Gwyn Swann and the Sorcerer's Stone

by Lady Dawson

Chapter Eleven: Foe to Friend

The break-in that had occurred at Gringotts that they had learned about first from Ron and then from the clipping from Hagrid's cabin turned out to be at the very same vault that Harry had visited with Hagrid on the day that Hagrid took him to Diagon Alley to do his school shopping. And Hagrid had taken something out of one of the vaults, something that was said to be Hogwarts business, very secret. Harry believed that whatever it was the Hagrid had taken from the vault was what the three-headed dog was guarding.

"But what could it possible be?" Gwyn wondered as they headed towards the Great Hall the following morning for breakfast. "What would need such heavy protection?"

"Well, it's either got to be really valuable or really dangerous," Ron suggested.

"Or both," Harry pointed out. The only thing that he could tell them about the object was that it was about two inches long, which wasn't much to go by and without further clues, they didn't have much of a chance of finding out what it was.

Hermione wasn't speaking to any of them at the moment, which was a shame, because she was the only person in the Gryffindor girls' dormitory that she could talk to. Having boys for her best friends was all very well, but sometimes, it was nice having a girl to talk to.

Gwyn sat down on the breakfast table, pouring some cereal into a bowl as she reread her Charms essay before they had to turn it into Professor Flitwick later that day as the mail started to arrive. She glanced up as a letter dropped onto her empty bowl from Mrs. Harris.

Gwyn,

I was very glad to hear that you'd been sorting into Gryffindor. Your mother would be very proud of you if she could see you today. With some training, you may turn out to be just as extraordinary witch as she was!

By the way, yesterday I received the paperwork for becoming your guardian. William wasn't happy when I had to go over to get his signature to validate them, but he didn't need much persuasion, dearest. I'm sorry. But I'm happy to have you around as long as you like. You are always welcome at my home, Gwyn.

However, I am going to be going to America for the Christmas holidays to spend it with my sister. I've wrote to her and she says that you're more than welcome to come, but from your letters, I'm guessing that you would prefer to spend them at school with your friends. (Give my best to Harry and Ron, will you?) Whatever you decide to do for the holidays will be fine with me. Just let me know what you decide.

With love

Madeline Harris

Gwyn smiled faintly; she hadn't been expecting to think about the Christmas holidays just yet when it was barely October, but she knew that Mrs. Harris liked to plan things ahead. She was pretty sure that she'd stay here, but she would wait a bit to see what her friends' plans were before deciding.

"What's that?" she asked, suddenly noticing that Harry had received a package and he handed the note to her, grinning happily. She took it and read the note carefully. It was from Professor McGonagall, telling him that it was his new broom and that the captain, Oliver Wood, would meet him at seven o'clock for his first training session.

"Come on, let's go unwrap it in the dormitory," Ron said excitedly and they all finished their breakfast quickly before heading up to the Tower to unwrap the broomstick. Gwyn hadn't seen a broomstick before, apart from the ones during flying lessons, so she was eager to see what a brand new one looked like.

Unfortunately, they were intercepted by Malfoy and his lackeys, who had seen the package in the Great Hall. Malfoy grabbed it from Harry, trying to figure out what it was from feeling the package. Jealous and rage reaped across his face as he thrust it back towards Harry. "That's a broomstick. You'll be in for it this time, Potter. First years aren't allowed them."

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

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

Before the fight could continue up again—which Gwyn wasn't sure if she was going to break up or join in—Flitwick suddenly appeared beside them. "Not arguing, I hope, boys?" he asked. "Miss Swann?"

Gwyn shook her head with a smile at her favourite teacher. "No, Professor, we were just having a mild disagreement, weren't we?" she asked, giving them all her best smile. Harry and Ron nodded. "And now that it's over, we'll best be moving along."

"Potter's been sent a broomstick, Professor," Malfoy said, still attempting to get them into trouble.

"Yes, yes, that's right," Flitwick agreed. "Professor McGonagall told me all about the special circumstances. Which model is it?"

"A Nimbus Two Thousand, sir," Harry said. Gwyn was having a hard time controlling her laughter as he said, "And it's really thanks to Malfoy here that I've got it."

Gwyn pulled both of her friends away from the group as they hurried up the stairs, eager to get away from Malfoy and so they could spill their laughter. Once they were two floors up, they all started laughing helplessly until they recovered. "Well, it's true," Harry said while Gwyn was still giggling. "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 rules?" Hermione asked as she walked up behind them. She eyed the package in Harry's hands with disapproval.

"I thought you weren't speaking to us," Harry reminded her.

"Yes, don't stop now," Ron added as Gwyn tried to get them, once again, to get along. Which wasn't much use, considering that Hermione wasn't happy with her either. "It's doing us so much good."

"Guys, can't we all just get along?" Gwyn asked, but Hermione was already gone. She sighed. "Seriously, would it kill you to be nice to each other?"

"Last I checked, she was upset with you as well," Ron reminded her as they climbed up to the dorms.

"Yeah, well, she is sort of my friend," Gwyn said with a sigh. "And you know, it is kind of nice to have a girl for a friend, too. Don't get me wrong, I like hanging out with you guys, it's just . . . sometimes there's stuff that you need to talk to a girl about and . . . Hermione's the only one in the Gryffindor dormitory that I can stand."

Harry sighed. "Well, if she would lay off interfering so much, then it'd be easier to get along with her," he admitted. Seeing the unhappy look, he wrapped an arm around her. "We'll try and get along with her better in the future, okay?"

She smiled gratefully at him. "Thank you," she said as they headed up to the boys' dormitory, where they hid the package underneath Harry's bed before heading off to classes.

When they were finished with dinner, they went back to the dorms so that they could unwrap it. Gwyn let out a low whistle when she saw it, hardly able to believe her eyes. It was as if it had been made of glass, it shone so much, like the sun. "Wow," she said softly.

--

During the course of the next few weeks, Gwyn barely saw Harry outside of classes and mealtimes because he now had Quidditch practice three times a week, plus homework, which meant that she and Ron spent a lot of time either doing homework or playing chess. Ron turned out to be a superb chess player and Gwyn grew tired of playing it after awhile.

"Couldn't you be a gentleman and let me win once in awhile?" she asked dryly as his queen took her knight.

"Where's the fun in that?" Ron asked with a laugh, continuing to direct his chess set. Unlike Muggle chess, the pieces moved and were alive. Parvati Patil had loaned her a chess set. Gwyn was a decent enough player—okay, she could get by—it was just having the chessmen shouting advice at her when she did something wrong was confusing.

Lessons were a lot more interesting now that they'd gotten the basics down and when they arrived in Charms class on Halloween, Gwyn was happy to learn that they were going to be performing the Levitation spell that they'd been preparing for.

"Partner?" Harry asked Gwyn when Flitwick told them to divide up into pairs and she nodded, smiling.

Ron was about to be partnered with Seamus when he got taken by one of the Ravenclaws. Much to his dismay, he was forced to be partners with Hermione, who didn't look any happier about the arrangement than Ron did. She was still angry with them and had ignored all of them—especially Gwyn—since the day Harry's broomstick had arrived. This made the dormitories an uncomfortable place to be and Gwyn tried to avoid them as much as possible.

"Now, don't forget that nice wrist movement we've been practicing!" Flitwick reminded them. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick. And saying the magic words properly is very important, too—never forget Wizard Baruffio, who said 's' instead of 'f' and found himself on the floor with a buffalo on his chest."

Gwyn chuckled as she pulled out her wand, letting Harry go first, but he didn't have much luck. "All right, your turn," he finally gave up and Gwyn sighed; nobody else in the class was having much better luck.

"All right, here we go," she said, pulling her sleeve out of the way as she moved her wrist in the familiar gesture that they'd been practicing for awhile now. "Wingardium Leviosa!" she chanted, swishing and flicking her wand towards the feather they were supposed to be levitating.

To her amazement, the feather lifted off of the table and hovered into the air, commanded by the blonde witch behind the wand. "Oh, well done!" Flitwick exclaimed, clapping. "See here, everyone!" he called to the rest of the class, who turned to look towards them. "Miss Swann's done it!"

"Well done!" Harry said, clapping with the rest of the class. Gwyn blushed at the attention, her concentration shot and the feather dropped back down to the ground as everyone, encouraged by her success, went back to their own feathers.

"Okay, you try again," Gwyn insisted.

Harry sighed as he pulled out his wand again, trying once again to lift the feather off of the table when Gwyn saw Ron and Hermione arguing from a few tables over. "How did you do it?" he asked her.

"I don't know," Gwyn admitted, brushing her hand through her blonde hair, trying to remember what she'd been feeling just before the feather had lifted off of the table. "I guess . . . I imagined it floating."

Harry nodded, squinting his eyes in concentration and attempting to lift the feather again when another feather lifted into the air, but it wasn't theirs this time.

"Oh, well done, Miss Granger!" Flitwick cried and Gwyn and Harry looked over to see Ron and Hermione's feather hovering into the air, with Ron in a very bad mood by now.

"It's no wonder no one can stand here," he grumbled as they walked through the corridors after class. By the end, Gwyn had helped Harry to cast the levitation spell, though it could use some work on both of their parts. "She's a nightmare, honestly."

"Ron!" Gwyn said in exasperation just as Harry was pushed sideways into her by Hermione, tears pouring down her face as she ran past them towards the girls' bathroom on the same floor.

"I think she heard you," Harry reprimanded Ron, who looked uncomfortable as his friends looked at him.

"So?" he mumbled, avoiding the dirty look that Gwyn shot him. "She must have noticed she's got no friends."

"Have we given her any reason to want to be our friend?" Gwyn replied softly. Harry looked at her and she moved past her friends. "I'm gonna go check on her. I'll meet you guys in Transfiguration." She walked towards the girls' bathroom and pushed it open, hearing sobs in the last stall. "Hermione?" she asked, knocking on it. "Hermione, it's just me. Are you okay?"

"Go away!"

Gwyn sighed, setting her bag down. "Hermione, I know that he can be a bit of a jerk sometimes, but he doesn't mean what he says half of the time. I mean, he's had five brothers to grow up with."

"I mean it, Gwyn, leave me alone," Hermione sobbed from behind the closed stall.

"Are you just going to stay in there for the rest of the day?" Gwyn asked and the soft sob indicated an affirmative. "Okay. Well, are you at least going to come to the Halloween feast tonight? It's the first one, we can't miss it."

"Just go to class, Gwyn," Hermione told her through her tears. Gwyn hesitated, not sure whether it was okay to leave her alone. "I just really want to be left alone right now. Please," she added, her voice turning into begging now. "Just go."

Gwyn sighed. "Okay," she said after a minute. "Do you want me to get the homework for you?"

"Yes, please. Thank you."

"Sure." Gwyn, feeling as though she were doing the wrong thing, headed out the door and walked to Transfiguration, just barely making it through the door when class begun.

Hermione wasn't seen for the rest of class or all afternoon. Gwyn had checked on her before she went to the feast, but the bushy haired witch requested that she be left alone.

"You did a number on her, Ronald Weasley," Gwyn snapped at him as she met her friends outside of the Great Hall. "Hermione is still in the bathroom, crying her eyes out. I really think you need to go in there and apologise."

"Why should I?" he complained.

"Because she's a human being, you moron, and deserves to be treated as such," Gwyn shot back. Harry tried to intervene. "If you don't go after the feast, I'm going to drag you down there and force you to apologise to her on bended knee, understood?"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it," he muttered as they entered the Great Hall and all thoughts of Hermione vanished at the sight of the decorations. Live bats, the candles in pumpkins, and food appearing on golden plates, as it had during at the welcoming feast.

However, the feast had hardly even begun when the doors to the Great Hall sprung open and Quirrell burst into the hall, complete terror written upon his face as he raced up towards the teachers' table. "Troll," he gasped, "in the dungeons . . . thought you out to know." And then he fainted onto the floor without another word.

The only word that Gwyn could describe the next few minutes was blind panic. Everyone was screaming and crying and it took several purple firecrackers from Dumbledore's wand for silence to fall over the hall. "Prefects!" he called. "Lead your houses back to the dormitories immediately!"

Gwyn joined the mob of Gryffindors with Harry and Ron as they moved through the crowd. "How could a troll get in?" Harry asked and Ron shook his head, bewildered.

"Don't ask me," he responded as they climbed the stairs with the rest of the Gryffindors. "They're supposed to be really stupid. Maybe Peeves let it in for a Halloween joke."

"Yeah, but aren't they supposed to be really difficult to control?" Gwyn inquired. "If you ask me, it would have to be somebody who has a speciality in dealing with them."

"Maybe," Harry said slowly, then comprehension suddenly dawned his face and he pulled Gwyn and Ron away from the crowd. "I've just thought—Hermione!"

"What about her?"

"She doesn't know about the troll," Harry reminded the redhead and after much reluctance from Ron, they took off down the corridor, slipping through the Hufflepuffs and then into a deserted hallway to get to the girls' bathroom.

"Wait," Gwyn whispered, hearing footsteps nearby. She spied a large stone griffin. "Come on, over here." She pushed herself as far against the wall as she was able and Harry and Ron slipped into the space left. "Who is it?" she whispered into Harry's ear.

"Snape," he breathed back as the footsteps walked through the corridor and faded away. "What's he doing? Why isn't he with the rest of the teachers?"

"Search me," Ron answered as they crept along the next corridor, coming straight into the troll.

Gwyn almost screamed at the twelve foot, grey, lumpy troll that was headed their way. It peered into the girls' bathroom that Hermione had been hiding herself in and, to Gwyn's horror, slouched its way into the room.

"Good," Harry said, absent of the danger. "The key's in the lock; we could lock it in."

"Have you lost your minds!" Gwyn half-shrieked at them. "Hermione's in there!"

"WHAT?!"

None of them had any other option as they raced forward, plunging into the girls' bathroom. Hermione was cowering against the wall, her eyes wide and her face dead white as the troll advanced on her, smashing the sinks into bits and pieces as they went.

"Confuse it!" Harry yelled to them and Gwyn immediately started seizing destroyed sink pieces and smashed bathroom parts, throwing them at the troll to distract it from Hermione. Unfortunately, the troll barely even noticed the ammunition that Gwyn was hurling at him.

"Oy, pea-brain!" Ron yelled.

The troll looked towards them at Ron's yell and decided to go for them instead. Gwyn grabbed her wand, not sure which spell was even going to be useful for them as Harry ran past the troll, grabbing Hermione and yanking her up to get her away from the danger.

"Come on, Hermione, run!" Gwyn yelled at her, distracted from trying to come up with a spell. That small distraction caused her fall prey to the troll, who grabbed her and threw her towards the wall. Gwyn gasped as she hit, the wind knocked out of her.

"GWYN!" Harry yelled, furious as he leaped onto the troll, fastening his arms around the troll's neck, thrusting his wand up its nose. The troll roared with pain as he swung his club around, in too much pain to think about what it was trying to hit.

Ron yanked out his wand and Gwyn was shocked when he shouted, "Wingardium Leviosa!" And was even more astounded when the spell he was unable to work just that morning succeeded almost effortlessly. The club was lifted out the troll's hand and dropped onto its head. The troll swayed before it collapsed onto the ground, making everything tremble around them. A few loose glass pieces from the smashed mirror fell out and for a few minute, that was the only sound in the room.

"Is it—dead?"

"I don't think so," Harry answered Hermione as he pulled his wand out from the troll's nose, wiping off the lumpy grey glue on the troll's trousers. "Just knocked out." He hurried over to Gwyn, who groaned as she pushed herself to her feet. "Are you okay?"

"I'll live," she admitted as he helped her up. "But I think we're in trouble," she added weakly as Professors McGonagall, Snape, and Quirrell burst into the room. Quirrell looked as though he might faint again, while Snape inspected the unconscious troll and McGonagall looked at Gwyn, Harry, and Ron, more furious than she'd ever seen her.

"What on earth were you thinking of?" she demanded. "You're lucky you weren't killed. Why aren't you in your dormitory?"

All of them looked at each other, not sure what to say when Hermione, to their surprise, came to their defence. "Please, Professor McGonagall, they were looking for me."

"Miss Granger!"

Hermione was standing up on shaking legs as she looked at the Transfiguration teacher. "I went looking for the troll because I—I thought I could deal with it on my own—because I've read all about them." Harry and Ron were staring at her and Gwyn's mouth fell open in surprise. It was lucky that none of the teachers were looking at them. "If they hadn't found me, I'd be dead right now. Harry stuck his wand up its nose, Gwyn was trying to distract it away from me so I could get away, and Ron knocked it out with its own club. They didn't have time to come and fetch anyone. It was about to finish me off when they arrived."

"Well, in that case . . ." McGonagall looked between the four of them, trying to decide what to do. "Miss Granger, you foolish girl, how could you think of tackling a mountain troll on your own?" Hermione looked ashamed as she lowered her gaze. "Five points will be taken from Gryffindor for this. I'm very disappointed in you. If you're not hurt at all, you'd better get off to Gryffindor Tower. Students are finishing the feast in their houses." Hermione nodded as she cast them a look before she left and McGonagall turned to them. "Well, I still say you were lucky, but not many first years could have taken on a full-grown mountain troll and live to tell the tale. You each win Gryffindor five points. Professor Dumbledore will be informed of this. You may go."

They didn't bother to argue, just hurried out of the bathroom and up the stairs, away from the grotesque smell of the troll. "We should have gotten more than fifteen points," Ron grumbled.

"Ten, you mean, once she's taken off Hermione's," Harry pointed out.

"It could have been worse," Gwyn admitted. "You guys were about to lock that thing up with her and who knows what would've happened if that had happened. Pig snout," she added to the Fat Lady as they reached the portrait.

The common room was packed with food and the rest of their house. Hermione was waiting for them at the door and all of them looked at each other for a long moment before Gwyn smiled at Hermione. "Friends?" she asked, to make sure.

"Friends?" Hermione inquired, looking at Harry and Ron.

"Friends," Harry confirmed.

"Friends," Ron agreed. They all smiled at each other before heading off to grab a plat of food. Gwyn later thought about the irony of everything. Saving a classmate who was furious with them from a mountain troll had made her a friend. Fate certainly had a quirky sense of humour.