There was not a cloud in the sky the next morning. Strange birdsong issued from the Forbidden Forest, and a gentle summer breeze blew about Hogwarts, disturbing the drapes in one private room of the Hospital Wing.

Madam Pomfrey fussed over Harry's hand, which was ensconced in a green rubbery substance. "… cannot believe the DMLE is using that sort of curse, on schoolchildren no less … if I ever lay my hands on that woman …"

"Surely I don't need to stay here if it's just my hand that's damaged, Madam Pomfrey," Harry said.

"Don't try to charm me, Mr Potter," she said absently, "but I never expected you to sit still for longer than half an hour at a stretch, so yes, you may go. That cast should mostly protect your hand while it recovers; I want you to come back here in thirteen days so that I can confirm there's no lasting damage. If you do anything particularly foolish like trying to remove it yourself, I shall give you the Draught of Living Death, see if I don't. That was a very nasty curse; treat it like one."

"I'm not that stupid," said Harry, giving his hand an experimental clench. A jolt of pain shot up his arm, and as soon as he let it go, the cast snapped back to its original shape.

Madam Pomfrey gave him a sceptical look. "Go on, then."

"Actually … can I see Sirius now?"

"You may not." Harry blinked. "For one thing, he's still unconscious. That last Portkey reopened his wounds, and they've resisted my attempts to close them."

"They've resisted –?"

"It's peculiar," Madam Pomfrey admitted. "But don't worry yourself; I have it in hand."

"But you just said you couldn't heal him," Harry said. "That sounds pretty worrying."

"I said I hadn't healed him; there's a difference," she corrected. "One tries the simplest remedies first. In any case, he is in a delicate state, and I need to tend to him. Go on; the young lady outside needs you more than he does."

Harry had never won against Madam Pomfrey. He sighed and left. "Morning, H– uh, Cho," he said, surprised.

Her hair was as long as it had been at the Malfoys', although it was properly washed now. She was wearing a threadbare Hogwarts uniform, her eyes downcast. "Hi, Harry," she said. "Can we talk for a bit?"

"Okay," he said, and set off. "Come on; I want to go outside."

She kept pace. "Harry … what happened to your hand?"

He glanced down at the cast. "Madam Bones happened to it," he answered. "It doesn't really hurt any more," he added, not wholly truthfully. "But that's not what you wanted to talk about, is it?"

"No," she said. She breathed in, then let it out like a deflating balloon. "I wanted to apologise for how I treated you earlier. I … had a limited perspective."

"Uh-huh," he said noncommittally. "What changed your mind?"

They passed a gaggle of Ravenclaw fourth-years, who stopped talking and moved to the far side of the corridor to pass. Harry was used to this, it had been happening since the end of term, when he had confessed his complicity in assassinating Dumbledore, but Cho winced and was silent until they rounded a corner.

"Last night. I saw and heard from the castle. With three sentences, You-Know-Who turned the entire DMLE against Hogwarts," she said, clearly picking her words carefully. "It's one thing hearing that he outsmarted a couple of teenagers, but it's something else to actually see him in action. It would be ridiculous to blame you or Hermione … was it Granger or Dolohov?"

"Granger," Harry said crisply.

"Granger, after that," Cho continued, not missing a beat. "But even before then, I should have given you the benefit of the doubt. You were in a difficult situation, and you made the best decision you could have with the available information. I was out of sorts, given where I'd just been, but that's no excuse, so I'm sorry."

Harry caught her looking at him sideways, and she looked away. He guessed that her clothes were spares which either McGonagall or Flitwick had dug out for her. She was probably still using Narcissa's wand. Most tellingly, the hordes of friends that had surrounded her two years before were gone.

In Harry's experience, even when someone was proven wrong, it usually took them at least a week to swallow their pride and apologise. Most of the time, no-one apologised for anything at all, no matter how unarguably they were to blame, unless they needed something urgently. Cho obviously was an extrovert who couldn't deal with being by herself for any length of time, and if her old friends were still on good terms with her, she would have been able to borrow some better clothes.

On the other hand, that just meant that Cho was lonely and vulnerable, on top of having been kidnapped twice over the past months and her two best friends being murdered by Voldemort's minions. He remembered the time Ron had refused to talk to him at the beginning of the Triwizard Tournament, because he'd been jealous and felt overshadowed; and how Harry had welcomed him back as soon as he had asked, because Hagrid had once told him off for throwing a friend away over something trivial. That had been such a long time ago.

"It's alright, Cho," he said.

"Really? I don't –"

"It's alright," he said again. "We'll just have to work harder the next time."

"You're going to fight him again?" Cho asked, wide-eyed.

"Well, eventually, I have to, don't I?" said Harry. "Because of the prophecy. We're just hoping he's going to deal with the sacrificers first."

Cho shivered. "I don't think I could do that," she said. "Even five minutes with Bellatrix Lestrange … no, I couldn't face him. But then, you're you."

Harry wasn't sure quite how to respond to that. "Do you know what happened last night?" he asked instead. "I sort of blacked out just after Fleur and Bones started duelling."

"I was in Ravenclaw Tower, and it was dusk so it was hard to make everything out," said Cho, "but Mrs Weasley said you'd arrive then, so some teachers and a few other adults went out to rendezvous with you. We heard what You-Know-Who said, there was spellfire, and our side managed to get everyone back inside and shut the gates. They're enchanted, obviously, and the DMLE haven't got through.

"It looks like they have charmbreakers sniffing around our wards, but they haven't made any headway. I think we're probably safe from them, for a while at least; Hogwarts' wards draw their strength from its residents, and there are more of us than there are of them."

Harry frowned. That logic only held if the average person in Hogwarts was as magically potent as the average enforcer. Or unless the sacrificers showed up, or Voldemort decided to get creative again.

"How many people are there around here, anyway?" he asked.

"Quite a few," she said. "Most of the students, except children of Death Eaters, came back, and lots of their parents are here. The house-elves have been busy clearing out rooms for everyone, and there are volunteer groups working on expanding the greenhouses to grow enough food, since we'll hardly be able to buy it from Hogsmeade. I think Hermione's there. I'd help but" she took out Narcissa's wand and gave it a desultory swish "this is being temperamental. I've read that you're supposed to practise with a new wand for two weeks before using it for anything important."

"Didn't stop you at the Malfoys'," Harry observed.

Cho flushed. "Well, I'd been a prisoner there for three months; I had frustration to work out."

They walked through the Great Hall, where several familes were sitting around the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw tables. They pointedly looked away from Harry.

"If they think I'm a nutter, why are they even here?" Harry asked Cho angrily, his voice low enough he could pretend he was trying not to be overheard. "It's not like I have solid proof of the sacrificers. I could barely convince the faculty of it a week ago."

"Who said anything about sacrificers?" Cho asked. "They're here to hide from You-Know-Who. I would have thought they would have hidden here during the last war, too, but apparently the Ministry kept on promising that he'd be defeated in another three months so it wasn't worth taking refuge."

"Hmm," Harry said. "Let me mull that over." [Voldemort, are you there?]

[Yes. You want to become opponents again?]

[Not really. I want to know why you bothered with last night.]

[Think about things from Madam Bones' perspective. She thinks I'm at Hogwarts, and that I've turned the Order. She won't believe you if you tell her otherwise, because you're a confessed collaborator; and she won't believe anyone else, because you could have put them under Imperius.]

[And if we all come out with our hands up and our wands down and invite her to inspect the castle?]

[Then she'll have to arrest you all, which would give my assassins a golden opportunity to wipe out the entire Order at once. Obviously I'd throw you in a dungeon somewhere, so the prophecy would still protect me. And Bella told me she wanted to play with the Granger girl. I'm not quite sure what that means specifically, in this context, but I see no reason to deny her.]

Harry suspected Voldemort had made up the latter part, but he wasn't about to call a bluff.

[So you'll invent reasons why you can't do that,] Voldemort continued, [so that the refugees won't pester you, and meanwhile, both the Order and DMLE are out of my way, leaving me clear to hunt down the sacrificers. Once that's done, I suppose I might as well conquer the Ministry. I mean, why not, right?]

Harry had in fact guessed most of this, but Voldemort loved talking about how clever he was. [It's also to your benefit that refugees come here, though, isn't it?]

[Do tell.]

[The more people we have here, the more effort the Ministry has to waste keeping par with us, and the less they can spare fighting you. The sacrificers won't have as many targets. And your goons won't be able to waste as much time pointlessly attacking civilians.]

[Mm, that last especially. You would not believe how annoyed I was that Malfoy hit the Dursleys.]

[Malfoy?]

[You didn't think that was me, did you? I'm insulted.]

[You arranged to have my best friend murdered in cold blood.]

[Oh I'm capable of it, certainly, and I'll admit that it was my plan, hatched fifteen months ago in fact, but consider this. Your mother's love charm protected you from death from me and my 'goons', correct? Except it wouldn't stop me, since I was revived with your blood, so it only stops the goons from killing you. However, the prophecy also stops my goons from killing you.]

[…]

[I had the plan shelved indefinitely once we recovered the prophecy, because it meant that there was zero benefit to killing the Dursleys, and there was the significant cost that it would warn you that I was less benign than I was pretending. A cost which that imbecile neglected to consider. If I had been alive at the time, I would have abducted Hermione's family instead. What was her sister's name … Therese, I think? She'd have had real value as a hostage. But no, Malfoy jumped off half-cocked on a useless Muggle hunt, and my inner circle followed after like a clutch of retarded ducklings, attacking possibly the only target in the world which you don't care about but which would galvanise the important targets into going into hiding, and losing me a valuable follower in the process. I think it's past time I made an example of him.]

[…]

[I digress. You make a decent point about refugees. What did you have in mind?]

[First, don't attack here again. If you do and it looks like we're not safe, people will leave here.]

[I wasn't going to. It would be too much work, and it's not like you're a threat.]

[Second,] Harry went on, ignoring Voldemort's jibe, [people can't just walk in through the front gates any more, not with that DMLE blockade out there. I want you to leave the secret passages out of the castle that the DMLE doesn't know about clear.]

[Letting you smuggle supplies and Order members in and out, too.]

[Meaning we'll hold out and tie up the DMLE for longer.]

[Mm. I shall consider it. Anything else?]

[Attack Ollivander's shop. People don't believe me when I talk about the sacrificers; they'll need to actually see one of them in action. If you lure him out into a big, flashy battle, like with Dumbledore, where he single-handedly holds the line against your entire inner circle, using magic like no-one's ever seen before, preferably with lots of reporters watching …]

[… then people might cotton on and flock to Hogwarts. Interesting idea. It wouldn't even need to be a serious battle, just a dramatic one. Of course, it would be poor propaganda if we deliberately lost a fight like that, and it would take rather more planning to take him on directly … however, it does give me an idea or two. Very well. What's your angle in all of this? You're hoping to recruit some of the refugees, and to undermine the ritual?]

[More that I just don't want innocent people dying.]

[How charmingly innocent you are, but I doubt the Order will overlook the possibility. I can't help but notice that I'd keep their powers out of the sacrificers' hands just as effectively by the time-honoured expedient of genocide.]

Harry blinked. How on Earth had he ever believed Voldemort was a good guy, when he could so casually propose wiping out ninety percent of magical Britain? [You said you wanted to take over after? I assume you don't want to rule over a graveyard.]

[I concede it wouldn't be ideal, but adaptability is a virtue.]

[Look. The people already here are much likelier to help fight you if the alternative is being slaughtered en masse. So unless you feel like offering your own sanctuary …]

[Jointly run by myself and Bella? No, I can tell a terrible idea when I hear it. I won't interfere with anyone seeking asylum at Hogwarts. You can tell your superiors, if you think they'll listen. Before you go, though, would you mind doing me a favour in return?]

[What is it?]

[One of my junior Death Eaters recently went missing near someone who I believe has joined the Order. Tall chap, light brown hair, name's Pollux Bendager?]

That would be the one Fleur had caught, whom Harry had again forgotten. [I'm not helping him escape. You're not doing me any favours; you're considering actions which benefit yourself. Besides, I can tell you're already plotting how best to double-cross me.]

[Actually, I just wanted to find out whether your side was the one who found him. Thanks. You haven't executed him, have you? He's not immortal, and I do hate having to tell my followers that their sons have got themselves killed.]

[Who do you think we are? Death Eaters?]

[Touché.]

"Are you talking to him?" Cho asked.

Without him really noticing, they'd exited the castle. A hundred or so people were milling around the greenhouses; there had previously been seven, but now there were skeletons of three more, these all being much larger than the others. Flitwick seemed to be in charge, but not in control. Terry Boot was alternately pointing at the Lake and conjuring images of an irrigation ditch, while Arthur Weasley kept interrupting, clearly suggesting improvements which ran contrary to the laws of physics. A red-faced Daphne Greengrass was ranting at Patricia Stonewall, the new Herbology teacher, who steadfastly ignored her to carry a pot of sprouts from Greenhouse Four.

He could hear people inside the Quidditch pitch; presently, Malfoy zoomed upward in pursuit of an unseen Snitch, a third-year Hufflepuff boy trailing in his slipstream; a well-timed Bludger forced Malfoy to break off his run. McGonagall was outside the pitch, arguing with Fleur about something, judging by how emphatically Fleur was gesticulating. Lupin was with them, apparently trying to reconcile them, but he clearly couldn't get a word in edgewise. He was standing closer to Fleur than McGonagall.

Further away, just beyond the gates, four figures in brown coats were waving wands around, presumably probing the wards that stopped people from simply climbing over the perimeter fence. Inside the fence was the blonde girl with the burn scars and eyepatch whose name Harry kept forgetting. She was apparently chatting with the DMLE, although they didn't seem to be paying her much attention. McGonagall noticed and headed over, frowning; Fleur followed, still talking nonstop, and Lupin threw up his hands in frustration and turned and went into the pitch.

"I just finished," said Harry. "I think he's probably going to spend slightly more effort attacking people other than us for a while."

"That's not as reassuring as you think it is," said Cho.

"By the way, do you know what happened to that Death Eater Fleur caught?"

"McGonagall recognised him, he was a student who graduated a few years ago. Pollux something. A Slytherin, of course."

"Bendager," Harry supplied. "Is that an important family?"

Cho shrugged. "It doesn't need to be. Most of You-Know-Whose forces weren't last time, you know? You can't take over the world with just the aristocracy. I heard he had lots of low-ranking Death Eaters from poor families, who basically figured it was join him or push a mop. I think Crabbe and Dolohov" she paused for a moment "were like that. Dolohov was much better at it, obviously."

Hermione walked out of the fledgling Greenhouse Eight, dirt all over her hands, and spotted Harry; her eyes lit up and she came over.

"Harry," she said. "Are you feeling better?" She made to hug him, but saw the dirt on her hands and checked herself.

"I'm fine; this is nothing," he said, waving his cast around.

"Coming from you, that can mean anything between actually being fine to having fifteen minutes to live," Hermione said, concerned.

"Madam Pomfrey signed off on it," Cho said.

Hermione's gaze flicked between the two of them, and she sized up the spacing: Harry was closer to Cho, having walked side-by-side with her.

"I see," she said. "So you two have buried the hatchet, then? That's good to hear."

"Yeah, we're okay," said Harry.

"Sorry about snapping at you, too," Cho said to Hermione. "It was cruel of me. I left your robes in Ravenclaw Tower; I'll get them back to you later today."

"Thank you," Hermione said, a little less brightly than she usually was when other people swallowed their pride. "Sorry I didn't visit you, Harry; Madam Pomfrey told me to go away awhile earlier, and then Terry happened by and told me they needed help …"

"Don't worry about it; this was only a four or so," Harry said easily.

"A four?" Cho repeated.

"A one is a punch in the face, a ten is almost certain death, like that time in second year, when that damn Basilisk bit me," Harry explained.

Cho opened her mouth to ask whether he was serious, then decided she didn't want to know and shut it again.

"So, what do we do now?" said Harry, looking to the gates, where McGonagall was apparently berating the blonde girl for fraternising with the enemy. "We're not just going to sit on our hands for the next … it could be years before the other factions are weakened enough for us to beat them. Voldemort" Cho flinched "lasted for almost fifteen years without even weakening, last time."

"Technically, this is summer holiday," said Cho. "I don't know about you, but I wouldn't mind a holiday."

"Do you want to help with the greenhouses?" Hermione asked. "They want everyone to pitch in."

"This new wand's playing up," Cho said.

"That doesn't matter; they need people to work with their hands, too," Hermione pressed, indicating how dirty hers were. "Didn't anyone say that? Come on; working together is actually really fun. I wish we did more of it, in class."

She turned to take them to the greenhouses, and Cho shot Harry a look of raised eyebrows. He shrugged back.

As they got nearer, Mr Weasley noticed them. He broke off his conversation and came over to meet them.

"Hello, Hermione, Harry," he said. "And, um …?"

"Cho," she supplied.

"Arthur Weasley," he said. "Pleased to meet you." She assented. "Harry, how are you feeling? I didn't think Madam Pomfrey usually gave people casts."

"Er," said Harry. He was acutely aware that he hadn't spoken to Mr Weasley or indeed any of his family since Ron had died, which one could very easily blame Harry for, since he was the one who'd let Ron come along, and it was also his fault that Ron had gone on the expedition when he'd had the lethal weapon installed. Yesterday with Mrs Weasley didn't count; he'd barely been awake.

"She says it'll be fine," said Hermione. "I didn't realise you'd be coming here, Mr Weasley."

"I'm a Weasley," he said, distracted. "We're on the who's who list of blood traitors; it'd be a matter of days at most before a Death Eater got me. Harry, could I have a word?"

"Er," Harry said again. He shot Hermione a pleading look.

She mouthed 'You can't avoid him forever' back.

"We'll go on ahead," said Cho. "Harry, don't take too long; I promised my friend I'd introduce you to them."

"Er," Harry said again, as his friends deserted him and Mr Weasley took him back to the castle. They stopped outside, by a stretch of wall with no windows or doors nearby. "I'm sorry!"

Mr Weasley looked at him curiously. "You are? What for?"

Last year, Snape had snapped at Dean, who blanched and confessed to copying much of the week's scroll from Roger Malone. Snape explained that he was actually criticising Dean's flame, which was on too high, before assigning Dean a detention and deducting twenty points from each of Gryffindor and Hufflepuff.

"For bleeding all over the Burrow yesterday," Harry improvised.

Mr Weasley blinked in surprise. "You do realise that You-Know-Who is almost certain to burn it to the ground while we're away, don't you?" he asked. "We always knew we'd be the first pureblood family attacked. No, actually I wanted to ask you about something. Your class shares Potions with the Slytherins, don't you?"

"Er," Harry said again, trying to see where this was going. "I did, yeah. I don't know if Houses are kept separate in NEWTs or if I'll even be allowed to keep going – Snape doesn't let you unless you get an Outstanding OWL, and we haven't got our scores back. I'm not sure we will at all."

Mr Weasley waved this aside. "So you know Draco Malfoy fairly well?" he continued.

That explained it. "I wouldn't call us friends, exactly … or at all …"

"You know that he's been going out with my Ginny for some time now."

Harry normally wasn't the sort to pass blame, but he wasn't stupid. "She made me promise not to tell anyone," he said.

Mr Weasley nodded, unhappy but accepting. "I suspected as much. Do you think he's a good match for her?"

"I wouldn't foist him on the Giant Squid," Harry replied candidly. "Unless you mean, is she better for him than another girl would be?"

"Molly's delighted," Mr Weasley said.

"She was?" said Harry. "I had the impression she didn't like him. I thought I saw her glaring at him during the funeral?"

"That was before she knew who he was," Mr Weasley said, exhaustion apparent under his eyes. "Since she found out, she's decided Ginny's going to win him over to the Light, and they'll happily marry and have eight children and live in a manor house. She brought four of those Knut dreadful romance novels here. You have to help me!"

"Um. What am I supposed to do?" Harry asked. "She's the year below me; I'm not really in her core circle of friends. And I don't get the feeling she's the sort of person who'd let anyone tell her who she couldn't date."

"Don't you think we could threaten Malfoy?" Mr Weasley asked. "You're a classmate; he'll expect you to pay him more attention than I can."

"We've been threatening each other since the first train ride here," said Harry. "He's not afraid of me. Besides, he'd mention it to Ginny, and then she'd keep seeing him out of contrariness, and she'd ignore any other advice I tried to give her."

"Hermione's smart, and Ginny respects that. Maybe …?"

"They're not exactly bosom friends," Harry said. "They're not in the middle of a fight any more, but they just don't have very much in common."

"What do you think we should do, then?" Mr Weasley demanded.

"Mr Weasley, I was worried when I first heard about it too," said Harry. "I do care about Ginny, you know, but you can't just make her break up with him. My plan was just to let it run its course. She's a smart girl; she'll realise they have no future and leave him by herself."

"But what if Malfoy hurts her?"

"Then you'll have to race half of Gryffindor to be the one to feed him to the Giant Squid," said Harry. "Look, she's not stupid. She won't let him do anything she –"

"Oi! Harry!" Cho shouted from the greenhouses. "Stop chitchatting and give us a hand!"

"Sorry; better not keep her waiting," Harry said regretfully. "She has a huge temper."

"Fair enough," said Mr Weasley, and they began walking toward the greenhouses. "Will you at least try to intimidate Malfoy, though?"

"It's the least I can do," said Harry.

Terry and a gaggle of friends, mostly girls, had taken the opportunity to get started on their ditch, and were variously trying to Vanish or levitate away clumps of earth. Harry couldn't tell why they were bothering, really; it wasn't like there weren't functioning pumps.

Closer to, he could hear what Daphne was saying. "… and even aside from all that, this is completely the wrong climate for keratic plants. They don't thrive anywhere in Scotland."

"That's why we're putting them inside a greenhouse, Greengrass," Neville said over his shoulder.

"Don't act like you know anything about agriculture, Longbottom," she snapped.

Mr Weasley wandered over to the ditch to participate. The new greenhouses were just posts demarcating where the walls and roof would be. A knot of Slytherins and one Hufflepuff had a cauldron boiling under Professor Sinistra's supervision. One scooped up some of the contents in a ladle and let it trickle out between two posts; the liquid hardened in midair into the same green glass as that of the other greenhouse walls. Harry made his way inside, to where he could see Hermione and Cho taking keratobulbs out of a long pot and transplanting them into a fresh bed of soil; as soon as he crossed the threshold, the temperature and humidity jumped, suggesting some sort of insulation magic was in place until they finished the walls.

"Thank you so much," he said to Cho. "Where's your friend?"

"You looked like you needed rescuing," she explained.

"You're a good person," Harry replied, and got down to help as best he could one-handed. He pulled out his wand and began casting the handful of charms he'd learnt in Herbology over the years: ones to aerate soil, keep the environment stable, and kill parasites.

"What did he want, anyway?" Cho asked.

"For me to break Ginny and Malfoy up," Harry said. "I told him I'd think about it. I don't think I've ever seen it not go badly when a third party gets involved in a relationship."

"I saw Malfoy in the stadium just now," said Cho.

"Trust him to be slacking off when there's work to do," Hermione said. "He did it nonstop with Prefect duties; I don't know why Dumbledore even gave him the badge in the first place."

"Actually, I was more thinking about how his father's a Death Eater," said Cho. "Do you think he could be a spy? Or a saboteur?"

"Yes, probably," said Hermione. "On the other hand, it's just a bit too obvious; everyone and his brother are going to be watching him. I'd bet he's just a decoy spy, and Voldemort" Cho flinched "has another one here somewhere."

"What makes you so sure of that?" Cho asked.

"Experience," said Hermione.

"Also, Tonks isn't accounted for," said Harry. "She could be … well, not anyone, but anyone you don't know."

"That's … disquieting," said Cho.

"It's not quite as bad as it sounds," Hermione said. "I mean, there's no guarantee that she's here at all; she could be spying on the Ministry, or doing something against the sacrificers."

"This is actually kind of scaring me," said Cho. "Could we please talk about something else?"

There was a pause, in which the only sounds were of them scraping soil and the chatter of the other workers; Daphne's higher-pitched diatribe carried over it, and Neville's laconic responses were lost.

"What's she saying, exactly?" Harry asked. "I mean, farming is the sort of thing her family is good at."

"She wants us to grow herbs, rare flowers, and other cash crops," Hermione said, rolling her eyes. "Says we'll need the money, and we could just buy food."

"Won't that be, I don't know, difficult?" Harry asked. "I mean, there are Aurors outside; and I don't fancy lugging enough food for thousands of people through the secret passages. Every day."

"I don't think she's fully internalised the concept," Cho said.

"Once you're done with this patch, move on to the next," Hermione said to Harry of his wandwork, indicating the other beds of soil around them.

"Thanks," he said. "Why is she even here? I got the impression that her family would rather hire tutors."

"Maybe they're hoping she can be damage control," said Hermione. "You know, try to put a human face on the Greengrasses, after you told everyone about how they helped the Marionette Man; try to make them out to be good people."

From outside, they could hear her say, "If any of you had any financial sense at all –"

Padma shot back, "Yes, why don't you tell us about that famous Greengrass financial sense," and this bought a moment's quiet.

"Sounds like she's doing a bang-up job of it," Harry observed.

"I'd think she's here for the same reason most of the old pureblood families come to Hogwarts at all," said Cho. "My friend Melissa Fawley – as in the House of Fawley, you know, one of the really old ones – said it was more about trying to make alliances through marriage than it was about classwork."

Hermione quirked an eyebrow. "I thought they had, I don't know, Yuletide balls, and those awful tea parties with great-aunts who always pinch your cheek, and so on, for that," she said.

"The Ravenclaw perspective would be that it's easy enough to sound intelligent," said Cho, "you know, by reading a few newspapers and talking about current affairs, but it's hard to be sure that the boy to whom you're promising your daughter is actually intelligent, just from a dinner party. When you have a school with impartial teachers and things like OWL and NEWT exams, you know whether you're getting someone smart enough to manage the family inheritance. And you get a better idea of whether they can play well with others; can they talk with Muggle-borns without making an ass of themself and such."

Harry considered this. Possibly the Malfoys should have kept Draco home. On the other hand, he was doing well enough for himself. "And I suppose for the not-quite-so-old families, like the Goyles, it's a chance to try to get a leg up."

"That sounds absolutely medieval," Hermione said, wrinkling her nose. "Do they actually still think that way?"

Cho shrugged. "I don't know. I haven't spoken with her in a while, but I know she never dated. Maybe you should try to fix Ginny up with a different pureblood boy?"

"Please do," said Ginny, behind them.

"Oh!" Cho exclaimed, turning bright red. "I, um."

Harry moved to do introductions, before realising that both girls had played Seeker: of course they already knew each other.

"No, really," said Ginny. "Anyone has to be better than Malfoy. He thinks he's so impressive because he disobeyed his father to come back here."

"Did he," Hermione said, clearly recalculating how trustworthy Malfoy was, and clearly still getting a negative number.

Ginny nodded. "You'd think he'd wrestled a dragon, when we're only in here because it's safer than being out there. I swear, he thinks he's everything. I'm not talking to him. But, um, actually, Harry? I sort of have something I need to tell you."

"This isn't anything to do with your father, is it?" Harry asked.

Ginny blinked. "No. He talked to you? What did he want?"

"He was asking about the rules of golf," Harry said. Why can't I ever lie this smoothly when it's anything important?

"Is that a Muggle game?"

"An incredibly boring one," said Harry. He'd sneaked out of his cupboard once when he was young and watched a few minutes of it over Uncle Vernon's shoulder on the television; once. "I think he'll stick to Quidditch."

Ginny discarded this. "Actually, it was about that thing you loaned me yesterday."

"You mean the Invisibility Cloak?"

Ginny nodded. "No offence," she added to Cho.

"None taken," said Cho. "I wouldn't have told me about that either."

"Moody has it," Ginny said. "Apparently that eye of his can see through it. He caught me last night and told me to hand it over. I told him no, and he jinxed me and took it."

"What! Why?"

Ginny shrugged helplessly. "I don't know; he didn't say much, except that if you want it back, to ask him yourself."

"Of course I want it back; it's an Invisibility Cloak," Harry said, getting up.

"Um, Harry?" said Hermione. "He'll still be there later, and we've only just started here."

Harry paused, then crouched back down.