Harry Potter and The Fifth House

Chapter 51: The Calm Before the Storm II


Neville bounced on his toes, grinning happily as he followed the others out of the potions room.

"This is ridiculous," Blaise declared from in front of him. His school bag was slung over one arm while his other hand was intertwined with Neville as they walked up the stairs. "You're way to enthusiastic for someone who just came out of the exam for their least favorite subject."

Neville gave a small laugh before scratching at his chin with one finger, "I just think I did really well for once. There's no way I failed potions this year, right?"

"You probably didn't," Draco drawled, "but I can't say the same for Harry."

"I don't know what went wrong," Harry groaned, rubbing a hand against his forehead. "Everything seemed okay at first but then it just wouldn't thicken."

"Cheer up mate," Ron drawled patting Harry on the shoulder. "Maybe your dad will be a little lenient with you since you've done just fine in his class before."

Draco shook his head, "As if. I'm only his godson and he comes down on me hard. It's going to be even worse for Harry."

Harry scrubbed at his face with one of his hands. "Let's just stop talking about it. I think my grade is still okay overall. The real issue is divination."

"If you and Ron manage to salvage your grades in there, it'll be a miracle."

"You shouldn't be talking," Neville piped in. "Wasn't your grade in Ancient Runes pretty bad before Christmas, Blaise?"

"Shush, my grades just fine," Blaise drawled, squeezing Neville's hand.

Draco gave a light laugh, "Before or after you asked your step dad to do your homework?"

"After." As the group erupted into laughed, Blaise called over them, "However I'll have you know, he refused so I still did all the work."


The hallway was lit only by candles, the world outside the windows black, as Blaise trudged up the stairs. Neville walked in front of him now, gripping his hand as he pulled him up after the rest of the group.

"This is ridiculous," Blaise groaned, rubbing at one of his eyes with his free hand. "It's midnight and we're going to take an exam."

Neville tossed a smile over his shoulder, "This isn't the first time we've had an Astronomy test, Blaise."

"It's the first time I've had to do one after a week of virtually no sleep," Blaise threw back. They walked in silence for a minute, Blaise trying to keep his eyes open and Neville listening to the soft conversation of their classmates in front of them. Blaise spoke again after a moment, "We're never watching the stars together, you got that?"

"I didn't expect us to," Neville answered with a slight laugh. "It's a bit cheesy."

"Who cares if it's cheesy? I'm just not willing to stay up this late at night."

Neville just laughed as he squeezed his hand.


Hermione was bent over her textbook when she felt two hands grab her shoulders.

"Time to leave the library Hermione," Fred drawled from in front of her. He was bent over the other side of the table, his hands reaching for the book.

"I have to study for Arithmancy."

Behind her, George clicked his tongue, "You've been here longer then we have and we're studying for our OWLs."

"You two don't take this all seriously. The only reason you're here is because your mother sent you a letter, didn't she?"

She felt George's hand move on her shoulders, like he was shrugging. "That may be true for today, but we've been here all week studying. Mom would kill us if we didn't at leastact like we thought this was a big deal."

"This isn't about us anyway. You should take a bit of a break. Studying for so long on so little sleep isn't good for your health." Fred grinned as he finally managed to wrestle her book away from the arms. "Ah ha!"

She glared before huffing, "Fine. But I don't know what you think I'm going to do. I can't go find the others because they might actually fail the rest of their exams if they don't study today. Neville and Astoria both needed a lot of help with their transfiguration."

"We won this off a Hufflepuff playing Exploding Snap," George declared as Fred stored her textbook in his bag. His left hand left her shoulder, dangling a book in front of her face. "We figured you would want to read it."

She looked over the cover before craning her neck back to look George in the eyes, "A fairytale?"

He shrugged, "You like reading. I figured you would enjoy it."

"I thought the point of this was too get me out of the library?"

"It is. Which is why you're coming to the courtyard with us. You can read while we're messing around, we've gotta get all this pent up energy out," Fred answered.

She nodded after a moment, gathering up her stuff. As they led her out of the library, George's arm still around her shoulder and Fred with his hands clasped behind his head, she questioned, "I don't understand why you're letting me read, though. I mean, aren't you dragging me out to stop studying?"

"You're not studying," George pointed out. "Just reading a book."

"And you like reading," Fred added. "It's relaxing to you and that's all we really wanted. For you to take a break for a bit."

"Even if that's a bit mental to us, it's something you enjoy so we're not going to tell you it's not acceptable or anything. We've gotten enough of being told that to know it sucks."

Hermione found herself a bit stunned.

It was refreshing to have her hobbies acknowledged without the usual judgment that came with them. Having it come from the twins, who she had always seen as the kind of people who would judge her for enjoying her books, was even stranger to her.

She held the book close to her chest, ducking her head so the grin spreading across her lips was covered by the book, as she murmured, "Let's just hurry to the courtyard."


"Bye," Luna said, barely managing to get the word out around her laughter. She waited until Colin had climbed to the next stairwell before walking into the common room.

There was a greeting on the tip of her tongue when she found Neville, Blaise, and Draco sitting together on the couch but it faded when she noticed the looks on their faces. Neville frowned, ratherthansmiled the way she expected now that exams were over, and Draco had his knees drawn up to his chest. There was something like guilt flickering in his eyes as he watched the fire.

"What happened?" Luna questioned, glancing between the three. "And where are the others?"

There was silence for a minute before Blaise sighed, "Guess I'm the bearer of bad news today."

"Bearer of bad-" something like panic settled in her gut. "Are the others okay? They didn't go charging into-"

Blaise shook his head as he stood up. He wrapped his arms around Luna, pulling her head against his chest and murmured, "Hagrid lost the appeal. The others went to check on him."

Her mind reeled for a minute before she felt her throat seize and her eyes prickle. She moved her hand away from her side, slapping it over her mouth before the sob could escape.

"It's okay," he whispered against her hair. "If you want to cry, that is. It's perfectly fine. Draco and Neville both cried too."

"You didn't," she choked out. "You shouldn't have to be strong for all of us."

Blaise took a deep breath before answering, "I haven't cried since husband number three. I don't know if I even remember how to, so don't worry about me and cry if you want. You liked Buckbeak, didn't you?"

She nodded against his chest. "When we went to visit, Hagrid told Colin and I that we couldn't ride him since we were second years. I was looking forward to being able to try next year."

"I'm sure he would have let you." He stroked her hair as he felt tears begin to soak his shirt.


E/n: three more chapters and then we're switching stories guys!

Other then that I dont really have much to say xD

Next time: The Sirius Incident PIII