The Price of Ambition

Daphne lounged in the second comfy armchair of Harry's shrunk trunk, flipping through pages of a three hundred year old charms text book. This was their third covert visit to the library's restricted section since their visit to the Hogwarts pipe network. Harry had set up a tiny fideliused area in the reading section, just large enough for the trunk to sit, fully expanded with the lid open.

She sighed, shut the book, and added it to an ever growing pile on the floor next to her.

Next to the rejected books, Trippy the drugged again house elf lay on the floor, dead to the world, again. Knowing she had a spy tracking her every move was disconcerting to say the least. On the other hand, knowing they could ambush the little bugger and wipe her memories whenever they needed made her feel a little better.

Harry's feet appeared from the invisible open trunk lid and descended a few steps, closely followed by his shins, thighs, midriff, torso, arms full of books, and finally head, each body part sliding into view as it left the cloak's invisibility field and entered the subspace of the trunk.

"How's it going?" Harry asked.

She glanced at the pile of books to her side and frowned. "Nothing yet." She grabbed the next book from the yet-to-check pile, opened it and started to make notes on the chapter names.

Harry nodded, carried his load of restricted section books to the small table, dumped them on the side furthest from her, landed in the armchair opposite her, picked up a single thick tome, and started reading.

Time flowed by.

She closed the final page of the book and picked up her wand. "Tempus." She frowned. This one had taken forty minutes to skim through, only to confirm there was nothing of help to them. Although there had been an interesting titbit on the fidelius charm.

Harry gazed at her over his book.

She put the book down on the rejected pile. "Why doesn't Dumbledore just put the stone under fidelius if he's trying to keep it safe?"

Harry yawned. "The Flamels probably do. The Headmaster probably has the stone here as a lure to get me and Voldemort in the same place at the same time. You know, for the prophecy."

She frowned. "But aren't you worried the stone might be a fake then? I mean, why have it here at all?"

Harry shook his head. "Nah. Anyone who knows the Headmaster well could tell you he's just the kind of arrogant sod who'd never believe anyone could actually get past all his defences."

Daphne looked at the thick book still laying in her lap. "Any idea how many books there are that might have what we're looking for them in them?"

Harry looked off into the distance for a moment. "Maybe three or four thousand?"

She scowled. "There must be a better way of doing this."

"There is."

She looked at him expectantly.

"Already have them all memorised and then use advanced occlumency to quick search through them all in your mind."

She threw up her hands. "Well, that's not very useful."

Harry inclined his head.

"And who uses their occlumency all the time while they're reading? You'd be magically exhausted after every single day."

The corner's of Harry lips twitched upwards. "Why do you think Hermione was far less tired after getting off the Hogwarts express than everyone else?"

She stared at Harry, face totally blank. "What?"

"Hermione's been using her occlumency, all day, every day, for almost three years. Her system can probably process magical toxins faster than anyone else in our year."

She gaped.

"Not included myself, of course, but I've a lot more magical power to build up my toxin tolerance with. If I was working with what Hermione had, she'd probably be doing better than me," Harry added.

"That's… insane!"

Harry's eyes gleamed over his book. "That's the point."

Daphne leaned back in her chair and stared at nothing on the floor, shoulders drooping and posture slumped. She knew Granger worked hard. She knew Harry had been teaching the muggleborn for almost as long as she, Daphne, knew him. But she knew what magical exhaustion felt like. It felt like a million angry ants running through your head, dragging you to unconsciousness, whether you were ready for it or not. And the feeling didn't always stop the next day. Waking up feeling like a hippogriff had run you over wasn't fun. To willingly go through that every day for Merlin knew how long it took to build up tolerance… was it any wonder she was struggling to keep up?

She glanced up from her staring match with the floor to see Harry's eyes still gleaming over the book, the edge of his mouth tugged upwards. The gleam slowly turned into a twinkle.

She breathed in sharply. "You bastard! You're enjoying this!"

Harry's face broke into a full on ear to ear grin.

"Stop it!"

Harry's grin widened yet further.

"Argh!" She grabbed the nearest book and hurled it at his stupid grinning face.

The book sailed past his rapidly ducked head. Harry broke into deep laughter.

Daphne scowled and clutched her fists. "Will you shut up! It's not funny!"

Harry slowly stopped laughing, though the grin remained firmly plastered on. "I'm sorry, Daph. I shouldn't be laughing." His grin melted into a fond smile. "I seem to recall you saying a couple months back that it would be your job to 'keep all these girls in line'."

She stiffened. Yes, she had said that, hadn't she? That was before she'd really met Granger. Miss overly-familiar, headstrong, pure-blood-trained, muggleborn-free, youngest-healer-trainee-ever, always-rolls-sixes, push-herself-sick-for-years, magical-powerhouse, Hermione Granger.

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