Although she'd hoped for a miracle, Tansy hadn't really believed that the Medela Bracelet would stop her nightmares. Even with the long-term sleeping potion from Madam Pomfrey, she'd grown so accustomed to seeing her mother in her dreams, added to visions of Sirius getting captured and memories of the Chamber of Secrets that she was quite surprised to wake up the following morning having experienced no nightmares at all. Grinning, she slipped out of bed and headed for the door, where she collided with a fully-dressed and harassed-looking Hermione.

'Oh, you're awake! Mrs Weasley just sent me up to see if you were up yet. We're leaving in five minutes and the Muggle taxis have just arrived. You'd better get a move on.'

After an uncomfortable journey to King's Cross, Tansy was grateful to get out of the cramped taxi. Looking around to make sure that Mrs Weasley was otherwise occupied and that the taxi-drivers were looking the other way, she surreptitiously levitated her trunk onto a trolley and placed Lucky's travelling basket on top. As she grasped the handles, she felt a hand on her shoulder and swung round to see Fred grinning down at her.

'You know, you could've just asked for some help.' Tansy flushed and smiled shyly back at him, temporarily loosing the ability to speak.

'I just… um… well I didn't want to be any trouble…' She muttered, after a long pause.

'I don't think I would've minded helping you to lift your trunk,' Fred said mildly. Tansy felt herself getting hotter and looked at her feet, avoiding his piercing brown stare. 'You need to have more confidence…' Fred began, but he was interrupted by his brother.

'Tansy, can I put Pig on top of your trolley please? His cage will keep slipping off mine...' Half pleased and half annoyed that Ron had ruined the moment, Tansy nodded and moved Lucky's cage slightly to make room.

The journey to Hogwarts was relatively settled, although the weather got progressively worse the further north they travelled. Bored with the endless Quidditch talk, and also quite shy around Dean, Seamus and Neville, Tansy dug out Magical Drafts and Potions from her trunk and began to read up on antidotes; she knew that she still needed to put in a lot of effort if she was to maintain her grades in Potions and thus give Snape no excuse to pick on her. About halfway through the afternoon, Malfoy and his cronies looked in on them. Tansy looked up apprehensively, ready to face more taunts, but he seemed to be more interested in talking about something that was happening at Hogwarts during the coming year. Nobody in the carriage had a clue what he was talking about and Tansy wasn't too bothered about it anyway; she was sure that they'd be told as soon as the feast had ended and it was probably something she wouldn't be particularly interested in anyway like the inter-house Quidditch Cup.

A rumble of thunder overhead greeted them to Hogsmeade station and Tansy jumped slightly and wrapped her cloak more tightly around her body, trying to shield herself from the torrential rain as she climbed into one of the horse-less carriages with her friends. The carriage shook lightly as the wind buffeted it and rain lashed across the small window. Tansy looked out into the darkness, smiling as she saw the approaching castle lights, before glancing back towards the village; she was looking forward to visiting Hogsmeade legally this year as Sirius had sent both her and Harry permission slips at the end of the previous term.

They rumbled to a halt in front of the wide stone steps and Ron opened the carriage door. A spray of wind-swept rain immediately drenched all of them.

'Run for it,' Harry advised and slid quickly out of the carriage, before sprinting up the steps into the entrance hall. Tansy followed, shielding her head with her cloak. She lowered her arms as she reached the safety of the entrance hall.

'I don't think that I could be any wetter even if I'd gone for a swim in the Black Lake fully dressed,' Hermione grumbled, squeezing water out of the hem of her cloak.

'Urgh, I know…' Tansy began. A large, pink water balloon hit her on the head, cutting of her words. Soaked to the skin, she looked up in time to receive another one full in the face. Blinking water out her eyes she saw Peeves, the school poltergeist, floating above them, his face contorted with concentration as he took aim at Hermione.

Furious, Tansy whipped out her wand.

'Aquaconglobo avis!' She said clearly in her mind. Peeves shrieked in annoyance as the remaining water bombs turned into a flock of small birds which flew out of the open front doors and into the storm.

'Well done, Miss Laverstock,' Tansy swung round, blushing as she saw that Professor McGonagall had materialised in the entrance to the great hall. 'Peeves go away immediately or I shall call the headmaster.' Peeves stuck out his tongue at the Professor and zoomed away up the marble staircase.

'Move along, then; into the great hall!' Professor McGonagall waved the crowd of damp students into the great hall.

'You know, I'm quite looking forward to the Sorting,' Tansy said quietly to Hermione as they took their places at the end of the Gryffindor table. 'We missed last year's after all.'

'I haven't been to one since my own.' Harry said, sitting down opposite the two girls.

'I wish they'd hurry up; I'm starving,' Ron moaned.

'Now Ron, the Sorting's much more important than food.' Nearly Headless Nick materialised out of the table in front of them, causing Tansy to jump horribly.

Twenty minutes later, the Sorting was over and Ron's wish was granted. However, the feast was not the peaceful affair that Tansy had dreamed of; about halfway through Nearly Headless Nick let slip that Peeves had terrified the house-elves in the kitchen and Hermione refused to eat another bite.

'Oh come on, Hermione,' Tansy pleaded, as the remains of the main-course disappeared off their plates and were replaced by puddings of every variety imaginable. 'Look, I don't believe that not eating will make any difference at all. Do have some of this chocolate brownie and, look, salted caramel ice-cream!' Hermione glared at her and shook her head stubbornly.

'SLAVE LABOUR!' She said loudly, causing everybody within about ten meters of her to turn around. Tansy gave up and went back to her own pudding.

At the end of the feast, Dumbledore stood up, but he had barely started giving out the start of term notices when the door of the great hall creaked open and a man appeared. As he limped towards the top table, Tansy gasped in recognition; it was the same man who had taken her to Kings Cross the previous year. As the headmaster introduced him as 'Professor Moody', Tansy whispered this bit of information to her friends.

'What happened to his face?' Hermione muttered.

Ron shrugged, 'he's an Auror, Hermione; catches dark wizards. Bet he got in a duel with…' Dumbledore clapped his hands together for silence and Ron stopped whispering.

'As I was saying,' he continued, smiling down at the four houses, 'it is my great pleasure to inform you that the Triwizard Tournament will be taking place at Hogwarts this year.'

Tansy listened intently as Dumbledore described the history and the rules of the tournament and felt herself relax slightly as he laid down the age-limit: Although she knew that she would never have considered entering the competition even if she had been allowed, she also knew that both Harry and Ron would've probably gone for it and she couldn't bare the thought of either of them getting hurt or even killed. Fred and George Weasley, however, were furious.

'That's just not fair!' George exclaimed, as they moved towards the doors. 'They can't stop us from entering… I reckon a few drops of ageing potion is our best bet, Fred.'

'You can't enter,' Hermione protested, rather piously, as they started up the marble staircase. 'Dumbledore knows you're not of age and anyway, people have died; there's an age limit for a reason. You wouldn't know enough…'

'Relax, Hermione,' Fred said jauntily. 'That was ages ago and anyway, where's the fun without a bit of risk?' He sped up to catch up with his twin.


The following morning Tansy went down to breakfast with the girls from her dormitory. As they entered the great hall, she was immediately called by Professor McGonagall, who was walking up and down the Gryffindor table distributing timetables.

'Miss Laverstock, a moment please?' Conscious that many of the Gryffindors were looking curiously at her, Tansy walked over to her head of house. 'Let's take this somewhere quieter, shall we?' Professor McGonagall continued, appearing to notice her discomfort.

Tansy followed the Professor towards the head table and into a room at the back of the great hall.

'Well, Miss Laverstock,' Professor McGonagall began briskly, removing a piece of blank parchment from her bag. 'I trust that you had an agreeable holiday at the Weasleys?' Tansy nodded. 'We have had some issues with your timetable…' Professor McGonagall's lips thinned slightly as she went straight to business and Tansy looked at her worriedly.

'…there's no need to look so concerned, Miss Laverstock. I have sorted it out. You will be able to attend your Arithmancy class with the Ravenclaws and Slytherins again whilst your classmates are in Transfiguration but your attendance in seventh year Transfiguration is more of a problem as it would require you to miss both your History of Magic class on Tuesday morning and your Potions class on Friday afternoon…' Tansy's heart stopped for a few seconds; she was going back to individual Potions classes with Professor Snape!

'…Professor Flitwick has kindly informed me that he is more than happy to tutor you individually again this year but I'm afraid that Professor Snape feels that he doesn't have free time…' Tansy felt relief wash over her and barely listened to the rest of the explanation. '…therefore, as you must have at least one class with other students in order for us to work on human Transfiguration, you will attend one seventh year class a week and one individual tutoring lesson with me. This will probably be of benefit to you as, once again, you need to improve your written work in order to obtain a good grade in your NEWT at the end of the year.' The Professor tapped her wand on the parchment and handed Tansy a finished copy of her timetable.

'Starting Thursday evening, Miss Laverstock. Have a good day.' She turned on her heal and swept out of the room.

Tansy had just about enough time to wolf down a plate of sausage and toast before the bell rang for first lesson. The great hall was immediately filled with the noise of benches being pushed back as the students got to their feet and hurried out of the hall. Luckily yesterday's storm appeared to have blown itself out because the fourth years were outside all morning. Although Tansy normally enjoyed Herbology, this morning she found the Bubotubers slightly disgusting and was glad to escape down to Hagrid's cabin for Care of Magical Creatures. Her hopes of a decent lesson were dashed slightly when Hagrid indicated several large, wooden crates filled with the most repulsive creatures she had ever seen, which he had dubbed 'Blast-Ended Skrewts'. She couldn't help but feel that the whole lesson was slightly pointless as the Skrewts didn't appear to have any functional purpose, and she actually found herself silently agreeing with Malfoy when he demanded why they were trying to raise the creatures in the first place. After half an hour of offering smelly handfuls of half-rotten grass snake into a crate, she was in a foul mood and it wasn't at all improved when the end of one of the Skrewts exploded in a small cloud of sparks, leaving a long burn on her arm. Her spirits didn't improve much when she glanced at her timetable and realised that they had double Divination after lunch.

They all sat down at the Gryffindor table and helped themselves to lamb chops and green beans. Tansy lazily flicked through The Monster Book of Monsters and then her copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

'Well, there's no mention of Blast-Ended Skrewts in here,' she began. 'Oh, are you going, Hermione? You were quick.' Hermione nodded and departed at top speed and Tansy went back to her lunch.

'What were you saying, Tansy?' Ron asked, through a mouthful of sprouts.

'Well, only that there's nothing in either of these books on Hagrid's new pets. He probably bred them himself.'

Ron snorted, 'just wait till Lucius Malfoy realises that he's been doing illegal breeding…'

'You don't think we could just persuade him to let them loose so they die off naturally?' Tansy asked hopefully.

'Not a chance,' Harry answered. 'C'mon, we'd better get a move on; we've got Divination next and it's all the way up the top of North Tower.' Tansy grabbed two rock buns from a nearby plate and stood up, pushing her books back into her bag.

She groaned theatrically, 'seriously, why on earth didn't we drop this subject at the end of last year?'


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