The Brightest Black - A Dramione Fanfic

Family Connections

Harry stepped out of the fireplace and into the Headmaster's office, doing a quick hop step so as not to fall. Floo was not his preferred method of travel, but it was fast. Ginny was sound asleep in one of the chairs, her head resting on Dumbledore's desk. She was still in the robes she'd been wearing when he took her to Hogsmeade yesterday. Now they were wrinkled and covered in mud. Professor Dumbledore emerged from the fireplace as soon as Harry moved out of the way.

"Harry, why don't you take a seat? I have a few questions for you."

Harry took the remaining empty chair next to Ginny and watched as the Headmaster waved his wand and tapped the fireplace, supposedly shutting down the floo.

Dumbledore silently walked over to his office chair and sat down, he gave the sleeping Ginny a sad smile before reaching out and tapping her shoulder gently. She jerked awake, her wand clenched in her fist.

"Oh, you're back! How's Hermione? They wouldn't tell me anything. Did the Minister believe you? He called me a silly girl! Says Lord Voldemort isn't really back! That I didn't know what I was talking about! Told me to go back to school and go to bed like a good little girl! He even patted me on the head!" Her voice was heavily laden with disgust in the last bit.

"Um..." Harry didn't quite know where to start. Especially as just the thought of Hermione and her situation brought angry, guilt-ridden tears to his eyes. It was his fault she'd gotten injured. He'd wanted her to come. If it wasn't for that connection she'd be safe in Hogwarts, not tied to a hospital bed, in terrible pain. When he reached out he could distantly feel her – silently screaming and wanting to scratch her skin off. Even while asleep

"Miss Weasley, I am afraid that Miss Black was hit with a terrible hex or curse. One the healers have never seen before. They're doing their best to cure her, but it may be awhile before she is fully recovered. As for Cornelius, he is choosing to ignore the truth. So I will have to take matters into my own hands. Even Scrimgeour, the head of the aurors, believes that Barty Crouch Jr was not working alone." He looked at her over the top of his half-moon spectacles, "Does that satisfy your questions?"

Ginny grew pale nodded before reaching over to grasp Harry's hand, giving it a squeeze. He smiled weakly at her and returned the squeeze, before looking back at the Headmaster.

"You wanted to speak to me, sir?"

"Yes, I want you to tell me about this bond between you and Hermione Black. For example, what does it do? How long has it been there?"

Harry shrugged, "It's always been there, for as long as I can remember. If one of us is terribly upset or in unbearable pain the other one can feel it, too. Sometimes we can even see what the other is seeing. We also know exactly where the person in pain is. That's how Hermione found me. We can dampen it somewhat with occlumancy. I can feel her right now, the curse isn't letting her rest."

Dumbledore steepled his fingers and looked thoughtful for a moment. When he spoke again his voice contained an emotion that Harry couldn't quite place, but it felt like regret.

"I know exactly what binds the two of you. Now, please hold any questions until the end. Back on that Halloween night when you and Hermione were orphaned I took several hours to perform a ritual with you after Hagrid pulled you from the rubble. At the time I believed Sirius had betrayed your family, so I planned to send you to your muggle aunt's house. I knew you would need protection as there were still Death Eaters on the loose. So I cast a ward on your very blood, it was tied to the protections your mother cast on you as she died. The ones that let you survive the killing curse. What this meant was as long as you shared a home with a relative of your mother's you would be safe. A very necessary thing when your only relatives are muggles. Blood wards are tricky things, they not only require a blood relation, but also some emotion between the two people. Any emotion will do. Even hate, though that would afford only the most basic of protections. The best emotion is, of course, love. When Sirius took you from your aunt I assumed the wards were useless, but Professor Quirrell's reaction to touching you in your first year showed they were still quite active. Your mother is not related to the Blacks as far as I know, so I was very confused. I eventually asked a squib friend of mine to try and dig into your mother's genealogy. It took her some time, but she found an ancestor of your mother's about four generations back that had no history. He just appeared one day as an apprentice to a goldsmith in Bath. There are no records of his parents or his family. He married the goldsmith's only daughter and took her family's name, as that was the name of the shop. Setting a young squib up with a good life in the muggle world was done quite often by many wizarding families after the Statute of Secrecy. Leading me and my friend, Arabella, to believe this man was a squib. Now here's where Arabella got creative. She went back down the line and traced where his other three children ended up. It turns out that the youngest daughter is Miss Black's ancestress, while the second son is yours. So, you and your sister actually do share blood; likely the smallest amount possible that the blood wards will recognize."