"Have you heard?" Justin began, rather shrilly, as he flung himself on a chair next to Zacharias in the common room. "Ernie's just told me, can you believe it? It's completely out of line, I can't… I mean who does she think she is?"

"Umbitch? High inquisitor of Hogwarts and senior under-secretary to the ministry, I'd imagine. Unless somebody's confounded her or something. Have you?"

"Of course I haven't," Just snapped, "This isn't a laughing matter Zach. She's crossed a line. Also, don't call her that, you don't know who might be listening."

Zacharias made a show of looking around the room, "Hmmm… given it's only us and the firsties in here, and they're busy being noisy, I'd hazard a guess I'm okay. Unless you're sucking up to her all of a sudden."

"Oh shut up," Justin replied dismissively. "But really, what do you think? She's being totally unreasonable, it can't be allowed. I'd be surprised if there wasn't a law against it. It's awful, you must agree with me?"

"No, because I have no idea what you're talking about."

"She's checking owl post, opening packages and monitoring correspondences," Justin announced, "I'm sure it's an infringement of our rights."

"And I'm sure I don't care."

Justin looked at him as if he'd announced he kicked puffskeins off the astronomy tower for fun, and so he elaborated. "So a few people's post is getting intercepted – who cares? It's all dross anyway – 'Dear whoever, how are you? See you in July'. Does it really matter?"

Justin rolled his eyes, "It's the principle of the thing. They aren't her letters to read, so she shouldn't be."

"Well sure, but it's not like it actually affects either of us. Unless you're planning something I don't know about?"

"We're both in the D.A," Justin reminded him.

"Yeah but I'm writing home about it am I? Wait… tell me you haven't."

Justin shook his head, "I'm not that stupid, and at any rate I think it'd be a rather ill-advised thing to tell mother about. I'm sure most people's letters are fairly…"

"Uninteresting?" Zacharias suggested.

"Well… yeah. I just… first they're reading our letters, but who knows what it could escalate too."

"Yeah, next they could start telling us what to do… oh wait – school rules, so they do," Zacharias cuffed Justin's shoulder and rolled his eyes, "You worry too much. It'll all be fine."