When Professor Trelawney got the sack, I hadn't been there to see it as I'd been in the library, though I heard about it soon after. I also heard about the new Divination teacher, a centaur by the name of Firenze which made a lot of the girls very happy. I had more on my plate than ever, however, to worry about centaurs and Professor Trelawney, as Hagrid had brought me in on a secret which he hadn't shared with anyone else, not even Harry, Ron and Hermione. Hagrid had a big brother. And I mean that literally, a big brother, because he was big, huge actually, despite the fact that he was much younger than Hagrid. A giant, though a rather runty one, I'll admit. Hagrid worried that if he were to get the sack, he'd have to leave Grawp – his brother – behind and didn't want him to get lonely.

Although I wasn't entirely sure what I could do with a giant on my hands, I at least promised Hagrid to do my best and even spent some time with the giant, introducing myself as Mia and teaching him letters of the alphabet by shooting large shimmering letters into the air, starting with the first three – 'A, B and C'. I couldn't come every day as it would be too obvious, but I did sneak out in my free time whenever I could in order to help Hagrid, getting to know Grawp better and soon found out that he often picked Hagrid up and threw him about. "Bad Grawp!" I yelled as Grawp flung Hagrid away whilst throwing a tantrum, waving my wand to levitate Hagrid before he could land, letting him down gently. "Bad, bad Grawp! Mia ANGRY!"

I found using simple lingo actually helped a lot, and he got upset when he realised that someone was angry with him so would whimper and blink at me, offering me a selection of his possessions that Hagrid had collected for him until I'd accept, as I'd learned this was his way of saying sorry. "There, there, Mia happy. Good Grawp." It was hard work, I'll tell you that. At least with the DA meetings back on, there was a sense of normality in life that I couldn't find elsewhere. Soon enough we were working on patronuses, which of course I could already do, so people asked me about being an animagus as I happened to mention that the form your patronus charm takes is the animal you'd most likely turn into.

"It's not guaranteed, after all some people can have mythical creatures as their patronuses." I was saying as my lion patronus stalked around me, like she were showing herself off to the onlookers. "But it gives you an idea. Come on, let's practice people, think of something happy, something that really fills you up with glee." Fred and George had managed to produce two magpies, one for each, though when I asked them which memory they'd chosen, they just grinned at me mischievously and refused to answer.

Ginny was doing excellently with her wild horse patronus, Hermione managing to produce a chirpy little otter and everywhere I looked, more and more people were beginning to achieve their full patronuses. Neville was struggling with this one, which made it all the more difficult for him as he had been doing so well with improving up until now, so I went over to help him. "How're you doing Neville?"

"Terrible. I'm terrible at this!"

"Not at all, you just need to push away all that self-doubt and focus on a time that you were really happy." I said to him, but his face didn't relax or brighten at all, so I put my hand on his shoulder. "I have an idea. We'll try something else, shall we? Instead of a memory, per se, think of something that just makes you happy. Chocolate, Christmas, being with friends, just something to kick start that warm, fuzzy feeling you get in your chest whenever you're happy." I said to him and I noticed that a few people were listening in as well. "It's what I did to start off with, I couldn't get my patronus to stick at first because I couldn't keep a memory in my head. Do you want to try this instead?"

Nodding his head, Neville took a deep breath as I coached him to close his eyes and take his time, focusing on that feeling before raising his wand. "Expecto patronum." Silvery wisps began to shoot out of his wand tip, creating a pale mist which drifted out of sight which made Neville begin to shift and whimper slightly so I stood behind him and covered his eyes with my hands.

"Focus on the feeling, not what you're seeing. Try again." Once again Neville repeated the spell and this time, the wisps seemed much brighter. Then they were shifting, revolving around and moving until gradually, a shape began to form. I tensed with excitement, watching until all at once, Neville's patronus revealed itself and I whipped back my hands. "You did it! It's a red panda!" The little panda looked up at Neville as he broke into a laugh and the euphoria only made the spell stronger. It scuttled and jumped around, long tail whisking around as I clapped Neville on the back heartily and several others came over to congratulate him, but just before we could really get into the mood, there was some kind of commotion going on.

Dobby the house-elf had appeared, and he was worriedly tugging on Harry's robes as he trembled. "Dobby! What are you…what's wrong?"

"Harry Potter, sir…Harry Potter…Dobby has come to warn you…but the house-elves have been warned not to tell…" This didn't sound good. Harry had to grab onto Dobby before he could run headfirst into a wall, restraining him effectively.

"What's happened Dobby?" Harry questioned, everyone now lowering their wands and looked around in confusion and concern as Dobby squeaked as Harry hung onto his arm.

"Harry Potter, she…she…" Oh no.

"It's Umbridge!" I yelled, quickly putting the pieces together and several of the girls screamed.

"What about her? Dobby – she hasn't found out about this, about us, about the DA?" Dobby whimpered and tried to continue hurting himself in punishment as Harry continued to hang onto him. "Is she coming?" Finally letting out his voice, Dobby nodded his head to tell us that yes, she was coming. Harry immediately turned to the rest of us in order to bellow. "What are you waiting for? RUN!" I grabbed Neville and the Creevey brothers, herding the Gryffindors to me as I also grabbed Ginny in order to get them out of the door and running back to the common room.

I lost sight of Harry, Ron and Hermione, making sure that the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws got away too as I kept a lookout, sending everyone as quickly as I could on their way and to hide in bathrooms if they could. We ran into a group of Slytherins but I quickly held out my arm to block everyone else's way, holding them back around the corner as for the moment, the three Slytherins had their backs turned towards us. "Confundus." I whispered, sending three spells at the Slytherin students where they went into a daze then swished my wand around to place a silencing spell on all of our feet, so as we ran past them none of us made a sound.

When we reached the Fat Lady, I had barely managed to blurt out the password before she swung open with a look of worry to us all. "Never mind that, hurry inside, come along now! Quickly!" My guess is the portraits knew what was going on and they were on our side. I stood guard, wand held up as everyone else climbed inside before I pulled the portrait shut behind me and started to count heads.

"Two…three…four…five…six…seven…" There were a number of us, but we were still missing someone. "Where's Harry? Who last saw Harry?"

"He went last, made sure everyone else got out first!" Colin Creevey promptly told me so I rubbed my face and turned around, considering going back out there to find him.

"Oh Mia don't, if you're caught…"

"But Mia's Head Girl." George pointed out but Hermione was shaking her head.

"That won't matter, will it? Umbridge will just assume she's in on it if she's caught. I'm sure Harry's alright, he'll be back here soon." But as we waited for over an hour with no sign of Harry, a lot of us began to fear for the worst. Turns out, the worst wasn't even the worst thing that had happened. Dumbledore had been forced to flee after he took the blame for organising the DA, leaving Harry clear though now every member on the list they had found were being watched and we were all given lines.

My hand was now going to be scarred for life thanks to that woman, but it didn't matter. I was determined to make life a living hell for her so I snuck up to the Headmaster's office, spoke to the gargoyle there and sealed it shut so that she couldn't get in the very next morning. She was not happy about that. In addition, we now faced a new problem in the form of the Inquisitorial Squad, comprised entirely of Slytherins who now had power and authority that even I and Cedric Diggory didn't have as Head Boy and Girl.

We happened to bump into each other in the library and started talking about it quietly. "It's not right what she's doing. This morning, I caught some of those Slytherins forcing some first years to hand over their sweets by threatening to put them in detention if they didn't." Cedric was saying to me as we pretended to be working. "I tried to step in, but they deducted fifty points from Hufflepuff."

"Yeah, we've got that too. Montague tried to do the same to me and the twins this morning but we shoved his head into a vanishing cabinet then promptly shut him in." His eyes widened at me but I didn't feel remotely guilty, waving it off with a hand. "He'll turn up somewhere." Cedric sighed heavily.

"I want to do more but no matter what I do, it isn't working. These students are terrified, especially the younger years." He said then caught sight of my hand which was still red and raw so he gingerly reached out for it, moving my sleeve aside to see the words I must be obedient standing out against my skin. "She's vile and cruel. This is…this is barbaric."

"All we can do is try and protect the kids as much as we can, Ced." I told him simply, moving my hand in order to hide it from sight. "But you mark my words, Umbridge is going to get what's coming to her. I suggest you be on time for lunch today, I can promise you that it'll be spectacular." He looked at me quizzically but I merely smiled and said nothing. Cedric and I got on well, which had surprised me at first. He was clever and modest, which was the complete opposite to me as I was ingenious and brilliant in every way but had no intentions of letting these facts go unknown. His calm demeanour was rather affecting, as I felt more relaxed around him rather than being irritable and jumpy.

It was a shame we didn't hang out more often. Anyway, I left early in order to help Fred and George prepare, however I had to go into the hall to eat so that I wouldn't be noticed as missing for when they started the show. Sitting down, I helped myself to food and talked leisurely with my friends around me until suddenly, a great big BOOM of sound broke through the ambient chatter of the hall, making everyone fall silent. As everyone else looked worried and a little frightened, I broke out into a broad grin. Showtime.