It turned out that the snowball fight would have to wait until later because Christmas dinner turned out to be Christmas breakfast. It made Danny incredibly confused. He started questioning their logic, but then just shrugged and went along with it.
When he arrived at the Great Hall, his eyes grew wide. It was . . . actually quite nice. The ceiling was snowing but it wasn't cold. And the food on the table smelled more incredible than even the start-of-term banquet. There were wizard crackers that went off with a boom like a cannon and had much better prizes than regular ones.
He got Ginna to pull a cracker with him. She won a telescope and a fedora. She gave the hat to Danny and kept the telescope. She seemed pleased with her prize. Danny was just excited to wear a hat that had appeared out of, more or less, thin air.
Some of the desserts even had prizes in them. The Gryffindor prefect (whom Danny had finally learned was named Percy) almost broke his teeth because of a silver sickle in his pudding. Danny was not graced with such a gift.
All in all, Danny was having a hard time being a Scrooge.
He finally left the table and brought an armful of things he had gotten from the crackers, most of which were sweets that he fully intended to eat later.
Finally, they got to have that snowball fight. Harry was there too, he and Ron were a team. Fred and George were another team, and (after convincing them to let Ginna join) Danny and Ginna were the last team. And the fight was truly epic. About twenty minutes into it Danny nearly dropped his snowball when he heard Ginna laugh. A joy-filled, carefree laugh. She hadn't seemed to notice her slip up as she hurled another snowball at George.
Danny smiled and, ducking a snowball from Ron, rejoined the fight.
They finally went back inside after an hour of fighting. They started walking towards the Gryffindor common room when Ginna stopped. Danny stopped too and looked back at her. The other Gryffindors kept walking.
"Ginna?" Danny studied her face. What was wrong?
She looked him in the eye. He saw a strange emotion in it, almost like- she looked quickly away, took a deep breath and looked back up, now with a neutral expression on her face. "I've got to head back to my own common room."
Danny frowned. "Oh." he looked in the direction of his common room. "Are you sure? Maybe we could all go to the Great Hall instead-"
Ginna shook her head. "No, that's fine. I'm still surprised you were able to convince them to let me play."
"But you had fun, right?"
She smiled a little. "Yes, I guess I did. Thanks for forcing me to go."
Danny laughed. "No problem."
She looked back behind her. "I'll get going. Maybe I can write a letter to my mum."
"Ah, yeah." Danny rubbed the back of his neck. "I hope she is doing good."
Ginna smiled. "I hope so too. See you tomorrow." she turned and walked away before anything more could be said.
Danny frowned as he watched her leave. He thought of the look in her eyes. It wasn't something he'd seen from her before. The emotion that had filled her eyes looked like . . . regret.
The rest of the night was filled with Harry losing to Ron in chess, Percy chasing Fred and George, and an actual dinner of turkey sandwiches and cake. Danny thought that it was definitely one of the best Christmases he could remember. Not that there was much competition.
After everyone else had gone to bed, Danny stared out a window in his dormitory, and let his mind drift. He thought about the two teachers he had left to follow, neither of them seemed capable of trying to kill Harry. One of them was his Professor Sinistra who taught Astronomy. Her personality didn't seem like that of a killer. And the other teacher, Professor Quirrel, Danny doubted he'd even be able to say any spells properly.
He guessed Professor Snape was probably his best bet. But even with how terrible he seemed, Danny couldn't shake the feeling that it probably wasn't him. But now there were really only three people to choose from, and to be honest, the other students could be back in less than a week. Danny was really hoping that from now on they could take their time so that they could catch the right person, however, once classes start back up they'd be too busy with school.
Being an Auror was turning out to be more difficult than he had expected.
He sighed and flopped onto his bed. His thoughts now drifting to Ginna, and the brief regret she had shown.
What did she regret? Ginna was one of the people whom Danny thought was always sure of her choices and didn't care if others thought that she was right or wrong. And yet . . .
He frowned. Was he sure that was what he saw? Could it have been something different? Was he just misreading her?
Danny draped an arm over his eyes. He felt like he shouldn't worry about it. If she wanted to talk about it then she would. He never pushed her for answers before and he wasn't sure if he wanted to start now. Still, it was bothering him . . .
He groaned and pulled up the covers. It was too late at night to do anything. He could think about it more in the morning.
Doing his best to push his thoughts aside, Danny fell into a restless sleep.
Danny wasn't sure if he was allowed to sit at a table that wasn't Gryffindor, but seeing as no one stopped him during his cautious walk to the Slytherin table, he took it as a sign that it was alright. He had thought for sure that at least Harry or Ron would ask him what he was doing, but they seemed to be absorbed in whatever conversation they were having.
Danny slipped into the seat across from Ginna. Before he could speak, she did it for him.
"Why are you sitting here, Danny?" she asked as she calmly continued to eat her bacon.
"Because I wanted to."
She raised her eyebrow.
Danny rolled his eyes and leaned forward. "Does that really matter?" He reached into his bag and pulled out a few papers, setting them on the table as he went.
"Are you sure you want to discuss that here, Danny?" Ginna said cautiously.
Danny smiled deviously. "Guess what?" he pushed a piece of paper over to her. "We now have code names."
Her eyebrow shot up to her hairline as she picked up the paper and looked over it. "Professor Snape is. . ." She snickered. Amusement grew in her eyes as she continued down the list. She pushed the paper back to Danny with a smirk. "Great job, people will think we're speaking absolute gibberish."
"Exactly," he said, picking the paper back up. "We don't want anyone to catch on to what we're doing."
"But apparently you want them to think we're five-year-olds playing make-believe."
Danny rolled his eyes. "It's not that bad."
Her smirk became even more amused. "Whatever you say, Danny."
Danny sighed. "Are we going with this, or not?"
Ginna shrugged. "I don't see a problem with it."
Although Danny seemed annoyed at her amusement, he was actually proud he had almost gotten her to laugh again. He cleared his throat and looked over his list. "Okay, so, let's review. 'Professor Snape' is. . ."
Ginna snickered. "A bat."
"'Professor Quirrell' is. . ."
"Garlic."
"'Harry Potter' is. . ."
"A golden snitch."
"'Flich' is. . ."
Ginna smirked. "A pain."
Danny chuckled. "Close enough."
Ginna waved her hand. "Okay, my turn." she snatched the paper from him."
Danny frowned slightly. "But I made the list. . ."
"And I'm helping you memorize it. Besides, my mum once said that the best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else."
He raised an eyebrow. "Is that true?"
She smirked. "No idea. Now," she cleared her throat. "'Professor Sinistra' is?"
"Starlight."
"'A dark spell/dark magic' is?"
"Cheating."
"'Kill' is?"
"Tickle." Danny and Ginna both smirked.
"Alright. And, finally, the emergency word is?"
Danny wrinkled his nose slightly. "Christmas."
"I can't imagine why you would choose that," Ginna said, grinning.
Danny crossed his arms and looked away. "I wanted to choose a word that I'd usually never use."
Ginna nodded seriously, her eyes glittering with humor. "Right. However, considering that it was just yesterday, you might want to change the emergency word to something else."
Danny rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "Yeah, I guess."
Ginna mulled it over. "If you can't come up with anything by tomorrow morning, then I'll give a suggestion."
Danny nodded.
Ginna pulled a few of Danny's papers over. "So, you want to follow Starlight, and if she checks out, move on to Garlic?" somehow, by a great miracle, she was able to say this with a straight face.
Danny nodded again.
Ginna exhaled slowly and put the papers into a pile, handing them back to him. "We'll start in an hour."
"Okay."
She did a shoo motion with her hand. "Now let me eat, my eggs are cold."
Danny smirked and rose. With a last glance towards Ginna, Danny left the Great Hall.
It was nearing six at night, and so far Professor Sinistra hadn't done anything out of the ordinary. Ginna made a note on her parchment and looked up to find Danny watching her intently.
"So?"
She rolled her eyes as she put the parchment away. "Starlight is clear, for now, but we should still keep an eye on her in case we're wrong."
Danny nodded and made the same note on his paper.
"Danny, map."
"Huh? Oh." He reached into his bag and pulled out the map. Ginna took it and started studying it intently.
Danny looked at her a little amused. "I thought you had it memorized?"
Ginna smirked. "Don't question my logic, Danny."
He shrugged and leaned against the wall. "Hard not to."
Ginna just rolled her eyes and continued to compare the map with her schedule on Professor Quirrell. After a full two minutes, she rolled up the two parchments and put them away. She seemed troubled.
Danny stood up away from the wall. "Ginna? What's wrong?"
She stared at him and took a deep breath. "It's probably just because of the break, but usually Profes- Garlic would have been in the professor's lounge at the same time as Starlight. But, he wasn't there today."
Danny frowned. He hadn't known she was observing more than just Professor Sinistra. But the more he thought about it, he realized she was right. The only time they had seen Professor Quirrell was at lunch. "You're right. But. . . does that mean he's suspicious?"
Ginna frowned. "I'm not sure, however, I have a bad feeling about him."
Danny laughed nervously, disbelievingly. "But, it's you know. Him, he couldn't even say a proper spell without stuttering!"
"And yet," she said, looking directly into his eyes with an intensity that did not match the calm voice she used, "he teaches Defense Against the Dark Arts."
Danny's eyes widened and he started to pace. "When you put it that way, of course, he'd be the most suspicious! He would definitely know enough dark spells - er, I mean - he would definitely know the best way to cheat! But, what if today was just a coincidence? And what about Profes - er - the Bat? Is he still suspicious?"
"Danny!" Ginna grabbed his shoulders and turned him around, stopping him mid-rant.
"Uh, huh?"
She took a deep breath. "This could be a fluke. Yes, Garlic is suspicious, however, we could be wrong and we just need to keep an eye on him for now, alright? On both him and Bat."
Danny nodded. "It just seems so ridiculous that Pro - ugh - Garlic would be using cheats. He doesn't seem like someone who would do that."
"Ah, but Danny," Ginna said knowingly, "not everyone is what they seem."
"Like you?"
She seemed to freeze at that, and the regretful expression briefly crossed her face before she replaced it with a smirk. "We'll see." She glanced out the window. "Come on, I don't believe we will learn much else tonight. We'll continue this discussion tomorrow. Good night, Danny."
Surprised with the sudden statement, Danny blinked and looked out the window too. It was getting pretty late. . . he nodded. "Okay, Ginna. See you at breakfast."
Once again, Danny sat down across from Ginna. He'd carried over his food this time, and now the two friends sat in silence as they ate. Danny wolfed down his food eagerly and waited for Ginna. Finally, she sighed, pushed away her plate and leveled Danny with a glare. "I'll never be able to eat in peace, will I?"
"Hey!" he returned a mock glare. "I only started showing up yesterday!"
"And yet, somehow, it still feels annoying enough to have lasted this whole time."
Danny crinkled his nose and huffed. But he smiled as he noticed Ginna was smirking. Eagerly, he leaned forward. "Did you come up with a good emergency word?"
"Well, it's not as funny as yours, but I was thinking 'axuda.'"
Danny stared at her in confusion. "Not that it doesn't sound nice, but um, what is it?"
Ginna smiled a little sheepishly. "Well, it means 'help' in Gaelic."
"You know Gaelic?"
She frowned and rolled her eyes, her previous sheepish demeanor gone. "Geez, it can't be that had to believe, after all, you're practically learning Latin just being here!"
Danny gaped at her, shocked. "I am?!"
Ginna rolled her eyes again and smirked. "Let's just focus, alright? Now, what do you think of axuda?"
Danny muttered the word a few times and nodded. "Sure! It sounds pretty great. Let's use it."
Ginna had a look of triumph. "Great. However, this kind of leads to the next thing I'd like to discuss."
"And that is?"
She sighed. "I don't think we can tell whether or not Garlic was a fluke until school restarts. Although technically, the added students would make surveillance ten times harder, the professors will be on a set schedule that would allow us to determine their threat level properly." she sighed again. "If you want, we could still follow Garlic and the Bat before the students arrive, but . . ."
Danny sighed. "No, no. You're probably right. It will be more difficult when classes start up, but . . . it will be worth it in the end. Right?"
Ginna nodded slowly. "However, we should still keep an eye out for suspicious activity."
"Yeah. Definitely."
They sat in silence for a few minutes. During this time, Danny's head sunk lower and lower. Yeah, they'd still be technically investigating, but not actively investigating for several days. He was trying his best to believe that there wasn't much he and Ginna could do at the moment. He needed to remind himself that this was not the end of their investigation, it was just a short stall. They would be able to get back to it in no time.
"Hey, Danny?"
He swung his head up to look at Ginna, she had a mischievous glint in her eyes. He raised his eyebrow in question.
"There's still plenty of snow outside."
A grin started to stretch across Danny's face. "Are you challenging me to a snowball fight?"
She stood. "Not that much of a challenge," she smirked as she started walking away.
Danny stared at her a second before he stood and ran after her. "Oh, you are so on!"
Author's Note: I figured you guys wouldn't care why I was late and to be honest I don't have an excuse. I hope you enjoyed the chapter! I'll see you in the next one.