A dish best served cold

5

Ron Weasley was about to have a conniption. Had he been a robot, not that he knew what that was, he would probably have short-circuited and fizzled out. His sister had regained her crush on Harry Potter. This would have to end. He knew what Potter was doing. He was playing with his little sister's heart and would break hit when he got the chance. After all, if the new Lord was aware of what he and Hermione had been doing, which Ron was sure he was, then surely he would be aware of the fact that Ginny was benefitting from it. And yet, he showed no outward sign of disdain for the youngest redhead.

That wasn't the only thing though. Ron suspected that Harry had slipped into the Dark Arts, and had been responsible for killing the Undersecretary to the Minister. Nothing happened to him though. Instead, it was Ginny that was under investigation. All because of a slight burn on her hand. When Ron had asked her about what was going on and why they suspected her, she had been tight lipped.

By the time they were done with the investigation, they had installed Percy as the new Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts. Ginny, however, still wouldn't say anything about the investigation other than the fact that she might have gone to jail if not for Harry defending her. She had said that part with a faraway look of longing in her eyes.

When Ron had mentioned his suspicions about Harry to Hermione and Percy, both of them had given him a similar response. Harry was a dangerous opponent, but only politically. He was as likely to be practicing Dark Arts as Dumbledore. His background as far as bloodline was concerned, was far too Light Sided for him to have been tainted by the allure of the Dark side. Of course, they had no idea about his Beaufoy heritage, and the marriage of a Black into the Potter family was not common knowledge, so they were pretty far off about that. Percy did, however, make it clear that if Potter stepped out of line, he wouldn't hesitate in finding a way to put him back in place. The minister was getting sick of the boy's growing popularity amongst his peers.

Ron decided that if nobody wanted to help him, well then he would just have to do it himself. He wouldn't let his innocent little sister have her heart ripped to shreds by the evil thing that had replaced his former friend.

-HPHPHPHPHPHPHP-

Harry was sitting in the Room of Requirement on a Saturday evening in September. He had just finished Quidditch practice with the team, and it looked to be another great year. He had no doubt that they would win the Cup. Of course, they had needed to fill the goalie position so the team had held tryouts. Ron had come to try out, and had done the best of all of them until someone gave a closer look at McLaggen. They couldn't be sure how it had happened but the boy had been hit with a mild Confundus charm. Harry had his suspicions, but didn't voice them. He had a better way of humiliating the girl. They had done another round of shots on goal for both Ron and McLaggen and to the surprise of no one, the seventh year McLaggen did far better than the red headed loser.

After the practice was over today, Harry had decided to do some work with The Touch using the exercises in his book. The problem was, he didn't have anywhere with enough privacy. He spent a few minutes trying to figure out where to go, before finally deciding to ask the ones that knew the castle more thoroughly than even the Headmaster. The House Elves. Luckily for Harry, there was one that was completely faithful to him ever since he had freed the creature. Dobby, ever enthusiastic, had been more than happy to show Harry to the Come and Go Room, also known as the Room of Requirement.

It was set up like a small living room, with an arm chair, a round table and a fireplace. On the table were small knick knacks of all sorts. Pencils, stones, quills, paper, blocks of wood and a plethora of other little items. He opened the book to page 78 and read the passage about endurance exercises. Apparently, by using his power to break and fix things that require less energy, he could build up a tolerance to the drain, and he would also be able to maximize the effect while minimizing the draw on his magic.