Save The Date (A Drarry FanFiction)

Chapter Forty Three

   Hermione circled around the third ring for a while before she came across Ron – she hadn't appreciated just how big it was before. There were so many trees, all densely packed together. He looked tired but he didn't show any signs of giving up any time soon, not with Harry still in danger, and she felt a surge of affection for him. "How are you doing?" she asked by way of greeting as she approached, then rubbed his back.

He bent down and kissed her cheek, then showed her how his list was progressing. "Slow going," he admitted. "But I've found at least one possible match for every image I've logged so far. People celebrate some weird arse holidays."

She glanced at the page he held up for her to see, spying such gems as "Sausage Roll Day" and "Make A New Friend Day" and "World Beard Day".

"I'm not sure people really celebrate them," she said with a shrug. "I think it's more a novelty thing, probably designed around advertising campaigns."

Ron scoffed. "That's not particularly in the spirit now, is it?" he said with a lopsided grin. "From now on, I demand we celebrate the extremely important and underappreciated Ice Cream For Breakfast Day."

Hermione smirked. "Then I insist we celebrate..." She scanned down the list. "Clean Your Floors Day."

"I'd rather go with National Bubble Bath Day," Ron countered with a grin that made her insides warm up, then gave her a loving kiss. After though, he sighed, the gloom of their situation settling back in. "Find anything useful?"

She leaned her head on his chest. "Maybe. Good? I don't know. I feel like Harry and Malfoy's souls, or whatever you want to call them, their minds? They've been pulled into these trees or something. Whatever the holiday magic is used to create, that's where they are. I just can't really fathom what that means exactly."

Ron stroked her head through her woolly hat. "Well, we'll work it out, and then we'll bring him back. Like we did for you with the Basilisk."

She smiled at that memory. She had been so proud when she'd woken from her frozen state to discover Harry and Ron had figured it all out despite her only leaving them a single clue of "Pipes".

"Exactly," she agreed. "We're only just getting started."

"Out in public? How daring."

Hermione and Ron both jumped at the sultry voice right behind them, and weren't surprised to see Pansy with her hands in her pockets and a smirk on her lips. The blue light made her cheekbones look even more angular and her dark eyes positively black, still, they held a certain impish spark about them.

"Do you creep up on everyone like that?" Hermione demanded, flustered.

"Only the ones I'm fond of," Pansy replied without a hint of irony. "Come on, I've got something to show you crazy kids."

She led them further back, beyond the densely packed third ring, and indicated the trees there with a sweep of one of her pink, gloved hands.

Ron looked back towards the trees of the third ring he'd been working on, then back again. "This is just the regular forest now," he said in confusion.

"That's what I thought," Pansy conceded with a tilt of her head. "But look what happens when you get closer." She stepped towards the nearest tree, and sure enough, an image began to form. "See?"

Hermione squinted. "It's a calendar page?" she said, not sure what that meant. "The month of November?"

Pansy frowned at her, then looked down at the bark herself. "That's not what I see," she said in confusion.

"Really?" asked Hermione.

"Yeah," said Ron, moving next to another tree. "I see the letter P. Hang on, wait." He considered his own tree more closely. "This one says R?"

Hermione shook her head. "I just see another calendar," she told them, not understanding. "Except that one is for March." There wasn't a year defining the dates though, she noticed. Just a month and the numbers one to thirty or thirty one in a square grid. "That's strange. Pansy, what do you see?"

"Money," she said simply.

Hermione tapped her jaw and looked between the two trees. "Okay," she said, then went to stand by a third tree. "Now I see a September calendar."

"The letter H," Ron supplied with a frown.

"Still money," said Pansy. "Less than on my tree, but more than Weasley's," she added slyly.

Hermione ignored her. None of the other trees had done this, as far as they had documented (which was a considerable amount so far) everyone had seen the same thing.

"What does it mean?" Ron asked.

She shook her head. "I honestly haven't a clue," she admitted. "But, I think maybe we should go tell McGonagall."

The other two nodded. "Agreed," said Pansy, and they began walking hurriedly back into the glade.