Haha! Chapta three is here! I'm so happy I've actually gotten this far cuz I thought I might be lazy and stop it at midnight duel… ;; Anyway, on with the show!

Halloween

Malfoy couldn't believe his eyes when he was woken in the middle of the night by Filch and twenty three trophies from the trophy room were all around his bed like a shrine. Malfoy couldn't believe that he'd gotten detention after he tipped off Filch about the students out of bed. Malfoy couldn't believe that some idiot had managed to turn him crimson and gold and he couldn't believe that it wouldn't come off! Finally, at breakfast, despite the uproar from the Gryffindor table, he couldn't believe his eyes when he saw that Harry and Ron were still at Hogwarts the next day, looking tired but still cheerful.

Indeed, by the next morning, Harry and Ron thought the encounter with the three headed dog an adventure and were quite keen to have another one. As for Sonya, they completely considered her a true friend now for having saved them from Filch, although Ron was sure that, after the prank Sonya pulled on Malfoy, his twin brothers would be in love with her. In the meantime, Harry filled Ron in about the package that seemed to have moved from Gringotts to Hogwarts and they spent a lot of time wondering what could possibly need such heavy protection.

"It's either really valuable or really dangerous," said Ron.

"Or both." Harry added.

"But as all they knew for sure about the mysterious object was that it was about two inches long, they didn't have much chance of guessing what it was without further clues.

Neither Neville nor Hermione showed the slightest interest in what lay underneath the dog and the trapdoor. All Neville cared about was never going near that dog again.

Hermione was now refusing to speak to Ron and Harry, but seeing as she was such a bossy know-it-all, they took this as an added bonus. Sonya was the only one who seemed a slight bit worried. Anyways, all they really wanted was a way of getting back at Malfoy for almost getting them expelled, and to their great delight, such a thing arrived a week later.

As the owls flooded into the Great Hall as usual, everyone's attention was caught at once by a long, thin package carried by six large screech owls. Harry was just as interested as everyone else to see what was in this large parcel, and was amazed when the owls soared down and dropped it right in front of him, knocking his bacon to the floor. They had hardly fluttered away when another owl dropped a letter on top of the parcel.

Harry ripped open the letter first, which was lucky, because it said:

DO NOT OPEN THE PARCEL AT THE TABLE. It contains your new Nimbus Two Thousand, but I don't want everyone knowing you've got a broomstick or they'll all want one. Oliver Wood will meet you tonight on the Quidditch field at seven o'clock for your first training session.

It was signed by Professor McGonagall. Harry had difficulty hiding his glee as he handed the note to Ron to read. Sonya reached over and slid her hand over the package.

"Hmm, Potter, I wonder what this broomstick-shaped package is…" she whispered to him with a slight laugh. Harry grinned back at her as Ron handed back the letter.

"A Nimbus Two Thousand!" Ron moaned enviously. "I've never even touched one!"

The three of them left the hall quickly, wanting to unwrap the broomstick in private before their first class, but halfway across the entrance hall they found the way upstairs barred by Crabbe and Goyle. Malfoy seized the package from Harry and felt it as Sonya sized herself up against the two gorilla-like boys.

"That's a broomstick," he said, throwing it back to Harry with a mixture of jealousy and spite on his face. "You'll be in for it this time, Potter, first years aren't allowed them.

Ron couldn't resist it.

"It's not just any old broom, it's a Nimbus Two Thousand. What did you say you've got at home, Malfoy, a Comet Two Sixty?" Ron grinned at Harry. "Comets look flashy, but they're not in the same league as the Nimbus."

"What would you know about it, Weasley, you couldn't afford the handle," Malfoy snapped back. "I suppose you and your brothers have to save it up twig by twig."

Sonya smugly stepped into the conversation.

"Ah, but Malfoy, the difference between you and Weasley is that he doesn't mind. He could have a Nimbus or a Cleansweep for all I care and wouldn't mind as long as he had a broom. You take so much pride in your material possessions that you can't stand the fact that anyone else has a better broom than you do so that you become… well, sicker with jealousy." Malfoy looked absolutely stunned. Before he could reply, however, Professor Flitwick appeared at Malfoy's elbow.

"Not arguing, I hope, boys, Sonya?" He squeaked.

"Potter's been sent a broomstick, Professor." Malfoy said quickly.

"Yes, yes, that's right," said Professor Flitwick, beaming at Harry. "Professor McGonagall told me all about the special circumstances. And what model is it, Potter?"

"A Nimbus Two Thousand, sir. And it's really thanks to Malfoy here," Harry said, trying not to laugh at the horror on Malfoy's face, "that I've got it."

Flitwick smiled at Harry again and walked off as Harry and Ron started for the stairs. They stopped when they heard Sonya talk.

"You know, Malfoy, that crimson and gold look was really going for you. I loved it, at least." She said, smirking as evilly as Malfoy could.

"So it was you!" Malfoy said to Sonya. She turned around and started to walk off.

"Get back here! Don't walk away while I'm talking to you!" Malfoy yelled. Sonya turned slightly.

"Why? Don't you like the view?" Sonya kept walking towards the stairs, adding an extra sway in her hips just for Malfoy. It was hard to tell why his cheeks were red: because of Sonya, or because of the crowd around him completely laughing at him.

Harry, Ron and Sonya headed upstairs, smothering their laughter at Malfoy's obvious rage and confusion.

"That was brilliant, Sonya. That really was," Ron gasped as they headed up a staircase.

"You two weren't bad yourselves. You just don't have the female advantage." Sonya returned.

"Although, it's true, what I said," Harry said suddenly. "If he hadn't stolen Neville's Remembrall, I wouldn't be on the team…"

"So I suppose you think that's a reward for breaking the rules!" Came an angry voice from behind them. Hermione was stomping up the stairs, looking at the package in Harry's hand disapprovingly.

"I thought you weren't speaking to us?" said Harry.

"Yes, don't stop now," said Ron, "It's doing us so much good!"

"Ron, stop it!" Sonya cut in as she came to the front. "Hermione, I think what Harry is trying to say is that he's sorry he broke the rules, but it was for good intentions and it's lucky that he didn't get expelled, isn't it, Harry?" Sonya said, stressing his name.

"Oh, oh, yeah! Yeah, that's exactly it. And Malfoy's been-"

"Malfoy's been annoying us Gryffindors, hasn't he? So this was a nice, non-violent way to get back at him. That's all." Sonya said. Hermione walked away, digesting what Sonya said.

Harry had a lot of trouble keeping his mind on his lessons that day. It kept wandering up to the dormitory where his new broomstick was lying under his bed, or straying off to the Quidditch field where he'd be learning to play that night. He bolted his dinner that evening without even noticing what he was eating and then rushed upstairs with Ron to unwrap the Nimbus Two Thousand at last.

"Wow," Ron sighed, as the broomstick rolled out onto Harry's bedspread.

Even Harry, who knew nothing about the different brooms, thought it looked wonderful. Sleek and shiny, with a mahogany handle, it had a long tail of neat, straight twigs and Nimbus Two Thousand written in gold near the top.

At six o'clock, Sonya dragged him down to the Quidditch field to practice flying before Wood showed up. He'd never been inside the stadium before. Hundreds of seats were raised in stands around the field so that the spectators were high enough to see what was going on. At either end of the field were three golden poles with hoops on the end. They reminded Harry of the little plastic sticks Muggle children blew bubbles through, except that they were fifty feet high. Harry eagerly mounted his broomstick and kicked off from the ground, eager to join Sonya up in the air. What a feeling—the Nimbus turned wherever he wanted at his lightest touch. He wove in and out between the goal posts and sped up and down the field, sometimes racing Sonya and sometimes simply trying to watch all of the things she was doing.

"Wood's here, Harry!" She shouted. Harry looked behind him to see Oliver Wood dragging a large crate down the slope. Sonya grinned and winked at Harry, then flew spiraling towards one of the seat towers screaming, pretending she had lost control of the broom.

"Hey, Potter, come down!" Oliver called. Harry landed next to him.

"Oy, you okay over there?" He called to Sonya. Sonya picked up her broom, still intact, and marched on over, rubbing her head. "And is that your broom?"

"Yeah, it's my broom, and my head hurts. You won't tell on me, though, right?" She asked innocently. Oliver sighed.

"Yeah, yeah, just be careful."

"Of the broom?"

"Of yourself too. If you take a single wrong turn with that thing, you might end up getting hurt."

"Okay then. Bye Harry!"

"Well then. You really are a natural on a broom. Anyway, today, I'll teach you the basic rules of the game and then you'll come to regular practice three times a week."

He opened the crate. Inside were four different-sized balls.

"Right," said Wood. "Now, Quidditch is easy enough to understand, even if it's not too easy to play. There are seven players of each side. Three of them are called Chasers."

"Three Chasers…" Harry repeated as Wood pulled out a bright red ball the size of a soccer ball.

"This ball's called the Quaffle. The Chasers through the Quaffle to each other and try and get it through one of those hoops to score a goal. Ten points every time the Quaffle goes through one of the hoops. Follow me?"

"The Chasers throw the Quaffle and put it through the hoops to score," Harry recited. "So—that's sort of like basketball on broomsticks…with six hoops. Isn't it?"

"What's basketball?" asked Wood curiously.

"Never mind."

"Now, there's another player that deals with the Quaffle— the Keeper. That's me on our team. What I do is I try and stop the Quaffle from going through our hoops."

"Okay, so three Chasers and one Keeper," Harry said. "So, what are they for?"

Harry was pointing to three other balls in the crate.

"Oh, well… Take this," said Wood, handing him a small club, somewhat like a short baseball bat. "There are two Bludgers. These two, actually."

Harry looked at the Bludgers: they were small, jet black and seemed to be straining to get free from their restraints.

"Stand back, Potter." Wood released the two Bludgers. At once, they zoomed out and came almost immediately at Harry's face. He swung with the bat to stop it from breaking his nose, and after a while of struggling, Wood was able to get them back into the crate.

"See? The Bludgers rocket around trying to knock players off their brooms. That's why you have two Beaters on each team—the Weasley twins are ours—and it's their job to protect our side from the Bludgers. So—think you've got all that?"

"Three Chasers try and score with the Quaffle; one Keeper to guard the goal posts; two Beaters to keep the Bludgers from our team."

"Very good," said Wood.

"Er—have the Bludgers ever killed anyone?"

"Never at Hogwarts. We've had a couple of broken jaws but nothing worse. Now, the last member of the team is the Seeker. That's you. Now, you don't have to bother with the Quaffle or the Bludgers—"

"—Unless they try to kill me."

"Don't worry, the Weasleys are more than a match for the Bludgers. They're like a pair of human Bludgers themselves."

Wood reached into the crate and took out the fourth and last ball. Compared to the Quaffle and Bludgers, it was tiny, about the size of a walnut. It was bright gold and had little fluttering silver wings."

"This," said Wood, "is the Golden Snitch, and it's the most important ball of the lot. It's very hard to catch because it's so fast and difficult to see. It's the Seeker's job to catch it. You've got to be able to weave in and out of Chasers, Bludgers, Beaters and the Quaffle to get to this before the other team's Seeker does, because whichever Seeker gets it first wins their team one hundred and fifty points, which nearly always wins them the game. That's why Seekers get fouled so much. A game of Quidditch only ends when the Snitch is caught.

"Well, that's it. Any questions?"

Harry shook his head. It would be the doing that would be tough.

"We won't practice with the Snitch because it's nearly dark. We'll just use these." He pulled out a bag of ordinary golf balls and the two of them went into the air. Wood threw them as hard as he could in every which direction, and Harry caught every single one every single time. Wood was completely delighted by the time they went back in.

"That Quidditch cup'll have our name on it this year. I wouldn't be surprised if you turned out better than Charlie Weasley, and he could have played for England if he didn't go to work with dragons."

Perhaps it was because he was so busy now, what with Quidditch three evenings a week and homework piling up, but Harry could hardly believe it when he realized that it had been nearly two months since he came to Hogwarts. The castle was becoming home more than Privet Drive had ever been. His lessons, too, were becoming a lot more interesting after the basics.

On Halloween morning they woke to the delicious smell of pumpkin wafting the corridors. Even better, Professor Flitwick announced in Charms that he thought that they were ready to make objects fly, something they'd all been dying to try since they'd seen him zoom Neville's toad Trevor around the room. Professor Flitwick put them in pairs to practice. Harry's partner was Seamus Finnigan (which was a relief because Neville had been trying to catch his eye. Ron, however, had been partnered with Hermione Granger. It was hard to tell which of the two was angrier about this. She hadn't spoken to either of them after Harry's broomstick arrived, only to Sonya (who ended up with Neville).

"Now, don't forget that nice wrist movement we've been practicing!" squeaked Professor Flitwick. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick. And saying the words properly is important too. Never forget the Wizard Baruffo, who said 's' instead of 'f' and found himself with a buffalo on his chest!"

It was very difficult. Harry and Seamus swished and flicked, but the feather that they were supposed to levitate just lay on the desk. Seamus got so impatient that he prodded it with his wand and set it on fire—Harry had to put it out with his hat. Neither was any happier when they saw Sonya's feather flying around the room, tickling people's noses and earning points.

Ron, at the next table, wasn't having much more luck.

"Wingardium Leviosa!" he shouted, waving his arms like a windmill.

"You're saying it wrong. It's Win-gar-dium Levi-o-sa, make the 'gar' nice and long."

"You do it if you're so clever, Granger!" Ron snapped back at her while batting away Sonya's feather.

Hermione rolled up her sleeves, flicked her wand and said, "Wingardium Leviosa!"

Their feather rose off of the desk and hovered in the air four feet above their heads while Sonya's feather smacked Ron on the nose a few times.

"Oh, well done!" cried Professor Flitwick, clapping. "Everyone see here, Miss Granger's got it!"

Ron was in a very bad mood by the end of class when Sonya and Hermione battled with their feathers.

"It's no wonder no one can stand her," he said to Harry as they pushed their way into the crowded corridor, "she's a nightmare, honestly."

Something knocked into Harry as they hurried past him. It was Hermione. Harry was startled to see that she was in tears.

"I think she heard you."

"So?" said Ron, but he looked a bit uncomfortable. "She must have noticed too, that she's got no friends."

Hermione didn't turn up for the next class and wasn't seen all afternoon. Sonya also disappeared after the next class after reprimanding Ron. On their way to the Halloween feast, Harry and Ron overheard Parvati saying that Hermione was in the girls' bathroom, and that Sonya was trying to comfort her.

"She'd been crying the whole afternoon, poor thing. I wonder what happened?" Parvati asked her friend. Ron looked even more uncomfortable at this, but it all dissolved a moment later as they entered the Great Hall.

A thousand live bats swooped down over the tables and up towards the ceiling. The tables were laden with food and they saw Sonya appear moments later as they settled down as though she had been one of the bats.

Harry had been-

Um, okay. Hold on a second. Here, you pull out your books and read the next three and a half pages or… just read the summary.

Quirrel runs into the hall, screams about a troll and collapses on the ground. Everyone goes into a panic and Dumbledore orders everyone back to their houses via prefects. The prefects start to lead them back when Harry and Ron realize that Hermione is missing. They run towards where they think the troll is and lock him in a room, but not before seeing Snape run towards the third floor. Poor Hermione, they soon realize, because the idiots locked her in WITH the troll! So, they run back and find Hermione cowering in fear. Then they start trying to distract the troll.

There. Was that so hard? Anyway, onwards!

The shouting and echoes seemed to be driving the troll berserk. It roared again and started for Ron, who was nearest and trapped.

Harry then did something that was both very brave and very stupid. He took a great running start and leaped onto the troll as it was bent over. He managed to get his arms around its neck from behind. The troll couldn't feel him, but even it could feel pain: exactly what it felt when Harry's wand went up its nose.

Howling in pain, the troll twisted and flailed its club, with Harry hanging on for dear life. Any moment, the troll was going to rip him off or hit him with the club.

Hermione sunk to the floor in fright; Ron pulled out his wand and cried the first spell that came to his head, "Wingardium Leviosa!"

The club rose higher and higher above the troll; the spell had worked!

"Harry! He's going to get hit too!" Hermione yelled.

A figure completely cloaked in black waved its wand at itself, then took a great twelve foot running leap, grabbed Harry and flew down to the ground unharmed as the club fell, with a sickening crack, on the troll's head. The troll swayed on the spot and fell to the ground with a thud that made the whole ground tremble.

Harry got to his feet. He was shaking and out of breath, but looked over at Ron, frozen with his wand in the air.

"Is… Is it dead?" Hermione asked timidly as Ron lowered his arm.

"No, just unconscious, I suppose." Harry said. He leaned down and pulled his wand out of the troll's nostril. It was covered in what looked like lumpy gray glue.

"Urgh—troll boogers."

He wiped it on the troll's trousers.

A sudden slamming and loud footsteps made the three of them look up. They hadn't realized it, but they'd been making quite a big racket. Professor McGonagall appeared, closely followed by Professors Snape and Quirrel. Quirrel took one look at the troll, let out a faint whimper and sat on a toilet seat, clutching his heart.

Snape bent over the troll. Professor McGonagall was looking at Harry and Ron so angrily, hopes of winning fifty points apiece for Gryffindor faded quickly from Harry's mind.

"What on earth were you thinking of?" said Professor McGonagall, cold fury in her voice. "You're lucky you weren't killed! Why aren't you in your dormitory?"

Then a small voice came from the shadows.

"Please, Professor, they—they were looking for me."

"Miss Granger!"

"I went looking for the troll," Hermione said as she managed to get to her feet. "because I thought that I—I could take on the troll. I've read all about them, and thought I could deal with them, but—but I couldn't. And if Harry and Ron hadn't come to rescue me, I might have died. Harry stuck his wand up its nose and Ron knocked it out with its own club. They didn't have time to go fetch anyone. It was about to finish me off when they arrived.

Harry and Ron tried to keep the shock off of their faces. Hermione Granger, goody two shoes extraordinaire, lied for them to the head of their house?

"Well! In that case…" Professor McGonagall said, staring at them, "Miss Granger, you foolish girl, how did you think of tackling a mountain troll on your own?"

Hermione hung her head. Harry was speechless. What had happened to Hermione? She was the last thing to do anything against the rules, and here she was, pretending that she did just that just to get out of trouble. It was as if Snape started smiling and handing out sweets.

"Miss Granger, five points will be docked from Gryffindor for this," said Professor McGonagall. "I'm very disappointed in you. If you're not hurt, you'd better get to the Gryffindor tower. Students are finishing the feast in their houses."

Hermione left and Professor McGonagall turned to Ron and Harry.

"Well, I still say you were lucky, but not many first years could have taken on a full grown mountain troll. You each win Gryffindor five points. Professor Dumbledore will be informed of this. You may go."

They hurried out of the chamber and didn't speak until they had climbed two floors up. It was a relief to be away from the stench of the troll, quite apart from anything else.

"We should have gotten more than ten points," Ron grumbled.

"Five, you mean, once you've taken out Hermione's."

"Good of her to get us out of trouble like that," Ron admitted. "Mind you, we did save her."

"She might not have needed saving if we hadn't locked that thing in with her," Harry reminded him.

They had reached the portrait of the Fat Lady.

"Pig snout," they said and entered.

The common room was packed and noisy. Everyone was eating the food that had been sent up. Hermione, however, stood alone by the door, waiting for them. They was a very embarrassed pause. They all hurriedly said thanks to each other and hurried off to get plates.

But from that moment on, Hermione Granger was their friend. There are some things that you can't share without ending up liking each other, and knocking out a twelve-foot troll is one of them.

As he sat eating, Harry saw Sonya slightly toast him—and she held a black face mask in her hand.