Harry suppressed another yawn and tried not to cringe at the occasional shout that happened to be too close by. Oliver, sitting on one side of him, was a bundle of nerves, and his constant muttering would have been annoying even if he had not been insisting on Harry's input from time to time. The rest of the Gryffindor quidditch team was similarly keyed up, and Fred and George, sitting on the other side of Harry, kept up a running commentary with the chasers sitting on the other side of Oliver, shouting over Harry's head.
All Harry wanted to do at the moment was to sleep for the next eight hours, rather than having to contribute to the conversation. It had been almost dawning when they had returned from London, and he had been far too keyed up to sleep in the car. Then they had gone back in time – far too many hours – and Harry had had the opportunity to sleep, but to his time-addled mind it had been morning already, rather than the middle of the night. Suffice it to say he had not slept much. Or barely at all, really. And now it felt like the evening of a very exhausting day, even though to everyone else, it was mid-morning.
Hermione and Ron had opted to come along for moral support and were sitting in the row in front of him, though people had shifted around enough that they were no longer immediately in the seats in front of Harry.
At any other time, Harry would have been as invested in the match as his fellow quidditch players, if not more so. Even though no one blamed him for falling off his broom in the previous quidditch match, he still felt responsible for their loss.
Lee Jordan's voice rose, becoming excited, and Harry forced himself to pay attention to the match. Ravenclaw had scored again. Harry thought he was ready to cheer with the people around him, but was suddenly overbalanced by everyone around him jumping to their feet, and fell forward, crashing into Ginny sitting in the seat in front of him.
She turned around, then waved off his apology. "Ravenclaw's just overtaken Hufflepuff," she told him as quietly as was manageable in the din. "Now, if only they catch the snitch they'll have won with enough points that Gryffindor will still have a chance at the Quidditch Cup."
"Er, yeah, I know," said Harry.
Ginny looked flustered. "Yes, of course. Of course you know. I just thought – because you might be distracted with whatever you three are – and how sleepy you are, with how late you three returned last night—" She cringed, noticing Harry's alarmed expression. "Oh, sorry, sorry – I keep noticing your absences—"
Looking a little alarmed herself then, she looked at the other students around them – none of which were paying them any attention. She then did an impression of a fish out of water, as her awkwardness around Harry reasserted itself. Then she abruptly turned around again.
All of a sudden, Harry had no trouble staying awake.
The Ravenclaw seeker, a pretty girl a year above Harry, caught the snitch soon after that. Harry was ready to jump to his feet together with the rest of the Gryffindor team, to celebrate their future rivals winning. They had rivals again – because they were back in the running for the Quidditch Cup.
Harry was as thrilled as the rest of the team at the happy news, but he escaped Oliver making plans to pick up their training again as quickly as he could to talk to his friends. He told them about Ginny's comment during the match. Hermione and Ron both suggested they would talk to Ginny, but when they looked around, she was nowhere to be seen.
Harry thought maybe there was no need to draw attention to the situation and it might be better not to mention her comment at all.
Ron shook his head, his expression dark. "Ginny has a knack for noticing things that are none of her concern. She was the one who discovered Percy had a girlfriend. That was fun, of course – Fred and George got a fair few laughs out of the situation this summer. But then there was my wand last year—"
"That was mostly Riddle, though," said Hermione. "Still. I can have a word with her—" She snorted at Ron's suggestion that he would do it. "You'll just tell her to mind her own business – which'll only make it more obvious that there's something we didn't want her to notice. No. Let me. I'll be subtle."
The boys agreed – if somewhat reluctantly – not fully convinced by her ability to be subtle. They looked for Ginny on the map, but could not find her – which likely meant she was outside of the castle. Harry spent the rest of the day in a sleepy haze, willing himself to stay awake so he would get back to a normal sleep cycle before Monday. Towards the evening, he was dozing in the comfortable armchair in the common room when Hermione nudged him awake. Ginny had returned. She was among a number of her classmates – perhaps some friends she had managed to make – but she did not stay among them for very long.
Once it looked like Ginny had settled down to do her homework, Hermione got up to walk over. Harry pressed his sneakoscope into her hand. Hermione looked at it, then at Harry, and nodded, taking it along. It did not take her much to persuade Ginny to follow her out of the common room again. Ron and Harry waited for their return, attempting to play gobstones. Neither of them enjoyed it much, but Harry did not have the mental presence for chess, and neither was in the mood for the unpredictable explosions of Exploding Snap.
The girls returned, then parted ways, Ginny going back to her homework, while Hermione rejoined Ron and Harry.
"So?" asked Ron.
Hermione grimaced. "You were right. She's noticed more than we'd like. She was still awake last night when we went back to the common room – she couldn't sleep, she said. We never even noticed her…"
Harry remembered how tired he had been then, and how distracted by all that had happened in London. Yes, he supposed they could easily have missed her sitting in a dark corner of the common room.
"But that's not the interesting part," went on Hermione. "When she told you that she keeps noticing your absences, Harry, what she meant was that she noticed that you weren't around on Hallowe'en," she whispered, then shushed the boys before they could raise their voices at the alarming news.
"We need to talk to her," Harry said urgently, his eyes turning to where Ginny sat, looking perfectly innocuous bent over her homework.
"No need," said Hermione. "It turns out, Fred and George already talked to her – told her to keep quiet." There was a deep frown on her face, but she looked thoughtful more than worried. "They seem to be keeping their promise to Ron to help us. And Ginny told me she's not interested in interfering—"
"Did the sneakoscope go off?" asked Harry.
"No," Hermione said slowly. "So I guess that Ginny meant what she said. She'll keep quiet."
~HP~
Hermione was the one who first suggested it.
Harry debated whether to say anything at all, but on Sunday evening, during his chat with Sirius, he kept feeling the need to bring up Hermione's words, to explain why he had stayed in the library with her. It had been in her support, in some sense, although he did not feel that she had been right. In the end, he did not mention it to Sirius.
But afterwards, when he returned to the common room and his friends' company, he spoke up. "You know how Sirius mentioned that his family disowned him? That happened after he ran away from home when he was sixteen. He told me and Dudley a little about that because his situation was kind of similar to ours – but in reverse. He got into arguments with his family ever since he got sorted into Gryffindor, and—" Harry hesitated here, unwilling to say too much about what he had guessed about the volatile nature of Sirius' home life he had gleaned from his godfather's comments.
"The point is," he went on, looking away from his friends' frowning faces. "Sirius was willing to go against his family because he disagreed with their views on muggleborns and muggles, and so on." He pushed the words out hastily, almost mumbling. "So whatever he said about his Veritaserum questioning, Hermione, he wasn't – isn't—"
"I know." Hermione was frowning, her head lowered, eyes averted from her friends. "I shouldn't have said what I did. I know Sirius isn't prejudiced. It's just that I wasn't expecting him to own a house elf." Hermione thought this over, then pulled a face. "Alright, I wouldn't let myself think it, but I guess a part of me did doubt him, a bit. And like you said, Harry – sometimes we hear what we think we already know. And then to hear about Kreacher – and in that grand old house—"
Harry started to defend Sirius again.
Hermione shook her head, finally facing her friends. "I know I was wrong. Well, not about Kreacher – I'm still not happy about that. But as for Sirius… I know he fought in the war, put his life at risk, despite being a pureblood himself—"
Ron shifted at that. "So what? You think purebloods wouldn't want to fight you-know-who and the Death Eaters?"
"Well, of course some did – and maybe for reasons other than muggleborns. I'm just saying Sirius' life wouldn't have been at risk if he hadn't chosen to fight himself," said Hermione. "I also knew he'd been in Gryffindor despite the sort of family he came from," she went on before Ron could argue.
"And he chose muggle studies in third year – I bet his parents loved that," said Ron.
Hermione nodded. "Also, I guess, I should know him better by now…" She shifted uncomfortably. "You know, what I'm beginning to think is that Sirius is really horrible at defending himself."
Ron snorted. "You think? After the way he landed himself in Azkaban?"
Hermione nodded. "What he said when I accused him—" She swallowed, looked away again. "I'm thinking, what if he's always been like that. I wonder what he was like back when he was at Hogwarts and was unexpectedly sorted into Gryffindor. Other people were bound to have a certain opinion about him, right?"
"And you wonder how he used to respond," Ron said slowly.
Hermione nodded. "I can't imagine him responding well, is the thing…"
They all thought abut it for a moment.
"I guess I could ask Lupin," said Harry. "Oh, but it'll be the full moon tonight, won't it? He won't be teaching tomorrow." He saw his own grimace reflected on his friends' faces. Snape substituting for Lupin had been a trying experience the previous month.
Hermione shrugged. "Lupin might be a start – once he's back. But I was thinking we should talk to a lot more people, actually. Get them to tell us why they all believed in Sirius' guilt, you know. I'm beginning to fear that I know what we're going to hear. Sirius is very good at being contrary, but not so great at getting people to see things from his side…"
~HP~
The potions class on Monday morning would have been trying even if Harry had not been dreading the defence lesson to follow, fully expecting that Snape would be substituting again. (He was not dreading meeting Snape again that evening, to begin the new batch of Wolfsbane, but he did not dwell on that.)
They had begun working on an antidote to common poisons, and Neville was jumpy, anxious not to attract the sort of attention that might lead Snape to test the effectiveness of his antidote on Trevor. Snape, for his part, did everything to fuel Neville's fears – making comments about students not supposed to be helping each other while clearly looking at Neville and Hermione, or naming several poisons that the antidote was supposed to be able to counteract, and how long each of those would need to kill 'a small test animal' without the antidote.
After class, Neville thanked Hermione for having helped him avoid any major disasters. He still looked weak-kneed, but getting better, already looking forward to the upcoming defence lesson with his new favourite teacher. Harry almost said something stupid, but remembered in time that he was not supposed to know that Lupin would be absent that day.
Harry and Ron started fuming about Snape in defence of Neville. Hermione looked unconvinced when Harry claimed she might have rescued Trevor's life once again.
"I don't think Professor Snape would actually poison him – unless Neville's antidote was reliable," she said.
"Sure he wouldn't," Ron scoffed. "He's already tried – remember? With the shrinking solution."
Hermione waved him off. "Snape could probably tell the potion was fine – and wouldn't do any harm—" She said this while looking at Neville, perhaps thinking this would reassure him.
"You don't know that—" Ron began to argue.
"Does it matter?" Harry cut across. "Not for Neville, I don't think." He turned to the embarrassed-looking boy. "Snape did enough to make you believe he'd kill your toad. No wonder you can't stand him."
It was Neville himself who switched topics, as they walked to the great hall for lunch, eager to get away from the unpleasantness of potions, now that he had survived that week's class.
Harry, on the other hand, was thinking of Neville's low opinion of Snape. He was their friend, he was bound to keep noticing their absences. If Neville somehow found out that they were voluntarily spending time with Snape, how would they ever explain it to him?
Harry, Ron and Hermione were only a little less surprised than the rest of their class to find Professor Sinistra, their astronomy teacher, substituting for Lupin that day. It was not an unpleasant lesson, if quite boring, spent reading a chapter from their textbook.
Harry watched Neville intently that evening, after he, Hermione and Ron came back from muggle studies and ancient runes. When the three friends got up to go to the dungeons, Neville's eyes were on them. Harry sighed and waved as they left the common room.
Snape was once again strangely tolerable as they began preparing the ingredients for the next batch of Wolfsbane. He went so far as to explain properly why they needed to follow this or that instruction. Lulled into that weird state of truce, Ron then dared to ask why Snape had not substituted for Lupin that day.
"Do you think I have nothing better to do than take on all the extra work Lupin generates for the rest of us? I assure you I do. The only reason I forced the extra work on myself the last time was to warn your class." Snape sneered. "Not that it did any good, I suspect. Either the students are too dense to figure out the obvious, even after the clues I gave them, or—" He did not finish the sentence, but looked pointedly at them.
Ron's neck had gone red, but he still mumbled something about Snape's alleged wish to have the defence against the dark arts position.
"It never fails to amaze me how people believe that ridiculous rumour." Snape sounded almost out of sorts. "I'm a potions master, in case you forgot. I was the youngest in a century, actually, when I earned my mastery at twenty-one!"
"But everyone knows—" began Ron, his entire face gone red.
"Everyone is a blithering idiot," Snape cut across him. "Really, after all that nonsense Riddle said last summer, I'd have thought it'd be obvious – at least to those who were there." He shot his listeners another pointed look. "The Dark Lord is vain enough to appreciate any likenesses between him and his followers. He likes to think that I'd want the defence against the dark arts position – because he himself wanted it at some point. Haven't you heard of the curse on it?"
This was the first time Snape had openly acknowledged to the three of them that he really was a spy, causing his students to stare back at him in astonishment.
"So you're just keeping the rumour going that you want the defence position to flatter him?" said Harry, finally getting over his surprise.
Snape sneered. "I'm not going to deny that I think I'd do a far superior job than the sorts of underqualified people hired these days to do the job—"
This was predictably followed by protests defending Lupin's teaching.
Snape's sneer only grew more pronounced. "If you're that eager to learn about vermin, so be it."
With that, he went back to working on the aconite – too poisonous to let his assistants handle it – without saying any more on the matter. Harry, Hermione and Ron were fuming and had lost any wish to continue asking about it – whatever the reason for Snape actually being forthcoming had been, it had passed.
Once they returned to their common room, Harry looked around for Neville and found him staring at the three of them, once again having noticed their return. Caught out, Neville waved at them, then came over to greet them, looking sheepish.
"Sorry, guys," he said. He mumbled apologetically – and quietly – about noticing their absences, when they were clearly trying not to get noticed. He waved off their objections. "It's none of my business, really. I was just wondering if you're back to practising duelling like last year, but I really didn't mean to spy on you or whatnot—"
After a minute processing this, Hermione pursed her lips. "You know, we actually haven't been doing nearly as much of that as we'd like."
Harry would not have thought it wise to say any more of their secrets – it was already beginning to seem like far too many people were suspicious of them. But Hermione ended up more or less inviting Neville to join their duelling practice at some point – as he had been doing the year before.
After that uncomfortable little chat, Harry looked around to see if Fred and George were nearby. They were. Moreover, they were by themselves. A perfect opportunity. Harry sighed and pointed this out to Ron, who nodded grimly. After Hermione's chat with Ginny, they had decided they better question the twins as well, to find out how much they might know. They had been in Hogsmeade on Hallowe'en, after all. Yet, from Ginny's comments it sounded like they had noticed Harry's absence from school as well.
Fred and George looked them over, then gestured for them to join them. Harry and Ron drew a couple stools closer – which placed them at something of a disadvantage compared to the older boys, sat comfortably on a sofa.
"Hermione heard from Ginny that you talked to her about Harry – about not mentioning that she noticed his, er, absences every now and then—" Ron began.
"Not that I'm not grateful," Harry added hastily. "That's, er, very—"
"Very much something you're in dire need of?" Fred filled in the blank.
George glanced from his twin to the younger boys. "We keep having to divert attention from all three of you, actually. Take this evening, for example. You'd told your dorm mates you were off to the library, but when that tall black boy and the short Irish one – what's their names—"
"Dean and Seamus?" Ron supplied.
"That's them." Fred nodded. "When they came back from the library and asked after you two, we—"
"Had to lie and tell them you'd wandered off to chat to some old portrait—"
"Not our best excuse, but it was short notice." Fred sniffed.
Before Harry or Ron could stutter confused thanks, the twins looked at each other, silently debating something. Then they leaned forward, looking conspiratorial.
"We do wonder, though," George began quietly. "Why are you three spending so much time with Snape?"
This was followed by aborted, gurgling noises from the younger boys.
Fred gestured them to be quiet, trying to look annoyed, but unable to hide the smugness underneath. "Come on, Ronnie, we already talked about this in the summer, didn't we?"
It was now time for Harry and Ron to exchange a look.
Finally, Harry nodded, resigned. "You saw us on the map, didn't you?"
His finally acknowledging that he and his friends knew about the Marauders' Map created a moment of stillness. Ron was looking unhappy, while the twins were processing Harry's acknowledgement of something that they had essentially known – or at least very strongly suspected – but had heretofore failed to find proof for.
"Well?" George rolled his eyes at the confused looks he received. "What's going on with Snape?"
Fred let the younger boys sweat a bit, let them try a couple disjointed explanations while they contradicted each other. Then he cut them off with a wave of his hand. "Actually, George, I don't care so much about Snape. I'm much more curious about how Harry here and Hermione seem to be in two places at once every now and then," he said, then leaned back to appreciate the terror blooming on the younger boys' faces.
"You – you must've confused someone else's names for ours," tried Harry.
"Maybe the map makes mistakes every now and then," said Ron.
The twins looked at each other, looking thoughtful, as if actually considering these explanations. Then they slowly shook their heads.
"I don't think so, George. What do you say?" drawled Fred.
"I know it's not so." He hummed. "I seem to remember something, Fred…"
"Something concerning that big prat of our elder brother, you mean?"
Ron and Harry exchanged confused looks. The twins leaned closer to them.
"The thing is – it used to happen to Percy, too, not so long ago. His excuses weren't any better, mind—"
"But we decided to test them," George went on. "We split up—"
"And met both versions of him at the same time," Fred finished, looking very self-satisfied.
"He was apoplectic with rage, let me tell you—"
"And still wouldn't explain. But he threatened to take us to McGonagall—"
"Which means it's not some awesome bit of mischief as we'd hoped." George sighed.
"We did manage to make Percy admit that it's some kind of timetabling aid, or some such. I'd still like to know what it is." Fred looked at the younger boys expectantly.
"It's something for, er, good students. You know," said Harry, then cringed. It did sound vaguely insulting.
"Oh. You mean no troublemakers. Students who get house points rather than detentions, is that it?"
Ron shifted. "Yeah, so what—"
"So…" drawled George. "How come you three of all people wound up in that category? Just the one measly detention you got with Snape – and everyone agreed it was undeserved—"
"And all those house points you three have been collecting this year—"
Harry and Ron exchanged pleased, if somewhat embarrassed looks.
"We've been listening," went on Fred.
"Listening, yes… But what we're hearing clearly doesn't add up—"
"Because we know you three are up to worse trouble than ever. The question is what…"
"Don't worry. We won't ask. We certainly won't tell anyone else—"
"But still… It would be disappointing if the three of you turned into teachers' pets after all the promise you showed…"
Fred and George did some more silent communicating, then decided they had given enough of a warning to the younger boys. Looking as sincere as they ever did, they promised to continue helping with their alibis.
~HP~
Harry came up with a plan to talk to Hagrid about Sirius. He had been mulling over Dudley's idea to have Hagrid examine Hedwig for a while already, but had hesitated, because he did not know how to explain why he was worried about his owl. Thankfully, she did not appear at all unwell. The solution came unexpectedly on Tuesday, after his defence lesson, which also provided him with an opportunity to talk to Lupin, who had returned to teaching on the second day after the full moon.
For once, it was Lupin himself who asked Harry to wait a moment after class. He looked more ill than usual, with dark circles under his eyes. He hesitated, clearly debating what – if anything – to say, until they heard the voices of another batch of students outside the door.
"You wouldn't happen to have another class now, would you?" said Lupin, looking almost relieved.
Harry shook his head.
"Harry… this may be a strange question…" Lupin was not looking at him, was instead regarding the contents of his shelf with inordinate interest. "How has your owl been recently? It's that large snowy owl, isn't it?"
Harry drew in a sharp breath. "How—" He bit his tongue, only then considering if he should have pretended to misunderstand.
"You know?" Lupin's voice was barely a hush.
"Well – I – I noticed that Hedwig was – wasn't—" Harry stopped stumbling over words. He drew a breath. "How did you find out? Do you have some lead on Pettigrew—?"
Lupin frowned at once. "Pettigrew?" he went on in that near whisper tone. "What does he—" He stopped, considered. "Oh. No, Harry. It's not him," he said with sudden urgency. "It's the aurors. The ministry."
There was a bang against the door, making both Harry and Lupin look at it in alarm. A student – one of the older years, by the apparent bulk – must have decided to ever-so-carefully lean against it from the outside.
"That's all I meant to—" Lupin got up to walk towards the door. "I'm afraid I've a class to teach now. I'll see you next week, Harry."
Thus dismissed, Harry hurried to catch up with his friends, to tell them what had happened. They soon agreed that it might mean Lupin was coming around after all.
Sirius was less enthusiastic when Harry told him. He was happy to hear that Lupin was trying to help Harry, but overall, he was concerned. The ministry keeping track of Harry's letters could only mean that Harry's initial letter to Sirius had caused more suspicion than they had hoped.
Knowing from Remus about the aurors watching his mail meant Harry had reason to ask Hagrid about Hedwig. He would have to be careful not to get Remus in trouble, but for all that Hagrid was prone to say unwise things sometimes, Harry trusted him – and thought Hagrid also trusted him in turn, enough not to question where Harry had the information from. He decided to talk to Hagrid on the weekend, but Harry actually managed to talk to McGonagall before then.
Friday morning, McGonagall returned Harry's corrected homework with a comment in the margin. Harry first barely glanced at it, his eyes drifting to the end, finding the mark satisfactory and almost rolling the parchment back up again, to put in his bag. The gap between Harry's written and practical work in transfiguration had widened as his skill improved because of all the work he was putting into the animagus transfiguration. But he simply did not have the time to write his homework to the standard McGonagall might have expected from someone with his skill level. This meant ever more negative comments on the corrected homework (but also more house points for his work in class).
The comment was next to the paragraph he had written about the symbolic attributes of animals, how those differed in the Latin-based magic from the rest of the world, and how they affected transfiguration – a boring, dry excerpt he had almost copied from his textbook. He glanced at the comment again.
Especially relevant to the animagus transformation – as we discovered last summer.
Harry felt awkward thinking how to chat with McGonagall, of all people. But she had brought up the topic. He lingered after class, causing Hermione and Ron to stay behind as well. He approached her desk, his essay in hand. "I saw your comment."
McGonagall understood immediately which comment he meant. She gave a soft sigh. "I can't say it hasn't irked me that they must've learned the animagus transformation while under my care, without me being any the wiser. They had too much brains and not enough sense, those boys." She shook her head regretfully. "But that Pettigrew takes the form of a rat, of all things…"
Hermione, listening to the exchange, walked over, curious. "Him being a rat and you turning into a cat – did that carry over in human form?"
McGonagall nodded. "For years – when I thought he'd died a hero's death – I used to berate myself for how impatient I used to get with him. He was never quite as talented as his friends – or so I thought." She regarded Harry with a tiny frown. "I believe you're aware who his group of friends were."
"My dad, Professor Lupin, Black and Pettigrew, right?"
"You also know about Professor Lupin's condition, I heard. And the other three became animagi…" McGonagall looked wistful. "How I'd love to know what your dad's animagus form used to be. Such a talented student he was… But of course the only people who could tell me now are – are—"
"So was Pettigrew the most annoying one of them?" Harry asked hastily, before she had found a word descriptive enough. He found himself wishing it were possible to tell her all about his dad's animagus form – and where he had acquired the knowledge from.
McGonagall drew in a sharp breath. "No. That dubious honour fell to Black. Even among that group of troublemakers, he stood out as incredibly irritating—"
Harry had to keep a straight face at that, the urge to mention something regarding cats and dogs almost overwhelming.
Ron had joined them as well. "Not one for following rules, was he?" he asked with a barely suppressed grin. "Sounds like the exact opposite of Hermione! Your animagus form must be the complete opposite of his." He grinned cheekily at Hermione, who was barely suppressing a glare.
"Well, it's hardly that straightforward," said McGonagall. "There are so many aspects of one's character that go into deciding one's animagus form. They might even turn into the same animal, for all we know. On the other hand, very seemingly similar people might turn into completely different animals—" She finally noticed her listeners' strange mood and ended her lecturing mode. With a reminder that they had another class to get to, she dismissed them.
Harry joined in with Ron's sniggers as soon as they were out of earshot. He had been tempted to tell Ron that getting McGonagall to guess Sirius' animagus form might be risky, but he reconsidered. Hermione's put-out expression, her nose in the air, doing her best to show that she was not amused, had been worth the risk, he decided.
The next day, Harry, Ron and Hermione took advantage of the weekend to visit Hagrid after Harry's quidditch training. They collected Hedwig from the owlery and took her along to his hut. Hagrid was unsettled by something, they could tell right away, as he went about rearranging his space in a distracted fashion to make space for them. When they asked for the reason, Hagrid admitted that he was worried about the incident with Buckbeak – even though Dumbledore had recently managed to talk the governors from sacking him from his teaching post.
Harry, Ron and Hermione congratulated him on the success, unsure why Hagrid looked more worried than he had before, not less.
"I feel somethin's underway," he said while shaking his hairy head. "That Malfoy is up ter no good, I jus' feel it…"
Hermione began asking question after question, and not liking the answers she was getting. Harry meanwhile was feeling guilty for not having given Hagrid's problems with Malfoy much thought. In fact, he had sort of assumed that the situation with Buckbeak had been resolved somehow.
Once Hagrid had covered all his suspicions regarding Malfoy's plans, he turned his attention to Hedwig.
Harry awkwardly tried to explain that he thought she might be unwell. When he could not say in what way, exactly, at Hagrid's probing, he sighed. "I… suspect someone's reading my mail," he finally explained.
Hagrid reacted with the expected bewilderment. "Whatever makes yeh think that?"
Harry had to explain a bit, admit to knowing more than he was willing to share. Hagrid eyed him suspiciously, clearly not satisfied with the explanation, but eventually he relented, examining Hedwig. After some time, he turned back to Harry, his face drawn into a worried frown. He admitted that he suspected Harry was right – someone had been casting surveillance spells on her. He did his best to reassure Harry that at least Hedwig seemed to be in excellent condition.
It was not anything Harry had not already known, but it still upset him. "I keep telling her not to oppose them – to protect herself," he mumbled. He was unreasonably angry that he could not protect her better himself. At least, if it was really the aurors reading his mail, they'd be careful with her. They were bound by laws, they were professionals. Harry sighed.
Hagrid gave Harry the opening he had been looking for. "Yeh must be sending some strange letters this year," he said.
Hagrid's searching look, combined with his tone, which sounded off somehow, made Harry jolt. He was immediately sure he knew what Hagrid had been thinking of. Did everyone know about that stupid letter he had sent Sirius? It was always best to be direct with Hagrid, because he himself was always direct. So Harry asked.
Hagrid nodded. He had been told about that, as had been every other member of staff at Hogwarts, it seemed. The groundskeeper was not known for subtlety, and it was obvious how curious he was.
"I think it's the ministry, going through my mail. And I guess that's why," admitted Harry.
Hagrid tried to say something reassuring, broke off. Finally, he asked Harry why he had bothered to write to Sirius.
Harry sighed, beginning to tire of all the lies he was spinning about Sirius. So he went for a more truthful answer. He told Hagrid of his initial wish to take out his anger at Sirius, but then he added that he had been curious about his godfather, his father's old friend.
"Do you remember him from when he was a student here?" Harry finally asked, and at Hagrid's nod, he asked again, "What was he like?"
Hagrid began with a description Harry was familiar with, of a troublemaker and best friend of his father. First, Hagrid grew furious at remembering the way he had been (supposedly) deceived by his good opinion of Sirius – which had been reciprocated. "Wasn' like most of those rich, old purebloods – like Malfoy. Used ter come visit me with his friends. Very fond of me dogs he was." But the more he talked, urged on by the questions Harry and his friends kept asking, the more uncertain he sounded, describing someone he had clearly been very fond of. By the end, he looked quite lost.