Lecture for Cho

Hermione copied another spell out of an ancient tome. She added an explanation, described the related wand movement and referenced the book. On Saturday, she would add this parchment like all others she had written this week to her encyclopedia about magic.

Critically, she looked at the future page of a book. Conscientiously, she unwrinkled a corner. Once she was satisfied with the page, she leaned back in her chair and craned her neck.

She sat not at her usual table but the one next to the southern window. She regularly chose this place when Harry had Quidditch training. With a bit of effort, she could see the pitch from here.

However, she was not looking for Harry. Today was the Ravenclaws' turn. And finally, after what felt like the hundredth time of her twisting in her chair, the seven broom riders called it a day. They descended to the ground and gathered in a small circle.

Hermione made the best of the opportunity and unfolded the Marauders' Map. It was undeniably a really useful item. It was also quite convenient that Harry was not only willing to lend it to her but happy whenever she requested it. Nowadays, he rarely asked what she wanted it for. Maybe, he assumed that she was still checking the enchantments. Or he thought she was sneaking around.

She had told him that she had most probably figured out how the map worked. In November, she had tracked down three charms which, combined with a Protean charm, could theoretically allow the creation of something like the map.

Hermione's working hypothesis was that the four boys known as the Marauders had roved the halls for weeks or months - depending on how determined they were. They had cast charms on the parchment and the floor of each and every hallway.

She thought that only Preteen boys with too much time on their hands could have done something like this. The irony that her own project was even more ambitious was lost on her.

So far it remained all theory though. To confirm it one way or the other, she would have needed to poke a little bit harder at the magical artifact. Which could unravel the magic. Best case, a small part of the castle would no longer be visible.

Since Harry was extremely fond of his heirloom, Hermione had decided to not risk its partial or complete destruction. If she had wanted to know she could have always asked Sirius Black. Given the letter Harry had shown her, he would have probably been eager to answer any question she had. However, she was unwilling to give even the appearance of forgiveness. Especially not over something as irrelevant as this. The memory of her mother being held hostage was still too fresh. Sirius Black had to earn the acquittal he desired the hard way.

Once Hermione had checked the library and the areas close by on the map, she took another look out of the window. The Ravenclaws must have split up a few moments before. Six of them were on the way to the locker rooms. The last one had turned straight for the castle.

And while Hermione was unable to actually see who was heading back to Hogwarts in the dim light of the late afternoon, it was not hard to guess who the lone student was. Cho Chang was the only witch on the team.

Hermione collected her parchments but left the books on her table. To any observer, the place was supposed to look like she had gone to the lavatory. It never hurt to think of an alibi in advance.

Intercepting Cho was very easy thanks to the map. Without it, the task of tracking her down would have been much harder. Due to the changing staircases, the students ended up going different ways all the time. And laying in ambush too close to a common room was a bad idea.

Hermione watched the footprints of her victim on the map. Cho was walking pretty fast. Hermione saw Neville stumble out of her way. His feet turned in Cho's direction. Hermione imagined that he said something. But the Ravenclaw didn't slow down which was comprehensible. Her priorities were probably getting out of her sweaty clothes and taking a shower not socializing with younger students.

The tricky part of the plan was to intercept Cho in a place where nobody would disrupt their little meeting. The last thing Hermione wanted were witnesses. In that regard, Cho did her a huge favor. She ignored the Grand Staircase in favor of a secluded and rather steep stairwell.

Hermione hurried to a narrow corridor on the seventh floor. She whispered at the map, "Mischief managed."

A moment later Cho came around the corner. Their eyes met. The Ravenclaw stopped mid-step. She tried to retreat.

But it was way too late, Hermione had already been aiming at her and she hissed almost inaudibly, "Petrificus Totalus!"

Cho's arms and legs snapped together before she had turned completely around. Like a stiff board, she tipped over backward. Almost immediately, she bumped into a wall and remained leaning on the wall at an awkward angle.

"I guess this is better than having to bend down all the time," Hermione grumbled.

Cho's unmoving eyes were aimed at the upper half of the opposite wall. Which was why, Hermione had to step pretty close to the other witch if she wanted them to look at each other's faces.

"I was told you're frustrated with Cedric. I was told he has been gloomy, irritable, or whatever. He's supposedly not a lot of fun to be around these days." Hermione used her wand to shove a curl of hair behind her right ear.

"I was probably told about him to excuse your behavior." Her nostrils flared when she harrumphed. "But I don't feel very forgiving. I'd like you to contemplate the following question: What do you consider worse a gloomy Cedric Diggory or an irate Hermione Granger?"

The brunette witch leaned so close that her nose almost touched Cho's. "I guess, you heard of the saying 'All is fair in love and war'?" This was why they were having this little discussion. This was step one of Hermione's master plan.

"I thought about doing something nasty to you." Hermione stepped back to a distance at which Cho could probably still see her.

Unsurprisingly, the petrified witch didn't answer.

"You know the usual - send you to the infirmary for a while, keep Madam Pomfrey busy for a few days. That kind of thing." If Hermione could have gotten away with it she would have cursed Cho. Sadly, there was a substantial chance Harry would figure out why and how Cho had ended up in the hospital. He wouldn't be pleased. That was why Hermione had decided to be more subtle about this.

"But then I thought I'd just talk to you first. It's certainly only a misunderstanding. I mean Luna didn't mean anything by showing off her backside to Harry. So maybe the same goes for you?" Hermione smiled humorlessly at Cho.

It was hard to come up with two Ravenclaws more different than the two of them. That both of them just flirted with her boyfriend without meaning it was very unlikely. Hermione had chosen to give Luna the benefit of the doubt.

"It's funny that we're talking about Luna." Hermione waved her wand. Purple sparkles flew everywhere. The Ravenclaw's breathing hitched. "A few weeks ago Madam Pince asked me why Luna was barefooted."

She hesitated demonstratively, "I never bothered to ask her. I thought it was just another of her oddities. But I wasn't entirely sure. So in the end, I asked her. Guess what she told me?" Hermione made a rhetoric pause. "Turns out, for a while all of her shoes were amiss. Turns out, a lot of other things are still amiss."

She smacked her wand into her left palm. She repeated it a few times. It almost sounded like a spanking.

"You're a prefect." She pointed her wand at Cho's face. "It's not my job to take care of such unpleasantries. It's yours. I suggest you rectify this as soon as possible. I'll even help you to do your duty. I'll give you a strong incentive."

Hermione slowly unfolded a parchment. "This is a jinx. Not very handy as you can see. But unique. It requires no wand movement. That's the special thing about it." Hermione started reading the long formula out. Her wand started to glow in a soft blue hue. The light grew slowly out of the tip and formed a tendril. It fumbled over the pretty seeker's face before it connected with her mouth.

Turns out, one can cry while being under the full body bind.

When Hermione was done reading, the light disconnected from the wand and slipped into Cho's mouth.

Hermione set the parchment on fire. She used the Levitation Charm to keep it in Cho's narrow field of vision until nothing but cinder was left.

"You probably wonder what the jinx will do to you?" Hermione smiled in a pointedly evil manner. "When you'll wake up tomorrow morning you'll be stuttering. It will only be for an hour and very mild at first. But in one week you'll probably consider it desirable to be silent until lunch."

By now, thick tears were rolling over Cho's face.

They meant nothing to Hermione. Even her younger compassionate self's heart would not have melted. Cho was nobody to feel sorry about. She was a crappy prefect. And she had flirted with Harry. Hermione would not give some pretty face a chance to steal her boyfriend away.

Her next words reflected her sentiment perfectly. She said in mocked sympathy, "Aw! Don't cry." Hermione patted a wet cheek. "While I'm sure that works on pretty much anybody, it doesn't work on me. And who knows? If you hurry, you might be singing merry Christmas carols in two weeks."

"And even if you fail the task... I'm not overly cruel. Luna said she usually gets her stuff back at the end of the year. I'll undo the jinx then." Hermione imagined that she saw a spark of hope in Cho's unmoving eyes. "Mind you, the end of the school year."

Hermione mused that this was kind of like a fairy tale. Cho was the spoiled and egoistic human who needed to be taught a lesson. Meanwhile, Hermione was the fairy who made the world a better place.

"I'd like to address one last point. I was told you're not completely daft. Therefore I'll warn you about trying to break the jinx on your own."

"I'm very serious Cho. I know the jinx seems to be on the childish side but you should not try to undo it by yourself." She insisted, "If you or someone else meddles with it my counter curse might not work anymore. And while I'm confident Dumbledore could undo the jinx if he puts his mind to it for a few hours I would not bet on him having time for something as menial as this in the foreseeable future. Over the last weeks, I've rarely seen him in the Great Hall. He seems to be very busy."

Hermione clapped her hands once.

"And before we wrap this little chat up. I'd like to say just one more thing." She stepped uncomfortably close and put all her fury into her next words, "If you flaunt your assets" Her wand tapped twice and very unambiguously at Cho's chest. "just one more time in my boyfriend's face I'll do something to you. Something, you would regret. Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry."

The last words were hissed through her teeth. If Cho wanted war she could have it.

There were even more students with blue and bronze highlighted uniforms than usual in the library. Even Hermione who was as averse as ever to listening at any gossip or tittle-tattle had overheard the rumors why that was so. There had been a series of commotions in the tower of the Ravenclaws.

Cho seemed to be set on singing Christmas carols. She had repeatedly disrupted the apathetic peace and studios quiet of her house. Hermione had overheard Lavender and Parvati speculate that she had started a campaign to secure the Head Girl badge once she got into her seventh year.

On the one hand, Hermione felt immensely pleased that she had had this impact on the other girl. But on the other hand, she would have liked to see her jinx come into full effect which was very unlikely to happen if things kept developing in the manner they did right now.

Hermione shook her head to get rid of the thought. It did not do to dwell on the spoilsport.

She concentrated on her homework. For once only two books lay on her table. She was merely doing her History of Magic homework after all. One more inch to write and she would be done. The problem was that her text was finished. Her essay had reached its conclusion and there was nothing left to add.

Grumpily, Hermione put her quill aside. She pulled the left book closer. She flipped one page back and moments later two ahead.

The most important piece of research she had ever done for Professor Binn's class was to find out who his favorite historians were. Hermione exclusively quoted their works in her homework.

She came to her own conclusions while reading the texts but she had stopped bothering to express her mind long ago. She had to work twice as hard if she wanted to get the same grade for her own thoughts. Honestly, she had stopped caring about the ghost's class pretty early. Mastering actual magic was a lot more rewarding than memorizing the dates of goblin rebellions or the paths of the giant raids during the Viking Age.

The most important thing Hermione had learned due to Professor Binns was a skill called time management. It was the only reason she still got Os in his class.

Her interest in magical history had dwindled so much that her only motivation to earn good grades was the game she played with herself. She always wrote the exact number of inches required while simultaneously trying to minimize the invested effort and maximizing the grade she'd get for it.

Today's essay felt like a loss in that regard. It was likely to turn out as an EE.

Giving in to her frustration, she checked her homework planner. So far, she had gotten only one EE this term which meant another EE would not ruin an overall O. She decided to simply add a loosely linked fact to her essay.

It was then that Harry triggered a surveillance charm. Hermione watched him appear between two bookshelves. He gestured amusedly at her almost empty table. "History assignment?"

She sniffed defensively, "I'm still using twice as many books as you."

Harry's face split in a wide smirk. "You and I have different ways of not caring for the class."

The left side of Hermione's mouth twitched.

Still chuckling, Harry stepped behind her to lean over her shoulder. His breath on her neck made her shiver. "Looks like you're almost done."

She turned her head to the left. Their faces were really close. "Just one more sentence."

"Okay, I'll wait." Harry stepped out of her field of vision.

Curiously enough, the silence which had felt pleasant just some moments ago became uncomfortable now that Harry was there. Hermione glanced through the curtain of her hair. Her boyfriend was openly staring at her. "What are you looking at?"

"Nothing," He replied slightly taken aback.

She huffed, "Stop staring at me."

"Is a boyfriend not allowed to look at his girlfriend?" He asked with a lopsided grin.

Hermione caught herself smiling back. She forced the smile down and tried to glare. "Not while your girlfriend is trying to concentrate."

The damage was already done. She could see it in the wizard's trembling shoulders. He would have been openly laughing if they hadn't been in the library. "Okay, how about I'll step behind this shelf," He gestured like a TV host to his right. "And we both pretend I'm not here."

Hermione tried to glare harder.

She knew that she failed when Harry hugged his belly and did as he had announced with a barely muffled laugh.

Hermione hurriedly flipped forward to the next chapter and then wrote down that the incident had taken place only weeks before the Werewolf Committee was founded... which was a completely unrelated fact… crappy book! She folded her parchment anyway and called, "Done!"

From the way Harry appeared from around the corner, she could tell that he had been leaning against the back of the shelf.

"Does the lady fancy a little walk?" He was apparently trying to imitate someone.

He wasn't very good at it. Hermione had not the faintest idea who he was pretending to be. "It's almost curfew."

"It's a very long way back to our dorm. It's all the way up on the seventh floor. We might have to set up a camp halfway for a little bit of recreational time." Harry winked not very subtly at her.

"Such things can't be helped." She still had no clue who her boyfriend was thinking of.

Harry grinned sillily at that.

Okay, just maybe, she was as eager as he to find an empty classroom.

Harry had opted to not redo his tie and was now playing around with it.

In Hermione's opinion, he was overall behaving like a small child. "Put it away. What are people supposed to think when they see you fiddling around with your tie?"

Waggling eyebrows announced an answer she was not going to like, "I think they'll think it anyway."

She knew that he was right. Their relationship was anything but a secret. And over the past week, she had gone out of her way to be seen together with Harry. "There is no reason to be that obvious about it though. So put that thing away before I vanish it."

"You could at least say, please."

"You want me to beg you to not flaunt the fact that you and I recently engaged in activities that had me undoing your tie?"

Harry frowned. He hastily stuffed his tie into a pocket. "If you put it like that."

"I wanted to talk about something else." The teasing tone from before was gone from Harry's voice.

Hermione glanced somewhat warily at him. She wondered whether Cho had said something. "And about what?"

"We're having another meeting tomorrow. It's been almost two weeks since... you know… Neville's wand." He smiled apologetically at her. "I think people have calmed down enough by now. You should swing by. Maybe, ten minutes in or something like that. I'll make sure the room is ready and that people are paired off."

Hermione didn't want to have an audience for this talk. She gave Harry's arm a soft pull and maneuvered him into an alcove so they would not walk into the other students who planned on returning to their tower in time for curfew. "We're talking about nine days and not two weeks."

"Tomorrow it'll be ten days."

"Only if you count the day it happened as well."

Harry cocked an eyebrow. "Why wouldn't I?"

"Because the time passed between both meetings will amount to nine days."

Harry fell silent and frowned for a short moment.

Hermione mused that he probably did the math.

"Okay. Fine. Nine days," He agreed. "Anyway, we've had two meetings. And on the last one, I was even asked when you'd be back. Neville is doing so much better with his new wand. It's really hard to overlook that you were right about him and his old wand. The difference is mind-boggling."

Hermione gave him a nod. "I think the problem was an unlucky combination of wand and wizard. Neville was probably ill-suited to both the wood and core. From what I gathered about wands from Ollivander and read about it ever since I conceived that you can mitigate a shortcoming on one of them with the other. But there is little you can do about a completely mismatched wand."

Harry looked curious enough to make Hermione explain, "Okay, first of all, there are a lot of woods and almost as many materials for cores. Most cores are really... Let's call them particular. Approximately, only one out of ten cores is good for a specific wizard. They still work somewhat though. Even the very best explanations why this is so, tend to be very inconsistent. There were multiple attempts to systematically research the matter. But they all failed for more or less the same reasons. The most important one was always the unwillingness of the actual wandmakers to share their expertise. Which is not a very big surprise if you consider that their families gathered knowledge on the matter over the course of centuries."

"That's kind of understandable." Harry nodded. "Egoistic but understandable. But how can Ollivander only use three types of cores if they're so finicky? I distinctly remember him saying that he exclusively uses only the three best types of cores during the weighing of the wands."

"Weighing of the wands?"

"Ollivander checked the wands of all four champions before the first task of the Triwizard Tournament." Harry grumbled bitterly, "You wouldn't know, because instead of reporting about it Skeeter wrote some whiny crap about me." A dismissive gesture later, he said, "Anyway, Ollivander mentioned it when he checked Fleur's wand. It had Veela hair as a core."

"Veela hair?" Hermione asked in surprise. "I can't remember Veela hair being mentioned in the books I found in the library at all."

"I think the hair was from a relative of Fleur," Harry added. "Her gran or great-something."

"Really? That's interesting." Hermione considered this information thoughtfully. "Maybe she strongly resembles that relative of hers. Ollivander told me that the personality of the creature the core was taken from was important."

Harry contemplated this only for a moment before he asked excitedly, "So we're all kind of like phoenixes, dragons, or unicorns?"

Hermione could not keep her amused snort in. She swore silently. She hated it when Harry made her snort. "No. It's not that easy. There are huge charts about reciprocity and anti-reciprocity between the personalities of the creatures and the ones of the witches and wizards."

"So, I could be the total opposite of the phoenix who gave a feather for my wand?"

Hermione noted that she had asked Ollivander almost the same. "The rules are different for different cores."

"That's annoying," Harry grumbled.

"And also one of the reasons why research on the matter was eventually given up."

"You make it sound like we're lucky we all get a wand at all."

"Not really. Almost all witches and wizards can be matched to either dragon heartstring or unicorn tail hair. It's only a question of combining those two with the right wood. But even if those two were not available, it may be true that most core materials typically only work sufficiently for one out of ten magicals, but there are so many of them that most magicals could have a dozen different wands."

Harry unleashed a volley of questions, "Dragon heartstring and unicorn tail hair - what about phoenix feathers? And since Ollivander failed to match me to dragon or unicorn, does that mean that there is something wrong with me? I remember that some of Ollivander's wands reacted very weirdly when I touched them?"

"Phoenix feathers were one of the core types studied in detail because they were rumored to be a mark of great wizards. They proved to be especially hard to match in the trials. My best guess is that Ollivander has them in stock because of the rumors. And I doubt that you can't use wands with dragon or unicorn at all. Maybe Ollivander was especially picky about your wand or he got the wrong impression about you and consequently handed you one bad match after the other." She added in a teasing tone, "Or you're just so very special that there is only one wand for you in the entire world."

"If you explain it like that... it's definitely the special thingy," Harry dead-panned.

"By the way," The bespectacled wizard smirked at her. "Don't think you're cunning. I noticed that you changed the topic. The question still stands: Do you want me to fetch you or would you prefer to arrive a little later when everything is prepared?"

The young witch shook her head ruefully. "Actually, I don't want to come at all." She shrugged her shoulders reluctantly. "Maybe, I'm just tired of lecturing."

Harry looked disbelievingly at her. "You just gave me a lecture about wand cores. A pretty long one, I'd like to add. You're giving me more lectures than some teachers!"

"That is different."

"In what way is it different?" Harry asked patiently.

"First of all, I won't need to repeat your lectures a dozen times over. And telling something to you is different anyway." Hermione knew that she was far from making a point.

She tried to explain herself, "You instantly understand what I'm trying to tell you or you have that nonplussed look. When I look at you I always know if you get the point. Half of the other students have this blank listening face. And the other half of them do not even realize when they get something wrong. And then there are those who say things like 'the book said so and so'. And I hate to correct the same mistakes over and over again."

Like it wanted to prove her point, the nonplussed look had appeared on Harry's face. "So one hundred fifty percent of the students don't understand your explanations?"

"Yes, that sounds about right," Hermione sniffed testily.

Now that she had started to talk she couldn't stop anymore. "And I also hate how slow they're all at picking things up. I know that you're exceptionally fast and good at getting wand movements right. But some of them seem to be unable to learn with their eyes at all. I have to explain every detail to them. And then there are the sloppy ones! Have you looked at Parvati's hand when she uses her wand? I bet she couldn't draw a recognizable circle if her life depended on it!"

"I'm not very good at drawing either. Have you seen my scrawl?"

Hermione couldn't stop her huffed answer, "Don't belittle yourself. You're way better than any other student in the group. Professor Flitwick could make you teach the first years how to swish and flick."

"That isn't exactly hard."

"I thought so too," Hermione grumbled under her breath. "It was fine when it was only Luna, Katie, you, and me. Katie isn't so bad and Luna... well, Luna can drive me up the wall but she's clever in her way. And her wand movements are beyond reproach."

Harry's shoulders sagged. The disappointment was carved into his facial features.

Hermione sighed. Her hand grasped his. She squeezed his fingers. "I'm sorry, Harry."

He gave her a weak smile. "And if you would only teach a few students? Those could then teach everyone else? How about Katie, Luna, and me?"

Hermione's head had started to shake before Harry even finished. "Luna is not very good at explaining. She gets sidetracked on the simplest of stories. And I doubt Katie would cut a better figure at teaching than Luna. She needs to repeat stuff quite often before she stops being insecure about it. That's why she was at every single meeting."

"How about-"

Hermione shook her head vehemently. "Harry, I don't want to rejoin the training group. I would have never joined in the first place." She hugged him. "I enjoy practicing magic with you a lot. Because you're really good and also because I like you. And for exactly those two reasons, I don't want to come back."

Harry hugged her back. "It'll be hard without you."

"You know that you don't have to do this Harry? You don't have to compensate for the shortcomings of any teacher or the Ministry. Maybe, you shouldn't even try to."

He was silent for a remarkably long moment. "But I want to. It's important to me."

Still holding onto him, Hermione asked quietly. "Are you mad at me?"

He tightened his arms a little. "No."