Chapter 19
Reyna
We were all groggy the next morning from staying up late, but fortunately the aerials sensed my needs as I awoke and espresso was waiting for me. I slipped my riding clothes on after knocking it back and diving through the shower as I was expecting Neville and an early morning Skippy feeding. Skippy had loved everything Neville had brought the day before so we were both looking forward to his early morning visit today. Instead of a gentle knock like yesterday, I heard Neville call my name from the hall.
"Well, his manners have decayed." I thought. Surely he wasn't getting so accustomed to me that he was taking me for granted now. "Next he will just pull up in my driveway and honk his horn, metaphorically speaking."
I opened the door and saw the problem. Guarding my bedroom's entrance were Aurum and Argentum, and neither looked like they were in the mood for Neville to knock. A card was attached to Aurum's collar from Hylla saying they were all tuned up and repaired, and operating at 100%.
"Good morning!" I said as I put my arms around Neville's neck and kissed him before thinking "What the fuck am I doing?"
I quickly pulled away. Neville seemed in shock and certainly confused. Truthfully, I was confused as well. It felt so natural to kiss him good morning, even though we had never kissed, or really even talked about romance.
"I'm sorry" I sputtered, "Its early, I'm not really awake and"
"No, that, that was nice. Can... Could we do that again?" Neville asked.
"I really, well, I should" was all I got out before Neville kissed me again, this time longer, but still softly. His lips were delicious and I just melted as we placed our arms around each other..
"Wow." I said as we pulled away, although remaining in each other's arms. "You must be really special."
"Well, as long as I'm special to you anyway." He smiled. His smile was really cute when he was trying to flirt, which as you have probably noticed, isn't something he's really good at. It didn't matter. He cared for Skippy without me asking, and cared for me apparently as well. Flirting was over rated and unnecessary at this point.
"No, I mean, well yes, I mean it like that too, but uh, this is Aurum and Argentum. They have standing orders to kill anyone that means me harm, and they can detect lies, insincerity and ulterior motives. They got a few dings in the war and my sister has had her tech people working on them. I guess the aerials led them back last night from Amazon. So when I say you're special, I mean, yes, I like you, a lot, but perhaps more important and immediate at this juncture, you haven't been ripped to pieces, so you must be all right. Uh, so that took a lot of courage. More than you knew." I smiled. "So what did you bring Skippy?"
"Uh, pretty much the same, but Hagrid did give me a bottle of single malt scotch today." He said as the blood drained from his face.
"Hey! I don't want you scared of me. Aurum and Argentum must really like you, they haven't even growled. When they first met Percy and Jason I thought they were going to tear them apart no matter what I ordered. They're really sweet... Kinda like my boyfriend." I said, and saying the word melted away any doubt between us as to who and what we were to each other. "Come on lets go or we'll be late for breakfast." I slipped my arm into his and led him towards the stables.
We fed Skippy and turned her and the pups out to play together for the day. What was once an everyday activity for them at Camp Jupiter had not happened in some time and all three were happy to frolic in the fields of parallel space. I ran back and changed into my school uniform and we dashed down to breakfast, only to find that of the pool crowd we were the only ones there. A few of Neville's friends said 'hi' and 'good morning' but for the most part they gave us our space.
Our friends wouldn't be seen until they dragged into Defense against the Dark Arts a moment or so before class started. It hardly mattered though as Umbridge was a full ten to fifteen minutes late and looked as though she had not slept at all.
Prior to her arrival Neville, ever the brave one, broke all high school decorum by sitting with me rather than his Gryffindor class mates. Several of the Slytherin boys chuckled at this, one chided him asking "Why Neville, do you have a girlfriend?" and the question made them all laugh.
Neville did me proud.
"Yes. And she's wonderful." He said, looking up at me, completely disinterested in them or what they thought.
"Does she know your folks are in St Mungo's?" One of them said, and Neville tensed up as though he was ready to attack, or as if he had just been beaten. I would have to talk to him about telegraphing his moves, and letting people get under his skin. His courage marked him potentially as a great fighter, but he would need to work on his tells.
At this remark the whole of Slytherin laughed at Neville. I knew of the fate of his parents from the dossier, but we had not talked about it so I had to tread lightly here.
"Uh about that Reyna, I guess I should tell you, both my mother and father are, well, they were tortured nearly to death in the last wizarding war with the cruciatus curse and are, well, they are in a hospital for magical injuries." He whispered.
"Oh that's terrible! But, so, um, whats wrong with that? Why are they acting as being a wounded veteran is something to be ashamed of? If my father was in a hospital for his war service I'd be proud. Instead he's a ghost that haunts a bar in Puerto Rico and as a result his daughter earned a living for a few years turning teenage boys into hamsters." With that I shot a transfiguration spell across the room at the offending Slytherin who of course collapsed into being a hamster, their now empty robes falling to the floor.
The rest of Slytherin rose as one and drew their wands, but with a flick of their's Percy and Annabeth disarmed them nonchalantly as they came in the room and sat.
"What did we miss?" Percy asked as he sat.
"Oh, well, I guess we should tell shouldn't we Neville?"
"Uh, yeah, well" He mumbled, his mind clearly on the spat with Slytherin and not really wanting to tell anyone else about his folks.
"We're a couple. Its official." I said as I slid my arm into his and squeezed his as I lay my head briefly on his shoulder, which surprised Neville and brought his mind away from the sadness of thinking of his parent's suffering.
"Oh that's wonderful!" Annabeth said as she jumped up and hugged first me then Neville. "You have the most wonderful, brave, beautiful girlfriend Neville! I'm so glad you two found each other!"
"No one said you could pick those up!" Percy said as several of the Slytherins sank to the floor to recover their wands. "Accio" he calmly said, and all the loose wands flew to him and stacked themselves neatly on a table. This drew a confused look from everyone in the room, as we would later learn no one had ever seen an Accio spell bring more than one thing at a time.
"Congratulations Neville, Reyna is one in a billion." Percy said.
"Whats the deal with the hamster? Some boy get out of line?" Annabeth asked.
"Yeah, that ugly boy with the long hair thought it was funny that Neville's parents are being treated for war injuries in what passes for a magical VA. I can't wait to meet them Neville, I know you must be proud." I said, and I meant it sincerely.
"You got them to drink a potion?" Percy asked.
"No, I just used the spell."
Neville smiled. "I can't wait to introduce you. Oh, and that was a girl. Pansy Parkinson."
"You sure? No, that had to be a boy. No girl would let her looks go that bad. Besides, look! Slytherin doesn't have any girls." I said, knowing the insult would burn those that deserved it most.
"Uh, yes, honey, they do, see?"
"Oh. I guess you're right. Its just hard to tell them apart. Why do they dress so dark and goth? Don't they know that went out like 20 years ago? Are they waiting for a reunion tour by The Cure?"
"So, uh, you gonna change her back?"
"You think I should?"
"Yeah, Umbridge will be here in a bit and I don't want you to get detention."
"Oh. Okay. Uh, see, the thing is...I'm not sure... I never really turned anyone back from a hamster. Percy, do you remember how?"
"I used Hermes vitamins, remember? But just try the disenchantment for transfiguration. That should work."
"You turned Percy into a hamster?"
"Guinea pig" Percy interjected.
"Hamster sounds funnier, and yes she did. If I hadn't screwed it all up life would still be idyllic. We'll tell you about it sometime." Annabeth giggled.
I knew how to reverse the transfiguration of course, but the look in Slytherin House's eyes was priceless!
In a moment Pansy was standing in front of her robes, as naked as the day she was born, screaming bloody murder, and wandless. That was when a very tired, clearly distraught Umbridge walked in, took 10 points from her and ordered her to stop acting like a slut.
The rest of the class was just as bizarre. Due to our ADHD it was like 45 minutes of watching someone have an argument with themselves, but probably only lasted about ten. At once she was actually teaching us defensive and offensive spells, and how to use them, then telling us we would never need to as Voldemort clearly wasn't back. "But just in case, let's practice deflecting spells." She finally said about ten minutes into her lecture.
"Slytherin House, where are your wands?"
"They are over here Ms Umbridge" Percy answered. "It has to do with Miss Parkinson's attire when you came in."
"Oh. I see. Well, you are at a curious age, but that's no reason to disrobe a fellow student. 15 more points from Slytherin." She said, and with this Ron could barely contain his laughter.
"But they weren't the ones! She turned me into a hamster!"
"Stop lying. First you come into class naked, now you lie about our American guests. Like they would have any idea how to transfigure a human into an animal. I should report you to the Ministry for being a slut. But today, you get a warning. And 10 points deducted. Now, where were we?"
"Deflecting spells Mam." Annabeth answered.
"Well,,,, why would you need to do that? Just, practice amongst yourselves until class is over. Class dismissed." She said and walked out.
Moments later Slytherin House looked at Gryffindor, then at American, saw us all basically fondling our wands, and decided to beat it out of there. When the last left all of Neville's friends came over to congratulate him for his stand against them and, I suspect, to meet his girlfriend and her friends.
Nico merely leaned against a wall, his eyes closed as if napping, and smiled.
We had a good half hour before Potions so we all went to the dining hall to ingest as much coffee as the elves could make. Our little gang was slowly coming together, and Hazel used this opportunity to remind everyone about practice that night after dinner. Jennifer hoped we could finish up dress selection too so we could move on to accessorizing before we did the tuxes, and the girls were excited at this prospect. "Oh! Did you spend the night in the pool Percy?"
"No, I went to the bath. It was big enough and not as noisy. But I'm good now. Thanks to you guys."
Potions was back to normal for us. Snape doted on Slytherin and had clearly heard about the prior class, but other than ordering the return of the wands he only made veiled comments and seemed disappointed that they were not able to take better care of themselves. While we were working on our mixtures, or rather while our wands were surreptitiously working on them for us, Jennifer mentioned that she overheard several of the Slytherins whispering amongst themselves that they were going to disarm us by surprise as we exited the classroom. I had noticed them mumbling but thought nothing of it. One would have had to had god like hearing to have picked up on it, or been able to lip read. I imagined with Jennifer it was the former.
"Don' t worry about it." Percy said, and Annabeth nodded. And we didn't, so strong was their word among us.
As we left we were maybe twenty feet out the door into the broad hallway when we heard "Oww" "SHIT!" "Fuck!" and smelled fresh ozone in the air.
We kept walking as Percy stopped and turned to face our attackers.
"Did you really think I would give your wands back without jinxing them first? Are you that fucking stupid? Next time you aim a wand at Gryffindor or American you might want to wear welders gloves."
Snape looked out the door at him, then at Draco, Crabbe and Parkinson with disgust in his eyes.
The rest of the day blew by but we were all run down from not sleeping enough. Still we were fresher than Umbridge, who skipped dinner altogether. Throughout the meal Snape just stared at us with a cold stare. I'm not sure if he was trying to intimidate us or what, but I've been stared at by a drakken with a hundred eyes, his two black orbs weren't going have much of an effect. The entire House of Slytherin pretty much avoided looking at us. Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff did, and grinned, happy that someone had put the bullies in their place. Well, that's what they get for trying to insult my boyfriend. I wondered how they would react if the entire 12th Legion dropped down on their asses and... then I realized I shouldn't let them get me that worked up and smiled at Neville.
After dinner it was time to talk swords. Much to the disappointment of our Gryffindor friends, at first all we did was talk and show. Types of swords, their uses, their parts and then the basics of Greek one on one tactics and Roman squad level combat tactics. It was a lot to absorb. We finally let them at least play with some wooden swords to get a feel for it, and so they could be thinking of ways to integrate sword and wand combat. Ron and Hermione had a nice feel for the tactics, but Ginny and Harry were pure geniuses at actual sword play. Oh, they weren't about to take on the lowest probatio in 4th cohort (I had started picking on the 4th since Frank and Hazel were with the 5th), but for first timers they weren't bad. Neville was also strong with a blade and thinking through his attacks, but his footwork was terrible. That I could teach him in our spare time, in addition to Annabeth's schooling.
Ginny got a round of applause from all of us when, facing her brother, he attempted to disarm her but she, instead of holding her ground and deflecting, or backing off, charged forward screaming as she deflected his spell and swung with her sword under his sheild/wand arm. It was truly beautiful.
"That is the hardest thing I have to teach. In traditional combat, for thousands of years, soldiers lined up at a distance and shot at each other. It is only natural to not want to get closer to someone who is shooting at you. With the advent of cavalry that didn't really change, until the American Civil War when demigods, uh, and magicians, on both sides began charging into the artillery. See, artillery had replaced archery for long range attacks by then but it was hard to re-aim artillery, so if you stood back and shot, they could reload and shoot you. Instead, the cavalry shot, then instead of hunkering down and waiting for the return, charged forward so the artillery went over them. Once they were into the opposing lines they would massacre the other side. Our air forces, US and British, use this tactic openly even today. They fire a missile just as the enemy fires and instead of turning off to avoid the incoming ordinance, they charge into it causing it to overshoot, then plant another missile up the enemies' ass. Each of you has to learn, whether with spell or blade, deflect and attack, but constantly attack, never, ever, ever, let the other side regroup or rethink." Annabeth said. "And of all my students, only two have gotten it right from the start, Ginny, and Percy."
"I only got it because I was so damned pissed at you." Percy smiled.
"Meh. You got over it Seaweed Brain."
"True" he smiled. "Ron, you did well too, but you only had a plan for your first attack. You need to have several spells lined up, with variations in case the first one fails or is blocked. So, you shot expelliamous, if that works, great, hit with a stun next. If not, another expelliamous, and then a stun as she gets to you, then hit her with your shield and drop your blade from the top. Once your opponent is running at you with their sword in a right or left hand, unless they are particularly acrobatic, you know where the attack is coming from. With a little practice you'll learn to recognize and defend it. But you were ready with your sword, you just ran out of time. Not bad for a first try." Percy said diplomatically. In truth, Ron got his ass handed to him by a little girl.
We planned to work for an hour, but the magicians were into it and so we kept going about three hours. By the end of the night they were asking where they could get swords from, and how we concealed ours.
We agreed to do it again the following night, but Harry said he, Ginny and Ron would have Quidditch try-outs the night after that.
"Hey, I have a question about that." Frank said.
"Sure, whats that?" Harry replied.
"Well, uh, let me show you on the map."
We went into the study room and the Hogwarts map was still laid out, along with prom fashion magazines.
"Okay, so as I get it, the dome of protective spells covers basically the castle with a radius down to Hagrid's more or less, right?"
"Um, yeah" Ron said.
"So, we've been thinking that if we were to be attacked, it would be here, in the woods, or here, he pointed, at Hogsmeade, or on the way there, right? I mean, we have Bob up there now, but basically we've all been thinking if attacked it would be on the way to or from, or at, Hogsmeade." Frank said.
"Right." Hermione said.
"Right, but look, the Quidditch uh, arena?"
"Pitch" Ginny said.
"Right the pitch, it isn't under the dome. So if you wanted to attack, why wouldn't you do it there?"
"Well they can't put protection on it as the alumni tend to just apparate in, and the Death Eaters wouldn't attack during a match, all the professors are there, and alumni show up, the place is usually packed with aurors that attended the houses that are playing." Ron said.
"They did at the World Cup last year, and the dementors did in our third year." Harry said "and at practice there aren't any professors or aurors. No Frank is right, if I was going to kill me, I would do it at practice."
A pregnant silence fell over the room. Finally Hazel spoke.
"Harry, I think I have the various positions worked out for the American House team, would you mind if I came to your practices so I could learn the nuances of the game?"
Harry smiled. "I don't know, were you going to bring any friends?"
"Oh, just a few. I promise we won't be in the way."
"It would be our honor to teach you what we know about Quidditch." A smiling Ginny finally said.
