When the front opened, and allowed her entrance to Number 12 Grimmauld Place, Hermione was surprised that the atmosphere of the old house was even more oppressive than she remembered. The air seemed so thick, that it would require multiple cutting spells in order to penetrate it. The Black Family's ancestral home wasn't one that she had come to associate with liveliness during her previous stay, but she had to admit that the absolute silence that stretched on in front of her was deeply unsettling.

Hermione felt bad about leaving her family on another Christmas holiday, and she had hoped that this vacation would help start to repair their estranged relationship. All those hopes were lost after she had read about the attack at the Burrow in The Daily Prophet. She quickly told her parents that she needed to see if her friends were okay, instead of showing sympathy or even attempting to convince her to stay as she had expected, her parents begrudgingly let her go with little resistance, the contempt for her world apparent in their eyes. She no longer wished to fight with them, so instead of facing the confrontation that they would inevitably have, she called the Knight Bus and left for Grimmauld Place.

Entering the kitchen, she was met by the somber Weasley family, each member was eerily still, so unlike the usual energy that the family gave off. Mr. Weasley wasn't talking about some new muggle item he had come across, Ron and Ginny weren't harking on about Quidditch, Fred and George weren't joking around, and Charlie was off in a corner by himself. Most startling off all was Mrs. Weasley who wasn't bustling about the kitchen or corralling her family, instead she was sat at the kitchen table so still that she could've been mistaken for a statue. Finally, her eyes landed on the last two occupants of the kitchen, Fleur and Sirius. Sirius had yet to notice her, he too was gazing at the grieving family, whereas Fleur quickly noticed Hermione and quickly wrapped her friend up in a warm embrace.

Once his eyes focused on her, Sirius attempted to give her a smile, yet it was obvious that it was a forced one. The Weasley's had also noticed her, and Hermione's heart nearly gave out from the universal look of loss and despair that flickered behind the family's eyes. Hermione made her rounds to all the family, offering he condolences, getting extra-long hugs from both Ron and Mrs. Weasley who had made sure that Hermione knew how grateful her family was for her support.

When Hermione made her way over to Sirius, he could already see the question in her eyes, and nodded his head towards the stairs. Hermione knew that he would be tearing himself up over what happened, but she hadn't anticipated him to cut himself off completely.

"He's closed himself upstairs with Buckbeak. He hasn't come out, even for meals. The only times I've seen him is when is to use the loo and when I take his meals upstairs."

Hermione nodded her head in understanding and headed towards the stairs to try and get through to Harry. As she exited the kitchen, she heard two chairs being pushed in, followed by three sets of footsteps, meaning that Fleur, Ron, and Ginny were right behind her. Once they made it up to the top floor Hermione continued to the door, while her companions had remained behind.

"It's no use Hermione, he's not coming out."

Hermione continued as if they didn't hear them. Rasping her knuckles on the door, she tried her hand at trying to reach her best friend.

"Harry?" No response came. She listened carefully to hear if there was any movement inside the room, but found none. "Harry!" This time she was sure that she heard something on the other side of that door that wasn't Buckbeak. "Harry, open the door!"

"Hermione? What are you doing here?"

She let out a breath that she didn't know she was holding. The sound of a few sighs of relief behind her let her know that she was the first to make this much progress with Harry.

"I heard about what happened Harry, I wanted to see if you were alright."

"But what about your parents?"

She was a little taken aback by his statement. Leave it to Harry to be worried about her relationship with her parents, when he was clearly going through some tough time.

"It doesn't matter Harry. Please come out, everyone's worried sick about you."

It was several long moments before the door opened revealing a very weary looking Harry. By the looks of him, he hadn't been sleeping well and despite Sirius bringing him his meals, he looked as if he hadn't eaten in a few days, even if it was only one. With further coaxing, Harry made his way down to the kitchen to see the rest of the Weasley's.

"Mrs. Weasley? About Bill- "

"You've nothing to worry about dear."

"But if I was faster- "

Instead of responding verbally, she engulfed Harry in a hug that wasn't her usual bone-crushing one, but much more gentle and reassuring.

"It wasn't your fault Harry. You have nothing to be sorry for."

"They were there because of me," Harry stepped out of her embrace and tried to put some distance between him and the family he felt he had unintentionally hurt, "If I wasn't there, the werewolves wouldn't have attacked and the Burrow wouldn't be destroyed. How can you claim that it wasn't my fault?"

Hermione stepped closer to him and put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "You didn't make them attack the Burrow. You weren't the one who killed Bill. They're the monsters not you."

"But I nearly did," Harry jumped up so quickly that he startled his companions as he headed towards the room's window. "I nearly killed a man Hermione, and what's worse…I enjoyed what I did to him, the feeling of my claws ripping into him, all of it."

This time it was Mrs. Weasley who came to comfort him. "But you didn't Harry, and that's what makes you different from them." Before he had the opportunity to try and argue with her, she wrapped him up in another hug, and tried to put Harry's troubled conscience at ease.

The relief was clear on his face as he returned Mrs. Weasley's embrace, both finding comfort in each other. He did the same to the rest of the family, before moving on to Sirius and receiving a hug from him as well.

"Whether or not you feel that the attack was because of you, you still did the right thing and did all you could to try and save the only real family you've ever had," Harry noticed the sadness in Sirius' eyes following that statement, "and for that, you have nothing to feel ashamed of."

"But- "

"No buts, and besides, it seems that Fenrir Greyback and his pack have been planning on making their move sooner or later."

"What do you mean?"

Sirius' expression hardened as he motioned for Harry to sit down at the table, before joining hi there.

"Remember when Remus and I told you that the werewolves were planning something." After receiving a nod from his godson, the old Marauder continued. "Since the end of summer, there has been an increase in werewolf activity. You wouldn't know it because there is little said about it in the Daily Prophet, but the number of werewolf bite victims has been going up, yet these attacks have been stealthily and at random intervals to hide the fact that they're connected."

He paused as he seemed to be weighing his words carefully.

"It seems that he has chosen now to come out into the open. The same night that the Burrow was attacked, there were an additional half a dozen attacks across Britain, each targeting Pureblood families and leaving many of the victims bitten."

"So, that's why they attacked the Burrow, to try and create more werewolves?"

"That's not entirely true Hermione. While, it may have been part of their goals, we believe that they may have had another one," Sirius' gaze once more fell on Harry, his expression one of regret and sorrow, "We believe that they may have been after you Harry."

There was a collective gasp around the room, and the sound of glass shattering as Hermione accidently dropped her glass. Sirius stopped to wave his wand and clean up the pieces of glass before continuing further.

"We feel that the Burrow was chosen as a target for one of two reasons. 1, to try and frame the attack on you, thus turning the wizarding public against you further, or 2, to kidnap you and either take you to Voldemort or force you to join his pack."

Harry's eyes nearly popped out of his head. He tried to rationalize all that Sirius said. What did Greyback want with him?

"Why would he want me in his pack?"

"I cannot say for sure. Most likely for political reasons." He received confused looks from around the room and decided to clarify his statement. "If the Boy-Who-Lived joined the pack of a notorious werewolf, even if his reputation is being slandered, then Greyback could use that as either a means to try and sway the public's opinion on werewolves, or use you as a beacon to convince other werewolves to join his pack, if they haven't already."

Harry was still a little confused about the whole thing but decided to drop the subject, it only served to deepened the guilt he felt. Despite the Weasley's continued assurance that the attack wasn't his fault, he couldn't shake the feeling that there was possibly another reason for the fight that night.

After that revelation, Harry, along with Hermione, Ron, and Fleur were sat in Harry's room, silence settling amongst them. Despite what his actions downstairs told everyone else, it was apparent to everyone in the room that Harry still blamed himself for Bill's death.

"You see mate," Ron began, trying to cut through the awkward tension that was in the room, "No one here blames you for what happened at the Burrow."

Instead of cheering him up, Harry still seemed trapped within himself as he turned his hands over repeatedly, the image of his claws covered in blood flashing through his mind. Fleur could see where his mind was and decided that she had had enough.

"You are not a monster 'arry. You could 'ave killed ze monster zat killed Bill, but you didn't, despite ze fact zat 'e deserved it."

Everyone remained silent as Harry seemed to either too engrossed in his self-reproach or chose not to pay any attention to Fleur's words.

"I can't believe zat you are doing zis again. 'Ow may times must I ask you to open up wiz me. I tell you zat you shouldn't be ashamed of what you are but you still refuse to accept yourself."

Harry was slowly starting to boil inside. His hands clenched tightly at his sides, yet Fleur seemed to have not noticed. Luckily, Hermione had.

She flashed back to similar arguments that she had once had with Harry, except for the opposite reason. She had once believed that Harry was too accepting of his status as a werewolf and had foolishly tried to admonish him for changing. How foolish she had once been. It had taken a while but she was finally beginning to somewhat understand what Harry was going through. She knew that she would never fully grasp his situation, but she had tried to see things from his perspective and saw that Harry was trying to make the best out of his current situation.

He had wanted nothing more than to be the same person that he was before the bite, and still did. but both he and Hermione knew that it was currently impossible for him to do that. Fleur didn't know what it was like to have these inhuman abilities forced upon you after a relatively normal existence, and because of it, it seemed that she was starting to push Harry a little too far.

"Fleur, I'm not sure this is the time for this."

"But why-"

"Because I wasn't always this way!" Harry pounded his fist into the wall in frustration, accidently leaving a small dent where his fist had made impact. "All I ever wanted in my life was to be normal, and now I will never have that," he turned his eyes to the other occupants of the room, the fires of rage burning lightly behind them.

"You've 'eard us say time and time again zat what 'appened at ze Burrow wasn't your fault."

"You wouldn't understand- "

"Zey came because zey wanted you in zere pack."

Harry was silent, but it was clear to everyone that he was close to exploding, except for Fleur who was equally as fired up. Through clenched teeth he managed to get, "There's more to it than that."

"You act as if you're ze one who told zem to attack. Why do you continue to blame yourself?"

"Because that's not the only reason they came!" He blurted out before he could stop himself, effectively silencing the argument in its tracks.

"What do you mean that it's not the only reason?"

Ron's question caused Harry's eyes to widen as he realized that he had accidently let out more than he had planned to. He had managed to keep this secret to himself since that fateful day after Voldemort came back. He had been afraid of telling his friends, partly due to the fear that they would abandon him once they knew the truth, but now the cat was out of the bag. With a sigh and a bow of his head, he headed towards the door, locked it, before heading back to his friends.

"There's a reason why Voldemort attacked my parents. It's out because he wanted them dead…he wanted me dead."

Three pairs of eye widened as several gasps escaped into the room, as the three people that were closest to Harry tried to decipher what he was trying to say.

"Before I was born, A prophecy was given to Dumbledore. One that told of a person who would be the one to defeat Voldemort and end his reign of terror," inhaling deeply, he recited the words that had haunted him since the end of the previous school year.

"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches... born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives... the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies..."

Silence descended on the room as Ron, Hermione, and Fleur tried to wrap their heads around what they just heard. Hermione was the first to come to her senses.

"But Harry, Prophecies are a load of rubbish. I simply can't believe that this is true. You don't really believe this, do you?"

"It is real Hermione. Dumbledore says that there is a room in the Department of /mysteries where they house prophecies, and apparently this one is there. Besides, one of Voldemort's followers had heard the first part of the prophecy and told him. Since he believes it, he will keep coming after me until one of us is dead."

This time, the silence was a little heavier. Ron had a scared expression on his face, Hermione seemed to be close to tears, while Fleur's expression was difficult to decipher. Without warning, Hermione launched herself at Harry and wrapped him in a massive hug, that despite his depressing attitude, did make Harry feel better. Once she relinquished her death grip on him, Fleur moved to hug him as well, hers being a little softer.

"I'm sorry you 'ave to deal wiz zis 'Arry." She pulled back to look at him, though her gaze was till soft, he could see that a question was dancing behind her eyes. " 'Ow long 'ave you known?"

Harry groaned internally at the question. He knew that Fleur wasn't going to like the answer.

"Since after Cedric died."

Fleur pulled away quickly, almost as if she was burned.

"You've known all zis time and you didn't tell us?"

Harry at least had the decency to look shamed, his eyes being cast towards the floor.

"I couldn't. When Dumbledore told me, it took so long for me to wrap my own head around it and I just couldn't figure out how to tell you." It wasn't a complete lie, but he hoped that Fleur wouldn't see through it and learn the real truth behind why he didn't tell them. Unfortunately for him, he saw Fleur's eyes widen as she saw through his deception.

"You zought we would abadon you, didn't you?" Harry didn't answer but his silence was enough of an answer for her. "I can't believe you. I know zat I 'ave been around for as long as Ron or 'Ermione, but how could you think that I would leave you because of this. Do you 'ave so little faith in me, in us?"

She waved her hand towards Ron and Hermione but Harry still chose not to answer, only succeeding in making Fleur angrier. She stood up abruptly and began to head towards the door.

"I understand zat you zis is 'uge burden on you but you 'ad promised to be open wiz me, zat we were in zis togezzer," she paused as she took a calming breath, "I'm upset, but it doesn't make me any less sorry for what you 'ave to go through 'Arry." She turned back towards the door, unlocked it and took one step out into the hallway, before stopping to address the room again.

"I'm sorry, but I can't stay 'ere. I need to get away and clear my 'ead. Au Revoir, "Arry. Ron 'Ermione."

She then walked down the hallway and didn't come back. It was a few minutes later when the remaining trio heard the distant sound of the Floo Network lighting up, signaling that Fleur had indeed left, leaving behind a distraught Harry, who felt like he had messed up one of the best things that had ever happened to him.