and George with Lee Jordan, all three of whom were carrying large paper bags crammed with Zonko's merchandise. There were already more than fifteen people inside as I sat next to Ron and for some reason it worried me.
"A couple of people?" said Harry hoarsely to Hermione. "A couple of people?"
"Yes, well, the idea seemed quite popular," said Hermione happily. "Ron, do you want to pull up some more chairs?" I pulled her aside,
"Hermione, you do know that most of these people are not here for the "lessons" but for Harry right?" I said in concern. I was not sure that he could handle being bombarded by so many people.
"There is nothing I can do about it now." She whispered back.
The barman had frozen in the act of wiping out a glass with a rag so filthy it looked as though it had never been washed. Possibly he had never seen his pub so full.
"Hi," said Fred, reaching the bar first and counting us quickly. "Could we have. . . twenty-five butterbeers, please?"
"Twenty-four, and a firewhisky." I said going to stand next to Fred.
The barman glared at us for a moment, then, throwing down his rag irritably as though he had been interrupted in something very important, he started passing up dusty butterbeers from under the bar. "No firewhisky unless you are seventeen." He said going back to his rag. Well I tried.
"Cheers," said Fred, handing them out. "Cough up, everyone, I haven't got enough gold for all of these. . . ." Harry watched numbly as the large chattering group took their beers from Fred and rummaged in their robes to find coins. He looked nervous.
"What have you been telling people?" he said in a low voice to Hermione. "What are they expecting?"
"Er," said Hermione, her voice slightly higher than usual out of nerves. "Well— er — hi."
The group focused its attention on her instead, though eyes continued to dart back regularly to Harry.
"Well . . . erm . . . well, you know why you're here. Erm . . . well, Harry here had the idea — I mean" — Harry had thrown her a sharp look — "I had the idea — that it might be good if people who wanted to study Defense Against the Dark Arts — and I mean, really study it, you know, not the rubbish that Umbridge is doing with us" — (Hermione's voice became suddenly much stronger and more confident) — "because nobody could call that Defense Against the Dark Arts"
"Hear, hear," said Anthony Goldstein, and Hermione looked heartened — "well, I thought it would be good if we, well, took matters into our own hands." She paused, looked sideways at Harry, and went on, "And by that I mean learning how to defend ourselves properly, not just theory but the real spells —"
"You want to pass your Defense Against the Dark Arts O.W.L. too though, I bet?" said Michael Corner.
"Of course I do," said Hermione at once. "But I want more than that, I want to be properly trained in Defense because . . . because . . ." She took a great breath and finished, "Because Lord Voldemort's back."
The reaction was immediate and predictable. Cho's friend shrieked and slopped butterbeer down herself, Terry Boot gave a kind of involuntary twitch, Padma Patil shuddered, and Neville gave an odd yelp that he managed to turn into a cough. All of them, however, looked fixedly, even eagerly, at Harry. This was exactly what I had been afraid of.
"Well . . . that's the plan anyway," said Hermione. "If you want to join us, we need to decide how we're going to —"
"Where's the proof You-Know-Who's back?" said the blond Hufflepuff player in a rather aggressive voice.
"Well, Dumbledore believes it —" Hermione began.
"You mean, Dumbledore believes him," said the blond boy, nodding at Harry.
"Who are you?" said Ron rather rudely.
"Zacharias Smith," said the boy, "and I think we've got the right to know exactly what makes him say You-Know-Who's back."
I gave Hermione my "I told you so look. "Look," said Hermione, intervening swiftly, "that's really not what this meeting was supposed to be about —"
"It's okay, Hermione," said Harry. Hermione should have seen this coming. Some of these people — maybe even most of them — had turned up in the hope of hearing Harry's story firsthand.
"What makes me say You-Know-Who's back?" he asked, looking Zacharias straight in the face. "I saw him. But Dumbledore told the whole school what happened last year, and if you didn't believe him, you don't believe me, and I'm not wasting an afternoon trying to convince anyone."
The whole group seemed to have held its breath while Harry spoke. I sighed; it was moments like this that made it really hard for me to get over Harry. When he took charge like this and stood up for what he believed in, it was that bold side of him that I liked the most.
Zacharias said dismissively, "All Dumbledore told us last year was that Cedric Diggory got killed by You-Know-Who and that you brought Diggory's body back to Hogwarts. He didn't give us details, he didn't tell us exactly how Diggory got murdered, I think we'd all like to know —"
"If you've come to hear exactly what it looks like when Voldemortmurders someone I can't help you," Harry said. His temper, always so close to the surface these days, was rising again.
"He doesn't want to talk about Cedric, all right? So if that's what you're here for, you might as well clear out, yeah, I said it get the hell out or keep your mouth shut." I said taking over.
I cast an angry look in Hermione's direction. This was all her fault; she should have only invited legitimate people. But none of them left their seats, not even Zacharias Smith, though he continued to gaze intently at Harry.
"So," said Hermione, her voice very high-pitched again. "So . . . like I was saying . . . if you want to learn some defense, then we need to work out how we're going to do it, how often we're going to meet, and where we're going to —"
"Is it true," interrupted Susan, looking at Harry, "that you can produce a Patronus?" There was a murmur of interest around the group at this.
"Yeah," said Harry slightly defensively.
"A corporeal Patronus?"
"Er — you don't know Madam Bones, do you?" he asked. Susan smiled.
"She's my auntie," she said. "I'm Susan Bones. She told me aboutyour hearing. So — is it really true? You make a stag Patronus?"
"Yes," said Harry.
"Blimey, Harry!" said Lee, looking deeply impressed. "I never knew that!"
"Mum told Ron not to spread it around," said Fred, grinning at Harry. "She said you got enough attention as it was."
"She's not wrong," mumbled Harry and a couple of people laughed.
"And did you kill a basilisk with that sword in Dumbledore's office?" demanded Terry Boot. "That's what one of the portraits on the wall told me when I was in there last year. . . ."
"Er — yeah, I did, yeah," said Harry.
Justin Finch-Fletchley whistled, the Creevey brothers exchanged awestruck looks, and Lavender Brown said "wow" softly.
"And in our first year," said Neville to the group at large, "he saved that Sorcerous Stone —"
"Sorcerer's," I hissed
"Yes, that, from You-Know-Who," finished Neville.
Hannah Abbott's eyes were as round as Galleons.
"And that's not to mention," said Cho (Harry's eyes snapped onto her aargh!), "all the tasks he had to get through in the Triwizard Tournament last year — getting past dragons and merpeople and acromantulas and things. . . ."
There was a murmur of impressed agreement around the table
"Look," he said and everyone fell silent at once, "I . . . I don't want to sound like I'm trying to be modest or anything, but . . . I had a lot of help with all that stuff. . . ."
"Not with the dragon, you didn't," said Michael Corner at once.
"That was a seriously cool bit of flying. . . ."
"Yeah, well —" said Harry, feeling it would be churlish to disagree.
"And nobody helped you get rid of those dementors this summer," said Susan Bones.
"Not to mention," I said determined to say something great about Harry to shift his focus from Cho, "that I would have been ambushed by a couple of Death Eaters this summer if not for him."
"What no, not really Miley." He said.
"Don't be modest Harry, I couldn't have escaped if it wasn't for you." I stated
"No," said Harry, "no, okay, I know I did bits of that stuff without help, but the point I'm trying to make is —"
"Are you trying to weasel out of showing us any of this stuff?" said Zacharias Smith.
"Here's an idea," said Ron loudly, before Harry could speak, "why don't you shut your mouth?"
Perhaps the word "weasel" had affected Ron particularly strongly; in any case, he was now looking at Zacharias as though he would like nothing better than to thump him. Zacharias flushed.
"Well, we've all turned up to learn from him, and now he's telling us he can't really do any of it," he said.
"That's not what he said," snarled Fred Weasley.
"Would you like us to clean out your ears for you?" inquired George, pulling a long and lethal-looking metal instrument from inside one of the Zonko's bags.
"Or any part of your body, really, we're not fussy where we stick this," said Fred.
"Yes, well," said Hermione hastily, "moving on . . . the point is, are we agreed we want to take lessons from Harry?" There was a murmur of general agreement. Zacharias folded his arms and said nothing, though perhaps this was because he was too busy keeping an eye on the instrument in George's hand.
"Right," said Hermione, looking relieved that something had at last been settled. "Well, then, the next question is how often we do it. I really don't think there's any point in meeting less than once a week —"
"Hang on," said Angelina, "we need to make sure this doesn't clash with our Quidditch practice."
"No," said Cho, "nor with ours."
"Nor ours," added Zacharias Smith.
"I'm sure we can find a night that suits everyone," said Hermione, slightly impatiently, "but you know, this is rather important, we're talking about learning to defend ourselves against V-Voldemort's Death Eaters —"
"Well said!" barked Ernie Macmillan "Personally I think this is really important, possibly more important than anything else we'll do this year, even with our O.W.L.s coming up!"
He looked around impressively, as though waiting for people to cry, "Surely not!" When nobody spoke, he went on, "I, personally, am at a loss to see why the Ministry has foisted such a useless teacher upon us at this critical period. Obviously they are in denial about the return of You-Know-Who, but to give us a teacher who is trying to actively prevent us from using defensive spells —"
"We think the reason Umbridge doesn't want us trained in Defense Against the Dark Arts," I said, "is that she's got an idea that Dumbledore could use the students in the school as a private army. She thinks he'd mobilize us against the Ministry. Which is very possible according to a dream I had."
Nearly everybody looked stunned at this news; everybody except Luna who piped up, "Well, that makes sense. After all, Cornelius Fudge has got his own private army."
"What?" said Harry
"Yes, he's got an army of heliopaths," said Luna solemnly.
"No, he hasn't," snapped Hermione.
"Yes, he has," said Luna.
"What are heliopaths?" asked Neville, looking blank.
"They're spirits of fire," said Luna, her protuberant eyes widening so that she looked madder than ever. "Great tall flaming creatures that gallop across the ground burning everything in front of —"
"They don't exist, Neville," said Hermione tartly.
"Oh yes they do!" said Luna angrily.
"I'm sorry, but where's the proof of that?" snapped Hermione.
"There are plenty of eyewitness accounts, just because you're so narrow-minded you need to have everything shoved under your nose before you —"
"Hem, hem," said Ginny in such a good imitation of Professor Umbridge that several people looked around in alarm and then laughed.
"Weren't we trying to decide how often we're going to meet and get Defense lessons?"
"Yes," said Hermione at once, "yes, we were, you're right. . . ."
"Well, once a week sounds cool," said Lee Jordan.
"As long as —" began Angelina.
"Yes, yes, we know about the Quidditch," said Hermione in a tense voice. "Well, the other thing to decide is where we're going to meet. . . ."
This was rather more difficult; the whole group fell silent.
"Library?" suggested Katie Bell after a few moments.
"I can't see Madam Pince being too chuffed with us doing jinxes in the library," said Harry.
"Maybe an unused classroom?" said Dean.
"Yeah," said Ron, "McGonagall might let us have hers, she did when Harry was practicing for the Triwizard. ..."
"No, she probably won't. What we are doing is not exactly legal. In fact I bet we could all be expelled if the Ministry found out... Now that is thrilling." I said and immediately people looked uncomfortable. I loved being me.
"Right, well, we'll try to find somewhere," said Hermione. "We'll send a message round to everybody when we've got a time and a place for the first meeting."
She rummaged in her bag and produced parchment and a quill, then hesitated, rather as though she was steeling herself to say something.
"I-I think everybody should write their name down, just so we know who was here. But I also think," she took a deep breath, "that we all ought to agree not to shout about what we're doing. So if you sign, you're agreeing not to tell Umbridge — or anybody else — what we're up to."
Fred reached out for the parchment and cheerfully put down his signature, I put in my name after George so that I could watch everyone else squirm while writing their names.
"Er . . ." said Zacharias slowly, not taking the parchment that I was trying to pass him. "Well . . . I'm sure Ernie will tell me when the meeting is."
But Ernie was looking rather hesitant about signing too. Hermione raised her eyebrows at him.
"I — well, we are prefects," Ernie burst out. "And if this list was found . . . well, I mean to say . . . you said yourself, if Umbridge finds out . . ."
"You just said this group was the most important thing you'd do this year," Harry reminded him.
"I — yes," said Ernie, "yes, I do believe that, it's just . . ."
"Ernie, do you really think I'd leave that list lying around?" said Hermione testily.
"And um, Ernie, Voldermort doesn't care if you are a prefect or an expelled Hogwarts student. He will kill you if he wants, don't you want to put up a fight? It's a simple choice really: Be badgeless or defenceless"
"No. No, of course not," said Ernie, looking slightly less anxious. "I — yes, of course I'll sign."
Nobody raised objections after Ernie, though Harry saw Cho's friend give her a rather reproachful look before adding her name.
When the last person — Zacharias — had signed, Hermione took the parchment back and slipped it carefully into her bag. There was an odd feeling in the group now. It was as though we had just signed some kind of contract, I was pretty sure Hermione had jinxed that paper.
"Well, time's ticking on," said Fred briskly, getting to his feet.
"George, Lee, and I have got items of a sensitive nature to purchase, we'll be seeing you all later. Do you want to come Miley?"
After saying goodbye to Ginny, I left with Fred, George and Lee to buy supplies for the guys.