Hello, sorry about the long wait.

Harry Potter is not mine, nor will it ever be.

And now, on with the Chapter.

CHAPTER 17

Harry sighed, it had been a long day. After the potions incident he decided to skip the rest of his classes and burn off some of his fury at the hated potion professor by firing powerful cutting curses at tree's in the forbidden forest.

It was nearing nightfall when he finally decided to head back inside to find Daphne and head to the headmasters office to see about leaving the grounds on Saturday to visit Ollivander's. He was still worried that he would get into more trouble, but this was something that he had to do.

When Harry entered the front doors to the castle he heard a commotion coming from the great hall, reminding him that it was dinner time. And at the exact moment his stomach gave a grumble and he remembered that he had not eaten for a while, and all the casting he had done had also worked up an appetite.

As Harry neared the doors to the great hall he slowed down dreading what was coming. He had a feeling that he was going to be in even more trouble after what happened in Snape's class, but he hoped not. After all he has already taken even MORE points from them, and if he recalled correctly from earlier as he passed the glass vials that kept the house tally's. They were now at -433 points, which basically meant that there was NO way they could catch up. Unless Voldemort came back again, and he managed to fight him off one more time. Then Dumbledore may just give him a bunch of points to even it out. But he highly doubted that would happen. Then he laughed in his head, was he actually thinking Voldemort coming back for him to defeat again just for some stupid points was a good idea?

Harry entered the great hall and looked to the Gryffindor table. He saw Ginny, Ron and Hermione chatting as they ate dinner. Ginny looked up at that moment and caught his eye, and he gave her a small smile before nodding his head in Daphne's direction, indicating that he was going to talk to her. He got a small smile in return before Ginny returned to her food and conversation.

As Harry approached Daphne he noticed that she was one again with Tracey and the other girl, Amy he thought her name was.

"Good evening Ladies. I was wondering if I could have a moment of your time Daphne?" Harry asked politely.

Both Tracey and the Amy girl gave him looks of loathing and mistrust as they exchanged glaces with each other.

"Yes, when would you like to talk?" Daphne asked with a mask of indifference.

"After dinner if that would be acceptable?"

Daphne gave a slight nod of her head and resumed her meal, effectively dismissing him. And he couldn't help wondering why she was so cold to him all of a sudden, when just this morning they were fine.

"Right. Err, see you then." Harry mumbled as he rounded the table and headed for the head table to ask if the headmaster would be able to talk after the evening meal.

"Hello Sir." Harry said as he came in range of Professor Dumbledore.

"Harry." Professor Dumbledore inclined his head slightly. "Professor Snape has told me about what happened earlier today."

Anger pushed at Harry's nerves. But he held it in. "I see. And has he told you everything that happened? Or did he leave the part about trying to make me do all of Malfoy's work for him?"

The elder headmaster gave a weary sigh. "Mr. Potter, I wish you would both try harder to get along, you both antagonizing each other does not help anyone."

"I didn't do anything sir! I was just trying to do my potion when he started in on me, like he always does! And I'm tired of it! He's a horrible teacher! Ask any student who's not a Slytherin!"

"That is enough Mr. Potter. I have already spoken to many people about the incident, and I have revoked the points taken in this case. But you must learn to control your emotions Harry."

Harry looked at the headmaster with surprise. "Oh." Harry chanced a glance at Snape and could not help but notice the complete loathing and hate in his features. He turned back to Dumbledore and said in a quite voice."Err, thanks."

Dumbledore inclined his head somewhat before leaning forward some. "Was that all Mr. Potter?"

Harry regained his bearings and remembered the reason he had come to the headmaster in the first place. "Oh right. Um, I was wondering if you would be available after dinner? I. Um" Here he glanced at Daphne quickly before turning back to Dumbledore. "I did something else on the train ride that I should not have sir. And I was hoping me Daphne Greengrass could have a word with you?" As he was talking his voice got quieter and quieter, and at the end it was barely a whisper. And Harry hung his head in shame.

"I see." Dumbledore replied. "Very well, I will be available tonight from 9:30 to 10:30. would that be alright?"

"Yes sir." Harry replied looking up.."Thank you."

"I will inform the other Professors so that you will not get in any trouble for being out of your common rooms past curfew. Now why don't you go and enjoy some dinner. If I am not mistaken you have not eaten yet."

"Yes sir." Harry replied before heading to the Gryffindor table.

As Harry sat down he could not help but feel as if a slight weight had been taken from his shoulders. He still had to talk to the headmaster about going to Diagon Alley on Saturday, but he thought that things may just work out okay.

"Hey guys." Harry said as he took a seat next to Ginny and quickly loaded a plate of his favorites.

"Hey." Ron said as he finished off a bite of chicken. "Where have you been? You almost missed dinner mate."

Harry gave a shrug. "Just needed to get some air."

"You missed Charms." Hermione said in a clipped tone.

Harry pinched the bridge of his nose as he sighed. "I know. And I will make up the work later."

"You should not be skipping classes! We've barely even been here 2 days now and you have already gotten thrown out of one, and skipper another class! Not only that, but in transfiguration you did not even bring your wand! I'm surprised Professor McGonagall did not give you even MORE detentions for that! I cannot believe how irresponsible you are being!" Hermione ranted at him.

Harry counted to ten in his head before turning to Hermione. "I'm really not in the mood Hermione. So either leave it be, or just leave."

Hermione sent him a small glare before turning to her food and not talking any more. But Harry could not seem to care if she was mad or not, he has having a horrible day, and he really did not want to deal with her crap right now.

"You don't need to be such a prat about it, don't take your anger out on Hermione. She's just trying to help." Ron said in Hermione's defense.

"Help me?" Harry asked incredulously. "All she's doing is nagging at me about missing classes and not bringing my wand to class! And it was only one stupid class! Its not like I've missed a whole bunch of classes! And as for Transfiguration we did not even use our wands the first day! All we did was talk about what we will be doing this year. So its not like I missed anything!" Harry turned to his food that he had yet to touch, only for it to disappear before he could even pick up his fork. "Great! And now I cant even have dinner" he exclaimed as dessert foods appeared all around.

"Could always have extra dessert." Ron said with a shrug as he loaded up his plate with many different items.

Harry felt a poke on his shoulder and turned to see Ginny giving him a slight grin and holding a large steak with her fork.

"I had a feeling you would miss dinner." She said with a smile as she plopped the steak onto his plate. "Now eat before that gets taken away as well." She said before enjoying a spoon full of chocolate pudding.

Harry couldn't help giving her a large smile before he took her advice and quickly finished his steak. "Thanks Ginny" He said as he say back from how now empty plate.

Ginny turned to him with a smile. "No problem." she said as she took another bite of pudding.

Harry stared at her as she took the spoon from her mouth, and he noticed a little chocolate pudding on the corner of her bottom lip. And suddenly his mouth went dry, and he had the most insane idea cross his mind that he had ever had. Then before he could stop himself he reached out and ran his thumb across her lip to remove the pudding. Then again without thinking he licked the pudding from his finger.

Then he promptly froze as he realized what he had done. And glanced into Ginny's eyes, which where wide in surprise and shock. Then he heard the sound of something metal hitting wood, and turned to the sound only to find Ron staring at him with a mortified look.

"." Harry found he couldn't find any words to escape from his mouth. His brain did not seem to be working at the moment at all. After all, if it was he never would have done that in the first place!

"Fuck" Harry whispered glancing back and forth between a mortified Ron, and a shocked, and now blushing Ginny.

Sorry about the long delay everyone. I lost my job and things have been hard on me at the moment. I will continue this story, I will not leave you all hanging with an uncompleted book. It may be a while for another chapter, but I promise I will try and get one out faster than this one took. Thank you all for being such loyal readers.