THE_LOVE_OF_A_GOOD_WIZARD.doc

Title: THE LOVE OF A GOOD WIZARD
Pairings: Harry/Tom, Pansy/Minerva
Rating: PG-13 for now, likely to go up later for the main pairing
Warnings: AU, time-travel, hurt/comfort, fluff, angst, possibly a lot of dancing
Summary: History of Magic has something to teach after all, and two resourceful students decide that the key to having any future at all lies in the past, and in Tom Riddle's heart. Assuming he has one.

Disclaimer: All canon referred to within belongs to JK Rowling, Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books, Raincoast Books, Warner Bros. Inc., and possibly others. Non-canon bits were created for non-profit, non-infringement entertainment.
Archiving: absolutely nowhere, please!
Notes: I aim to post at least one chapter a week. Positive comments may well speed things up, while any other kind is happily ignored.


THE LOVE OF A GOOD WIZARD


1. History of Magic

The greatest changes in history seem to occur in quick succession and are often set off by single, isolated incidents. Incidents such as a young witch's refusal to take the Dark Mark, one of Professor Binns' lessons in History of Magic given to a mixed sixth year class, and a very unlikely alliance based on courage and hope.

"And to this day," droned Binns. "It is acknowledged in our world that had he not fallen in love with the kind, self-sacrificing witch Griselda Hughes, Dante Garibaldi would have become the Dark Lord of the Middle Ages. It was only Griselda's love and influence which prevented his rise to ultimate power and brought about his eventual abandonment of the Dark Arts." Binns smiled his ghostly smile, sensing that for once, the class appeared to be paying attention.

Harry Potter had been watching Binns, actually listening attentively. Of course, his first thought on hearing the story was that he wished desperately that some witch had fallen in love with Tom Riddle before he became Voldemort, killed his parents, and began to gather his death eaters. Though judging by his brief encounter with the boy's memory - extremely handsome or not - loving him would have proven too much of a task for anyone to take on.

A desk across from Harry, Pansy Parkinson's quill snapped in half. She was staring at the professor, then down at the book detailing the story of Dante and Griselda, and back up again at Binns. A calculating look crossed her face. Then she turned her head, noticing she was being watched.

Harry frowned at her and tilted his head, asking a silent question.

Pansy smirked, picked up a new quill, and scribbled a quick note on a piece of parchment. She folded it up and tossed it across onto Harry's desk.

Harry raised his eyebrow at her, then unrolled the note.

Potter,
Meet me in Greenhouse Two after lunch. We need to talk.
P.

He looked at her and nodded.

Pansy grinned and went back to paying rapt attention to the rest of the lesson.

* * *

Harry arrived ten minutes after Pansy.

"Took you long enough," she groused half-heartedly, perching on a low table with her well-shaped legs crossed. "It's hot in here, and I don't want my make-up to start running."

"You picked the place," Harry informed her. "And some of us like dessert. So, what's this all about?"

"History of Magic." Pansy smoothed the fabric of her skirt over her knees.

Harry looked at her. After a minute of silence, he said, "And?"

Pansy sighed. "It's obvious, isn't it? Come on, Potter. You of all people should know that the wizarding world would be a lot better off if Voldemort had never come to power to begin with." She refused to shudder in awe at the name, these days.

"Well yes, that is obvious." Harry looked a bit peeved. "Unfortunately, he was an arrogant, selfish, vain prick even while he was still at school, so it's not surprising that any good witch would have run in the other direction as quickly as she could."

Pansy looked positively triumphant. "See, Potter, this is why I've asked you here. You have inside knowledge of Tom Riddle. You're my man." Harry took a step back, but Pansy only snickered. "Not that way, Potter. Look, you've met him." When Harry was about to clarify, Pansy held up her hand impatiently. "Sort of met him. You know what I mean. And what kind of information I need."

Harry was catching on. "You're insane." He sat down hard on one of the benches, not really caring that he was sitting on a layer of freshly dug peat.

Pansy looked at him, her dark eyes serious. "No, Potter. I'm desperate. As things stand, I've lost my family, my inheritance, and I'm going to spend the rest of my probably rather short life trying to keep one step ahead of death eaters. We both know they don't take 'no' for an answer, and that they'll get to me sooner rather than later."

Harry winced.

"And I should think you wouldn't mind having your parents back either," Pansy continued, sounding not quite detached. "And your godfather. And Diggory?" Now she smirked.

Harry didn't notice because he was averting his eyes. "Yeah, okay. But look, Pansy - not to sound mean or anything, but I don't know that you exactly qualify as a good witch." He winced again. "Obviously, you're a good witch, but I don't know that you're…" He desperately tried to back-pedal when he realized that these days, there was little to say against Pansy Parkinson beyond the fact that she was vain and still proud to be a pure-blood.

Pansy raised her eyebrow at him. "Potter, I'm quite sure a redeemed witch will do." When he gave her an apologetic look, she laughed. "And I forgive you for being a prat. Years of habit are hard to break."

"Very funny," Harry muttered, but had to admit to himself that her easy forgiveness rather disproved her last statement. "But I still don't see how on earth you're going to manage to go back in time. We're talking fifty years or so."

"Yes, that part needs to be worked out." Pansy tapped her manicured fingers against her kneecap. "We'll have to research."

"Right." Harry stood. "Hermione."

Pansy looked at him blankly. "Potter, are you mad? Granger is not the only person capable of research. I'm a top student, as you're probably aware. And goody-two-shoes would run off to Dumbledore five minutes after you talk to her."

Harry was about to protest, but knew he couldn't exactly contest the statement.

Pansy, well aware of this, was already continuing, "Even if she didn't, she'd get it into her frizzled head that she's obviously a better witch than I am and would decide to go herself, which would be doomed from the start."

"Why?" Harry asked, genuinely curious.

"Think, Potter. This is Tom Riddle, future Dark Lord. For one thing, she's a mud… muggleborn. He'd hate her on principle. For another, she's a bookworm; she doesn't know a thing about men. And for yet another, I've spent my whole life around dark wizards. Granger would run away screaming, Gryffindor or not, at his first mention of the Dark Arts. I know what I'm doing, and I'm not intimidated by posturing. I'm also perfectly happy to do as much empty flattering as required."

Something about that last bit seemed wrong to Harry. "Do you think empty flattering will do the trick?" When Pansy blinked at him, he added, "I'm no expert on this romantic stuff, but for this to work, won't you have to, well... love him?" He silently cursed himself for blushing.

Pansy looked thoughtful. "Good point. We'll just have to hope for the best." She looked a little unsure for the first time since making her suggestion.

Thinking it would be a good time to point out the other obvious problem, Harry said, "We're going to go to Azkaban for the next fifty years if this goes wrong, you realize."

Somehow, that caution set Pansy back on track. "And if it goes right, we'll get to fix the past fifty years. Are you or aren't you a Gryffindor?" she challenged.

Harry glared at her. "I am." Silently, he added, 'And a Slytherin as well.'

"Thought so." Pansy hopped off the table and squeezed Harry's shoulder almost absently. "Well, I know where I'll be spending the next few days: the Restricted Section."

Harry surreptitiously patted down his backside, dislodging the peat clinging to his wool trousers. "I'll make a list of everything I know about Tom Riddle." At her gleeful expression, he cautioned. "It's not much."

"It'll do."

"You're awfully sure of yourself," Harry stated with no small degree of envy.

"Your point being?" Pansy asked, straightening out her skirt and blouse.

Harry laughed. "Never mind." Then he sobered. "You're not telling Malfoy about all this, are you?"

Pansy looked at him as if he'd just grown a surplus head. "You do know that Malfoy and I are no longer on speaking terms, right?"

Harry felt suddenly very stupid. "No, I didn't know that."

"I might as well tell you then that the majority of Slytherin and I are no longer on speaking terms." There was no hint of emotion in Pansy's voice, but her dark eyes dulled for a moment, and she averted her gaze.

"I'm…"

"Don’t say you're sorry, Potter." Pansy faced him sternly. "Because I'm not."

"Okay." Harry felt awkward but relieved that he wasn't expected to comfort Pansy - he was pants at that. But he regretted having brought it up and was desperate to change the subject. "Is there anything else I can do regarding Riddle?" he asked.

Pansy looked at him as if she was analysing him. "Just one thing," she finally said.

Harry met her eyes, wondering what was going on behind them. If ever someone plotted almost visibly, it was Pansy Parkinson, but he couldn't quite work her out. "What?" he finally asked.

Pansy gave a slight smile. "You're a powerful wizard, Potter, and I have a feeling I'll need your help with this. So think about whether you're just helping me research..."

Harry's eyes narrowed. "Or?"

"Or whether you're coming with me." And with that, she strolled past Harry and out into the cool autumn breeze without waiting for a reply.

2. No Favours for Slytherins


Harry spent the next week thinking about very little other than Pansy's scheme. It was completely insane. To somehow go back in time - with Pansy Parkinson of all people - and expect to slip effortlessly into Hogwarts classes in the 1940s, stop himself from killing Tom Riddle on sight, and hope against hope that Riddle would fall madly in love with Pansy and abandon his evil ways. How had this ever seemed like a feasible idea?

He finally confronted Pansy to ask this very question when he found her surrounded by two dozen books in the library.

She chuckled. "It's a terrible idea, Potter."

Harry looked flabbergasted. "So we're abandoning it?" He didn't know whether to be relieved or disappointed. Sliding into a chair opposite her and reaching for the nearest book, he was aware that she looked very tired and exhausted.

"No. Absolutely not." Pansy rubbed at her right temple. "It's the only course of action that makes any sense. What's the worst thing that might happen?"

Harry had been going over those possibilities for days, so he had a ready answer. He pushed aside the frankly incomprehensible looking volume on temporal and spatial shifts as if it had burnt him. "We make a mess of it before we even go back and end up in Azkaban?"

"Possible," Pansy conceded. "But not likely." She proudly pointed to the books. "I have reason to believe I've just about cracked it."

Harry frowned. "Okay. Well, we might manage to go back, but Riddle gets suspicious and ends up killing us. Of course, he'll probably end up killing us right here in our own time if we don’t go back, so I'm not sure that's much of a point."

Pansy looked pleased at Harry's reasoning. "Exactly. Any other worst case scenarios?"

"He lures you in with his devastating charms and the two of you end up terrorizing the wizarding world together?" Harry had no idea where that had come from; he looked at Pansy in shock.

She stared back at him, wide-eyed. "Bloody hell, Potter."

Harry chuckled uncomfortably at just how much like Ron she sounded, but decided not to point that out. "Just joking," he said unconvincingly.

"Uh huh." Her dark eyes narrowed at him. "Well, speaking of Riddle's devastating charms - how's your list coming along?"

"I've been carrying it around with me," Harry said, pulling a strip of parchment from his pocket and passing it to Pansy. "I'm adding to it as I think of things. As I said, it's not much."

Pansy scanned it, twirling a bang of dark hair at her ear as she did so. "Sounds like the poster boy for Slytherin." She grinned. "Sounds like the poster boy for everything, actually."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked uncomfortably.

She smirked at him. "It's good to know that before he became a snake-eyed, bald, slits-for-nostrils monstrosity, Voldemort was extremely hot."

"How do you know that?" Harry asked, tugging at his collar.

Pansy chuckled softly and read back Harry's description. "Black hair, intense dark eyes, high cheekbones, pale skin, tall, slim, kind of graceful, flaring nostrils - easy to piss off, rather up himself, full lips, unsettling smile… You know, Potter, if I didn't know better…" She stopped there, looking at Harry oddly.

"What?" he asked cagily, feeling himself blushing for no good reason.

"When did you see him? Second year, right?" she asked, still scrutinizing him as if he was an interesting new species.

Harry didn't like it. "So what?"

"Nothing." She held up the parchment between her fingertips, looking as if she was fighting back a smirk. "Are you done with this?"

He shrugged, somehow convinced it was better if he didn't hold on to it. "Pretty sure. Keep it. I'll let you know if I think of anything else."

"Have you thought about what I asked you?" Pansy said quite suddenly.

Harry shifted in his seat. "Yes, I have."

"Come to a decision yet?"

"Yes." He looked at her without flinching. "I'm going with you."

Pansy gave him a genuine smile - the first one he'd ever seen on her face. "I thought you might."

* * *

Three days later, in the library once again, Pansy asked Harry, "How good are you at divination?"

"What does that have to do with anything?" he asked, utterly confused.

"That answers my question then," Pansy stated. She gave a snort of laughter, slamming the thick leather-bound tome in front of her shut. It was just as well it was late enough in the evening for the library to be empty except for the two of them. All they got was a disapproving frown from Madame Pince across the room.

"I don't see how," Harry protested.

"Exactly." Pansy tapped her long-fingered nails on the cover of the book, assessing Harry. "Look, Potter. Take my word for it - divination is going to be more use to us in this than anything else."

Not wanting to point out that it was a bit mad for her to expect him to just take her word for anything, Harry concentrated on the rest of her statement. "I may be useless at divination - which is a pretty useless subject to begin with, if you ask me - but I do know it's about telling the future." He ignored Pansy's amused smirk to point out the obvious. "We're not trying to go into the future but the past."

"Quite aside from the fact that divination is not just about the future," Pansy pointed out. "If you're in the past, the present is the future."

Harry blinked. It made sense, but at the same time, not. He was coming to realize that applied to a lot of things about Pansy. "But we're not in the past yet. How do we get there?"

"You're aware that by manipulating a crystal ball, it's possible to travel into the future?" Pansy asked, not hopeful about the response. She was proven right.

Harry snorted. "Yeah, sure."

Giving a long-suffering sigh, Pansy pushed the book to one side, folded her hands on the table, and gave him a stern look. "Time to start with the basics of divination and some choice bits left out of class work."

Groaning, Harry settled in for a lengthy explanation.

An hour and countless questions later, he sat back and stared at Pansy, dumbfounded. "You're joking."

"I'm certainly not."

"If this is true, and it sounds really rather unlikely, if you ask me, I still don't see how it's going to help us. As I keep saying, we're trying to go back into the past, not the future."

"An exact reversal of everything I've just told you. It's beautifully simple," Pansy stated as if it should make sense.

Harry stared at her. "You're either more brilliant than Hermione, or completely barking."

She grinned. "Well, I know which it is. The question is: are you willing to put that famous Gryffindor courage to use and find out?" When no answer was immediately forthcoming, she leaned across the table and whispered, "I know that Granger was using a time turner to get to all her classes during third year."

"How?" Harry asked, shocked. He knew the thing was a restricted magical object, and Hermione hadn't even told him and Ron about using it. "How could you possibly know about that?" he demanded.

"Let's just say I had a pretty full time-table myself, and we ran into each other a fair bit." Pansy let that sink in.

Harry's eyes widened. "You were using one too?"

She looked resigned and weary. "No, Potter. You see, Slytherins don't tend to get special favours from the headmaster. I had to work out my own way to manipulate time."

Harry fell back against his chair and stared at her. He didn't know what to say in either Dumbledore's or Hermione's defence. He didn't know whether there was anything he could say. "When you say you worked out your own way…" he began cautiously.

Pansy snorted. "Yes, Potter. The one thing to be said for being raised in a death eater household is that you tend to be ahead of the curriculum here." She smirked. "Not to mention sideways of it."

"You used dark magic?" Harry's voice didn't hold accusation, just curiosity.

Pansy realized that and responded more openly than she might have otherwise. "Combined with divination, yes. There's nothing inherently 'dark' about temporal magic, except that if you start changing things in the past, you potentially wreak havoc with the future. Though personally, I don't agree with the idea that changes are necessarily for the worse."

Harry nodded. He certainly agreed with that himself. "You've been doing this since third year?" He was more than a little impressed.

Grinning, Pansy explained. "I've never yet used it to do anything but make it to extra lessons. What I've known so far hasn't allowed me more than an hour's time shift. But by forth year, when my housemates started going on about initiation ceremonies and death eater rituals and similarly disgusting things, I started thinking about more… elaborate forms of temporal magic." She waved her hand over the stacks of books between them. "There couldn't be a better reason to figure it all out than this, could there?"

Harry chewed his lip thoughtfully. "You're right." He assessed her in a whole new light. "Necessity is the mother of invention," he quoted.

"Huh?" Pansy frowned.

"Muggle saying." Harry grinned at her look of horror. "Okay. So we assume you know what you're doing. But I have two more questions first."

Pansy shrugged. "Go ahead."

"How do we get back here?"

"We find a crystal ball in the past, and use that."

Harry nodded. If this insane plan should actually work once, it probably would again.

"What's the other question?" Pansy asked, stacking the books to float them back to their respective shelves.

"If we make a mistake while we're… you know… stuck inside the crystal ball…"

Pansy looked at him. "We get crushed to fine dust by a million crystal particles." She wandered off, levitating books in front of her. "Goodnight, Potter."

Harry stared at her back. "Not bloody likely," he muttered.

Pansy chuckled as she disappeared around a shelf.

3. Consorting with the Enemy


"Harry, is there anything you'd like to tell us?" Hermione asked over breakfast the next morning.

Harry's fork remained poised in front of his mouth as he cursed whatever law of nature had Hermione knowing about every bloody thing that went on. He decided to try for innocence. "No, what do you mean?" Quickly gulping down his bite of food, he mumbled a propos of nothing, "I love it when they put chives into the scrambled eggs."

Ron, who had been chewing his lip uncomfortably, smiled at Harry. "Oh, me too!" Clearly relieved at the change of subject, he began to list his favourite breakfast foods.

Hermione would, of course, have none of it. "Oh, do be quiet, Ronald. Go on, Harry."

"Go on about what?" Bloody hell, what should he tell her?

"Well, you see…" started Hermione.

"We're probably better off not knowing," Ron interrupted, then pointed across the table. "Pass the butter?"

Harry did. "Not knowing what?" he asked reluctantly after all, because it was simply odd that Ron should not be full of all sorts of questions, considering.

Ron grit his teeth, but Hermione grinned at Harry. "You know you can tell us anything, don't you?"

"Uh, yes. I guess so." Harry scratched the back of his neck. He tried to work out whether they could possibly know what he and Pansy were up to. Either way, he was inclined to agree with Ron - his friends were better off not knowing.

"Of course you can," Hermione said sternly. "Even if you're… well…"

"Consorting with the enemy?" Ron offered.

Hermione glared at him. "Slytherins are not automatically the enemy, Ronald," she said, as if the thought had never crossed her mind before.

"Yeah, right," said Ron, thoroughly unconvinced.

Meanwhile, Harry was fidgeting. He rather thought that Riddle being Voldemort cancelled out what house he was associated with, but when he was about to come clean and tell all, Hermione clutched his arm and squeezed.

"It's fine with us if you're going out with Park… Pansy," she said, even while looking as if the name tasted bad.

Harry blinked. "What?"

"I mean, she's not your usual kind of Slytherin, is she?" Hermione chatted on, sounding as if she was desperately trying to convince herself. "I suppose she's all right. And at least she spends a lot of time in the library."

Harry burst out laughing, which caused Hermione to look very offended. He was thinking fast, and realized that if he didn't want to tell his friends why he was spending a lot of time with Pansy, he'd have no choice but to go along with their misconception. "So, you've seen us then?" he asked cautiously.

"Neville was leaving one of the greenhouses the other day and saw the both of you coming out of another one," said Ron, looking decidedly unhappy. "You were both looking kind of… flushed. Apparently."

'So would you, coming out of a greenhouse,' Harry thought. Aloud, he merely said, "Ah."

It didn't matter, because Hermione was only too happy to keep talking, now that the subject had been broached. "I saw you in the library with her the other evening, Harry, and I know you don't spend a lot of time there unless there's a really good reason." She grinned. "You were giving her a note and blushing. It was really rather cute."

Oh God! His note listing Riddle's… uh, particulars. "Thanks," Harry muttered, knowing he was blushing again.

Ron sighed. "Well, Slytherin or not, at least Parkinson is pretty ho... Ow! Hermione!" He rubbed his shin, glaring across the table.

Hermione sniffed. "Anyway, Harry. We're all right with whoever you like. We just want you to know that."

"Thanks. That's a relief." Harry didn't have to force the grin on his face; he really was extremely relieved. For once, Hermione was barking up entirely the wrong tree.

* * *

"We need to decide on a date," Pansy muttered while making a list of something or other in a notebook on her lap. She and Harry had taken to meeting in the Room of Requirement to avoid uncomfortable questions and drawing attention to themselves. They'd 'furnished' the room very sparsely with a sofa, an armchair, a low table to hold Pansy's books, and a stack of notepaper.

Harry, who was curled up in the armchair, nodded. "I've had a talk to Moaning Myrtle about that."

Pansy snickered. "You're kidding."

He glared at her. "No. She was killed by the basilisk when the Chamber of Secrets was opened. Since we're going to be messing about with all sorts of things anyway, we might as well try and save her."

"It really is true about that 'saving people thing' of yours." Pansy grinned.

"Isn't that the point of our little trip?" Harry asked heatedly. "We're not just going back for our own sake!"

Pansy sighed. "I was just taking the piss, Potter. Of course we'll heroically sweep in to save Myrtle, and thus generations of Hogwarts students from being perved at in the Prefect's bathroom. Happy?" She tilted her head at him when he snickered.

"Oh, all right. I have to remember I'm dealing with a Slytherin here. The soul of compassion, you lot are."

"You'll be dealing with two Slytherins soon," Pansy declared cheerfully, not deterred by Harry's glare. "So, when did Myrtle start her moaning?"

"Well, she was going on a bit when I asked her, but from what I can figure out, the chamber was opened in early 1943. We need to get there before then."

"Which year would Riddle have been in?"

Harry picked up his own notes. "Fifth. Bugger." He frowned. "He looked much older than that in the diary. We won't be in the same year; that'll make things harder."

"No, this is good, actually," Pansy said. "Apparently, the curriculum was a lot tougher back then, so if we get ourselves sorted into fifth year, we'll be better able to deal with… stuff, without falling behind in class."

Harry laughed out loud. "You're worried about our classes? You're quite sure you don't get along with Hermione, though," he teased.

"Very sure." Pansy pouted. "Anyway. Riddle was apparently the most brilliant student in Hogwarts history. I don't think looking like a pair of dunderheads is going to help us impress him."

"I wouldn't worry if I were you."

"It's you I'm worried about, Potter." Pansy grinned across at him, dodging the notepad Harry hauled at her head. "Let's aim for late 1942 then. I really don't think I can get us there on a fixed date."

Resigned to having to repeat an entire year, Harry sighed. "What do we do for money?"

"Take plenty with us, of course. I assume you have enough?"

Harry nodded. "Enough for both of us and then some."

"Really? Then why do you dress like a street urchin?" She cackled at Harry's glower. "Well, thanks for the offer, Potter, but I've got my own." She added another item to her list. When she realized Harry looked surprised - it was well known that Pansy had been disinherited - she shrugged. "I may possibly have siphoned off some of the Parkinson family fortune before making my allegiances known."

Harry laughed. "I suppose that's a shopping list you're making?" He'd been half-joking, but when Pansy nodded, he laughed even harder.

"Of course." Pansy struck out an item and replaced it with something else. "I've been looking at old wizarding photos from the 40s, and believe me, you'd better make a list yourself. People had a lot more class back then." She looked supremely happy about that.

Slightly exasperated, Harry said, "I take back what I said before - you're nothing like Hermione. Except for the bossy thing."

"Thanks, Potter." Pansy grinned at him. "Oh, by the way, you need to get a haircut. Men didn't walk about with bird's nests on their heads back then either."

"Enough!" Harry stood up, throwing his hands in the air. "We're not doing all this for a lark. And my hair is uncuttable, just so you know."

Pansy studied him with a grin on her face. "Oh well, I suppose you can pull off the bed hair look. It's almost cute on you."

Harry sputtered. "Parkinson, you're the one who's going to try and ensnare Voldemort! I really don't see how my hair matters either way."

"No, of course not," Pansy said quite agreeably, adding
- a few stylish men's accessories, preferably green
to her list.

"But as the most sensible thing for us to do is to pose as relatives, I want to make sure you don't make me look bad."

"Relatives?" Harry sounded horrified.

Pansy didn't find that at all flattering. "I was thinking of cousins. We can't pose as siblings, because it would be too easy to trip up on details; cousins aren't expected to know everything about each other. I suppose I had better get used to addressing you as Harry. I've got our background all worked out, by the way."

"Oh well, everything's perfect then." Harry fell down on the far end of the sofa. "What on earth am I going to tell Ron and Hermione?"

"Are they leaving for the Christmas holidays?"

"Yeah."

Pansy nodded sagely. "We'll be done with our preparations by then, so that'll work out well. If we miscalculate by a few days, there won't be quite as much fuss." She grinned. "With any luck, your friends will never know anything about all this."

"And if it all works out, there won't be a barking mad Voldemort to worry about in this time," Harry mused.

"That's the plan." Pansy drew a bold line at...