Hermione was angry with Slughorn, but not as angry as Snape was. Darth Wing wore the same disapproving stare as his owner. "I knew Dumbledore made a grave mistake with rehiring that one. Cooking isn't a difficult class to find teachers for. There's a whole television network full of people who can teach cooking." Ron and Harry bounced around the room and refused to sit down. Snape glared at them with the wand he used to demonstrate safety procedures. "It's unpossible to teach anything under these circumstances. Potter, Weasley, go to Gryffindor Tower. Don't return until you've learned how to be civilized."
"Sweet," Hermione said as she stood from her desk.
"I didn't say Granger," Snape growled.
Hermione looked behind her as Ron and Harry hopped through the doorway. She pouted and sat down. The door fell shut and she rose her hand. "Y'know I should go with them. They could really hurt themselves."
"We have a school nurse for a reason. You wouldn't want to put Madam Pomfrey out of a job, would you?"
"Whatever." Hermione reached into her bag and took out her sunglasses. She put them on and leaned back, placing her feet on her desk. "Whatta we gotta do? Have we got special bubble wrap today?"
"No. We will be teaching proper etiquette when carrying wands."
"Really?! Fascinating! Do go on, Severus."
He tried to ignore Hermione. "When a wand is not safely concealed wizards should be ready to fight." He tilted the wooden stick upwards in demonstration.
"You sure look ready to force someone to start dancing!"
"You should be paying attention. This is important." Her patronizing stare finally broke him. He lowered his wand. "I've changed my mind. We're going to be bubble wrapping again." Everyone groaned and Snape turned towards the chalkboard to diagram a bubble wrapped wand. "If you only knew," he grumbled.
Hermione glanced towards the window beside her. Taking off her shoes and discarding them in her bag, she quietly slipped away from her desk. She approached the window and began pushing up to open it. She didn't get very far because in rapid succession, the window made a cracking noise, Snape mumbled something to most likely reprimand her, and then something strange happened. Out of nowhere, the metal lock on the window flipped, locking it in a closed state. "What the…?" She grabbed the little metal piece and tried flipping it back. It must have been old, because it wouldn't budge.
"Nice try, Granger," Snape said, still facing the chalkboard. He finally turned around. "Why don't you come sit over here at this desk? Front and center." Hermione kept staring at the lock as she backed into a chair in front of Snape. "No snappy comeback? Good."
The class ended and Hermione skipped Cooking to return to Gryffindor Tower. Harry's right ear was pressed against the table and he was looking out of a window. Ron was laying on the floor in front of the fireplace.
"Ugh… I didn't like the orange stars," Ron said.
"Those were terrible," Harry agreed, drooling a little. "The red balloons were bad too."
"Not as bad as the huge pots of gold," Ron groaned.
"Don't remind me," Harry replied.
"Enjoying your sugar crash?" Hermione asked.
"They were so bright," Ron said as he reached to the ceiling.
"So bright," Harry repeated. "So much sugar."
"This proves the Slug Club is a stupid cult. Now you can both quit."
"NO!" Harry shouted.
Ron brought his hands down to his face. "The sugar… it makes everything go WOOOOOOOOSH!" His hands blasted off towards the ceiling again and fell back down.
"Aw, Ron, we just got you off of drugs," Hermione whined.
"But they're not drugs, they're marshmallows!" Ron said.
Harry looked up seriously. There were almost stars in his eyes. He lifted his hands above his head just like Ron had done. "They're magic marshmallows," he said while slowly lowering his arms in the shape of an imaginary rainbow.
"Why don't you go upstairs and sleep it off? I'd like to speak with Madam Pomfrey and I'd be less worried if the two of you were unconscious. Last thing we need is for you to find more sugar." Hermione watched them crawl upstairs and then left.
The weekend flew by. Ron and Harry were rational enough to agree to not eat as many lucky charms in the future. Breakfast on Monday morning was interrupted by Dumbledore. "Good morning everyone. I'd like to take a few moments to award the title of Prefect to two students." Hermione sank low at the Gryffindor table. "Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger," he announced. They reluctantly stood and trudged to the headmaster. They each received a shiny scarlet and gold badge that was engraved with the word Prefect. "Perhaps wearing these will hinder any rebellious actions." He announced the rest of the Prefects, but Harry got bored and stopped paying attention.
As usual, during Care of Magical Creatures, they asked some of their help-us-prove-Snape-is-a-half-vampire questions. Unfortunately, they never got a lot of human vampire information. Either because human vampires don't exist, or because Hagrid doesn't pay attention to anything that's not a magical creature.
After his lesson, they went to the Gargoyle Corridor for History of Magic. Dumbledore heartily welcomed them inside before presenting them with three rectangular boxes concealed in Hogwarts wrapping paper. He handed one to each of them and they quickly unwrapped their gifts.
"My wand!" Harry exclaimed.
Hermione stared at her wand with a puzzled expression. She then looked up to Dumbledore. "There isn't a certain book you need to get rid of?"
"Not that I can think of," Dumbledore answered. "That's all for today."
"We haven't even sat down yet," Harry objected.
Hermione was already in the hallway. "Meet you guys anywhere else!" she called.
To Harry's dismay, he remembered another thing he had to do for the Dumbledore's Army meeting that would be held later that day. Thus, he couldn't practice any spells.
Students started showing up at six o'clock since Sarita had given them ample warning of the two McGonagalls. Because of this, they allowed people in early to begin practicing. Still, the class formally started at seven o'clock. "Welcome back to Dumbledore's Army," Harry began. "First of all, Draco Malfoy. He's a Death Eater, which as you know, means he works for Voldemort. If you're in the same room as him, the same class, the same hallway, and for Slitherin's, the same dormitory, you watch him. I still don't know why he's here, but he is. Now, we will be reviewing today and only today." The meeting went on, and Harry walked them through things he had already taught. As he had hoped, they mostly remembered. While working on their dropkicking, he walked around the room and noticed Neville was surprisingly good at fighting. He must have been practicing over the summer, or more likely while he was in jail. Or in The Jail lol.
As time passed, Harry kept attending Slug Club meetings, and Ron often joined him. They were honestly worried about him and the other students. Sure, no one ate the bowls of marshmallows, but Slughorn still handed out a ton during the meetings. Way more than during class. Dumbledore's Army went on, a small group of people began to shine above the rest. It was still shocking but one of those people was Neville Longbottom. Neville. No one saw this coming. Seriously, no one. The Fictum Post kept an eye on Malfoy, who had been causing a lot of annoying trouble this year. Hermione spent most of the next four weeks in and out just like Ron had been while starting his maple syrup business. In her absence, Ron and Harry stayed in the Gryffindor common room trying to perform spells. It was more difficult than they thought it would be because the pronunciations were not listed. At all. One afternoon, Ron and Harry sat at a table with their wands readied. In between them was a light quill. Hermione had returned from wherever she goes, and was sitting at the same table in between Harry and Ron. This was the worst place she could be if she didn't want to be annoyed to tears.
t the other side of the table reading a book and taking notes.
"Win-gar-dium Levi-oh-suh," Harry said as he pointed his wand at the pencil.
"Wing-gar-dium Levi-oh-suh," Ron said.
"Wing-gar-dyum Levi-oh-suh."
"Win-gar-dium Levi-ah-sah."
Hermione covered her ears as she stared down at her book with
Harry shifted in his chair. "Wing-gar-dium Levi-oh-ssssoo. Seh. So. Sar."
Hermione stuck her notes in her book and closed it with a snap. She kicked her chair back and stood up before grabbing her wand and shaking it around violently as she tried to mock them. "Wing-gar-dium Levi-oh-sar!" Right before their eyes, the quill began to float upwards.
"You did it!" Harry shouted.
Hermione held her wand still. Her eyes looked like they were about to fall out of her skull. "That's… not possible," Hermione insisted as she stared at the levitating quill.
Ron grabbed another feather from his stack of books. "What was it? Levi-oh-sar? Wingardium Leviosa!" A second quill took flight. "This is so cool," he said as the quill mimicked the movement of his wand.
"This isn't possible. There must be a draft! It's just a coincidence!"
"Nope, Mud, it's magic." Harry took out another quill. He uttered the levitation charm and the third quill floated into the air.
"I'm dreaming. I'll wake up soon. This is all a bad dream. A lucid dream. Those are fun, right?"
"You're not dreaming, Hermione," Ron said, maintaining the feather's height. "This is real."
"No. I am dreaming."
Professor McGonagall, well one of them, walked into the common room. "Great work," she whispered quickly. "But lower them before anyone sees."
"Why?" Harry asked.
"Professor Dumbledore and Hagrid will explain it to you tomorrow in class. But until then, please, lower the quills." They obeyed her instruction, and at the same time began to wonder about her claims of being saner than her sister. "Miss Granger, are you alright?"
"Just waiting until I wake up."
"Oh, dear..." She glanced back at Ron and Harry. "Keep that book away from the others as well. Don't even let a professor see. Understand?"
"Yes, Professor," Ron and Harry said.
She exited the room and her steps faded as she continued down the corridor. Ron and Harry cleaned up their notes while Hermione stayed in her place.
"I wonder what he's planning," she replied. "How will he explain all this? How did he manage it anyway?"
"You're in denial, Mud."
"I am not!" she denied.
Harry and Ron looked at each other, slowly shaking their heads. She was definitely in phase one of this weird grief she was experiencing. She was grieving her dying beliefs.
The next day, Hermione was still being Hermione by the time they walked to History of Magic. Upon entering, they saw most of the members The Order of the Heroes standing idly around the room, while Hagrid and McGonagall were standing by Dumbledore at his desk.
"Sit, sit," Dumbledore said cheerfully, beckoning them their usual desks. Dumbledore looked kindly to them. "So, how has your day been going?"
Hermione glared at him icily. Dumbledore looked over to Hagrid who then prepared to speak. "Harry, Ron, 'member when I told yeh that yer wizards?"
"Like it was yesterday," Harry said as Ron nodded.
"I was lyin'. Truth is, I didn' know, and the odds were very low of yeh ac'ually bein' wizards."
"I'm confused," Harry informed.
"Grea', 'cause I'm here ter explain. Yeh might not've though' this world would have lore, bu' I can assure yeh, it does. We've bin lookin' fer three wizards born from muggle families fer just abou' thir'y years. Tha's why Dumbledore an' I made Hogwarts. Ter find these three wizards. If we brought all the muggles here, we could figure ou' who the wizards are."
"Aren't there a lot of wizards from muggle families?" Ron asked just before trying to remember the terminology. "What are they called?" He looked to Harry for help. "Mudbloods?"
Harry nodded. "Mudbloods, muggle-borns. Plus there are squibs."
"Squibs and muggle-borns are urban legends," Dumbledore said. "There is no common reason for two muggles to have a wizard."
"Bu' tha' uncommon reason is why yeh three are wizards."
"What is the uncommon reason?" Harry asked.
"That's a story for another day," Dumbledore smiled. "I don't want to put too much exposition in this scene. For your memoirs, Harry."
"Oh!" Harry exclaimed. "Thank you, Professor."
"Rubeus, please continue."
"In yer second year, I was curious if yeh three could be the wizards we had bin searching for."
"Second year..." Harry recalled. "That experiment! On Halloween night, with our hair and the beakers!"
"Exac'ly," Hagrid grinned.
"That was the real wizard test!" Ron realized.
Harry searched the desk in front of him. "Wait, so the brick wall test..." He shrugged. "I'll ponder that mystery later."
"But yeh gotta keep this a secret. No one else here, 'cept maybe some of the foreign exchange studen's, are wizards."
"The spell that Hagrid used to make you believe in magic, it fades," McGonagall explained. "That's what it's supposed to do. So the muggles will readjust to their magicless world."
"They might've!" Harry exclaimed. "But I wouldn't! I'm like the kid in the movie who heard the bell in the end! Everybody else stopped hearing the bell! My parents thought the bell was broken! Even my dumb sister stopped hearing the bell when she grew up! I never stopped listening to the sound of the bell! You all thought I was crazy! But I'm not! I'm just as sane as the rest of you! I AM THE ALPHA WIZARD! Where is my hot chocolate?!"
The Heroes looked to each other as if they had just smelled something really foul and wanted to see if anyone else smelled it.
Hermione was brought back to Earth. "Hold on, go back, you put a spell on us?!"
"To ge' the muggles here, yeah. Bu' no' everyone," Hagrid said. "No' yeh. Or Harry. He believed me even withou' the spell. Oh, an' Ginny Weasley. Didn' have enough time to comple'e the spell 'fore she ran off."
Ron looked horrified. "Why only me? Why didn't you enchant Hermione? I feel so violated."
"Didn' know she existed. Have yeh ever tried lookin' fer the records of thieves? I's nearly impossible."
"That's the point!" Hermione shouted. "And Hagrid, this is the reason? This is the reason you made dumb kids believe in magic. To live out some magic fantasy with your delusional friends?"
"Anger," Harry whispered. "Stage two."
They glossed over Hermione's outburst. More pressing details were to come. Dumbledore stared at the three students in front of him. "There's a reason that I'm telling you this now." The cheerful tone of the room dropped to a dark and serious one.
"Is it story time?" Harry asked.
"Yes." The Heroes each sat down at one of the many empty desks in the room while Dumbledore opened his desk drawer and pulled out a large, dusty storybook. Harry managed to catch a glimpse of only the author's given name: Rubeus. Hmmmm. Flipping through the first of the yellowed pages, — which were most definitely yellowed from printer ink rather than age — Dumbledore came to the beginning of the story. He cleared his throat. "A long time ago, there was a wizard who began causing terror to the muggle and wizarding worlds alike. Since he used magic, muggles were clueless as to what was going on. Crowds of busy people in cities would drop everything to start dancing. Skincare products disappeared from the shelves in a flash. Library books on aliens vanished without even being checked out."
"That's strangely specific," Ron commented.
"Yes," Dumbledore nodded. "This was a very bad man. Anyway, to give you the tldr, the muggles couldn't explain it. Much like Hermione here, they tried to deny it. Even now, they won't talk about it. To anyone," he paused. "That wizard... is called Voldemort."
Things started to make sense. Voldemort, the leader of the Death Eaters, was a wizard. If he wasn't scary enough with his bazooka, he could also use magic death lasers.
"He's looking for you three," Dumbledore continued, the room becoming darker.
"Bark bark bark!" came from across the room. "Sorry."
"Don't worry yourself, Sirius. We understand. As I was saying. He's been unsuccessful, and still doesn't know specifically who the three wizards are, but I have an inkling he knows we found them. On the bright side, He can't harm you while you're here. Probably."
"Probably?" Harry asked.
"Probably," Hagrid nodded.
"Probably," Tonks added.
"Probably!" Sirius exclaimed for the heck of it.
"Probably," Hermione said, rolling her eyes.
"And know, he has spies here," Dumbledore continued. "Young Draco is one of them."
Hagrid grinned. "Bu' he doesn' know tha' we know his Death Ea'er is a spy. So now he's our spy. 'Cause we spy on him."
The Heroes chuckled to themselves. This made them very proud of their work for whatever reason. And Dumbledore joined in their chuckling. "You may be dismissed."
Though they had a plethora of questions, Harry led Ron and Hermione out of Dumbledore's office. The Heroes, including Dumbledore, were still laughing.
Now being careful to not alert the muggles –ugh, it felt weird to all of a sudden be one of the only wizards — he kept the spellbook hidden.
"We need to go to the Room of Requirement, to discuss something with Hermione," Ron said.
"Yeah, we do," Harry agreed, watching Hermione's half-conscious self deny down the hallway. Yeah, that's the verb I'm going with.
They arrived in the large room and didn't waste time sitting down. There was no time. Actually, judging by their History of Magic classes, there was plenty.
"Mud, you're a wizard."
"No. I am not." She stared at her shoes.
Ron walked in front of her and put his hands on her shoulders. "Look at me," he said. "Magic is real."
"It doesn't make sense!" she argued. "Why? Why us? Why this?"
"Why is there a creepy student living in the bathroom? Why are so many people we know insane? Why did Snape have Devil's Snare on his robes? Why do we speak in a nonsensical hybrid British-American English? You can question anything you'd like, but it won't make the facts any less true. If you don't accept this and learn to use this ability, Voldemort is going to hunt us down and kill us!"
"Yeah, and not in a fun way," Harry added.
Ron looked over his shoulder, his eyebrows creasing at Harry. "What would be a fun way?"
Harry searched around the room. "I dunno, I just thought it might be like, I'm gonna kill you, ha."
They were both staring at him like he was a nutter by this point, and that's weird because Hermione was in the midst of having an existential crisis. And back to that.
"This…" she began. "This isn't something I can just accept. This… this is another world, and... I don't think I want to be apart of it. It's fine if you two want to... learn how to cast spells or whatever, but... I don't want this."
She shook her head and rushed towards the door.
"Mud!" Harry called. "I think this counts as bargaining."
Ron nodded before they rushed into the hallway. "This was way easier in Moaning Joanne's book."
In typical Hermione fashion, she didn't listen to the wise King and Protector of Hogwarts. They didn't bother chasing her. Maybe some alone time would help.
"Do you reckon she'll come to her senses?" Harry asked.
Ron stared at her as she disappeared down the corridor. "I think that's the problem."
Hermione didn't show up for dinner. In her absence, Ron and Harry ate while staking out Malfoy at the Slitherin' table.
"What's he got?" Harry asked with his chin on the table. He lifted his head and opened his eyes wide. "Is that a—"
"Puppy?!" Ron finished.
Under the table, Malfoy was shaking salt on to a muzzled golden retriever puppy. Instead of taking the time to run around the long table, they quickly crawled over Gryffindor's, then Hufflepuffs, followed by Ravenclaw's, and lastly over Slitherin's table.
"Let the puppy go, villain!" Harry shouted.
"Why?" Malfoy asked. "Are you inviting the Durssssleysssss here so they can kill it'ssss father?"
"You don't get to play that card, Death Eater," Ron said. "Not when you're one of them. Besides, we keep telling you, you're dad's not dead. He went out for some milk and he's not coming back."
Cue more denial. "I would rather be a Death Eater than one of the numerousssss Weasssleyssss. What'ssss the total number now? What doesss it matter? By nexxxt year I bet it will have doubled. All with that atrocioussss red hair."
"NO! NOT DOUBLE THE GINGERS!" Harry screamed.
"Leave my family out of this," Ron demanded.
"Fair enough. It'ssss not limiting me at all. I ssssee Granger'ssss not with you. I ssssuppose she finally became aware of how densssse she really issss."
Ron furiously pulled back his clenched fist in preparation to punch Malfoy. Harry would have stopped him, and suggested a peaceful discussion, but... eh, it was Malfoy. Ron did a big boy punch and hit Malfoy. It was much enjoyed by probably everyone in the room including Crabbe and Goyle. Ron shook out his hand, partly because that looked painful, and partly because of gross Malfoy cooties.
"Crabbe! Goyle! Ssssiezzze him!" Malfoy yelled, clutching his face.
Ron jammed his hand into his pocket and took out a small spray bottle. "Don't come near, one mist of this and you'll be out like a light." Well, Malfoy's large goon friends had not taken a single step towards them. For a moment they stood, scratching the back of their necks and standing awkwardly. But, five feet away from Harry and Ron, Goyle made an attempt.
"Punch, kick, grrr!" he announced, perfectly still.
"Fighting noises!" Crabbe added.
"Good minionssss," Malfoy encouraged.
"I guess it's a draw?" Harry suggested.
"Bad job," Malfoy barked, still covering his face with his hands.
"Wait a minute," Harry said. "One mist knocks them out? Wasn't that the feature of one of your dealer's new products?"
"Uh, maybe."
"Are you back on drugs?!"
"No, no! They're for defense. Defense drugs." Ron showed him the spray bottle and pointed to where it said Defense Drugs Patent Pending.
"I'm going to write to Mum!" Malfoy threatened. "She won't sssstand for thissss!"
"What'll she do?" Harry asked. "Commit more tax fraud?"
"At leassssst I know where she getsss her money. What do your parentsss do, PAH-ter? Rob bankssss?"
Harry gasped as if Malfoy's insult had been the worst one he had ever heard. Malfoy laughed his way out of the cafeteria despite having a bloody nose. "Minionssss!" he called. And they followed. What was this relationship?
They waited for Hermione in the common room. They stayed up longer than usual but they never saw her come through. Curiously, they noticed a certain vinewood wand with a dragon heartstring core was missing from their pile of magical things.
By the next morning, she was still missing. They took their seats in the golf cart, the crowd getting excited for the possibility of two open seats. Still, they couldn't bear to sell Hermione's seat away. This time, they annoyed their guest rider by waiting. The crowd walked on ahead and they remained in park. But Hermione didn't show. They went on their way, and Care of Magical Creatures proceeded without her. Afterwards, it was still only Ron and Harry who walked down the Gargoyle Corridor on their way to History of Magic.
"I'm officially worried," Harry admitted.
"She'll come back," Ron assured.
"How do you know?"
"She always does. She just needs some time."
"What if Malfoy put her in a cage and is gonna eat her?"
Ron continued to walk down the hallway, eyes enjoying the creepy old sculptures. "She'd pick the lock and escape before he could."
"So you're saying she's just in stage four, depression?"
"Exactly."
"Only one stage to go! And that's the best one!"