A/N: Thank you for the reviews! Cookies for everybody!

Year Five, Part 3

:: :: :: ::

Rose was able to keep her mouth shut in Umbridge's presence only by the grace of a Muggle fashion magazine that she'd charmed to appear to be her defense textbook to anyone who looked. So while Hermione went toe to toe with Umbridge, a warning hand wrapped around Rose's wrist to keep her quiet, Rose read about fall fashion trends and debated the merits of combat boots and bomber jackets.

She even kept her cool when Umbridge inspected Professor Grubbly Plank's Care of Magical Creatures lesson, though it was much harder when Umbridge asked leading questions about Hagrid's worthiness as a teacher. Hermione's nails left marks on her wrist, and Rose's tongue was sore from biting it, but she did it.

It became easier and easier to keep quiet, because Rose wasn't talking to anyone other than Ginny and Hermione. She was still avoiding Cedric after her spectacular breakdown in the Owlery, and she had no interest in speaking to her classmates who believed she was a slutty drug addict.

And then her world narrowed down to Hermione.

Ginny had been seduced away by a Ravenclaw called Michael Corner. Ginny wasn't entirely sold on Michael yet, but as she said, "At least I know he won't chuck me for being a blood-traitor."

"That's why you and Blaise broke up?" Rose cried.

"Didn't I tell you?"

"No! You just kept saying that he was a bastard."

"Well, he is. He said that it wouldn't be 'prudent' for us to date any more. He didn't actually say the words 'blood-traitor', but I can read between the lines. This was, of course, after he'd read the article in the Prophet about what happened to you after the Tournament. Bastard."

"I didn't know Blaise was… you know…"

"I don't think he is," Ginny said. "But the rest of the boys in his dormitory have parents who are Death Eaters, so… Peer pressure."

"Bastards," said Rose, and Ginny nodded.

"I'll see you later," said Ginny. "I have a cute Ravenclaw to snog."

Rose laughed and waved Ginny away. "It looks like it's just you and me, my bookish friend," she said to Hermione.

"That's good," Hermione said absently, sketching down one last line on an essay. "I have something to talk to you about."

"What's that?"

"I've been thinking about Sirius's suggestion that we study Defense on our own."

"And?"

"Well, we could always go look up hexes and jinxes in the library and practice them, but I was thinking that we needed something more. Like a teacher."

"Like who?" Rose asked. "I suppose we could meet up with Remus on Hogsmeade weekends, but that wouldn't be enough."

"No, it wouldn't." Hermione closed her books, avoiding Rose's eye for a moment. "I was thinking that… you could be our teacher."

"Me."

"You."

Rose laughed. "Hermione, I don't—"

"Rose, you're good at Defense. You know what you're doing, and most importantly, you know what it's like to be in a situation where you have to use those spells. We can practice all we like, but you can teach us what its like to use them in a real life or death situation."

"Hermione—"

"A war is coming," she insisted, and Rose went cold. She'd been doing her best to avoid thinking of it in such terms, and here Hermione was, putting it so baldly that Rose couldn't any longer. "V-Voldemort is back, and we're all going to be in the middle of it. You, and me, and Ginny, and the rest of the Weasleys, and God knows who else. Rose, we need to be prepared, and you can help us."

"I don't think I can." Hermione opened her mouth to protest, but Rose said, "Hermione, I didn't know what I was doing in the graveyard. I never know what I'm doing. I just… you just do what you can and hope to God you don't die. I don't think I can teach that."

"But you won the Tournament. You spent all that time last year practicing dueling with the upper years. And that's not mentioning the Philosopher's Stone in first year or the Chamber of Secrets in second. You have experience—"

"But that's still not—"

"You can teach us the spells. You can train us to duel. You can give us what we need to survive. Hopefully next year we'll have a decent Defense professor, but what if something happens before then? We need to do all we can now."

Rose fisted her hands in her lap and stared down at them. She thought about what Cedric had said, and how angry he'd been that she was going to do nothing… Well, maybe she couldn't convince anybody that Voldemort was back, but she couldn't stand the idea of people dying because they didn't know what was coming, or how to defend themselves against it.

"All right," she said. "We'll try it. Who were you thinking of asking to join in? The Gryffindors?"

Hermione smiled at her. "I'll deal with all of that. You just think about lesson plans."

Rose smiled back, and felt some of that ball of misery that had lodged in her stomach melt away.

:: :: :: ::

Hermione gave Rose nearly a month to work on lesson plans, which she most often did under the guise of taking notes in Umbridge's class.

"I want to put the Patronus Charm in here," Rose said to Hermione one night when they were cloistered in the library with a stack of defense texts and Rose's new Defense notebook, "but I learned with a Boggart-Dementor… I don't know how useful it will be to know the Charm, but not know what it's like to have to cast it when you actually need it. It's not easy when you've got a real dementor in front of you…"

"Put it in anyway. I want to learn how to do it."

Rose smiled and wrote it down. She tried to remember how Remus had taught her to do the Charm, and the tricks that had worked to get her motivated.

With help from Sirius, who had nicked Remus's old lesson plans and smuggled them to Rose through the Floo, Rose quickly got a good idea about the spells which were most useful in the 'Battle Against the Dark', as she liked to call it in a deep ominous voice, because it made Hermione roll her eyes.

In the end, Rose's lesson plans read like a quick and dirty Auror training program. "The basics are all here," Rose said to Hermione. "A shield charm, a couple nasty hexes, Impedimentia, Stupefy, the Patronus, Expelliarmus, and some stealth spells. All you need to block, take down, and get away. If we get through these then we can add on, but this will do for now."

Hermione flipped through Rose's notebook, lingering over the Patronus page, and looked more and more excited as she went on. "This is really good, Rose. I'm impressed."

"Yes, well, you were the one who taught me how to take notes. I even color coordinated, see?"

Despite all the work Rose had put into her 'Battle Against the Dark' notebook, she didn't expect that many people would be interested in the study group. She was, after all, The Girl Who Lived to Not be Taken Seriously.

When she voiced this, Hermione said, "You might be surprised."

And Rose was surprised when the next Hogsmeade weekend rolled around, and Hermione led her into the Hog's Head which was packed with students. Though not a single Slytherin, Rose noted.

"Hermione," Rose hissed, "this place is filthy."

The other girl was looking around the bar as well, nose wrinkled. "I know. But fewer Hogwarts students come here, so I hoped we would be a little… less conspicuous."

"Little chance of that," Rose muttered. The whole place was crawling with Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and a scattering of Ravenclaws. "They can't all be here for the meeting, can they?"

Hermione ignored her question, and taking a deep breath and squaring her shoulders, dove into the throng. Rose followed, aware of eyes on her as she followed Hermione, who stopped in front of Cedric Diggory. Rose hung back as they talked, as she still hadn't spoken to Cedric since the Owlery incident and had little desire to make a fool of herself again.

Cedric and Hermione seemed to come to a consensus, and he whistled. The chattering of the Hogwarts students subsided, and Cedric said, "Everybody who's here for the, uh, thing, gather round."

Rose's eyes went wide as everyone started circling their chairs around Cedric and Hermione. Rose grabbed Hermione's arm, "All of these people?" she hissed. "I thought maybe a few Gryffindors, but this is too much!"

Hermione shrugged helplessly. "I really didn't think quite this many people would show…"

There had to be at least fifty people in the bar, and they were all staring at Rose expectantly. True, she knew quite a few of them: George, Fred, Lee, the rest of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, Ginny and Michael, Luna Lovegood, Lavender and Parvati, the rest of the Gryffindor boys in her year… but she had not been expecting this, and so looked back at the lot of them, tongue tied for the first time in her life.

"Er," said Hermione, sounding just as nervous as Rose felt. "Well – er – hi."

Attention on Hermione now, she launched into her usual tirade against Umbridge and the mockery she was making of DADA, "But," Hermione said, "more importantly, I want to be trained well in Defense because… because… Lord Voldemort is back."

There were the usual shrieks and squeals of terror, and Rose rolled her eyes.

"Where's the proof You-Know-Who's back?" asked Zacharias Smith in an aggressive voice. Rose was reminded abruptly of why she'd never liked him. "I think we've got a right to know exactly what makes her say You-Know-Who's back."

Rose scowled.

"I say it too, Zach," Cedric calmly reminded him.

"All you said you saw was a man in a cloak holding something," Zach said scathingly. "She's the one who's claiming that was Him."

"I have a name, Zacharias," Rose spat. "And yes, I do say that he's back. He is. But I'm not going to waste my afternoon trying to convince you of it. Either you believe me or you don't, I'm not bothered."

They stared each other down. "All Dumbledore said was that—"

"If you want to hear the story again, I suggest you look up the Daily Prophet article on it. Rita Skeeter got something right for once. That will tell you all you need to know, but I'm not going to re-hash everything. If that's what you all are here for, then you might as well clear out now."

No one moved, so Hermione went on. "Right, so, as I was saying… if you want to learn some defense then we need to work out how we're going to do it, how often we're going to meet, and where we're going to—"

And then it was a free-for-all discussion about the many and varied miraculous feats Rose had accomplished. Blushing, and angry that she was blushing, she snapped, "Look, I had help with all of that. It wasn't just me—"

"But what about—"

"And the—"

"Yes! All right, I had to do some of it on my own, would you all just… quit?" Rose held her hands to her cheeks, glaring at Ginny, who grinned and laughed at her embarrassment.

"Are you trying to weasel out of showing us any of this stuff?" said Zacharias.

Ginny hexed Zach silent. "Go on, Rose."

"Thank you, Ginny."

"Yes, well," said Hermione, "are we agreed we want to take lessons from Rose?" There was a general murmur of agreement, and Hermione unrolled a scroll. "All right, then. Everyone signs."

After a brief debate on whether they ought to, Rose snatched the parchment away and signed her name. "Just sign it, you bloody cowards."

"Rose!"

"Well, they've got to sign. If they don't they'll be hexed with that artistic array of boils, and if they talk," she looked threateningly around, "then they'll be hexed as well. You've been warned."

There was a mad scramble to sign the parchment then, and Rose sent Hermione a smug look. The other girl rolled her eyes, but happily pocketed the scroll when it was filled with signatures.

"What kind of hex is on that?" Cedric asked Rose in a low voice.

She smiled thinly, and brushed a line in the air over his cheekbones. "Hope you never have to find out, Cedric."

He winced and rubbed a finger over his cheek.

"All right," Rose said, gathering everyone's attention once more. "We'll meet once a week – no, Angelina, it won't interfere with Quidditch practice – and we'll let you all know when and where… as soon as we find a where…" Rose hooked her arm in Hermione's, very eager to be gone already. "See you."

Hermione, bemused, followed her out of the pub, and they walked quickly to Honeydukes, where Rose bought a bar of chocolate.

"That was…" she sighed, and took a bite off the bar.

"Great!" Hermione finished. "Can you believe the turnout?"

"No," Rose scowled, "I can't. Where are we going to meet? There's too many people, Hermione!"

She waved Rose's concerns away. "It's going to fine. We'll figure something out."

"And what's the deal with all those seventh years wanting to learn from me? What can I teach them?"

"Think about the kind of education we've had in DADA, and see if you really need to ask that question."

Rose sighed. "All right, so our DADA professors have been a bit… shoddy… Not including Remus, of course. I guess they do need the help."

"It's going to be great," Hermione insisted. "Lets go back to the castle and figure out where we're going to have these meetings."

:: :: :: ::

Somehow, Umbridge had found out about Rose's study group.

"Someone talked," Rose said darkly to Hermione, as they looked at the latest decree that disbanded all student organizations.

"They can't have," Hermione said, shaking her head. "I checked the parchment. It would have said if the hex had been activated."

"Then someone else in the Hog's Head heard us."

Hermione nodded.

"I think you should start with the stealth spells instead of the defensive ones. We're going to have to be extra careful…"

That day was especially interesting, because Neville went completely mental before Potions, and punched Draco right in the mouth.

Draco was bragging about his father again, and Rose tuned him out. They'd not even glanced at each other since Rose had all but attacked him on the Quidditch pitch. But her attention was drawn when Draco said her name. "As for Potter… My father says it's a matter of time before the Ministry has her carted off to St. Mungo's. Apparently they've got a special ward for people whose brains have been addled by magic."

Draco made a face at Rose, and mimed a swoon. The Slytherins laughed. Rose, unimpressed, made a rude gesture with her hand.

"It's not funny!" Neville yelled, charging at the blond. He threw a fist at Draco's face, connecting solidly with Draco's cheek and the corner of his mouth.

Draco's head snapped back from the force of the blow, and he stumbled into Crabbe. He looked, for a moment, completely shocked. Everyone else was shocked as well, and stared dumbly at Neville, who shook out his hand, chest heaving. Neville was hardly the type to attack others, least of all Draco, because he was scared of him. Draco recovered with a snarl, and went at Neville. Rose threw up a shield charm between them, and Draco bounced off it.

"Drop it, Rose!" Draco yelled.

She blinked at the use of her name. "…No."

"Drop it!" Neville shouted, furious eyes fixed on Draco.

The dungeon door opened. Snape appeared in the doorway, his dark eyes took in the scene with a slight widening of his eyes. "Fighting, Longbottom?" he said, his cold voice bringing Neville back to earth.

"He punched me!" Draco said.

"Detention then, Longbottom. Mr. Malfoy, go to the hospital wing."

Neville said nothing, but snatched up his bag and stalked off into the Potions classroom.

Potions that day was being inspected by Umbridge, and Rose's only consolation was that Snape looked twice as irritated with Umbridge as Rose felt. Rose hoped that Snape would slip a little something into the woman's tea in revenge. Thoughts of the terrible things Snape could do to the High Inquisitor kept Rose quiet and smug all through the day.

:: :: :: ::

Though Hermione disapproved of 'slave labor', and was forever trying to incite the house elves into revolution, after Rose's scar did it's Lord Voldemort specific mood ring magic during Quidditch practice, she dragged Hermione and Ginny down to the kitchens for a sugar binge.

"What's a 'mood ring'?" Ginny asked, when Rose had told them what she'd felt.

"It's a Muggle thing. Never mind."

"You should tell someone," Hermione said. "Dumbledore should know."

"I'll tell Sirius," Rose said, selecting an éclair from the tray of pastries the house elves had made up. "He'll let the Order know if it turns out to be important. Likely, though, Voldemort is just angry because I'm still breathing, which isn't exactly news."

"You should be careful," Hermione said. "I think Umbridge is keeping a closer watch on you than usual."

"Then I'll write a letter and you can send it," Rose said. "That's one problem solved. We still need to find a place to have our study group."

"I've got nothing," said Ginny, and smiled down at a house elf who had just refilled her teacup.

"The Chamber of Secrets would be perfect, but the Slytherins know how to say 'open' in Parseltongue now, and I don't trust them…" said Rose.

"We need somewhere large enough, and hidden… oh, but where?" said Hermione.

"Emmy knows a place!" said the teapot bearing house elf.

The girls looked at the elf, surprised. Since Hermione had started badgering the elves about freedom, they tended to keep their distance. "Where?" asked Rose.

"We calls it the Come and Go Room, or the Room of Requirement," said Emmy. "Only the elves ever uses it, but it is giving you anything you need! I can show you!"

Rose grinned down at the elf, and wished Kreacher was half as helpful.

:: :: :: ::

The Room of Requirement was, as Ginny said, "Effing brilliant."

The girls spent a happy hour testing the limits of what the magic of the Room was capable of, and were not disappointed. Hermione 'required' a stack of rare books, and Ginny 'required' a lounge chair in front of a sunny window, and Rose was happy to lie on a chaise near Ginny with a bubble wand and a bottle of bubble potion. Ginny aimed sparks at the bubbles, and Hermione read.

"I love this place," Ginny sighed.

"It's great," Rose agreed.

The rest of the 'study group' thought it was great too. The girls had decided to keep the means to access the Room of Requirement a secret, but happily explained how the room worked. Rose, Ginny and Hermione had asked the Room of Requirement for a meeting place for a defense club, and the room had provided Dark magic detectors, Defense books, large silk cushions on the floor (Rose assumed for practicing stunning spells), a wide open area to practice dueling, and a raised platform, which was where the girls were sitting as the other students entered the room.

"What is this place?" George asked. "It's not on the map…"

Rose smiled at him, and hoped it didn't look as wobbly as she felt. She was glad that George was making an effort at being friendly, but at the same time it tore at something in her chest. He grinned weakly back, eyes going soft…

Ginny coughed, and Rose blinked. "It's, uh, called the Room of Requirement. One of the house elves told us about it." Ginny saved her from having to make any more painful small talk, and explained how the room worked to George and Fred.

Hermione had been checking off names from the list, and nodded to Rose when everyone was present. The other students were all sitting on the silk cushions, and the whole room had an air of rebellion. Rose took a deep breath, and stood.

"Hello, everyone," she said, and her voice rang pleasantly through the room. Ooh, she thought, I like this. The others giggled, waved, or said, 'Hello, Rose!' "Now, now," she said, adopting a sickly sweet tone. "I should like you to please reply, 'Hello, Professor Potter.'"

There was a chorus of groans and laughter, and Ginny balled up paper to throw at her. "All right, fine," Rose mock pouted, tossing the paper back at Ginny. "Anyway, this is the place we've found for practices, and I'm glad you found it okay… I've been thinking about what we should start with, and I decided—" Rose noticed a hand raised. "Hermione?"

"I think we ought to choose a name. It would promote a feeling of team spirit and unity," said Hermione.

"Oooh," said Ginny. "Can we be the Anti-Umbitch Group?"

"Or the Ministry of Magic are Morons Militia?" suggested Fred.

"I was thinking," said Hermione, frowning at them, "more of a name that didn't tell everyone what we were up to, so we can refer to it safely outside meetings."

"Artistic boils," Rose mused, thinking. "What about Study Group? That's nice and innocuous."

Ginny threw the ball of paper at her again. "Terrible. You've no imagination."

"The Defense Association?" said Cho Chang. "We could call it the D.A. for short."

"Yeah, that works," said Ginny. "Only let's make it stand for Dumbledore's Army, since that's the Ministry's worst fear."

Everyone laughed at that, and quickly agreed to the name. Hermione boldly penned 'DUMBLEDORE'S ARMY' across the top of the parchment with all their signatures on it, and pinned it to the wall.

"All right then," said Rose. She fetched up her 'Battle Against the Dark' notebook, and hugged it to her chest. "Business done, I thought we should split up into pairs, and practice the Disarming Charm. I know it's pretty basic, but—"

"Oh, please," said Zacharias Smith, rolling his eyes. "I don't think Expelliarmus is—"

"Zach!" Rose snapped. "Did someone put a wand to your head and force you to come here? Because I will bloody put a wand to your head if you don't quit bitching. If you feel this is beneath you, then you can leave."

Zacharias didn't leave, nor did anyone else.

"Good. Okay, hop to everybody."

Everyone got up and split into pairs, and Rose noticed that Cedric had claimed Zacharias for a partner. Having orders followed so easily was… kind of a rush. Rose found that she was smirking. Ginny nudged Rose with her hip. "This is totally going to your head, isn't it?" she grinned.

Rose snickered. "Completely. I'm mad with power. Knock me off my high horse, won't you?"

"Come on then." Ginny hopped off the platform. "I'm gonna steal your wand away, Potter."

"You're gonna try, Weasley."

:: :: :: ::

The DA was, there was no other word for it, fun. It was easier than ever for Rose to keep her mouth shut around Umbridge, even at her most poisonous, because Rose knew that she was doing what the Ministry most feared and carrying on right under Umbridge's ugly toad nose.

The warm glow of rebellion grew and grew with each accomplishment of the members of the DA: like when her fanboy, Colin Creevey, perfected the Impediment Jinx in just three meetings, or Parvati, whose Reductor Curse was now so strong that she could turn large objects to dust, or when Neville managed to stupefy Cedric right into the wall… And it wasn't just Rose who was feeling the effects. Hermione was nearly bouncing around to classes, smile permanently affixed to her face.

"I'm going to get an O on my DADA O.W.L.," she crowed happily.

"You're going to get an O in Charms too," said Rose, fiddling with the charmed galleons that Hermione had created for the DA to communicate their meeting times. "These are brilliant."

As with all things lately, the glow of happiness was abruptly extinguished. Rose should have been expecting it, really.

It was the first Quidditch match of the season, Gryffindor versus Slytherin, and Ron was a sad bundle of nerves. He fell apart at the first sign of opposition, and Slytherin was all too happy to provide it.

Draco had been at work once more, creating shiny little badges for his housemates and even composing a song. Rose, while incredibly annoyed, was also impressed at Draco's ability to rally all the Slytherins together. She could only imagine what the Slytherin common room had been like while he forced them all to learn the lyrics to, 'Weasley is Our King'.

They all sang:

Weasley cannot save a thing,

He cannot block a single ring,

That's why Slytherins all sing:

Weasley is our King.

Weasley was born in a bin,

He always lets the Quaffle in,

Weasley will make sure we win,

Weasley is our King.

And it wasn't a bad song, either… it was catchy.

Rose passed Draco in the air, and he was singing at the top of his lungs, "Weasley was born in a bin…" He grinned meanly at Rose as she passed. "Like my song, Potter?"

The sad thing was, she sort of did. It was terrible and cruel, but it made her remember the 'Support Rose Potter' buttons, and her heart ached with wanting Draco back on her side. She missed the obnoxious, vicious prat.

This did not mean that she was going to let him have the Snitch, however. She needed to catch it for Ron's sake, because they would lose the game otherwise and Ron would try to drown himself in the showers.

The Snitch showed itself and Rose streaked after it, a green-gold blur in the corner of her vision told her Draco was coming after her. They were neck in neck, Draco slammed against her side, and Rose bounced up on her broom with the force of the blow, searching for that extra inch—

Her hand closed around the Snitch, and Draco's hand closed around hers a moment after. She elbowed him away, and cut towards the ground.

WHAM! A Bludger hit Rose in the small of her back, throwing her from her broom. She landed flat on her back on the frozen pitch, breath knocked from her. She blinked up at the sky, gasping.

Angelina lit on the ground beside her. "Are you all right?" she asked frantically.

Rose moaned, and took Angelina's hand to pull her to her feet. "Ow."

"It was Crabbe!" Angelina snarled. "He whacked the Bludger at you when he saw you'd gotten the Snitch. But we won! Rose, we won!" She hugged Rose enthusiastically.

"Ow, Angie," said Rose, wincing.

"Sorry, sorry!" Angelina released her and bounced away to hug Alicia and Katie. The rest of the team were now landing, yelling and punching the air, all except for Ron, who Rose saw was slowly making his way to the changing rooms alone. It seemed that Ron would be trying to drown himself in the showers after all.

"Saved Weasley's arse, haven't you?" Rose turned to Draco. He was white faced and wide eyed, his fingers tightly clenched around his broomstick. He visibly gathered himself, and went on in a steadier voice, "I've never seen a worse Keeper—"

"Oh, will you leave off with Ron!" she said. "It's me you're mad at!"

Draco's expression closed down. "I wanted to write a few more verses," he went on, as though she hadn't spoken. "But I couldn't find rhymes for fat and ugly – we wanted to sing about his mother, you see."

"You leave off their mother," Rose hissed, taking a few steps towards them.

A shadow of a smirk ghosted across his face. "We couldn't fit in useless loser either, for his father, you know."

Rose clenched her jaw. "You want to talk about fathers, Draco?" Rose spat. "What room have you to talk when yours is just a cowering sycophant."

He flinched, and his expression went ugly. They were nearly nose-to-nose now. His voice was quiet and malicious as he said, "At least I have a father."

It was as though he'd slapped her, and Draco knew it. He looked viciously pleased by her flinch. The Snitch was digging painfully into the flesh of Rose's tightly clenched hand.

"What have you got, Potter?" he continued in that quiet, cruel voice. "Vague, misty memories of your parents? A half-mad godfather, in love with a werewolf."

"He's not mad!"

"Oh, but yes to the rest?"

Rose's yell had drawn the attention of the others, and George was suddenly pushing her out of the way. "What did you say to her?" he snarled in Draco's face.

Draco held up his hands, cool and innocent, "We were just talking, Weasley. What's it to you anyway? I heard you chucked her for going around behind your back." George went for Draco's throat, and Rose threw up a shield wall between them. Draco threw Rose a raised eyebrow. "What's with this anyway?" he asked her, gesturing at the shield wall. "Is it to protect him or me?"

Rose glared.

George pounded his fists against the wall, and Fred came up behind him to pull him back. "Leave the little ferret alone, Forge," he muttered.

Draco shrugged, unconcerned. "I almost had her, you know, Weasley? You got there just a few minutes before I did…" He glanced at Rose, his lip curled. "If I had, it would have been me she was spreading her legs for."

George went at the wall with a roar, Draco smirking and untouchable behind it, completely unconcerned with his anger; Fred wasn't even holding him back any longer. Draco raised an eyebrow at Rose. "I could have kept her interested too, Weasley. She wouldn't have been playing around behind my back."

Rose, cold and hot and so very still, like the whole world had stopped, made a tiny motion with her wand, and the shield charm fell.

George tackled Draco to the ground. Angelina, Alicia and Katie grabbed Fred and held him back. Rose watched with a detached sort of interest as George's fists pummeled Draco. Draco was yelling, and George was swearing, and the girls were yelling at him to stop, and Rose just watched. Draco fought back, landing a solid hit on George's nose.

She barely heard as Madam Hooch shouted out an 'Impedimentia', knocking George away from Draco. "What are you doing?" she shrieked. "I've never seen behavior like it – all of you to your Head of House's office! Now! That means you, Miss Potter – I've never seen the like—"

Rose went numbly, George furious at her side.

:: :: :: ::