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The Lioness And The Badgers	By : sawahhaych Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Hermione/Cedric Views: 7550 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter (Although I am British I am unfortunately not the amazing JK Rowling!). I do not make any money from the writing of this fic.

Chapter List
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How could Moody do that? Don’t get me wrong, I think we should be prepared, God knows Voldemort is after Harry and that all of us need to be ready when the time comes... but to show the Unforgivabe's to a group of fourteen and fifteen year olds? It just strikes me as wrong especially for an Auror. Something doesn’t quite add up about him, his complete disregard for the rules strikes me as odd, he was a law enforcer surely he should be more careful about rules?

I reach out and pull 'Famous Aurors throughout time' towards myself, already open at Moody's page. Alistair Moody, upstanding Auror... one of the best records of catching dark wizards. The page shows a picture of Moody in his younger days smiling at the camera, still an imposing and rather ghastly sight, leaning on his wooden cane.

I stare at the picture for a few minutes, my brain trying to make a coherent connection to the strange feeling I got in his lesson today. I look up as I hear footsteps approaching and see Cedric striding towards me, I offer him a small wave which he returns with a grin.

“Still looking for stuff on elves?” Cedric asks plonking himself down on the seat next to me in the library.

“Yes and no.” I answer sorting through various pieces of parchment. “I'm looking up Moody.” Cedric will probably think I am strange, all the students love the ex Auror, between the Malfoy incident and his approach to DADA he has everyone eating out of the palm of his hand. I have even heard the teachers comment on how he has got all the students talking about defence and what they are likely to study for the rest of the year in exited tones.

Cedric doesn’t look shocked by my interest in our new teacher. “Don’t like his lessons?”

“Well yes, no...” I shuffle my papers. “He really upset Neville today, me too if I'm honest, I don’t think I was ready to see the unforgivables without any warnings, then he just blurts out right there and then that only one person ever has survived the killing curse, like everyone didn’t already know.” I sigh gently. “Harry gets enough attention and I don’t think he needed to see the killing curse any more than Neville should have seen the Cruciatus.”

Cedric bows his head slightly. “Yeah, that wasn’t right, cruel even.”

“I don’t know what to make of him, He strikes me as a little...” I start but Cedric interrupts me before I can finish.

“Mad?”

I laugh a little. “Well yes, but not in a good way. He just gives me this weird feeling, it's in his eye, the real one I mean.”

Cedric nods. “I think I know what you mean. I have met him before, when I was younger, at the ministry with my father.” I raise my eyebrows. “He doesn’t seem the same to me, he's different. I know time changes people but...” He waves his hand in dismissal. “And that flask, I never saw him with it before.”

I smile. “I know what you mean, the flask, it's been driving me crazy trying to figure out what is in there, it could of course be totally normal... maybe some sort of vitamin type thing, seems like what he would do, constant vigilance.”

Cedric looks over some of the papers in front of me. “Maybe we should find out?” He asks with a wink.

So for the rest of the week and into the next I meet Cedric in the library every night, I don’t get to go down to the kitchens to see the elves as we are too busy trying to find a way of getting Moody's flask away from him. Not that I mind, I mean why else would someone like me get to spend time with someone like Cedric?

As the week passes I get much more comfortable with Cedric, I no longer blush at his lurid remarks and my shoes will soon be jealous that I am not giving them enough attention. Cedric is clever and witty with a black sense of humour which weaves beautifully with my own pessimistic sarcasm.

He seems to enjoy our conversations as much as me as we spend as much time discussing the Moody problem as we do anything and everything else in the world. You would think we would have ran out of things to discuss but as soon as we exhaust one topic we move onto something else and once we cant think of another Cedric inevitably starts asking about my life before Hogwarts, what it is like being a muggle, all about the world. I don’t mind though he is just curious and not in the way Mr Weasley is, Cedric wants to know about me, my life, my family. I tell him little about my family and skip over friends before I started school here, mostly since I didn’t have any, with questions about his own upbringing.

Harry and Ron assume I am researching elves still and Cedric's friends seem as allergic to the library as mine. “Maybe if we can get alone with him? Create a diversion and get at it, take a sample and put it back so he doesn’t know it's gone?” Cedric proposes. We have been round in circles for days now.

“He never takes it off his belt though.” I practically whine.

Cedric slides a sideways smile my way. “True, however...” He pauses a second, checking his has my full attention. “...That flask isn't very big, it cant hold more than a days worth with the amount he drinks it...”

My eyes widen in understanding, a plan starting to form in my head. “He has to have more, hidden away... probably in his rooms.”

Cedric is full on grinning now. “We just have to get to it.”

I bite my lip thinking. “We need to get into his rooms.” I could maybe use Harry's map and cloak, but that would mean I would have to tell Cedric about them and they aren't my secrets to tell. “How do you get into the rooms of the most paranoid man on the planet?” I ask Cedric.

“That does pose a problem.” Cedric admits tapping his quill on the desk top. “This is so frustrating!” Cedric groans dropping the quill.

I stand up from the table and begin to pace back and forth, walking usually helps me think. “If we could draw him away, one of us... the other could get into his rooms” I stop pacing and look towards Cedric already knowing what he will say.

Shaking his head Cedric answers. “He's too paranoid, we wouldn’t stand a chance of getting into his rooms without him letting us.” I pace in silence for a while. “You said Longbottom was in his rooms?” Cedric asks for the hundredth time.

“Yes but he was in there because Moody upset him, he invited him.” I say continuing my pacing.

Cedric watches me for a few minutes, both of us silent. “Would you please stop doing that?” Cedric asks after a while.

“What?” I ask halting.

“That.” He comments pointing to me, “The pacing, it's making me nauseous.”

I snort but sit down next to him. “What you gonna do Mr Prefect, give me detention?” I ask with my eyebrows raised.

Cedric's mouth drops open. “Miss Granger, you are a genius!” he says jumping up from his seat which earns a 'shh' from Prince.

I stand too. “What?” I ask trying to catch up to wherever his mind has gone.

Cedric grabs me by the waist and spins me round, I have to hold in a squeal lest we are kicked out. Cedric is holding me, Cedric is hugging me... I cant find my breath even as he places me on my feet, hands clasping mine. I am distracted by the sheer size of his hands which all but swallow mine up, his palms slightly rough, something I am used to from Harry and have always assumed was to do with riding a broom often.

“Detention.” Is the only answer I get for a moment, his eyes scanning mine for understanding. “Unless it's Snape, all the other teachers have you in their offices for detention, their offices which are connected to their private rooms.”

I grin. “One of us gets detention, the other waits until the detention is going on then gets Moody, keeps him busy for few minutes giving the other time to sneak into his rooms and take a sample of his potion or whatever it is.”

Cedric nods manically. “We can so do this.”

“But...” I bite my lip to think. “...Which one of us is going to get detention, and how exactly do you get detention from Moody?”

He takes in a deep breath through his nose. “Well, the way I see it I would probably be better in the detention.”

I nod. “We need to come up with something for me to say to him too, how I can get him away from you long enough for you to search.”

“I don’t suppose girl problems will work?” Cedric asks, serious or not I cant tell.

“Most men run a mile at the word period.” I smile as I see Cedric cringe at my crassness. “I could...” I think for a moment, would this be wrong? “... I could say it's something about Harry, Moody seems to be very interested in him, it might get him talking long enough if I can come up with a convincing enough lie.”

“Tell you what?” Cedric asks after glancing at the clock. “You work on your lie and I will work on how to get into detention. Meet here tomorrow at the usual time and we can pool ideas.”

I make my way back to the dormitory and tuck myself up in bed. I try to think about my side of the plan but can think of nothing but Cedric, willing even as a prefect to get in trouble for a good cause, well I hope it's a good cause, if it turns out that Moody is not hiding anything then this whole thing has been for nothing... well, not for me, I got to know Cedric.

I turn frustrated, shut up about Cedric stupid brain, I am meant to be working out what to say to Moody.

If I draw him away from the room too much he might make Cedric come with us, or lock his private rooms or something, I need to talk to him about something that wont need immediate attention but also needs to be said there and then.

All I come back to is Harry, Moody is an Auror and wants to protect him. I suppose I could ask him about being an Auror, what it takes and stuff... no... we could talk about that in the room with Cedric, he would just invite me inside.

This is insane! I am supposed to be clever and I cant even think of a lie! If only I could confide in the twins, I am sure they would be able to spout me off one in a second that would work!

Think Granger! I smile to myself, that's what Cedric calls me, well when he isn’t calling me Lady Catherine or a deviation of it.

'Boys are a dangerous distraction' I chant this to myself in my head, lips moving silently forming the words but not speaking them. 'I will not end up like my mother.' I say to myself in a whisper. My rebellious brain has other ideas though as I sleep, my dreams feature a tall, steel eyed Hufflepuff who sweeps me off my feet with no regard for my mantras or my mothers incessant warnings.

In the early hours of the morning I drift in and out of sleep, flitting from dreams of Cedric to those of Moody and the plan, my subconscious deciding that I need a good scare, Moody transforms from himself to Lucius Malfoy to Dumbledore, then through to Snape and Vector until finally resting on being Voldemort.

It is as I wake up, tears fresh in my eyes that I finally realise what I have to do, I know exactly how to get Moody away from his room for Cedric and Cedric was right, it has to be him in the detention or the plan will not work.
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The Lioness And The Badgers