After the disastrous talk with Hagrid, I returned to the dungeons. There were only a few people in the common room, since most of them were out enjoying their Saturday. The atmosphere in the common room was muted – thanks to the match no doubt – and a few people looked at me dejectedly when I entered.

I sat down in a corner quietly and began reading a book, to take my mind off things. A few minutes later, Astoria came down from her dormitory. Her face lit up when she saw me and hurried over to join me.

"Hey, you're back. How're you feeling?" she said.

"Fine. Madam Pomfrey fixed me up all right." I looked around the common room, then back to Astoria. "Listen, do you wanna go for a walk? This place is bumming me out."

"Sure, no problem."

We left the common room together. The rain had stopped now, so we went out to the grounds and began walking around the lake.

"Listen, Draco, I think you should know… no one blames you for the match, alright? It wasn't your fault," she said.

"Tori, that's sweet of you but c'mon now… I'm the seeker. I literally have one job and I couldn't do it properly."

"Only because you got hit by that Bludger!" she protested.

"Yeah, and a seeker is supposed to be quick and agile, so that he doesn't get hit by a Bludger. But enough of that, you were the awesome one. You kicked serious ass back there! You scored, what, eight times?"

"Ah, thanks," she said, beaming. "And for the record, it was seven."

We talked for a while longer. It helped me ease up, and also made me realize I was starting to enjoy being around Astoria more and more. Unfortunately, the rain started to pour again after a while and we had to run back indoors.

Astoria had some homework to do, so she headed off to the library, leaving me to my own devices once more.

I didn't want to go back to the common room, so I had to find some other way to kill time. Room of Requirement sounded good to me, figured it was about time I got around to practicing some spells.

Unfortunately, to make sure the Room wasn't occupied already, I had to go back to the common room anyway to retrieve the Map.

It was actually easier to know when a DA meeting wasn't talking place, since spotting even one member on the map, out and about, meant a meeting wasn't happening, whereas in the other case you had to make sure all the members weren't anywhere to be seen on the map.

Sure enough, spotting Harry, Ron and Hermione in Gryffindor Tower was confirmation that the room was vacant.

Once in the room, I got down to business. The Room summoned a bunch of training dummies as well as a couple of pretty nifty books on jinxes and hexes. I spent a bit of time going through some of them, then started practicing.

I started with Expelliarmus, of course. If Harry managed to survive the entire fucking series by yeeting everyone's wands out of their hands, then it was probably worth learning.

It was actually a pretty easy spell. But to be fair, spell-casting in general had become a whole lot easier in the past month ever since I got my new wand.

After practicing Disarming for about an hour, I moved on to Stunning. It was slightly tougher than Expelliarmus, mainly the aiming part. If you weren't concentrating properly the spell could shoot out in random directions and miss your target completely. I started to get the hang of it after a while though, and even tried my luck with one of the more advanced training dummies, ones that could duel.

It didn't go well.

After another hour of getting tossed around the room by the dummy, I decided to call it in for today. I had made some progress, and it was a start.

Dinner time was approaching, and after over two hours of training that sounded especially appealing.

In the Great Hall, I was gorging on a shepherd's pie when Pansy sat down to my left.

"Evening," she said brightly. "Astoria told me you were back. How're you feeling?"

"Never been better," I responded through a mouthful of pie. "Where've you been all day?"

"Library," she said. "You?"

"Eh… not important," I said. "Do we have patrol duty tonight?"

"Yep, and Monday as well."

I let out a groan. Patrols fucking suuuucked.

"Also, I think you should know," Pansy said. "I think someone – from another house – may have broken in to our common room recently."

That took me by surprise.

"What? How come?" I asked.

"The night before the match, during dinner time probably, when the common room was empty. We made about fifty-odd 'Weasley is Our King' badges and they were all gone by the time we got back. The song was gone too, but that wasn't a problem since we had already practiced it a bunch. I didn't tell you this earlier 'cause I didn't wanna worry you before the match."

Oh yeah, I kinda forgot about the whole song business. This explained why the other Slytherins had been singing during the match. I suppose in hindsight I probably should have guessed they'd have practiced the song a whole bunch before the match.

"Well, did you tell anyone outside the House about the song or the badges?" I asked.

"No-"

"Then there probably wasn't a break-in. Maybe you misplaced them or house-elves accidentally got rid of it while cleaning."

"Uh… house-elves?"

"The ones in the kitchen," I said. "They clean the common rooms at night- you don't know this?"

She shook her head.

"Well, in any case, don't worry about any 'break-ins'," I said. "Besides, it was stupid to begin with."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, like – come on, the song? The badges? It's such a silly thing to do. What was even the point there?"

"I – well…"

"Listen," I said softly. "Don't you… y'know, ever get tired of this whole thing? Trying to screw over the Gryffindors, I mean?"

She was quiet for a few moments, before saying in a quiet voice, "You've changed, Draco."

"I guess I just grew up."

I ate the rest of my dinner in silence. Why didn't I tell Pansy I had been the one who got rid of the badges? I don't know, honestly. Maybe because that would have been a little too much on my part…

After dinner I crashed at my dormitory to get some rest since there were still a couple hours till the patrol started. The dorm was empty, so I decided to pull out the map and take a look. It had become something of a pastime of mine. Was it creepy? I don't fucking know man, it's a map. But whatever.

I gazed around the map. There was Dumbledore, pacing in his study as always. McGonagall was in hers, along with Crabbe and Goyle who had detention. My gaze went to Gryffindor Tower, just in time to see Harry, Ron and Hermione leave.

They walked all the way to a certain seventh floor corridor where I knew the Room of Requirement was. Sure enough, after Harry paced around in the hallway three times, they disappeared off the map, presumably entering the Room.

As I watched, more and more people showed up in the corridor and disappeared. First Ginny Weasley along with Michael Corner, followed by Fred and George, then over a dozen others in groups of 3 or 4.

One particular group, which happened to be the last one, caught my eye in a big way. It consisted of Hannah Abbott, Cho Chang and… Daphne Greengrass?

Holy shit… Daphne was part of the DA?!

[…]

Two and a half hours later, as I patrolled the quiet, empty halls of the castle, all I could think of was one thing –

Holy shit… Daphne was part of the DA!

Like, seriously. I hadn't seen this coming. As far as I knew, she wasn't terribly pleased with Umbridge's 'teaching' but she had shown basically zero interest in doing anything about it. And as far as I knew, I hadn't even seen her talk to anyone from the other houses.

But then again, it's not like I was around Daphne all the time. Come to think of it, there were often instances where I wouldn't see her for hours at a time.

I saw Ron pass by up ahead, at the end of the corridor. I considered talking to him, about the song. But I decided against it. Odds were, his response would be much more similar to Hagrid's than Hermione's. In fact, I was starting to think the only reason Hermione hadn't told me to outright fuck off was because she had been genuinely shocked by what I had said.

Besides, the wounds from the song would still be fresh. Best not to remind him of it so soon. Maybe I'll do it some other time, when he may have cooled down a tad bit.

Also, seeing Ron meant that I had gone way off track, so I started making my way back to the area I was supposed to patrol.

[…]

Sunday was spent mostly in homework and spell practice in the Room of Requirement. I didn't talk to Daphne about the DA because… well, y'know. I couldn't just waltz up to her and go 'hey I know that you're attending a secret, semi-rebellious Defense Against the Dark Arts group organized by Potter'.

Monday was a bit more interesting, though. We had double Care of Magical Creatures on Monday, our first lesson with Hagrid back. Which naturally meant that Umbridge would probably be inspecting as well.

The Slytherins and Gryffindors headed down to Hagrid's cabin, heavily muffled against the November cold. Hagrid beamed at us, and said, "Alrigh' then, all of you follow me now! We're working in the Forest today; since they prefer the dark!"

An anxious murmur broke out. "What prefers the dark?" I heard Pansy say sharply to Daphne, a hint of panic in her voice. "What'd he say prefers the dark- did you hear?"

"Come on now, nothin' to be afraid of!" Hagrid said cheerily. "I've bin savin' a trip inter the Forest for the fifth year. Thought we'd go and see these creatures in their natural habitat. Now, what we're studying today is pretty rare. Reckon I'm the only one in Britain who's managed to train em."

"You are sure they're trained, right?" Daphne said, but there wasn't any snideness in her voice, more like genuine nervousness. "It's just that… you've sort of brought wild stuff to class before."

The other Slytherins and even a few Gryffindors murmured agreement. And Hagrid's reassurance that these mysterious creatures were in fact trained, didn't do much to ease their apprehension. Maybe it was because of the bruises on his face… or maybe the dead cow he was hauling over his shoulder, as he led us into the forest.

We walked for about ten minutes until we reached a place where the trees stood so closely that it was as dark as twilight. Hagrid threw the dead cow on the ground and turned to face the class.

"Gather round, gather round," he encouraged. "Now, they'll be attracted by the smell of the meat but I'm gonna give em a call anyway, cause they'll like to know it's me.""

He gave an odd, shrieking cry – like a strange bird – that echoed through the dark forest. A minute passed as the class peered nervously over their shoulders and around trees for a first glimpse of whatever monstrous creature Hagrid had in store for us today.

Hagrid gave another cry, and a few moments passed in silence. I looked around, then saw, from between the trees to my right, a pair of white glowing eyes growing larger through the darkness. A few moments later, the bony, horse-like face, neck and skeletal body of the Thestral emerged from the darkness.

"Uh, Professor, over here," I said.

He turned around and his face brightened. "Ah, here's one!"

The class looked towards where Hagrid pointed. Everyone looked confused, save for Harry and Neville. Harry looked relieved, probably because he had just received proof that the Thestrals weren't hallucinations, and Neville was a bit afraid.

The Thestral walked towards the dead cow and began eating it, causing some in the class to yelp.

"What's doing that?" cried a Gryffindor girl.

"That," Hagrid said, "Is a Thestral! Now, who here can see em?"

Harry, Neville and I raised our hands.

"Hmm, now can anyone tell me why these three can see em and the others can't?"

I quickly raised my hand again, as did Hermione.

"Hermione?" Hagrid said.

"They can only be seen by those who have seen death," she said in one breath.

"Excellent, ten points to Gryffindor," Hagrid said. "Now, Thestrals, really useful-"

"Aren't they really bad luck, though?" the Gryffindor girl from earlier cut him off. "Professor Trelawny told us all about them, they're supposed to-"

"Nah, that's just superstition," Hagrid responded with a chuckle. "Truth is, they're actually really useful!"

"Speaking of bad luck, here comes Umbridge," Daphne muttered from my side.

I looked over, and sure enough, I saw a short, squat blob of pink approaching us from the path we had come from.

The other students were looking at her too. I moved closer to Hagrid and muttered in a low voice, so as not to be overheard. "Umbridge's coming here."

"Yeah, I see her," he responded gruffly.

"Listen, she's gonna try to do you in," I warned him.

"Codswallop. Why'd she do that?" Hagrid said, but he didn't sound like he believed what he was saying.

"She hates half-breeds, that's why," I said quickly and quietly. "Listen, no matter what she says, you stay calm. Be straightforward and clear, don't laugh or use hand gestures or whatever, okay? Think twice about what you're gonna say before you say it. She can and will twist your words against you in her report, so try not to give her any chances."

"And just why should I believe you?" he responded coarsely.

I looked back at him. Had the trio not warned him about Umbridge? Or was he just saying this out of distrust for me?

"Listen, I'm just trying to help. If you don't wanna get put on probation like Trelawney has already, you might wanna follow my advice," I said coldly. "Also, based on what she's said and done these past couple months, there's a high chance she'll think Thestrals are too extreme for us to learn. So, if she says the Ministry's classified Thestrals as 'Dangerous', it's not true. They're actually classified as 'Potentially Dangerous'."

And with that I slipped back to the others, Hagrid looking at me with an odd sort of expression, which soon melted away into a friendly smile as he greeted Umbridge.

"Hello!" he said cheerily to her as she reached the class.

"Yes, hello, did you receive the note I sent to your cabin this morning?" she said curtly. "Telling you that I would be inspecting your lesson?"

"Oh yeah, sure," Hagrid replied. "Glad you found the place alright. Anyway, as you can see – or, I dunno… can you? We're doin' Thestrals today-"

"I'm sorry?" Umbridge said looking incredulous, pen raised to her clipboard but not yet writing. "Thestrals, you say?"

"Er… yeah," Hagrid said.

"Are you aware the Ministry has classified Thestrals as 'Dangerous'?"

Hagrid shot me a surprised glance. I nodded urgently at him, hoping he'd follow my advice.

"Uh, dunno 'bout that, pretty sure they're classified 'Potentially Dangerous'. Since they'll only attack ya if ya offend em," Hagrid replied.

"But they are still capable of attacking, are they not?" Umbridge argued.

"Yeah, but c'mon," Hagrid said. "Even a dog'll bite if ya bait it! Besides, there's more cow-related deaths in a year than there are Thestral-related ones."

Umbridge didn't reply, merely making a small note on her clipboard.

"Besides, the Hogwarts herd is trained. Even the other staff members'll agree with me when I say this lot is harmless as they come," Hagrid assured Umbridge.

Umbridge made another small note.

"Now, comin' back to the lesson," Hagrid said. "Thestrals, there's load of good stuff about em. For starters…"

As Hagrid explained the uses of Thestrals, Umbridge walked over to me. "Do you find," she said. "That you are able to professor Hagrid when he talks?"

"Well enough," I said with a nod.

Umbridge raised an eyebrow for a moment then moved on to another student. Apparently she had been expecting me to say the opposite.

And by the looks of it, Pansy had too, since she quickly rounded on me once Umbridge had moved on.

"Why're you trying to defend the oaf?" she said. "This could be our chance to get rid of him!"

"Listen, between Umbridge and Hagrid, Umbridge is significantly worse. I'm not gonna let her get what she wants, okay?" I snapped back.

"Worse? Than Hagrid?" she said incredulously. "Draco, she's on our side!"

"Ha, no she's not Pansy," I retorted.

Before we could argue any more, Umbridge turned to Hagrid.

"Well, Hagrid," she said. "I've got enough to be getting along with. You will receive the results of your inspection in ten days' time."

And with that, she turned around and walked away, looking rather disappointed with what she had gotten during the inspection.

And if Umbridge was disappointed, then job well done!

We continued the lesson after she left. Pansy didn't talk to me for the rest of the lesson, which was fine by me.

Soon, the bell from the castle sounded in the distance, signaling the end of an actually pretty decent lesson, as well as the day.

All in all, I do think Hagrid stands a better chance of not getting put on probation… though knowing Umbridge, there's no saying for sure.

[…]

I had patrol duty again that night. At this point you know the drill. Long, dull hours of walking through empty halls.

As I was walking through said halls, I heard a faint giggle directly above me. Looking up, I saw Peeves the poltergeist, floating over me. He stuck his tongue out at me before pushing over the nearby bust of Paracelsus. I stepped aside just in time to dodge the heavy stone sculpture, which hit the floor and shattered. Peeves flew away cackling despite having failed in his primary goal of splitting my head open.

Now a ghost that does things like this in a school might sound alarming, but Peeves hasn't ever actually killed or even seriously wounded anyone to my knowledge. Most of his pranks tend to be harmless; the ones that aren't – like this one – are usually followed by a warning of sorts. In this case it was him giggling.

So really my major concern at the moment was the fragments of marble littered all over the floor, as well as the fact that the noise may have woken up half the castle.

"Reparo," I muttered, pointing my wand at the mess and the pieces joined back together to form the bust of Paracelsus once more. I then levitated it back to its original position and then left the scene. I didn't get far; the second I turned left I nearly collided with Hermione.

"Oh, hello," I said.

"Um… what was that noise?" she asked, eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"Peeves. Knocked over a statue," I said. "I fixed it though."

I moved past her to continue on my way, but she stopped me.

"Wait."

"Yeah?"

"Earlier today," she said. "Why'd you say all that to Hagrid?"

"What do you mean?" I asked. Had she overheard my conversation with Hagrid?

"You warned him about Umbridge. Told him she hated half-breeds, what to say and how to behave," Hermione said. "Why?"

I shrugged. "Maybe… I just hate Umbridge more? I mean, the way she's teaching us is a complete joke, for starters."

"Uh-huh… Look, when you… said that you were going to change for the better," she said tentatively. "Did you really mean it?"

"Yes, I meant it," I said genuinely, after a brief pause. "Listen, I… I can't explain it. Maybe I just grew up, maybe I just got tired of being an ass all the time, but when I say I'm going to be better, I mean it. I really do."

Hermione opened her mouth to say something just before another voice came from the end of the hallway.

"Hermione, are you here? Patrol's over now, we can go-"

It was Ron. When he saw us, he stopped mid-sentence. Hermione quickly looked at her watch, then jogged up to Ron, but not before uttering a small noise that may, just may have been a 'good bye'. Ron just gave me a cold look before leaving.

Well at least I seemed to be making progress with Hermione. Or at least I thought I was. A simple apology was never gonna convince her. If she was ever going to believe that I had changed, it would be because of my actions, and I guess seeing me trying to help Hagrid was one such action.

The work was far from done of course, but it was encouraging to know that Hermione was starting to take it into consideration that I may not be a colossal prick anymore.

And so, with the smallest of smirks on my face, I too made my way back to the dungeons.

[…]

"Why on earth were you hanging around with Malfoy?" Ron asked incredulously.

"For the last time, Ron, I wasn't hanging around him," Hermione sighed exasperatedly. "And besides, you don't get to decide who I can or can't hang around with!"

"I'm not saying I do," Ron said defensively. "But Malfoy is the enemy. He's been a git to us for four years, you really gonna believe that he just up and changed in a single summer?"

"Well, why not?" Hermione said. "Besides, I'm not saying he's changed definitively. I'm just saying, since it's been what, two months of term and he hasn't done a single bad thing, we might ought to consider the possibility-"

"Listen, Hermione, people like Malfoy – with the kind of family he comes from – just don't change so quickly, so easily," Ron said.

"He helped Hagrid today," Hermione said. "Thought you ought to know."

"He what?"

"He warned Hagrid about what Umbridge was like-"

"We already told him that," Ron said.

"That's besides the point, and he even told Hagrid that Thestrals weren't actually classified as dangerous and that-"

"Wait, wait, how do you know all this?"

"I overheard," Hermione said. "You can go ask Hagrid if you want. He'll tell you the same thing."

When Ron didn't respond, Hermione pressed on, "Look, I'm not gonna say for sure that he's changed or that we should trust him just yet. But we shouldn't rule out the possibility either."

"Well… here's another possibility you shouldn't rule out either," Ron said. "Maybe he's working for Umbridge. Think about it, his family and Umbridge are the same scummy people, it makes sense he'd be the first person Umbridge would recruit."

"Okay, but at the same time, everyone in the school knows Malfoy hates us. He'd be the absolute worst choice to send to what, infiltrate us? And say he was working for Umbridge, why would he then try to help Hagrid instead of sabotaging him?"

"Well- I… dunno," Ron said, flustered. "But what about the s…"

"Yes?"

"Never mind," Ron muttered, ears turning slightly red.

Hermione knew what he had been about to say, namely the song the Slytherins had sung during the match, surely to accuse Malfoy of being the mastermind behind it. He hadn't said it though, perhaps because he just didn't want to think about that fiasco. Hermione let out a tired sigh.

"Listen, Ron," Hermione said softly. "Let's just put this matter out of our minds for now, alright? No need to argue over Malfoy of all people, okay?"

"Yeah, all right," Ron mumbled.

And they walked back to Gryffindor Tower in silence.