When Dumbledore couldn't think of anything else to say, Harry asked, "Are we done yet?"
Dumbledore nodded.
Harry left the room without a backward glance.
...
Dinner on Friday was nearing its end when Professor McGonagall tapped on the side of her glass to silence the Great Hall.
In the ensuing silence, Dumbledore got to his feet and said, "May I have your attention please. A request has been made that you all act as witnesses to a magically binding oath." He paused for a moment an expression of disappointment on his face. "Miss Granger, Mr. Potter, if you would both please come forward."
The silence in the Great Hall was such that everyone could hear the tapping of the butt of Potter's staff. Some of the students who shared classes with Potter also noticed that instead of having a flickering light as it usually did, the deep green stone on the top of Potter's staff had a steady pulsing glow almost like a heartbeat. All the students watched Potter and Granger walk up to stand in front of the Head table. Some of the smaller students had to crane their necks to see what was going on.
"Face each other," Dumbledore instructed.
Once they had done so, the Headmaster told Hermione, "you may begin whenever you are ready, Miss Granger."
There were several minutes of silence before Hermione looked at her former best friend and begged. "Please, don't make me do this."
Those closest to the Head table saw that Potter's face was a blank mask, showing no emotion whatsoever and his voice made it clear to the rest of the room as he said flatly. "The choice is yours, Granger. I know that McGonagall told you my terms. You can take them or leave things the way they are."
Tears filled Hermione's eyes as she took out her wand and laid it across the palms of her hands. "I, Hermione Jane Granger, do hereby solemnly swear upon my magic that I will never deliberately approach Harry James Potter or deliberately speak with him ever again. The day I do so, I will lose my magic."
The students in the Great Hall gasped as a blue aura surrounded Granger and it seemed to be reaching out tendrils toward Potter.
"I, Harry James Potter, do hereby accept the magically binding vow of Hermione Jane Granger to never deliberately come near me or speak to me ever again. And I return that which you value over everything else in your life."
As soon as Potter finished speaking, a deep green aura surrounded him and tendrils flowed outward to meet the questing ones from Granger. As soon as they made contact, they seemed to tie themselves together and then both auras vanished.
"So mote it be," Dumbledore intoned and they could hear the note of sadness in his voice. "The oath has been given and accepted and it has been witnessed by those assembled here. I only hope that one day you do not regret was done here today, Mr. Potter."
"I doubt I ever will." Harry told him before returning to his seat at the end of the Gryffindor table.
....
A Few Unpleasant Facts
"Headmaster, I would like to speak with you regarding Mr. Potter." McGonagall told him once the other Heads of House had left the Headmaster's office after their weekly Friday meeting.
"What else has he done, Minerva?" Dumbledore was beginning to regret forcing young Harry to go back to Hogwarts, but he wasn't going to give up on or abandon the boy, not this time. Aside from the fact that the wizarding world still needed Harry Potter, he had no intention of making the same mistake he'd made last year, the one that had led to Harry's incarceration in Azkaban.
"He hasn't done anything else Albus. It's what he might do next that has me concerned, given his actions toward Miss Granger. Not to mention the oath he made her swear that is going to force her to stay away from him or risk losing her magic. I know it was your intention to try and get him to forgive his friends and now that door has been slammed in Miss Granger's face forever." McGonagall told him.
"Not quite, Minerva." Dumbledore told her. "The oath doesn't block Mr. Potter from talking to her and if he does, then it will not cause the loss of Miss Granger's magic. It is possible that we may be able to convince him to release her from the oath he had her swear."
"That will never happen." McGonagall snorted. "It has been almost two months, Headmaster, and I see no signs of his anger diminishing. At best he ignores his fellow students and at his worst he is so contemptuous of them that they want very little to do with him. I don't think your plan is going to work Albus. If it were we should be seeing signs of it by now."
Dumbledore sighed and got up from his desk to stare out the window for a moment. "He just needs time, Minerva."
"How much time and is he to be given this time at the expense of the other students?" McGonagall wanted to know. "Because I must tell you Headmaster the first year Gryffindors will have nothing to do with him. They stay as far away from him as possible and a number of them were quite pleased that they were going to be in the same House as Harry Potter until they met him."
"Has he harmed them?" Dumbledore asked quickly.
"If you mean has he done anything similar to what he did to Miss Granger, then no, but he treats them with outright contempt and they had nothing to do with what happened last year. He is tarring them with the same brush that he has used for the second through seventh year students and they don't deserve that Albus. They are innocent of the wrongdoings of their fellow Gryffindors." McGonagall told him. "I never thought I would ever say this, but it may be in the best interests of all if Mr. Potter were segregated from his fellow Gryffindors, if only for their safety."
Dumbledore shook his head. "I'm sorry Minerva, but that can't happen. Also I doubt that Mr. Potter will do them any physical harm, unless they first try and harm him. He may be an angry young man, but he still has a strong sense of right and wrong and there are lines even he will not cross."
"What do you call what he did to Miss Granger if not physical harm?" McGonagall couldn't believe how calmly the Headmaster was taking this.
"No it was not," Dumbledore disagreed. "The harm he did was emotional and maybe mental. If he had wanted to, I think Mr. Potter could have easily blinded Miss Granger. He did block her ability to see the written word and for an avid reader like Miss Granger that was far more painful. I do have to agree with Mr. Potter about one thing. Miss Granger is a very stubborn young woman and it is very hard to get her to change her mind about some things. Also she is thoroughly convinced that she knows what's best for those around her and that she has the right to meddle in their lives."
"Hmm," McGonagall mused with her first smile of the evening, "that sounds an awful lot like some one I know."
Dumbledore drew himself up and tried to look affronted, "I have no idea who you could be taking about."
"Are you sure?" McGonagall teased, her grin broadening.
"Can we get back to the matter at hand?" Dumbledore requested. "As I was saying, all Mr. Potter did was cause Miss Granger severe emotional distress probably equal to what she caused him when she destroyed the photo album containing the only pictures he had of his parents."
"It was far greater surely Albus!" McGonagall protested. "The punishment didn't fit the crime simply for picking up a book off a table."
"But ultimately, I don't think that's what he was punishing her for. I think that was just the trigger. I think he was punishing her for destroying his photo album." Dumbledore countered. "She knew how much those pictures meant to him and she also knew how much it would hurt him to see those pictures destroyed by someone he thought of as his friend. By the same token, Mr. Potter knows how much Miss Granger loves to read and knew how much it would hurt her to not be able to do that."
McGonagall conceded that he was probably right. "I still think his final punishment far outweighed any crime she may have committed. He was Miss Granger's first friend here and I know how much she wanted to make up with him and get that friendship back."
"And that is why he has to stay in the Gryffindor dorms." Dumbledore told her. "He needs to work through his anger at his fellow students and the Wizarding world as a whole and he can't do that if we allow him to hide from us. It is important that young Harry remain in the wizarding world. He is too important to lose."
"You keep saying that Albus, but compared with the future witches and wizard of our world, why is he so important? If this keeps up it is possible that we may lose these students to other schools, if they don't decide to give up their education completely." She pointed out. "Tell me why he is so important."
.....
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