(A/N: Hee hee, thank you all so much for your reviews, they made my day! I hope you will all like where the story's headed… but I can't spoil the surprise yet, now can I? I'll try to make this chapter longer. Enjoy! ♥

Oh, and, P.S. – I think it's safe to say that I'm ignoring the 6th book in this fanfic. I'm far too attached to Dumbledore!)

Hermione woke up the next morning feeling more in control of herself than she had the day before. She was now certain that the heat in Professor Binns' classroom had been the cause of her wandering mind. With the prospect of a whole morning of Transfiguration under the steely eye of Professor McGonagall before her, Hermione knew there would be no room for any kind of daydreaming whatsoever.

In the Great Hall the bewitched ceiling cast an uplifting golden glow across the usually slightly mundane ritual of breakfast. Hermione slowly ate her way through a bowl of cornflakes as she carefully scanned the front page of the day's Daily Prophet. She smiled smugly to herself as she looked up from the newspaper to take a sip from the goblet in front of her and saw Ron scribbling furiously on a piece of parchment. The hastily scrawled title read "The Laws Of Transfiguration".

'Perhaps you should've done that last night,' she said with an innocent look, 'You know: when you were lecturing me about how I do far too much homework for my own good, and why I should do my work more like you do…?'

'Shut up,' Ron muttered, only stopping his quill to glare at Harry's smirk. Hermione was pleased to see Ron turn slightly pink. So he should be ashamed.

'You'd better watch out for McGonagall,' Harry advised.

Ron froze and hastily checked over both shoulders.

'I wouldn't worry about McGonagall,' Seamus Finnigan said conversationally as his hand reached for the bacon.

'What do you mean?' Hermione questioned, passing the plate to him.

'Haven't you heard?' Dean Thomas joined in.

All three friends shook their heads.

'She's gone off somewhere for Dumbledore. Ministry business, I think.'

'So what about her classes?' Harry wanted to know.

'Cancelled,' Dean and Seamus said together with matching grins.

Ron let out a strangled groan; staring down at the Transfiguration essay he had missed breakfast for and feigned stabbing himself with his quill.

Much to Ron and Harry's disappointment, Professor McGonagall's 6th year class were not let off scot-free to roam Hogwarts and have a pleasant morning off in the sunshine. Instead, the students were left in the care of the ever-irritable Madam Pince in the Hogwarts library and were expected to get on quietly with homework from other classes. Harry, Ron and Hermione shared a round table in the corner of the library and tried to look busy.

'This is worse than History Of Magic,' Ron whined, his face hidden behind a copy of "Hogwarts, A History".

'Ron,' Hermione hissed, 'That book is upside down.'

Harry gave a snort of laughter and was rewarded with a withering look from the librarian.

'Shh, both of you!' Hermione chastised, 'This is a library.'

'Yes Harry,' Ron mimicked, 'On no account must there be any fun or happiness of any kind…'

Hermione rolled her eyes at their sniggers and opened up a huge volume called "Ancient Runes and You". She tried to make her disciplined eyes read, but she had seen the words so many times before that she didn't even have to look to know what they said. She reached down to her bag at her feet and searched blindly inside it with one hand for something she didn't already know off by heart. By chance her fingers came into contact with a fat, squashy paperback. On further investigation it turned out to be one of the many teenage romances that had become Hermione's guilty and embarrassingly clichéd pleasure. The title seemed to jeer at her from the book's cover: "Eyes On You". Hermione angrily stuffed the book back into her bag and slumped down in her seat, taking cover behind "Ancient Runes and You". She crossed her arms on the table and rested her head on top of them. She tried to ignore the sudden knot in her stomach and the blush that she could feel burning on her cheeks, but the feelings from yesterday were all rushing back. She was filled with a puzzling, shivery excitement. She clenched her fists. If she just sat up and turned round she would come face to face with her watcher and eye to eye with the smouldering eyes on her. She swallowed nervously, flattened her palms onto the table, slowly sat up, held her breath and-

'Hermione? Are you asleep again?'

Hermione shot up about a foot in the air.

'No!' She squeaked weakly at Ron, gripping the edge of the table tightly, 'Just… daydreaming.'

She laid "Ancient Runes and You" flat down on the table and knew that her watcher wasn't watching anymore and must have already left… or was leaving right then. She casually turned her head to the door and watched with a sinking feeling as Neville Longbottom stumbled across the threshold and out of the library.

Neville's eyes could smoulder?