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keelywolfeA Lacking of Foresight: Chapter Twenty-Nine
by Keelywolfe
Fandom: Harry Potter
Harry/Ron
NC-17
Chapter 29
~*~
In which we say goodbye to old friends.
~*~
His office was so cold that Harry had taken to warming his hands on his teacup in an almost absent fashion. The fire had died down to the barest embers an hour before. Harry took no notice of it, idly tracing the grain in the wood of his desk with the tip of his quill. The ink lingered in shabby, glistening lines for long moments until it decided this surface wasn't parchment after all and vanishing into the air.
The paper in front of him had a fair amount of spelling errors, intermixed freely with factual ones, and he checked each one slowly, the ink flashing into red. It shifted to green when he added the rare compliment, shining off the paper, remaining a neutral black as he added the score at the bottom. He rolled it up and added it to the pile at his left and selected another from the slowly diminishing pile at his right.
He should have finished these hours ago, he knew. Essays from his first years should hardly take up this much of his time and yet, his thoughts refused to focus, drifting like a leaf downriver. It didn't seem possible that only a week before he'd been kneeling in blood and dirt, holding Ron's head in his lap while they waited for the Ministry to port him to Hogwarts. Not even twenty-four hours since he'd last been to the hospital wing, hovering outside the closed doors for long minutes before finally turning away, leaving them unopened.
Ink had dripped from the tip of his quill, puddling on the corner of the essay and trembling on the verge of a dozen colors. He swore and wiped it away with the edge of his sleeve, sending a mental apology in the direction of the house elves who did the washing as the half-dried ink chose to linger.
A knock on his door startled him from his morose thoughts and he looked up to see Professor Isabella Nosturnma hovering uncertainly in the doorway. She was on temporary duty at Hogwarts as the professor of Care of Magical Creatures until Hagrid returned.
Harry gave her a polite smile. "Yes?"
"May I speak with you a moment, Professor Potter?" she said timidly. Harry groaned mentally. He hadn't spoken to Nosturnma more than a handful of time but well considered them more than enough. He wasn't sure how she managed to teach a class, much less handle any of the magical creatures that Harry had learned about in school. She seemed more timid than Quirrell had been, her eyes doing an constant, and obvious, flicker to his forehead and then back to his face. He could see her doing it even from this distance. Flick. Flick.
"Of course," said Harry heavily, standing. He suddenly realized the room was cold enough that their breath fogged and he absently waved his wand at the fire, bathing it in a rush of heat.
The warmth seemed to embolden her and she stepped into the room, though barely.
"It's about the grendel you have in your keeping," she blurted, hands twisting nervously.
"Yes, what about it?" Harry tried to keep his impatience from his voice. Perhaps she'd decided to teach a class about it and was asking to borrow it.
"Well, I went into that classroom today…I only needed a book, I wasn't trying to impose on your space, Professor…only, I needed a text on kelpies and I was told they were kept in that classroom…" She spoke in a stuttering, nervous rush, her eyes pausing on his scar. "And… I'm sure you do well with him, being that you are the Dark Arts teacher, but…well, look!"
She yanked up the end of her robe and there was a scorched looking hole in it.
"It…it practically attacked me when I was only standing there, half a room away! If I had been closer, why, it might have…it could have…"
Her eyes were a weak, watery sort of blue, nothing at all like the sharp blue of Ron's eyes, looking at a person, occasionally through them. Harry blinked and realized that her eyes were not just watery but also red and he had a sudden horrified thought that she was about to burst into tears. The thought of her flinging herself at him in a fit of crying or rushing out into the halls where all and sundry could see she'd run from his office in tears were equally appalling.
Hoping to forestall it, Harry held up his hands awkwardly. "I see. Thank you for bringing it to my attention, I'll be sure to take care of it."
"Just…just see that you do!" she managed, whirling around to leave Harry staring after her.
He shook his head and waited for her footsteps to fade before sitting back at his desk. The waiting pile of scrolls looked like it had grown in his distraction. He looked at them, at his quill and back.
"Bugger this," Harry muttered, batting the scrolls off his desk. He snatched up wand and stuck it in his back pocket and made for the door, pausing long enough to kick away a scroll that had landed close enough to the fire for a curl of smoke to show on the edge.
The hallways were mostly deserted, the odd student or two appearing occasionally but rarely, and Harry realized it was later than he'd thought. The windows were night-darkened and several of the paintings were already snoring.
His classroom door was locked but opened willingly to his murmured password, and he stepped inside, lighting the tip of his wand rather than those in the room.
The grendel was curled up on the floor of his cage, playing with a small rag doll that one of the Gryffindor girls had made for him. While Harry watched, it happily he chomped the head off and let it roll around the cage before it vanished and reappeared once again attached. Harry had been particularly proud that she had managed that charm.
When it looked up and saw him, the grendel promptly dropped the toy and hopped up, chirruping happily. Harry settled himself on the floor next to the cage and reached inside, obediently patting its ugly scaled head.
"So you’re going to be leaving too now, aren't you?" Harry murmured, scratching behind its eyes. The grendel rumbled out what passed for its purr, pushing up eagerly into his hand.
All his students had been fond of the ugly little thing; they'd squabbled so much about feeding it that he'd had to set up a chart so that each House got an equal chance. Ron had liked it too, had often sat next to it during class and surreptitiously given it little treats or scratched beneath its chin, much like Harry was doing now. Academic interest, he'd claimed. Getting to know the dark creatures when they were small could be handy, it wasn't that he cared for the hideous little thing, oh, no...
"Harry?"
He looked up at the voice and saw Dumbledore standing inside the door. "I thought I saw a light in here," Dumbledore said, smiling.
He walked over to the cage and lowered himself onto the floor next to Harry. The grendel tilted his head at him, pulling away from Harry's stilled hand to inspect this newcomer. A few flicks of its tongue, snakelike, and it decided this person was acceptable. Imperiously, it butted its head against the cage and Dumbledore chuckled, reaching in to pet it.
"I've heard that this little creature is quite popular amongst our students," Dumbledore said, chuckling again as it made its rumbling purr.
"The staff isn't quite as enamored of him," Harry sighed. "I'm afraid it's time to send him off to Romania. It seems he attacked Nosturnma today in a fit of territorialism."
"Yes, she spoke to me earlier today."
"Did she now?" Harry murmured, his dislike of the woman edging up another notch.
They sat in silence for some time on the floor of the darkened classroom, each alternating in petting the ugly little creature in the cage, who delighted in swiveling its head back and forth until all its itchy places had been satisfied.
Dumbledore didn’t seem to have any urge to break the silence, though Harry knew him better. Once, Dumbledore had seemed like a father figure to him and over some time, he had developed into more of a friend. Harry still looked up to him, there was no questioning that, but he was also quite aware that he was a sneaky old bugger and it wasn't a light in a supposedly empty classroom that had brought him here tonight.
"I was thinking about Draco Malfoy, today," Harry said finally. The grendel was nosing towards his pockets hopefully and he drew out one of the small dog biscuits he'd taken to carrying, tossing it and watching it catch the treat with a crunch of powerful teeth.
"Ah, yes." Dumbledore shook his head sadly. "I had hopes once that he would be able to sever ties with his family. I'm afraid that there are some bonds that are nearly impossible to break."
He didn't mention the events that Ron had spoken of to him. He didn't need to, his eyes calm and telling.
"I feel like I should hate him," Harry said honestly. "But I can't really seem to." He drew his knees up like a child and rested his chin on them. "I hadn’t really even thought about him for quite some time. I heard that he’d died, of course. For a long time, most of my life was caught up with Quidditch. And then…" He thought of Cho, and there was still some pain there, a love that had been severed at the root. "And then it wasn’t. I didn’t have much of anything to think about until you contacted me and said you needed me."
"I'm afraid that the Defense Against the Dark Arts position is destined to cause me difficulties." He didn't sound particularly upset about it.
"I'm afraid that it probably is," Harry said, quietly. "I think, maybe, that when I first came, I needed to be here as much as you needed me to teach."
"That’s always possible," Dumbledore said agreeably. The grendel had curled up on the floor nearest to Harry with a sigh, nudging sleepily once last time against his stroking hand.
"I am happy here. You know that. Hogwarts has always been more of a home to me than anywhere else. I have colleagues here, my students, my work. I’d like to believe I’m almost as good of a professor as I am a Seeker. Most of the time," Harry added, thinking of the scrolls scattered on the floor of his office.
"Yes, you are. And you’re always welcome in these halls, Harry, so long as I am Headmaster. But I believe a person should beware of solitude. It can become a difficult habit to break." Dumbledore was never as idle as he often sounded.
"Yes, I suppose it can." Harry patted the warm, scaly snout and climbed slowly to his feet, wincing as blood resumed flowing in his legs. Dumbledore was smiling up at him, a fond and familiar twinkle in his eyes and Harry couldn't help smiling back. "Thank you, Albus. For everything."
"You're quite welcome, my boy. Quite welcome."
End chapter 29
As a side note, Chapter 30 should be the last chapter, unless unforeseen plot twists raise their ugly heads. See you then. ;)
by Keelywolfe
Fandom: Harry Potter
Harry/Ron
NC-17
Chapter 29
~*~
In which we say goodbye to old friends.
~*~
His office was so cold that Harry had taken to warming his hands on his teacup in an almost absent fashion. The fire had died down to the barest embers an hour before. Harry took no notice of it, idly tracing the grain in the wood of his desk with the tip of his quill. The ink lingered in shabby, glistening lines for long moments until it decided this surface wasn't parchment after all and vanishing into the air.
The paper in front of him had a fair amount of spelling errors, intermixed freely with factual ones, and he checked each one slowly, the ink flashing into red. It shifted to green when he added the rare compliment, shining off the paper, remaining a neutral black as he added the score at the bottom. He rolled it up and added it to the pile at his left and selected another from the slowly diminishing pile at his right.
He should have finished these hours ago, he knew. Essays from his first years should hardly take up this much of his time and yet, his thoughts refused to focus, drifting like a leaf downriver. It didn't seem possible that only a week before he'd been kneeling in blood and dirt, holding Ron's head in his lap while they waited for the Ministry to port him to Hogwarts. Not even twenty-four hours since he'd last been to the hospital wing, hovering outside the closed doors for long minutes before finally turning away, leaving them unopened.
Ink had dripped from the tip of his quill, puddling on the corner of the essay and trembling on the verge of a dozen colors. He swore and wiped it away with the edge of his sleeve, sending a mental apology in the direction of the house elves who did the washing as the half-dried ink chose to linger.
A knock on his door startled him from his morose thoughts and he looked up to see Professor Isabella Nosturnma hovering uncertainly in the doorway. She was on temporary duty at Hogwarts as the professor of Care of Magical Creatures until Hagrid returned.
Harry gave her a polite smile. "Yes?"
"May I speak with you a moment, Professor Potter?" she said timidly. Harry groaned mentally. He hadn't spoken to Nosturnma more than a handful of time but well considered them more than enough. He wasn't sure how she managed to teach a class, much less handle any of the magical creatures that Harry had learned about in school. She seemed more timid than Quirrell had been, her eyes doing an constant, and obvious, flicker to his forehead and then back to his face. He could see her doing it even from this distance. Flick. Flick.
"Of course," said Harry heavily, standing. He suddenly realized the room was cold enough that their breath fogged and he absently waved his wand at the fire, bathing it in a rush of heat.
The warmth seemed to embolden her and she stepped into the room, though barely.
"It's about the grendel you have in your keeping," she blurted, hands twisting nervously.
"Yes, what about it?" Harry tried to keep his impatience from his voice. Perhaps she'd decided to teach a class about it and was asking to borrow it.
"Well, I went into that classroom today…I only needed a book, I wasn't trying to impose on your space, Professor…only, I needed a text on kelpies and I was told they were kept in that classroom…" She spoke in a stuttering, nervous rush, her eyes pausing on his scar. "And… I'm sure you do well with him, being that you are the Dark Arts teacher, but…well, look!"
She yanked up the end of her robe and there was a scorched looking hole in it.
"It…it practically attacked me when I was only standing there, half a room away! If I had been closer, why, it might have…it could have…"
Her eyes were a weak, watery sort of blue, nothing at all like the sharp blue of Ron's eyes, looking at a person, occasionally through them. Harry blinked and realized that her eyes were not just watery but also red and he had a sudden horrified thought that she was about to burst into tears. The thought of her flinging herself at him in a fit of crying or rushing out into the halls where all and sundry could see she'd run from his office in tears were equally appalling.
Hoping to forestall it, Harry held up his hands awkwardly. "I see. Thank you for bringing it to my attention, I'll be sure to take care of it."
"Just…just see that you do!" she managed, whirling around to leave Harry staring after her.
He shook his head and waited for her footsteps to fade before sitting back at his desk. The waiting pile of scrolls looked like it had grown in his distraction. He looked at them, at his quill and back.
"Bugger this," Harry muttered, batting the scrolls off his desk. He snatched up wand and stuck it in his back pocket and made for the door, pausing long enough to kick away a scroll that had landed close enough to the fire for a curl of smoke to show on the edge.
The hallways were mostly deserted, the odd student or two appearing occasionally but rarely, and Harry realized it was later than he'd thought. The windows were night-darkened and several of the paintings were already snoring.
His classroom door was locked but opened willingly to his murmured password, and he stepped inside, lighting the tip of his wand rather than those in the room.
The grendel was curled up on the floor of his cage, playing with a small rag doll that one of the Gryffindor girls had made for him. While Harry watched, it happily he chomped the head off and let it roll around the cage before it vanished and reappeared once again attached. Harry had been particularly proud that she had managed that charm.
When it looked up and saw him, the grendel promptly dropped the toy and hopped up, chirruping happily. Harry settled himself on the floor next to the cage and reached inside, obediently patting its ugly scaled head.
"So you’re going to be leaving too now, aren't you?" Harry murmured, scratching behind its eyes. The grendel rumbled out what passed for its purr, pushing up eagerly into his hand.
All his students had been fond of the ugly little thing; they'd squabbled so much about feeding it that he'd had to set up a chart so that each House got an equal chance. Ron had liked it too, had often sat next to it during class and surreptitiously given it little treats or scratched beneath its chin, much like Harry was doing now. Academic interest, he'd claimed. Getting to know the dark creatures when they were small could be handy, it wasn't that he cared for the hideous little thing, oh, no...
"Harry?"
He looked up at the voice and saw Dumbledore standing inside the door. "I thought I saw a light in here," Dumbledore said, smiling.
He walked over to the cage and lowered himself onto the floor next to Harry. The grendel tilted his head at him, pulling away from Harry's stilled hand to inspect this newcomer. A few flicks of its tongue, snakelike, and it decided this person was acceptable. Imperiously, it butted its head against the cage and Dumbledore chuckled, reaching in to pet it.
"I've heard that this little creature is quite popular amongst our students," Dumbledore said, chuckling again as it made its rumbling purr.
"The staff isn't quite as enamored of him," Harry sighed. "I'm afraid it's time to send him off to Romania. It seems he attacked Nosturnma today in a fit of territorialism."
"Yes, she spoke to me earlier today."
"Did she now?" Harry murmured, his dislike of the woman edging up another notch.
They sat in silence for some time on the floor of the darkened classroom, each alternating in petting the ugly little creature in the cage, who delighted in swiveling its head back and forth until all its itchy places had been satisfied.
Dumbledore didn’t seem to have any urge to break the silence, though Harry knew him better. Once, Dumbledore had seemed like a father figure to him and over some time, he had developed into more of a friend. Harry still looked up to him, there was no questioning that, but he was also quite aware that he was a sneaky old bugger and it wasn't a light in a supposedly empty classroom that had brought him here tonight.
"I was thinking about Draco Malfoy, today," Harry said finally. The grendel was nosing towards his pockets hopefully and he drew out one of the small dog biscuits he'd taken to carrying, tossing it and watching it catch the treat with a crunch of powerful teeth.
"Ah, yes." Dumbledore shook his head sadly. "I had hopes once that he would be able to sever ties with his family. I'm afraid that there are some bonds that are nearly impossible to break."
He didn't mention the events that Ron had spoken of to him. He didn't need to, his eyes calm and telling.
"I feel like I should hate him," Harry said honestly. "But I can't really seem to." He drew his knees up like a child and rested his chin on them. "I hadn’t really even thought about him for quite some time. I heard that he’d died, of course. For a long time, most of my life was caught up with Quidditch. And then…" He thought of Cho, and there was still some pain there, a love that had been severed at the root. "And then it wasn’t. I didn’t have much of anything to think about until you contacted me and said you needed me."
"I'm afraid that the Defense Against the Dark Arts position is destined to cause me difficulties." He didn't sound particularly upset about it.
"I'm afraid that it probably is," Harry said, quietly. "I think, maybe, that when I first came, I needed to be here as much as you needed me to teach."
"That’s always possible," Dumbledore said agreeably. The grendel had curled up on the floor nearest to Harry with a sigh, nudging sleepily once last time against his stroking hand.
"I am happy here. You know that. Hogwarts has always been more of a home to me than anywhere else. I have colleagues here, my students, my work. I’d like to believe I’m almost as good of a professor as I am a Seeker. Most of the time," Harry added, thinking of the scrolls scattered on the floor of his office.
"Yes, you are. And you’re always welcome in these halls, Harry, so long as I am Headmaster. But I believe a person should beware of solitude. It can become a difficult habit to break." Dumbledore was never as idle as he often sounded.
"Yes, I suppose it can." Harry patted the warm, scaly snout and climbed slowly to his feet, wincing as blood resumed flowing in his legs. Dumbledore was smiling up at him, a fond and familiar twinkle in his eyes and Harry couldn't help smiling back. "Thank you, Albus. For everything."
"You're quite welcome, my boy. Quite welcome."
End chapter 29
As a side note, Chapter 30 should be the last chapter, unless unforeseen plot twists raise their ugly heads. See you then. ;)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-12-09 11:16 pm (UTC)Really wonderful.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-10 10:54 pm (UTC)