Chapter 9: Percy's Note

Harry woke with a start, feeling cold sweat on his face and trembling all over. He looked out of the window and realized that the sun was up. He got out of bed and changed into his robes, still thinking of his frightful dream. How could it have been he who attacked Naomi? Was this dream meaningless? He thought that maybe it was just because he had eaten too much at the feast. He left the dormitory and started down the stairs, where he met Ron coming up.

"There you are," said Ron. "I was just coming to wake you up."

"You may still have to," said Harry, yawning.

They met Hermione and Naomi in the common room and headed to breakfast together. They ate slowly. It seemed no one was fully awake yet, not even Hermione. Naomi finally broke the silence and said, "I could hardly sleep last night, I was too excited about starting school today."

The rest of them yawned or nodded in agreement.

After breakfast they collected their books and looked at their schedules for the first time, They saw that they had Charms--all day. Harry and Ron couldn't believe it, thinking there must have been a mistake with the schedules. They were about to ask a teacher when Hermione snapped, "Don't be stupid. It's N.E.W.T level. The important lessons last all day!"

After breakfast, they made their way to Professor Flitwick's classroom. When they got there, they were very displeased to see that they apparently had Charms with the Slytherins.

Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, and Pansy Parkinson were standing outside the door with the rest of the students waiting to go inside. The four of them were laughing loudly at something, and Harry had the feeling he didn't want to know what it was. Just then Malfoy noticed Harry.

"Hey, Potter!" he called. "We were just talking about-about..." his face fell and he trailed off as he saw Naomi standing with Harry, her eyes flashing dangerously at him. He shrunk back into the crowd and didn't bother them again until the door opened and Professor Flitwick called, "Come along, now, inside the classroom!"

As they all made their way into the room, Harry thought he heard Malfoy say, "Why did she have to be in N.E.W.T Charms?"

Harry smiled and sat between Ron and Naomi. Hermione sat on Ron's other side. They had seats in the second row.

"Good morning! Before we start, I would like to call roll. Lavender Brown?"

"Here," called Lavandar.

Professor Flitwick continued through the class, but when he got to Naomi's name he stopped. "Naomi Smith?" he called, looking around to see who Naomi Smith was.

Naomi raised her hand and called, "Here, Professor."

"Ah, yes. Professor Dumbledore said you would be here. Welcome, Miss Smith!"

And he continued through to the end.

The lesson was reviewing basic Charms. They did Cheering Charms, Levitation Charms, Summoning Charms, Silencing Charms, and others that they had learned throughout their years at Hogwarts. Naomi knew all of the spells and performed them perfectly, except that she "accidentally" aimed her Engorgement Charm wrong so that it hit Malfoy's head instead of the ink bottle she was supposed to be enlarging. The Gryffindors laughed uncontrollably while Professor Flitwick shrunk Malfoy's head back to normal size. Poor Professor Flitwick was trying desperately to restore order while at the same time demanding who had hit Malfoy with the spell.

It was then that Harry remembered the writing on the bottom of Percy's letter that he had intended to enlarge. Deciding to look at it when he went up to the dormitory that night, he turned his attention to what was going on in the classroom. He watched dimly as Naomi finally took pity on Flitwick and confessed to 'misaiming' the charm. He gave her one night of detention, but he did not seem to think it was too much of an offense. He actually seemed to be hiding a smile.

After the morning lessons, they went back to the Charms class for the rest of the afternoon. After class they went back to the Great Hall for dinner. Harry didn't talk much. He was thinking about that letter.

"Harry," said Naomi after a while, "are you all right? You've hardly said anything at all since Charms."

"Yeah. Well...no." said Harry, putting down his fork. "Listen, I never told you all this, but...I got a letter from Percy, too, Ron."

Ron and Hermione laid down their forks, too, and started at Harry in shocked silence. Naomi, however, said, "What'd he say?"

When Harry gave her a puzzled look, she said quickly, "Hermione told me about him."

"Well, it sounded like he's still a stuck-up tightwad, but there was tiny writing on the bottom of the letter. I couldn't read what it said, but I thought I'd just enlarge the parchment when I got here. I completely forgot about it, though, until Naomi hit Malfoy with that Engorgement Charm."

"Well," said Naomi brightly, ignoring the last comment about the Engorgement Charm, "I'm finished eating, let's go back to the Tower!"

They left the Great Hall and hurried up to the boy's dormitories. Ron, Hermione, and Naomi sat on Harry's bed while Harry dug around in his trunk for the letter. He finally found it down in the bottom and joined them on the bed. He put the letter on the bedspread and pointed his wand at it. "Engorgio," he muttered. The parchment grew until he could read the writing and took the spell off. He picked up the now rather large parchment and read out loud:

Harry- I'm just telling you that Dad and I staged that fight. I was always with the Order and Mum knew it too. She was just acting. We just needed someone to be close to the Minister. I'm sorry I never told you sooner, and I know you probably won't believe me, but it's the truth. I just found out this way to tell you so that the Minister wouldn't know. He'd be so mad at us for having a spy, he'd probably turn against us again. Hopefully he won't find this note. -Percy

Harry looked up. Ron, Hermione, and Naomi looked exactly as he felt. They were gaping at him, and Ron said weakly, "Are you sure you read it right, Harry?"

"Yeah, see for yourself," said Harry, handing Ron the letter. He and Hermione read it then put it down again.

"Do you think it's the truth?" whispered Hermione.

"I think it sounds reasonable enough...but your mum must be a really good actor, Ron." Harry said thoughtfully.

"Well, she did get really mad at Fred and George once when they tried to comfort her-Percy had sent back the Christmas sweater-and they said he was a humongous pile of rat droppings. She practically bit their heads off."

"...It does make sense," said Hermione slowly. "I think there's a reason to believe him...but then, of course, there's a reason not to believe him, too..."

"What do you think, Naomi?" asked Harry, turning to her. She had been silent for a long time. As Harry looked at her, he saw that her knees were drawn up to her chest, her arms wrapped tightly around them. She was staring blankly ahead, her face completely expressionless. Harry realized that she hadn't heard him, and nudged her with his foot. She started.

"Hm?" she said, turning to him.

"I said, what d'you think?"

"Oh...well...I agree with Hermione...it does make sense...but-"

"What?" said Ron eagerly.

"Oh, nothing. I was just wondering if maybe it was connected to-never mind. I'm going to bed."

And she got up and left the dormitory without looking back. Hermione sighed. "I'd better go to bed too. And you two, as well. Just get some rest for tomorrow, okay?"

When Hermione was gone, Harry and Ron changed in silence. Harry thought it would be best to shrink the parchment, just so it would be less noticeable. He shrunk it back to its original size, then crawled under the covers. Ron asked him a question, but he wasn't listening. He was thinking about the look on Naomi's face while she had been thinking. He knew she was hiding something from the rest of them. And, without intending to, he thought that she had looked so beautiful. He suddenly realized that this thought had occurred to him, and quickly shut it from his mind. He did not know why he had thought of that.

"Harry! Harry!"Ron's voice cut into his thoughts, brining him out of his trance.

"What?" Harry said, turning to face Ron, who was looking sarcastically downcast.

"You can at least listen when I'm talking to you," he said with a mock-hurt tone.

"Oh, gosh Ron, I'm so sorry!" said Harry in an equally sarcastic voice. "How can I ever make it up to you?"

Ron laughed and chucked his pillow at Harry. "So," said Harry slowly. "What were you saying?"

"Oh, never mind. I'll tell you in the morning. Now give me my pillow back."

×××××

Harry was sitting under a tree on the edge of the Forbidden Forest, Naomi sitting with him. She was avoiding his eyes, staring at the ground.

Harry jumped up and spun around as he heard a rustling noise behind him. Seven large Centaurs emerged from the Forest, bow and arrow raised. Harry whipped out his wand and got ready to defend himself and Naomi. She stood by him, a tight grip on her wand, but she did not raise it. Just then one of the Centaurs lowered his bow, pointed to Naomi, and whispered something to one of his colleagues. The second Centaur looked at Naomi and, looking very excited, whispered something to the one next to him. Soon the message-whatever it was-had been passed around the circle, and all of the Centaurs began to babble, pointing at Naomi and looking very excited indeed. They began to advance towards her and Harry readied his wand. But Naomi shot out a hand to lower his wand arm. He looked at her, bewildered, and she looked back with a warning glint in her eyes. She dropped her hand from his arm. She raised one hand into the air, then looked up to the sky. Harry looked up, too. It turned to nighttime in the blink of an eye.

He brought his gaze back down to the earth and saw that all of the Centaurs were gone, and that they were now standing by the lake. Harry recognized this spot. It was where hundreds of Dementors had attacked Sirius, Hermione, and himself.

Harry heard the swish of many cloaks at once, and turned slowly on the spot. Many large, cloaked figures were making their way silently towards Naomi and Harry. He pulled out his wand, ready to perform the Patronus Charm, when he noticed that one Dementor was behaving oddly. One of its hands was groping inside its cloak for something. Then it drew out a wand.

A wand. Dementors did not carry wands. Then it hit him. These were not Dementors at all.

"There is no Dumbledore to save you this time, Potter," said Lucius Malfoy's cold voice. "There is no one at all except for you and nature girl here, but soon not even you will exist."

He raised his wand and shrieked, "Avada Kedavra!"

The spell hit Naomi and she collapsed to the ground. Then the wand turned to Harry...

×××××

Harry sat straight up in bed, breathing very fast and his scar prickling worse than it had been all summer. He clapped a hand to it and moaned, then yanked back his bed hangings and was surprised to see that the sun had just risen. He dressed and hurried downstairs to the common room, where he found Hermione.

"Hermione," he gasped, "Where's Naomi?"

"Harry! Are you all right? You look dreadful!" said Hermione, hurrying over to him.

"I'm fine," Harry snapped impatiently. "Where's Naomi?"

"She upstairs getting dressed. Why? What happened? Sit down," the last sentence was a command. Harry sat and looked up at Hermione.

"You're sure she's okay?"

"Yes, Harry. Naomi is fine. Now will you please tell me what's going on?"

"It's just that I...I don't exactly know."

"Hey, Harry. Are you all right?" Naomi had just come downstairs.

"Yeah...I'm fine." Harry didn't really want to tell Naomi about either one of his dreams concerning her, for in both of them she had been hurt-and it had been he, Harry's, fault.

Ron came downstairs now, yawning and stretching.

"Whassamatter?" he said groggily. "Harry, why didn't you wake me u-u-up?" he said through a huge yawn.

"I thought you'd want to sleep," said Harry, eyeing Ron's appearance. This, of course, was a lie.

More people began to enter the common room from their dormitories, so the four of them found Ginny and set off to the Great Hall for breakfast.

"What have we got first today?" said Harry as they sat down. Hermione pulled out her schedule.

"First we have Herbology, then we've got Care of Magical Creatures." They had all managed to get into N.E.W.T Hebology and Care of Magical Creatures.

They met Neville Longbottom on the way to the greenhouses. He had always been very good at the subject and it was no surprise to Harry that he was in N.E.W.T level.

"Hey, Neville," said Ron, catching up to him.

"Oh, hello, guys! Going to Herbology?"

"Yeah, and I'd guess you are too, Neville," said Hermione warmly. Neville beamed, but the grin faded from his face when he saw Naomi, who was watching in a rather embarrassed silence. It seemed she didn't know what to do while Harry, Ron, and Hermione greeted an old friend that she didn't know.

"Neville," said Harry quickly, "This is Naomi Smith."

"Hi," said Neville awkwardly.

"Hey," said Naomi. "Nice to meet you."

"You too," muttered Neville, turning slightly pink. Harry thought it was quite amusing.

As they walked across the soaking wet grounds, a light drizzle began to fall. They all picked up their pace to get there before it started raining really hard.

They quickly slipped into Greenhouse Three because Professor Sprout was outside, ushering them to hurry up. They all sat at a table together and waited for instructions.

"Good day, class. Today we will be planting Ostrinus Kosma Plants. They are-" she lifted a potted plant onto the table. "-used in some antidotes for rare poisons."

Harry looked at the plant. It was tall, and seemed to have one thick, purple stem with lots of smaller, purple vine-like stems growing around it. There was a large flower at the top that was a deep shade of red, and in the center of the flower was a small, white bud. The whole thing seemed to be a bit...fuzzy, was the best word Harry could think of for it. It was covered in lots of tiny little hairs.

"Now," continued Professor Sprout, "Everyone take a pot and fill it up about halfway with soil. When you get your seedlings from that tray-" she pointed to a large tray in the corner with about thirty purple stems with red balls on top in it. "-you will put them into the pot and fill the rest with fertilizer. Then you will water it, but not too much. Plant as many as you can, I've got another tray for you to plant as well. When you finish planting one of them, place it at the end of your table. I'll be coming around to see how you're doing and to collect your finished pots. Go on, then, start working!"

Everyone began filling the small pots halfway with dirt, then getting a seedling and planting it as Professor Sprout had instructed. She walked around telling people what they were doing wrong or right, and collecting the potted plants. Naomi, Hermione, and Neville seemed to be the best at the job. To be truthful with himself, Harry had expected Naomi to wonder about how it was done or what the plant was. He was a bit surprised when she swiftly and deftly performed the task of potting the Ostrinus Kosmas. But then he remembered the praise Dumbledore had given Naomi during that meeting they had listened to. He said she had gone to school in her homeland and that she knew more than most students in the year.

After the lesson (which had lasted all morning), they all had sore arms from doing so much planting, were covered in dragon manure and dirt, and smelled rather bad from the dragon manure. They hurried off to wash up before lunch. After they ate they went down to Hagrid's hut to have Care of Magical Creatures class.

"C'mon, now! Hurry up!" Hagrid called as a few stragglers made their way to the hut. "Got an interesting lesson for yeh t'day."

Harry felt rather nervous. If Hagrid thought it was interesting, it would be best to back away right then.

"These," Hagrid began, "are-"

"Do they sting, bite, scratch, gore, burn, or in any way hurt people?" said Malfoy coldly.

"Why don't you shut yer mouth and let me finish?" Hagrid growled. "As I was sayin, these here are called Diricawls." He indicated an area of lawn that was marked off by a low wall, about three feet high. "Now, who can tell me 'bout the Diricawl?"

Hermione's hand shot up, to no one's surprise, as did Naomi's.

"Er-you, what's yer name?" said Hagrid, pointing to Naomi.

"Naomi Smith, sir."

"Right! Okay, tell us 'bout 'em, Naomi."

"They're birds, but they can't fly. They can vanish and reappear somewhere else in order to escape danger, and they originated in Mauritius."

"Good! Ten points ter Gryffindor! Now, come up here and have a look at 'em..."

They all moved forward and saw about fifteen small, plump, very feathery birds hopping around. Every now and then one of them disappeared in a little puff of feathers and reappeared in a different spot. Harry supposed there was a spell on the wall to keep them from poofing themselves out.

"Now, Muggles knew these birds as 'dodo birds', but 'cause they always disappeared, th' Muggles thought they had hunted the birds to extinction." He snorted, then continued the lesson, which proved to be fascinating.

They all ate dinner slowly that evening and made their way up to the common room. They saw that all of the Gryffindors were crowding around the bulletin board. Ron was the tallest, so he looked over all of the heads of the students to read the new sign.

"First Hogsmeade trip," he read. "October fifth. Great! It's not too far away!"

Harry, Ron, Naomi, and Hermione sat in chairs by the window. Naomi listened while the others talked about the village. Harry noticed her silence and a sudden thought struck him. What if she didn't get permission to go?

"Naomi," he said, and she jerked out of the sort of trance she had been in. "Did you get your permission form signed to go to Hogsmeade?"

"Wha- Oh, that. I'll ask McGonagall if I can go." She suddenly sat up very straight. "Oh my gosh! I forgot! I have to do Flitwick's detention today!" And she flew out of the common room.

"Ask...McGonagall?" said Ron. "Why, did she forget to ask her parents to sign the form?"

Hermione looked very uncomfortable. "I'm going to bed," she muttered. "'Night."

And she dashed up the girl's staircase.

"What was that about?" said Ron, staring dumbly after her. Harry didn't answer. He thought he had an idea of what it was about. He wasn't sure, but he thought he knew.