Chapter 88: Bad Reputation

It was the next morning. The four of them plus Neville headed towards the great hall. Phoenix, exhausted, felt Hermione giving her odd looks. Beside her, she noticed Harry and Ron were unusually quiet and saw poor Neville. His eyes splotchy and puffy from crying. She didn't know what all they said and did during their capture from Filch, but from what she could tell, it wasn't good.

While in the halls, Phoenix heard whispers and saw the stares from fellow students. How badly did they screw up? Most of the students, she noticed, were looking at Harry. 'Sadly, his reputation can be a blessing and a curse.' Phoenix thought. Phoenix kept her head up. She had been in this situation before at her other school. They will eventually get over what happened.

When they reached the great hall, Phoenix passed the giant hourglasses and noticed something off. Hermione saw the brief confusion. Two hundred points lost. That put Gryffindor in last place. 'Ugh, this was why everyone hates us.' Everyone wanted to see Slytherin lose, and Gryffindor lost that chance. 'We need to figure out how to fix this.' She thought. Nothing can be done about it now, but they could work on it later. Phoenix sat next to her friends while deciding what she wanted for breakfast, Hermione leaned over for only Phoenix to hear.

"That wasn't you last night, was it?"

Phoenix filled her plate. "What makes you say that?"

Phoenix heard the annoyed sigh, "if you want to know, you acted like you haven't been in this castle for months. Everything seemed new. And you confirmed it this morning by acting shocked about the points." Phoenix took a bite of her breakfast, wishing Hermione wasn't observant all the time. "It wasn't polyjuice, was it?"

"No," was all Phoenix said. She looked around her feeling stares. Everyone had their heads down, but she noticed the disgust eyes glancing up. She looked away hearing Ron, the eyes rested back on her.

"They'll all forget this in a few weeks. Fred and George have lost loads of points in all the time they've been here, and people still like them." Ron said.

"Ron is right, Harry. I've done tones of stuff at my other school. They will eventually get over it, we just need to focus on earning points by winning Quidditch. Maybe lie low on our adventures till this blows over."

"They've never lost two hundred points in one go, though, have they?" said Harry miserably. Phoenix gave him a pat on the back. He tried to smile back, but the misery still showed.

"Well-no," Ron admitted.

"Technically Harry, you only lost Gryffindor 50 points. There were four of us." Harry looked back at her, rolling his eyes with a sad smirk. Phoenix smiled in returned.

As time went on, nothing changed. The students were still angry, but not just at Harry. Hermione, Neville and she were suffering. Normally, these things didn't bother Phoenix, but it was starting to. Nobody would speak to them. Hermione and she had stopped drawing attention to themselves in class, keeping their heads down and working in silence.

Phoenix had to focus on her emotions and breathe deeply when she was around the gossip and classes. She didn't have full control of her new power and felt herself slip in and out of visibility from time to time. Hermione and she used a code word each time this happened, which became more frequent as the days continued. The two of them were hoping no one would notice Phoenix's issue.

Her and Harry's Quidditch practice was not helping. All the players wouldn't speak to them unless they had to and they would only call them "the Seeker," and "Chaser C." Hermione had to come to practice helping monitor Phoenix as her power became worse. They changed their code word to a movement as Phoenix could not hear her. Sometimes Phoenix took her frustrations out by throwing the quaffle at her teammates when she was briefly invisible. Thankfully, Hermione was the one who knew it was her.

If they weren't at practice, the four of them would study for the upcoming exams. They kept to themselves, which helped Phoenix keep her invisibility power controlled. They helped each other remember ingredients in complicated potions, learn charms and spells by heart, memorize the dates of magical discoveries, goblin rebellion, and everything else they could think of.

Phoenix and Hermione were testing Ron on Astronomy when Harry met them. They listened to what Harry told them he'd heard.

"Snape's done it then!" said Ron. "If Quirrell's told him how to break his Anti-Dark Force Spell-."

"There's still Fluffy, though," said Hermione.

"Maybe Snape's found out how to get past him without Hagrid," said Ron, looking up at the thousands of books surrounding them. "I bet there's a book somewhere in here telling you how to get past a giant three-headed dog."

"We don't even know if it was Snape Quirrell was talking to." Phoenix piped in.

Ron rolled his eyes, "who else would he be talking to?"

She shrugged, "it could have been anyone. Harry, you only heard and saw Quirrell, right?"

"Yes."

"There is no evidence then. Maybe he was talking to himself."

"You are always quick to think it was Quirrell!"

"And you are quick to think it's Snape. You have nothing. We have no evidence."

"So, what do we do, Harry?" Ron asked.

"Go to Dumbledore. That's what we should have done ages ago. If we try anything ourselves well be thrown out for sure."

"Phoenix is right. We've got no proof!" Harry said. "Quirrell's too scared to back us up. Snape's only got to say he doesn't know how the troll got in at Halloween and that he was nowhere near the third floor-who do you think they'll believe, him or us? It's not exactly a secret we hate…. or all but Phoenix hate him. Dumbledore'll think we made it up to get him sacked. Filch wouldn't help us if his life depended on it, he's too friendly with Snape and more students get thrown out, the better, he'll think. And don't forget, we're not supposed to know about the Stone or Fluffy. That'll take a lot of explaining."

Phoenix and Hermione looked convinced, but Ron didn't. "If we just do a bit of poking around-."

"No." said Harry flatly. "We've done enough poking around." He pulled a map of Jupiter towards him and started to learn the names of its moons.

Phoenix looked at Hermione and shrugged. The conversation was over.