Draco, Dominique, Pansy, Vincent and Gregory were sitting in the Slytherin common room. They were just sitting and carrying on with their homework. Suddenly the gargoyle opened and two panting figures entered the common room. As the people present in the common room turned to them they saw Blaise and Theo leaning on the wall beside them and were about to cry. Pansy, Nick and Draco ran towards them immediately.
"Potter knows...." Blaise said panting. All three of them took a sharp breath in and glanced at Crabbe and Goyle before running towards the boys' dorm.
As they entered they carefully locked and warded the dorm and also remembered to place a silencing charm.
"What did you see?" Nick demanded quietly.
"Harry knows...Dumbledore stealing..." Theo panted out.
"Talk in complete sentences idiot!" Draco snapped.
"Harry knows about you, Nick. He just came to know about you this summer; and many more things at that." Theo tried to explain.
Dominique was now getting fidgety. She was getting really worried about his brother. They already knew about Nick and Harry's relationship; and Nick loved her brother dearly. "Please tell me clearly what happened; and when did you see it?" she asked in a soft patient voice.
Blaise started explaining everything they saw and heard. As they explained the incident, the other three people listened in shocked trance. When Blaise and Theo were done talking, all the people present in the room had tears in their eyes. Nick sat down on a bed nearby and started sobbing hard.
"I'll kill that old bastard." She growled under her breath.
"And we all will help you." Draco chocked out from beside her, rubbing a hand on her back.
"At least we know that the twins are not with that old goat." Theo said in a considering tone.
"I don't know; he probably hates me even more now. How to gain his trust? He will never believe us." Nick said shaking her head.
After a moment of silence, Pansy spoke up. "Why don't we go and talk with the twins? I'm sure they will want to help Harry anyway they can. We'll just say that we want to help him." Pansy said a bit excited.
"Yeah, good idea Zee, we could do that. We could at least be able to make Harry listen to us that way." Theo said.
"Okay then, let's do this tomorrow." Nick said nodding.
They all departed to their own bed a bit excited and sad at the same time. They were excited that after so many years of hiding the truth form Harry, Dominique would finally be able to talk to her brother without sneering or showing hatred. Draco was relieved that he wouldn't have to taunt and tease Harry to talk with him and know about his condition with his 'friends'.
On the other hand, Harry didn't go up to his bed at all. He just sat in the common room and cried; sometimes felt good for having at two people who cared for him in real. He just thought whether Dominique knew that he was his brother or not. If she knew, then did she really hate him? If she didn't know, would she ever come to know about it?
The next day, as planned, the group of Slytherin started at their idea of talking to the twins. However disgusting they thought the process to be, to talk with two blood-traitors, they didn't know any other way to convince Harry into talking with them.
They eventually found them in their potions class; they waited outside for them; not in mood to attend any classes leaving their brother to die in agony. When the twins came out, they gave head start at the sneering.
"What are you lot doing over here? As per our information you don't have anyone here to hatch snakes with." George sneered.
Dominique immediately put both her hands out to her sides gesturing the others behind her not to react to that. "Weasley, we just need to talk with you; about Harry." Dominique said calmly.
Fred and George immediately froze and remembered what Harry had said about Dominique last night. They stared at her cautiously. "What about him?" Fred asked in a careful tone.
"Look, don't get jumpy and all after hearing this, but we know what happened last night. And we also know that Harry is my brother; from the very beginning. So can we talk now; in private?" Dominique said in a low voice glancing at her sides.
The twins looked at them for a moment before nodding and started walking toward a particular empty class. The Slytherins just followed them.
"Well, what have you to talk with us?" one of the twins said after closing and locking the door of the classroom.
"Look, as much as you think otherwise, but we are with Harry. I love my brother like any other sister. And thank god, that now you all know about Dumbledore. We are relieved. Now, what I really want from both of you is, convince Harry to talk with us for once. We promise we won't hurt him." Dominique said in a convincing voice.
"And why should we do that?" Fred asked crossing his arms across his chest.
"Because we need Harry to know that there equal number of people he can trust, if not more, than he can't." Dominique said following Fred's action.
Fred and George looked at her for a moment. They knew that she was correct, but they couldn't fully trust them right now with Harry. Too many people had already hurt him before. He couldn't afford anymore betrayal. But eventually they nodded.
"Okay, we can let you talk with him but, a gentle reminder, don't go and talk about trust and love in front of him right now, if you don't have a legitimate proof for it. He might snap. And he's still not talking too much with anyone, not even us. So good luck with the convincing part; we'll just come with you." George explained.
All the Slytherins groaned, except Nick. "It's okay. Your presence alone will do the magic." She said smiling.
They all set out to find Harry. They found the whole castle, but he was nowhere to be seen. But while searching for him in the Astronomy tower, they saw him sitting in front of the Black Lake.
Harry was just sitting and spending away his free class in front of the Black Lake. He was not in a state to talk with anybody right now. It's not like too many people came to talk with him except the twins and Remus. He had cleverly passed them away giving them some unavoidable excuses. But as he was thinking, suddenly a circle of people sat in front of him blocking the view of the Lake.
When he noticed, he saw the group contained Draco, Pansy, Blaise, Dominique, Fred and George. He frowned at the combination of people, and looked around. When nobody spoke, he just raised an eyebrow at them.
"Potter, why are you ignoring me?" Draco asked who was sitting just in front of him. Dominique immediately face palmed at his stupid question.
This time Harry raised both his eyebrows in question. "Malfoy, the last time I checked, you were neither my boyfriend, nor my ex that I'll ignore you." Harry deadpanned, crossing his arms. Everybody started sniggering at his comment.
"Shut up, Potter. What I mean is why are you not talking with anyone?" Draco asked a bit red.
"My life, my rules; got a problem?" Harry said in an aristocratic way. Dominique smirked at his expression.
"Harry, your muggle side is showing." Fred and George smirked.
"No offense, but honestly I don't care." Harry said shifting his gaze to his spread feet.
"Harry, we knew that you are my brother all along." Dominique spoke up.
Harry tensed, and turned his head toward her. "Then why say now?" Harry asked after few seconds.
"Because I think that it's time you knew that we actually care for you. If not Dumbledore, we would have been even leaving together and you would have been in Slytherin." Dominique said in a matter of fact tone. She looked at him for a few second. He did obviously not believe her. "Harry, let me explain, please. We know the truth. It's not like what you think; you actually have a lot of people whom you can trust. You just have to look in the right place. Right from your birth, Dumbledore kept placing you in the wrong places. First, he put you with those muggles when you could have easily been put with us with even higher level of protection. He knew that my mother was Lily's blood sister. Second, he made you think that the Slytherins are the evils, so that you willingly go in Gryffindor. Third, he compelled you to trust the wrong people. Harry, before we didn't have a choice but to be a jerk to you. We did that just to see if you are fine. We would confirm that you are fine, if you just reacted the same way as Draco when he taunted. And when you didn't react the same way, we instantly understood that you are not fine. That was the only way we could talk to you." Dominique finished with sad eyes. But fortunately, Harry was smiling a bit. So she immediately smiled back.
"What an amazing way to confirm that I'm fine. Couldn't you find any other way?" Harry said shaking his head and smiling. Everybody immediately laughed, happy that Harry was at least reacting positively.
"Not at least with those traitors lurking around you all the time." Nick said laughing.
For the first time Fred and George didn't react at the insult 'traitor', they knew that they were truly traitors; rather blood traitors for an entirely different reason.
"Harry there's more to the story than you can even assume. He's not only played with yours, but with many other lives and relations. The main cause that today Snape behaves with you so nastily is none other than Dumbledore. During the time when Snape was a student in Hogwarts, Lily, my mother and him became good friends even before the sorting. Even when my mom and Severus became Slytherins, Lily didn't break their friendship. When, one day Snape, irritated from your father's bullying called her mud-blood; she obviously got angry but never broke her friendship. Then after that, my mother convinced him to apologise to your mother. That was a good day actually; when Snape had apologised, Lily brought all four of the Marauders to apologise to him too. After that all of them became very good friends. But obviously, that old fart had to interfere. Fearing that it will affect the house rivalry, he erased all the memories of their friendship, and made Lily believe that she had broken her friendship with Snape after the 'mud-blood' incident." Nick finished taking a deep breath and scowling.
"That old bastard loves to put compulsions and blocks on people. He had me on a fifty percent block on my magic along with compulsions towards Ron, Hermione, Molly, Percy, and Dumbleduck himself. Just what does- "Harry was interrupted by a screeching Pansy.
"Fifty percent block on your magic?! How were you not a squib? Or you should have been somewhat close to Longbottom!"
Harry just turned to Pansy with two raised eyebrows. "I think it would do if you had a check on Neville's wand. I don't think you'll stand a chance in front of him if he had his own wand; instead of his father's. And talking about me; it's a pity you have forgotten that it was me who survived the most dangerous dragon with only fifty percent of my power in the tournament; not you. And I hope you didn't forget that Voldemort is still after me and decides to meet me every year at the end of the term." Harry said smugly. Pansy obviously didn't reply. She just turned and started fiddling with the hem of her skirt.
"And dear brother of mine, here comes the most interesting part of the story. I hope you didn't forget that Dumbledore was the Transfiguration Professor in Hogwarts during Tom's time. So...I think you can quite easily get the fishy smell coming from the name itself." Nick explained.
Harry just stared at her for a second before his eyes went wide like saucepan. He immediately got up from there and started walking away. But before he could get too far, he turned towards them and just said one sentence, "I trust you, Dominique." And then he disappeared into the castle within few seconds.
When Nick turned to the leftover group, she was met with two confused faces of Fred and George.
"What, the beetle's not through the hole yet?" she asked them making a face. They just shook their head. "Would you please do the honour, Blaise; while I try to go and find Harry?" she asked turning to Blaise.
Blaise just sighed and started explaining the whole thing to the twin. Dominique and Draco stood up as well before walking away towards the castle.
As they entered the castle, Dominique and Draco separated up to find him. Dominique searched for him in two of the towers and the other one. While Dominique was going towards the Astronomy Tower, she bumped into the most unwanted person in her life; Ronald Weasley.
Dominique just went on to pass him with a sneer but suddenly Ron held her hand. As she turned, she saw a disgusting smirk on his face. As she raised one eyebrow in question, he spoke up.
"What are you doing here in the Astronomy Tower? You should be in the Dungeons, right?" Ron asked the smirk still plastered on his face.
"What is it to you where I go? It's not like there's a rule that Slytherins cannot come to the towers." Dominique said jerking her hand out his grip.
"No, just asking, that's all." Ron said, his eyes roaming her body. Dominique instantly cringed and crossed her arms across her chest, to save some of her dignity. As she did that, Ron's eyes snapped up to her green ones. She was just staring at her in such a dark way, that anyone would mistake her to be actually a Death Eater, it's not like students other than the Slytherins didn't think like that. Then out of nowhere, Hermione came.
"Ron, what are you—what you doing with my boyfriend?" Hermione screamed.
What a banshee. "Oh nothing, your boyfriend was just checking me out." Dominique stated in a calm voice.
Hermione narrowed her eyes at Ron, but then immediately turned to Dominique. "Whatever are you doing here, anyway?" Hermione asked with same narrowed eyes.
"Well, I just answered the same question to him, so please..." Dominique jerked a hand towards Ron.
"Whatever!" Hermione said before pinning her hand through Ron's arm and dragging him away.
"What were you doing, checking her out like that?" she heard Hermione ask Ron.
"What, she's hot. And don't talk as if you don't check out Malfoy whenever he passes you."
"What, he's hot too. And that day I caught you shagging Lavender."
"And yesterday night I caught you shagging Cormac."
Dominique just stared at their retrieving backs, before blinking few times and walking away shaking her head in disbelief.