Reaching Maturity
Disclaimer: not mine. Ditto for Narnia. Really. Honestly. Verstehen Sie?
A/N: yes, I do have all the Quidditch scores worked out. I may not be that good at maths, but I did manage this lot, and I checked it. So there. Oh, and I'm really not that good at writing Quidditch matches, so please be kind.
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Chapter 18: Birthday Party
The next day dawned bright and clear – perfect conditions for the Quidditch match. Due to the combined protests of Snape and Flitwick, Dumbledore abandoned the order from the Ministry and raised the goalposts back to their original height. The whole school was, naturally, out in full force, all dressed in either green or blue, their spirits instantly raised the moment they saw the raised goalposts. Everyone had thought that the ruling from the Ministry was ridiculous, and they took great heart from the sight that greeted them.
The match was fast, furious and dirty. Ravenclaw were determined to get revenge for the previous year's 430-20 massacre by Slytherin. Ravenclaw scored three times in a short space of time, before Slytherin swiftly pulled level. Both sides were committing numerous fouls on each other, and it wasn't long before Ravenclaw were awarded two penalties, both of which they scored. Slytherin were also awarded two penalties – one of which was saved spectacularly by the foot of the Ravenclaw Keeper, and the other of which the Slytherin Chaser missed by miles. Slytherin reacted to Ravenclaw's second penalty by going straight up the other end and scoring.
Hooch was soon prompted to call a time-out to separate a Ravenclaw Chaser and a Slytherin Chaser, who were involved in a mid-air fistfight.
The ten-minute break succeeded in cooling to worst of the heated atmosphere – temporarily. The match had barely restarted before a Ravenclaw Beater hit a Bludger directly at the Slytherin Keeper, who doubled over in agony. Hooch awarded Slytherin a penalty, which the Ravenclaw Keeper calmly saved. By this point, Bludgers were flying everywhere and players were deliberately barging into each other and knocking their opponents off-course. Hermione muttered in Harry's ear that it was worse than watching a Gryffindor-Slytherin match.
And then the Ravenclaw Seeker spotted a tiny glint of gold. She dived after it, and seconds later the match was over, the Golden Snitch firmly held in her grasp. Ravenclaw had won, 200-40, thus avenging the previous year's massacre.
Snape, Harry noticed, did not look happy at all. He rightly guessed that the Potions teacher was cursing Lucius Malfoy for depriving his team of their best Seeker – and Draco Malfoy was good, Harry knew. Just not quite as good as me. Snape would now be in an even fouler mood than usual for the rest of the term. Slytherin had now played all their matches and with Ravenclaw going into their final match – against Gryffindor – with more points than his House, Slytherin would not be taking the Quidditch Cup that year. There was no doubt that the Ravenclaws would bear the brunt of his wrath, suffering more than the Gryffindors for the time being.
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Hannah was granted permission to go to Hogsmeade with Professor Sprout to get Draco's birthday present. In between homework and revision for their NEWTs, she spent a lot of time with Harry and Hermione planning things for Draco's birthday.
On the day of the party, she was accosted on her way to the hospital wing by Justin Finch-Fletchley yet again. "What's the occasion?" he inquired coolly, his eyes scanning her.
"None of your business." She attempted to get past him, but he blocked her way.
"I don't think so, Hannah. Not until you tell me where you're going."
Hannah raised one eyebrow. "Oh, really? Stupefy." He fell to the floor, unconscious, and she stepped calmly over his still form, making her way briskly to the hospital wing, an inconspicuous bag on her back. Despite being several minutes late, Harry and Hermione had yet to arrive.
They came hurrying up ten minutes later, out of breath and struggling to keep hold of their parcels. "Filch…on prowl," Harry gasped out.
"Kept…hassling us," added Hermione, just as out of breath. "Then Peeves…threw things at us…" She scowled. "Shall we…go in? Apologies again."
"Accepted." Hannah pushed open the door to the hospital wing and poked her head in. Madam Pomfrey bustled up. "There you are!" she exclaimed. "I was beginning to think you weren't coming!"
"Filch was on the prowl," Harry explained. "And given some of the stuff we've got, he'd accuse us of going to Hogsmeade or something."
"Come on in, then. Just a brief warning, though – go easy. Draco's still quite weak and this chest problem doesn't look like shifting at any point in the near future. And," she added, laying eyes on the parcels Harry and Hermione were carrying – food from the kitchens, courtesy of the house-elves – "I hope you haven't got any alcohol there. Remus Lupin's eighteenth still gives me nightmares. How they got Muggle alcohol in here, I will never know. And to think that he's a teacher now." She shook her head, a wry smile on her face.
"The strongest stuff we've got is lemonade," Hermione assured her as they went in. She knew better than to try to sneak forbidden items past Pomfrey. She seemed to have an internal detector for such things.
Draco was sitting, sketching, in a big armchair by a blazing fire, so focused on what he was doing that he did not notice the arrival of the others. Hannah went over to him first and tapped him on the shoulder. "Happy birthday!"
He looked up, startled. Recognising his visitors, his pale face broke into a grin. "Hannah! I was wondering what had happened to you. You never came yesterday." He hesitated. "I missed you."
"I was getting your party sorted," Hannah informed him. "Me, Harry and Hermione." She beckoned to the two Gryffindors to come over and they did so, depositing the food parcels on the table by Draco's chair.
"I suppose I should say something about being honoured or something," he commented in his old drawl to hide his disbelief. "Nobody's ever gone to this much trouble for me at school before – unless they're trying to get onto my good side."
All three caught the underlying tinge of loneliness and sadness in his voice, but knew him better than to comment on it; Draco loathed being pitied. "It's about time someone did, then," Hannah said brightly. "Harry and Hermione are on good terms with the house-elves in the kitchens, which is how we came by all these goodies." The three unwrapped the parcels – Winky had wrapped the food up to make it easier to carry, and also to hide it – and set out the food. There were sausage rolls and pasta salads, amongst a wide array of other things (healthy options, naturally; Hermione had been very firm about that) and also cakes of varying sorts.
"Don't go thinking there's any alcohol," Harry warned.
"I wasn't going to," retorted Draco. "Somehow I can't imagine Pomfrey permitting it."
"She won't." Two days ago, Harry had finally got the full tale of Lupin's eighteenth out of the DADA professor, and he recounted it now, for the benefit of the others, as they sat on the floor. The alcohol had been carefully gathered during the Christmas holidays of the boys' seventh year and smuggled back into the school in January courtesy of various shrinking spells. There were copious quantities of it – all the Gryffindor boys from the fourth year upwards had taken part with delighted glee.
During the party, all kinds of drunken antics had taken place. It had ended in the vast majority of those from the fourth year upwards being hauled up to the hospital wing at various points throughout the evening. Sirius and Lupin were dragged up by Harry's parents before Lily and one of her friends (both of whom were reasonably sober; Lily was Head Girl, after all) had to take James as well. Two boys – one seventh-year and one sixth-year – were found wandering the school grounds in a completely inebriated state, singing off-key, by McGonagall. She had deducted one hundred points from Gryffindor, and the house had lost the House Cup to Ravenclaw because of it.
This tale sent everyone into fits of laughter, during which Hermione choked on a crumbly biscuit and Draco was hit by a violent coughing fit. Harry banged Hermione hard on her back in an attempt to help, and Hannah went for some water.
Draco eventually stopped coughing and leaned back against his chair. He was white and shaking, tears that had been brought on by the coughing streaming down his face. He was struggling to breathe, and his three friends exchanged alarmed looks. Pomfrey was sure to ban them now, if she found out about this!
Within a few minutes, he had recovered, the wheezing now only slight. "I'm fine," he insisted. "I'll be OK. Tell me about the Quidditch. A certain person refused to even let me get out of bed that day, so I missed the whole match."
Harry immediately began telling him about the match, move by move, and the two boys quickly descended into discussing complicated tactics that the girls, who preferred to watch from the stands, did not understand. Hermione caught Hannah's eye, and the Hufflepuff nodded at her. Hermione cleared her throat. "Much as I hate to interrupt tactical discussions," she cut in, her tone suggesting that she was not sorry in the slightest, "there are one or two small pieces of business we need to attend to before Pomfrey kicks us three out."
The boys briefly glared at her, Harry as puzzled as Draco until he caught Hermione's eye. She nodded at him and pulled a box-shaped parcel out of her bag, handing it to Draco. "Open it," she ordered. "It's from me and Harry."
Within seconds, the birthday present was unwrapped, revealing a boxed gift set of all the Narnia books. Draco stared at them, eyes wide, and looked up at the two Gryffindors. "Why…?"
"Because you said you didn't have your own copy of any of them," Hermione replied. "So I spoke to Harry about it and then owled my parents, who were able to get hold of the set."
"But you shouldn't have…"
"Nonsense. It's your birthday and we're your friends," Hermione retorted. "It's what friends do – give each other presents on their birthdays."
"I wouldn't know," Draco muttered. He fingered the books for a moment before carefully stretching up and placing them, still in their box, on the table. He bit his lip hard to force back the rising emotions. "Thanks," he eventually whispered. "I – I really appreciate this." He hesitantly reached out and awkwardly hugged Hermione. She returned it, surprised but touched. Draco Malfoy was generally not a hugging person, and nor was he one to show his emotions so blatantly.
It was only short, and he was quick to pull away, but all four knew that any past differences between Hermione and Draco were just that – the past. The gesture had sealed their friendship.
Draco turned to Harry. "Thanks." He shook the hand Harry offered him, smiling.
Hannah cleared her throat to get Draco's attention, and handed him a rectangular, flat object. Draco eyed her quizzically and she pushed the item, neatly wrapped, into his hands. "Open it, then!" she said impatiently.
He obediently did so, and gasped. "Wow, Hannah! These are brilliant!" He stared at the watercolour paint-box in awe – they were Automatic Refill paints, which meant that he would not have to buy another box of watercolours for a long time. Putting the box down by the Narnia books, he reached out to Hannah. This hug lasted considerably longer than the one with Hermione had done, and when they broke away, Hannah's arm remained protectively around his shoulder.
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The next event to occur happened in Potions. Snape had given them clear instructions on how to brew a wound-sealing potion and had even written them on the boards. The students were working individually for once. "This is a very useful potion – one you would do well to keep in your home at all times in case of an accident."
He began moving between desks, occasionally passing on instructions and correcting students. "This is a relatively simple potion; I should not really need to correct you," he said scathingly before Dean put the wrong ingredient in his cauldron.
The head of Slytherin stopped and sniffed the air, frowning. "There should be no burning smell in here," he said slowly. "Who has done this inaccurately?" His dark eyes scanned the room, finally settling on two cauldrons next to each other in the Slytherins' half of the room. "Miss Parkinson…and Miss Bulstrode. Well, well. What a surprise," he said, upper lip curling. "Even Potter appears to be making a reasonably competent job of this potion. You put your house to shame." He turned his icy gaze on the two. "Get out of this class and don't bother coming back. I have had enough of you two! How you achieved an O in your OWL exam is completely beyond me. Now get out!"
The entire class had stopped working to watch the scene and Snape whirled on them now. "Well? What are you all staring at? Do you not have potions to make?"
The class immediately busied themselves with their potions once again, not wishing to bring Snape's wrath down on them. Pansy Parkinson and Millicent Bulstrode slipped quietly out of the room, unaware of Snape's furious and vicious glare boring into their backs.
He let the class talk amongst themselves as he occasionally did with seventh-years, while he went over to talk to Harry and Hermione. "I understand you had a small birthday party for Mr. Malfoy," he said quietly to prevent the other students from overhearing. There was no danger of Ron doing so; he was working by Dean after going off in a huff when Harry and Hermione had disappeared on Saturday. He was refusing to speak to them.
"We did," Hermione confirmed. "I think he really enjoyed it. He's a decent person underneath that arrogant attitude of his."
"Is that so surprising?" asked Snape softly. "He has been brought up to be so, to hold certain beliefs, and he is expected to be a certain way. The attitude is his protection from the pain the outside world inflicts on him. I'm glad to see that you two and Miss Abbott have become good friends with him, and he's going to be needing you a lot. I am relying on you to not let him down. You will suffer if you deliberately hurt him."
"We wouldn't even dream of it!" retorted Harry." He's our friend now. We won't fail him. That's a promise, sir."
"Good." Snape turned and swept off.
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TBC
A/N: before anyone has a go at me about grammar for, "It's from me and Harry", think about it – if you took away the "and Harry" bit, you would say, "It's from me". You would not say, "It's from I". So don't complain. As far as I've been taught, this is the correct way. If you don't like it, tough.
Author thanks:
Lucidity: as Draco and Harry are the two main characters, the focus switches between the two, rather than like in The Two Towers where the whole of Book 3 is focused solely on Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas and then the whole of Book 4 is focused solely on Frodo and Sam. What's wrong with Sprout? Do you have a problem with her? Remember that she is Hannah's head-of-house, and therefore chose Hannah to be a prefect.
Riob: I won't comment on the Draco/Hannah ship because you know how much I love this pairing. Harry/Hermione is deliberately not-so-subtle now, although they're fairly discreet about it. I imagine Lupin and Pomfrey will have picked up on it by now; nothing much gets past them! Ginny in all likelihood has as well, but she's not really in this story enough; she's not a very significant player. I know I'm being cruel to Draco, but then, when you've got one problem it tends to leave you vulnerable to a whole host of other things. And sleeping in the Great Hall can't have helped. Severus does have a hugely significant, if very understated (because Harry isn't really aware of it) role in the books, and I'm trying to carry that notion into this fic.
TinorialPeredhil: YAY! It let you in! I had to have someone get hauled up for not paying attention; Justin was perfect for the role because of the way I've been writing him. And Parvati is just the sort to get done for having nail varnish on in lessons. It took me a while to work out all the times for the exams, but it's just the sort of thing McGonagall would do to strike fear and panic into the hearts of students to get them revising! Hannah wouldn't use the Cloak; the risk with the Dementors, in her eyes, would be too great. Plus she doesn't know whether the teachers will say no at this point.
Glad the Harry/Hermione hints are getting through to people! There's more stuff that I'm not saying on this matter because I'm leaving it up to my readers to fill in the gaps (no, nothing sordid!) A story like this needs humour in it because the rest is so dark. Plus I can just imagine that sort of thing happening where Snape is concerned!
CloudofDreams: hey, they need some fun, to lighten the otherwise horrifically dark world in which they're currently living. Glad to see you're picking up on the romance hints; they're not meant to be subtle any more! I agree with you that Rupert Grint is a great actor. I know of a couple of very well-written stories that give Snape a love interest – such as Samhaincat's Solstice II. Alan Rickman is a fantastic and highly underrated/underacknowledged actor. Maggie Smith is fantastic as well, I agree. McGonagall reminds me of Ms Haworth (check your spelling of her name; she goes mental if you put the 'o' before the 'a'!) I'm not commenting on the outcome for Snape. Which CDs do you plan to lend me, then? And I don't break up till the 24th (officially) but my last lecture is on the Monday (21st) so hopefully I'll be home on the Tuesday.
Samhaincat: Sirius is popping up and disappearing again on a regular basis in this. He's more likeable in this fic than I now view him to be because this was originally written before OotP came out and there are only so many adjustments I could make. Harry understands Draco a lot more now and can see how narrow and inflexible Ron's way of thinking is; Ron tends to see things much more in black and white, whereas other characters see things in shades of grey.
Rebell: nope; Draco doesn't get a break! (blushes from praise) Draco's birthday is in this chapter. And Hannah rocks.
Dark Lady Arantraneth: I'm happy as long as my readers enjoy the story!
