The Calm before the Storm
"Hermione can you come down to the common room, there are some people who want to talk to you."
"Sure Lavender do you have any idea what it's about?"
"Yeah I do but I think it might be better if you heard it from them."
"Is it anything bad because to be perfectly honest I don't think I could deal with anything else right now?"
No I'm certain I can't deal with anything bad right now.
The last couple of weeks had been stressful to say the least. Harry and Hermione had told everybody in Gryffindor what had happen the very next morning. To her surprise everybody had believed the two of them with out reservation. All the girls had instantly group hugged Hermione while the guys all slapped Harry on the back and told him it would be all right. Right as the meeting was about to break up Ron had gotten back to the common room.
Most of the people there were prepared for one of Ron and Hermione legendary rows but to everyone's surprise it didn't happen. In fact Ron was polite to everybody then he went upstairs and got ready for class. He didn't spend much time in the common room after that but when he was passing through he would say hello to Harry and Hermione and even exchange pleasantries. It was Lavender that noticed that he never smiled though no matter what.
It might have been better if he had just blown off his steam at us and then maybe we could have worked it out.
"No Hermione it's not bad but like I said you need to hear it yourself."
Hermione carefully put her bookmark in the last place she had been reading in and went down to the common room. Waiting down in the common room were Cho Chang, Susan Bones and a Slytherin girl whose name she didn't remember. There were also just about all of the Gryffindor girls in there as well.
"Hey Hermione how are you holding up?' Susan Bones asked her.
"I'm great Susan thanks for asking. Ok I'm really not great but I'll be ok."
"Lavender said you guys wanted to talk to me?"
"Yes we do, we have heard what happened between you and Ron and first we want to say how sorry we are to hear it."
Hermione flushed a bit red "uh thanks."
The Cho spoke up "The real reason we are here is that we represent the girls of the other houses. We just wanted to let you know that no one from any of our houses is going to go out with Ron until he realizes the mistake he made."
Hermione coughed "But I was the one who made the mistake Cho."
"Well yes you did but you were under the influence of a spell. Both Ginny and McGonagall believe it and that's good enough for us even if it's not good enough for Ron."
"I'm grateful no one wants to take advantage of the situation but why are you all doing this?"
At that the Slytherin girl spoke up "Well we don't think it's fair and to be totally honest a lot of girls in the school sort of look up to you."
"Me?"
"Yeah you got your prince without acting stupid or being a slag or making a fool of yourself. It sort of gave the rest of hope that we could find great guys who would love us with out having to compromise. Then you got screwed over by this and well it made a whole lot of us mad. It also got us to thinking that maybe us girls should start sticking together more and not let the boys get away with so much."
Most of the girls in the room said "yeah' or just nodded but Hermione could tell that they were all in agreement.
"Thank you all for everything." Hermione said sadly. "But please don't be mean to Ron, he's not having a very good time of it right now."
Susan stood up and walked over to Hermione and sat down beside her. "Of course we won't be mean to him. He's one of the nicest guys at Hogswarts and he has helped me a lot while I have been here. We just don't want to give him an excuse not to realize he has made a mistake."
Cho Chang stood up "Well we better get back to our common rooms. We just wanted to let you know we are all willing to support you on this."
With that the girls all dispersed and the common room went back to normal.
Since I'm already down here I'll go to the library for a bit before dinner.
Neville was wondering how long it would be before Ron finished working on that Muggle contraption. Hogsmeade was this weekend and he knew Ron had wanted it to be finished by then. As he approached the turn towards the library he head Malfoy's voice shouting "Desang..".
Damn it what did he say I only heard the first part.
Neville looked around the corner to find Malfoy holding his wand at Hermione who had her hands up over her face.
"I thought you might like have those great big front teeth back Mudblood."
Neville pulled out his wand and went around the corner. "Expelliarmus"
Malfoy's wand went shooting out of his hand.
Neville moved forward and shouted "Stupefy."
The spell hit Malfoy and he slumped to the ground. Neville walked over and picked up Malfoys's wand.
"Hermione are you ok?"
She shook her head and Neville could tell something was wrong with her face.
"Hermione go to the Hospital wing and I'll deal with Malfoy."
At that she nodded at him and ran off.
Neville could tell Malfoy was coming to. "I'll give you your wand back at dinner Malfoy."
'I'll report you for hexing me Longbottom."
"No you won't Malfoy, because you would have to admit I disarmed you and took your wand."
With that Neville walked off heading for the Great Hall.
Ron reluctantly stepped out of the shower and started to dry off. His entire body ached and he was covered in little bruises. As he looked in the mirror he noticed that it looked like a big chuck of his hair and been cut off on the side.
What the hell happened to my hair? My life just keeps getting better and better.
He pulled on his boxers and a pair of gym shorts that he could wear back to the dorm room. Then he finished drying his hair with the towel.
At that point Seamus walked in "Hey Ron, I know this might be a touchy subject but I was just wondering if you heard how Hermione was doing after her run in with Malfoy?"
"I haven't heard anything about it, what did Malfoy do?" Ron asked his eyes narrowing.
"Neville told me that Malfoy hexed her when she was on the way to the library. It seems Neville disarmed Malfoy and was going to meet him in the Great Hall to give him back his wand.
"He attacked her?" Ron yelled. "Seamus find Harry and have him go to the hospital wing."
Ron headed out of the showers at a run.
This is it, I'm going to kill him. He's gone to far and this time he's going to pay.
Ron sprinted out of the common room passing Lavender and Parvati as he went by.
"Ron you might want to put on some clothes." Parvati giggled as he ran down the hall"
"I think your fine the way you are." Lavender sighed.
As Ron ran down the hall to find Malfoy all he could think about was how long he had been putting up with his crap and how many times Malfoy had hurt the people he loved. As he was thinking that he kept getting angrier and he started rumbling in his throat. Ron was coving ground fast and thought he would be in the great hall any minute. Then he felt a searing pain shoot through his whole body.
Two first year Hufflepuffs were shocked to see a sixth year run towards them in nothing but shorts but their shock turned to dismay when he shimmered for a moment and turned into a cat, a very big cat who kept running passed them. They ran screaming to their common room to tell a Prefect.
Neville walked over to the Slytherin table and tossed Malfoy his wand saying "Hey Malfoy I think you dropped this."
Malfoy smirked "You'll pay for defending Mudbloods Longbottom, just like your parents did.
Neville was about to draw his wand and curse Malfoy back to the Stone Age when a loud roar came from the great hall door.
Neville turned to see a lion running towards him. Neville thought he was about to die when the lion jumped over him and landed on the Slytherin table. Plates and platters went everywhere and the table groaned under the weight of the lion which had turned to face Malfoy and let out a thundering roar. Neville watched almost in slow motion as a wet stain formed on the front of Malfoys trousers and then Malfoy fainted.
The Great Hall was deadly quiet as everyone was afraid to move. Then the lion let out another earth shattering roar and it moved towards where Malfoy had fainted and picked his shoulder up in it's jaws.
Then at that moment from out of nowhere a small tabby house cat ran up and started running in and out of the lions legs.