Let's continue. Thanks for reviewing, Lauren Kassidy, and sorry about the chapter error.
"Fern, where were you?" Hermione cried, running over to her friend. "We won! Gryffindor's in the lead!"
The evening was a blur of happiness, although Fern was still brooding about the blackmail that had her dating an arrogant (but very cute) Slytherin.
Even worse, Harry told the rest of the Quartet that evening, that he'd heard Snape and Quirrell talking, and that he thought Snape was trying to get Quirrell to tell him how to get past Fluffy.
"You mean that the Stone's only safe as long as Quirrell stands up to Snape?" Hermione asked.
"It'll be gone by next Tuesday." muttered Ron.
Fern, however, didn't seem sure. "I don't know..." she muttered. "Something about this just doesn't add up. Well, it does, but I have a feeling that we're missing something."
However, the Quartet had more on their minds than the Stone. End-of-year exams loomed in ten weeks. Ron, Harry and Fern continued to check (from a distance) that Fluffy was still guarding the Stone, but Hermione was caught up in a frenzy of studying. She kept telling the others to do exactly what she was doing, and as the teachers started giving them more and more homework, they didn't have much of a choice.
Once, when they were studying, Hagrid came in, apparently trying to find something on dragons. The same day, they went to his hut to ask him more about the Philosopher's Stone. That was when they found out why he'd been looking up dragons – he had a huge black dragon egg.
"What I'd got there is a Norwegian Ridgeback." he said proudly.
Fern didn't recognize the name, but she knew how rare it was by his tone, and said "That's amazing. Cool!"
The Quartet continued to study for the next week, but then Harry got a note, carried by his owl, to say that the egg was hatching. Fern and Ron voted to skip Herbology to see it happening, but Hermione wouldn't let them.
They continued to argue, until Harry told them to shut up. Fern followed his gaze, to realize that the reason was because Draco was nearby, and was eavesdropping. He gave Fern his most flirtatious smirk when he saw her looking.
After the dragon hatched (Hagrid called him Norbert), the whole group spent most of the time with Hagrid and the dragon. Fern spent slightly less, since Draco cornered her once or twice, trying to get information out of her.
"I followed you four, I saw the dragon hatching before." he warned. "You want me to tell?"
"Tell what?" Fern muttered, not looking at him. "About the dragon, or about what I've been telling Jamie in my letters about Snape?"
"Dragon, duh." Draco said. "Continue."
Fern insisted she didn't know anything, which was hard when Norbert bit Ron, causing him major discomfort. In the end, the group decided, Hagrid included, that they'd have to send the dragon somewhere else.
Harry had an idea. He remembered Ron's brother Charlie in Romania, who was studying dragons. They could ask him to take care of Norbert until he was an adult.
The problem was, the Quartet would have to get Norbert up the tallest tower at midnight for him to be picked up. But they were determined to do it.
"We've got my Invisibility Cloak." Harry pointed out. "I think it's big enough to cover three of us and Norbert."
The dragon bite had to be treated in the school infirmary, and Draco took the chance to taunt Ron there and threaten to tell what actually happened.
Fern cornered him after class the next time. "You promised you'd leave my friends alone!" she hissed. "Remember?"
"Relax, Fern." Draco said. "I wasn't actually going to bust you..yet. But with that dragon bite, Weasley's really pushing the limits."
Ron didn't recover in time to join the other three on sending Norbert off, but that turned out to be a blessing in disguise – for him, at least. On the way to the tower of the night, Harry, Hermione and Fern actually passed Draco, having tried to tell on them to Professor McGonagall. However, she wasn't buying it, the Quartet was happy to see, and he only got detention and points off Slytherin.
Sadly, on the way back, the three kids were caught and sent to Professor McGonagall's office. When she put in an appearance, she had Neville in tow. She didn't know what they had really been up to, but she assumed that they'd told Draco some lie about the dragon to get him in trouble by getting him out of bed at night, and Neville had heard it. That's why he was out. The four kids lost Gryffindor 200 points in total, and got detentions.
All of the kids were pretty much sent to Coventry by everyone except the Slytherins, because everyone, even the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws just didn't want to see Slytherin winning the House Cup for the eighth year running. Ron was the only one who still talked to them. He pointed out that his brothers, the twins in third year, had lost hundreds of points and just like with them, people would forget about it.
"It's no picnic right now, though. I thought being sent to Coventry only existed in Enid Blyton boarding schools." Fern sighed, half-complaining, half-joking.
Draco waylaid Fern after classes more and more. "Heard you got detention." he said with a smirk. "So do I. It'll be like a real first date, won't it?"
"In case you don't know," Fern said through her teeth, "Harry, Hermione and Neville all have detention too, and you promised your little blackmail condition wouldn't get back to them."
"Oh, so you haven't told them yet?" Draco said. "I would've thought you told them everything by now. You're not very good at keeping secrets."
Fern just turned and stalked off. She got a long-awaited reply from Jamie the same day, which depressed her more. The last letter she'd sent was the one with the picture of Draco, and Jamie had noticed.
Hey Fern
Wow, your Slytherin boy is cute! I can see why you like him. You have got to get him to meet us. He's not a Muggle-hater, is he? From what you tell me, there are a lot of purebloods who are haters. I assume you did ask him out, since he let you take a picture of him. (Fern resolved to tell Jamie about the blackmail and what Draco was really like).
It sounds like Harry is doing great as a Seeker, since he's beaten Slytherin and Hufflepuff now. Update me on points!
Oh, and guess what? One of the Year 9 students has been hitting on Andrea. And she's actually flirting back! You should see her, she's acting so weird to usual.
Write back!
Jamie
Fern sighed, but wrote back straight away.
Hey Jamie
Slytherin boy read your letter when you passed on the advice to ask him out or let him down. I dropped it, and he used it to blackmail me into dating him. He said that if I didn't, he'd point out what you said about S cause he was sure S would know it was him you were talking about. Then I would get in trouble. He'd use any excuse to get me in trouble – I am, after all, one of Harry's friends. Even Hermione gets treated worse in Potions than in any other class.
So I might as well tell you all about him now he knows. His name's Draco Malfoy, and he's a pureblood snob, so yes, he hates muggles and muggleborns. I don't know why he's bothering with me, but he is. The day he blackmailed me, he also insulted Ron's family's wealth, and basically called Neville brainless. It's not fair that Neville gets picked on all the time, he's a nice guy.
Me, Neville, Harry and Hermione got fifty points taken off each for being caught out of bed after hours. It sucks, I know. No one in Gryffindor except Ron will talk to us. Most of the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws are shunning us too, because they all wanted to see Slytherin lose the House Cup for once, and now they're in the lead. We've got detention tomorrow night, according to a message we all got from McGonagall.
Andrea is flirting? It's the apocalypse! (Though Draco wanting a muggleborn girlfriend should have told me that). Tell me more!
Love
Fern
Fern's a bit more down than usual, I know, but she's having a hard time. Please review!
