Harry-Dementor

23- Battle of Longbottom Manor

Harry and Ginny fed the thestrals and played with the foals before hunting down the centaurs to deliver Firenze's cake to him. He was surprisingly grumpy; it seemed he really had wanted to go to the wedding. The centaurs had reluctantly allowed him to return to the herd at the end of the school year, but now didn't want him to get involved with the humans again, even if it was a house elf wedding and only a few humans were actually in attendance. "Get rid of the human invaders, Firenze," Bane growled at Ginny and Harry threateningly.

"Seriously," Harry sighed and rolled his eyes at the centaur. "Neither Ginny nor I are humans. If you weren't so prejudiced and looked at what's around you instead of only the stars, you'd know that," he admonished.

"There were only three humans at the wedding in actuality," Ginny informed them all. "Just Professors Sprout, Dumbledore, and Mr. Filch. I don't see why Firenze wasn't allowed to attend."

"You aren't humans?" Another centaur, Ronan, Harry thought, walked forward and sniffed them a bit.

"Fairy…dementor," Harry motioned between them. "I'm surprised you didn't know what I am immediately. I mean, the unicorns sure seem to have it out for me."

"Harry Potter is a…dementor?" Firenze raised an eyebrow and studied the duo in front of him.

"And he's with a fairy?" Ronan added as almost a question.

"Bane, you must admit," Firenze said with a twinkle in his eye as he turned to the seething centaur. "Things are getting very interesting around here."

"This was not in the stars," Ronan added with a nod.

"Well…er, I think we're going to head out," Harry tugged on Ginny's sleeve a bit. He was out if they were going to start in on a lecture about the stars. "It's getting dark, and we need to get back to our tent."

Ronan actually looked a little worried for them. "You must be safe in the forest, Harry Potter. There are dangers amidst the trees."

"I'm a dementor," he huffed one more time. "I'm fairly indestructible unless you all plan to start firing off patroni any time soon."

"Don't worry, I'll protect him," Ginny added on with a grin at the herd. "Dobby says hi by the way. It was a beautiful wedding."

They hurried out with confused centaurs in their wake. "Bloody centaurs," Harry grumbled. "They seem all right, but you never really know where you stand with them. They seem like they care one minute, then Bane comes along…"

"He's like Severus," Ginny nodded as they headed back to the tent.

"Yeah, I guess he is." Harry beamed at her and held the tent flap open for her to enter. She glared,at him before pushing him inside.

He couldn't wait to hear how that conversation went down.

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Harry carefully extricated himself from where Ginny was asleep wrapped around Jamie on the couch. He supposed he was supposed to wake her up and move them from the couch to separate bedrooms, but he figured this didn't count as funny business or manhandling or whatever Sirius was talking about. Seriously, Neville cuddled with Jamie most nights like this anyway.