Empty Spaces

Chapter 47

It had been Hermione who connected the dots for him, as usual. Harry didn't even bother reading the paper every day, maybe just the headlines if he was feeling on-top-of-things, but Hermione was so good at giving him a rundown on everything important that he mostly just read whatever articles she placed in front of him, and today was no exception.

"Harry– look here! Third page," she announced over breakfast, picking out a section from her Prophet and handing it over. "Do you recognize that name? Ironbark... This is the worker from the Magical Law Enforcement Office who declined my application. Didn't you say he was there yesterday when you went in with Draco? Look! He's gone missing..."

"What?" Harry asked, taking the paper and scanning down the page, "Yeah, that's definitely him. Says he disappeared last night... no reason to suspect foul play at this time... Just to contact the Ministry if you've seen him... Family is worried and so on..."

"Harry, you don't think Draco is in danger, do you?"

"What? Why?"

Hermione gave him the look she reserved for the times when she felt she'd said something extremely obvious while simultaneously feeling that Harry was being infuriatingly slow on the uptake.

"Blair Ironbark of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement denies my application. You receive a letter from Draco's father that he can override this denial on the condition that you leave his son alone. You ignore his offer, and let's face it, I don't think Lucius Malfoy is used to being ignored , do you? Meanwhile, the same Blair Ironbark is there when you show up with Draco yesterday afternoon, and now he's gone missing. Don't you find all these events to be too interconnected to be coincidental??"

Harry nodded, processing.

"Okay..."

"What happened yesterday at the Ministry?" Hermione pressed, "Did Ironbark say anything or do anything?? Did Draco? Did you???"

"Merlin's left nut, Hermione, hold on!" Harry replayed the scene in his head. Their interaction with Ironbark had been extremely brief and Harry had mostly been focused on Draco the whole time– the fact that he had been able to recognize Ironbark at all was, in Harry's opinion, something he deserved at least slightly more credit for than Hermione was giving him. "He didn't look pleased to see me, but the same can be said for loads of other people. He did put Draco on edge, though, which I guess could be counted as unusual?"

"Hmm... I wonder if Draco knows anything," Hermione mused. "Can you ask him today? You are going back again this afternoon, right?"

"Yeah, for tea," Harry doubted he would be able to sneak in a private conversation with Narcissa around. Despite their polarized views on just about everything, Harry liked Draco's mother. She'd saved his life– and Draco's– during the war. People could say all they wanted to about the Malfoy family, but when it came down to it, Narcissa had yet to give Harry an actual reason to not like her.

"Okay, but Harry, this is important," Hermione pressed, "There are too many clues, and Draco's been through enough already, don't you think? What if something happens before we have a chance to tell him what we know??"

"Okay! Okay, yes, you're right," Harry surrendered. He'd been planning on confessing everything this weekend when Draco returned home, but Hermione had a point. A lot could happen in twenty-four hours. Harry had seen the entire world fall apart in a matter of minutes. Who knows what a whole actual day could do. "I'll bring Lucius' letter, I'll tell him everything and then we'll figure it out. Together. Like always. Good enough?"

"Good enough," Hermione nodded, "Come on, we'll be late for Potions..."

Harry struggled in class today: Not only was the Ironbark question looming overhead, but the invisible pressure that he was now supposed to be "good" at Potions made everything somehow seem ten times worse. After Holmberg had personally vouched for Harry's skill in the subject, Harry's shrinking solution was quickly turning into a disaster to rival his work in Snape's class. After six years of failing miserably, how could Harry possibly be so naive as to think he could become good at this overnight? And now he'd already put in his applications for next year... what had he been thinking ...??