"Y'know, last year I thought he was letting up, but he's right back into it, huh?"
"Last year he had me to pick on," Harry told Neville.
"Man, that's right! Someone in the DA said you had to take Remedial Potions!"
Harry didn't need reminding about "Remedial Potions."
Pushing desks out of the way, Harry managed to summon an extended cushioning charm mat that would prevent the worst impact if they fell. He'd brought some golf balls(conveniently available in the quidditch supply closet) for targets, and Neville'd had the presence of mind to bring some lighter plastic pots for the same purpose.
"Look, Harry. . .I need to tell you something." He looked miserable. "My wand's been acting up. It works, but half the time it's way too much, and it does things when I'm not even trying. You don't think I've broken it already?"
Harry was flabbergasted. "Neville, how could you have broken it when it's still in one piece?"
"I don't know. Knowing me, I could have done something weird to it. And it's not like I can get a new one, or get it checked out."
"Neville, that's ins-" he changed his wording at the last second. "that's a bit unlikely, isn't it? A wand that chooses you is supposed to be more effective than someone else's, right?"
"I know, but no one else is setting their pants on fire by accident."
Harry declined to inquire further.
"Okay, look. Let's just test it out. We'll both use the same spell a couple times and see what happens."
The pots made easier targets, but they were thin and light, and the tiny golf balls seemed easier to repair. After some finagling to set up targets in a way that was least likely to damage school property, they dumped the pots on the desks and just took turns hovering golf balls for each other. They decided the reductor curse had enough berth that target size wouldn't matter.
As long as his wand kept level, Neville did fine on hovering, and Harry splintered the plastic coating on the balls cleanly. When it was Neville's turn, he was too reluctant to even begin.
"R-reducto," he stated weakly. Harry raised an eyebrow.
Neville took a deep breath and stood up straight. "Reducto!"
White dust exploded back into the wall. Some of the grains were clearly sharp, judging by the scratches on the floor. There were at least three different materials in the wreckage and Harry cursed the idea of repairing them.
"Never mind that-Scourgify!" Harry turned to Neville, who was cowering back. "So was that supposed to be a medium cast?" He nodded as Harry walked more dust to a trash bin.
"I have a theory," Harry stated, pacing a bit. "You said this is a new wand, Ollivander approved."
"Uh, yeah."
"And before, your grandma made you use your dad's wand."
Neville nodded.
"When your wand broke and you had to use," he wracked his brain, "uh, wait. Ginny's wand, right? Did that feel different than using your dad's wand?"
If his memory was wrong, Neville didn't correct him. "No, I couldn't tell much difference. We were sort of rushed. It's just this one that feels all. Enthusiastic."
"How different does it feel?" Harry asked eagerly.
"I mean, I wave it to cast and spells just happen."
Harry's mouth twitched and he resisted the urge to inform Neville that was what wands were supposed to do, but he noticed anyway. "I mean, I know."
"It's okay, Neville. What I wanted to say is, when you were learning how to cast spells, maybe you learned to force things through? So the wand's fine, you just need to moderate a bit."
Neville gulped, unconvinced. "I can try that."
"If you hospitalize Snape first I'll help you every day," Harry said acidly. "You should get started on those advanced shields."
After glaring at the textbook's index, they found that the chapter on dementors covered some powerful shield charms, but not in depth. By the time they actually found the passages Professor McGonagall had come to scold them back to their dormitory.
Before the next lesson, they met twice to practice what they'd found. Protego duo was a powerful but otherwise generic shield that both of them stuttered over. Protego diabolica produced some cold blue flames when Neville tried it out, but they didn't seem to deflect spells or even block Harry's movement.
Protego horribilis created a permanent wall that glittered with a transparent sheen from one side but vanished from sight at the other. After cycling through each of the incantations, they devoted the majority of their final practice to strengthening Neville's wall until it completely defended him on one side, from various spells and even Harry's thrown shoe.
"If it's this good, I bet he'll tell me not to use it," sighed Neville. "I guess it's something."
/
The first lesson was the duo variant and all told, the demonstration didn't go as badly as it could've. Snape still demanded a nonverbal cast that Neville couldn't produce, but after seeing Neville using the spell effectively he became bored. Neville was allowed back to his seat in short order, and with a muttering jab his eyebrows returned to a very ordinary length. The next lesson featuring the wall variant went fantastically, and Neville received a brief round of cheers with a fist pump from Harry for his efforts.
Watching Neville perform increasingly complex shields against both students and their professor was exhilarating, and not just because Harry experienced him practice. Any spells Neville cast during class were blatantly his own accomplishment and the glower on Snape's face when he tested one said their progress was beyond his estimations. It was exactly what Harry had been looking for since Neville had canceled the horn tongue hex.
Snape, of course, could read their minds, and Harry knew he was going to be targeted by association. But he finally felt like he was winning something against Snape. Usually.
Harry wasn't sure what it was. Maybe Ron and Dean clapping Neville on the shoulders, Hermione congratulating him and diving into some semantics on the theory behind wards, or the fact that their next class started with Neville's mysterious blue flames repelling any curse Snape came up with. In fact, probably all of these things together incensed Snape beyond the ordinary. He didn't even condescendingly explain what the blue flames did before his wrath began.
"Theory," Snape spat, "understanding, is of the most importance in dealing with the Dark Arts."
Reckon you've got more than enough understanding, Harry thought to himself, and Snape knew it based on the flash in his eyes when they made eye contact.
"The most powerful curses cannot be combated at all-only avoided, evaded, forestalled. To approach Fiendfyres without knowledge of how they develop is suicide. To utilize even a simple charm in one's defense without understanding how it will react to one's surroundings can cause unforeseen damage, or merely waste time."
He glared at Neville on this note.
"For the rest of class, you will sort every spell to your knowledge by all of its associated alchemical elements. While elementary, it is the first step to understanding spell reactivity. You will further describe the mechanism by which magical energy is transformed for no fewer than thirty of these spells.
"And Longbottom," Snape intoned in cold burning quiet, "you will be sparring with me personally every class until you can last three minutes performing nonverbally."
/
The bloody written assignment was too much for anyone to finish without hitting the library. The entire library, in fact, as no one book did the job. Hermione had been besieged by pretty much every Gryffindor in their year for help, to the point that Harry and Neville just joined them all to commit strength in numbers. This did not fix the issue of Snape targeting Neville for his spellwork.
They'd gotten in the habit of walking down to breakfast together to speak in brief privacy. On a morning when Ron was at the table and fixed in conversation with Seamus, Harry whispered for Neville to follow him. They walked quietly behind the two and and found a sparse area at the end of the table.
"Alright, here's good."
"What about Ron?" Neville asked Harry, grabbing pancakes onto his plate.
"Ron and Hermione could use more time to themselves," he said with a significant look. This was half the truth. He also had no new evidence against Malfoy and didn't feel like talking to Ron and Hermione after they'd dismissed him again the previous night.
Spending this much time with Neville kept Harry's mood afloat. He'd felt distantly attached to Neville since their first year, and moreso after discovering the fate of Neville's parents in the line of opposing Voldemort. The prophecy that could have concerned either of them felt bizarrely natural at its core, giving shape to a connection that he'd been aware of without pursuing. But then, it was because of the prophecy that both their families had suffered their tragic ends. . .
Neville wiped his mouth on his sleeve while still chewing. "Do I have something on my face?"
"What?" Harry snapped out of his reverie. Neville observed him.
"You sure you're getting enough sleep lately, Harry?" He asked in straight-faced concern. "You've been a bit out of sorts whenever we talk."
Harry didn't feel like sharing. "I was just thinking what we could do about nonverbal casting. I don't have much luck with it either. We could go over basic stuff verbally and then nonverbally and work our way up."
Neville winced. "What sort of basic stuff?"
Lumos and levitation were easy enough. Colloportus was not, but they both managed it in time to unlock the door right before McGonagall kicked them out.
Neville was no better at switching spells then he had been a few years prior, and Harry still hadn't cast one nonverbally when they gave up for that night.
They moved on to offensive spells and left the targets set down. Neville eventually managed to hit the desk instead of the wall, but he still couldn't aim a stun if his life depended on it. He was actually getting worse.
"I could swear it goes a different way every time," he muttered at a pot.
"It will if you keep saying 'stupefy' at different points in the cast."
"There's so much movement."
"We can come back to it later," Harry insisted, thinking, Or never.
Three meetings later, Neville still hadn't performed any of the spells he could actually do normally without saying them out loud, and worse, Harry hadn't noticed. It had taken him entirely too long to realize how fast Neville resorted to cheating it and just how low Neville's whispers could be.
"I just don't think I can, Harry," he burst out glumly. Harry observed him.
"Okay, well, try this." Harry scribbled on some parchment from McGonagall's bin and pressed it on Neville.
"L-"
"Nonverbally."
Harry set his glasses down safely and could still tell he was getting an incredulous look.
"Do it, you can! No whispering!"
With a flick of movement, Harry was hoisted by his ankle as expected. Neville sputtered while Harry burst out laughing.
"I've never done that before!" cried Neville's upside down blur.
"But you did it, I told you! Now put me down with the next one!"
He fell straight down and pushed out his arms to avoid breaking his neck. His shoulder slammed into the floor. "OW!"
He crumpled as Neville yelped and rushed over. They both tried to apologize in between Harry making pained noises. Neville was still panicking while trying to jerk him up by the arm. "Are you sure you're okay? I'm really sorry, really."
"It's my fault, I knew that would happen. Would've got the mat down if I'd thought at all." He grabbed Neville's shoulder for balance while straightening up. He could see Neville clearly this close. When they made eye contact, his mouth was dry.
Harry lifted his hand and Neville pulled back, nervous grin in place. "You. . .know more about what I can do than I do."
"Always have. I was just waiting for you to catch up."
Neville laughed at his confidence, blurry again. "It's practically ten. I have some moonflowers to check on. They'll be everywhere if we don't get the seed pods off. . ."
Harry replaced his glasses as they reorganized the room. They stopped outside the door upon leaving. They were still trading grins infectiously.
"I just wanted to say, thanks." Neville leaned up and hugged Harry.
For maybe five long seconds Harry was impossibly light. The moment stretched an eternity and still Neville released him before he could react.
"This was fun," Neville said with a smile up at him, and turned away.
Harry, feeling pleasantly mollified, watched Neville walk up the corridor. He was smiling across his entire face without realizing it.
Boys didn't usually hug Harry unless he'd just caught the snitch, which made a good excuse for why he felt like he'd won the quidditch cup again. It figured Neville wouldn't care about the strangeness of being that close to him, he thought.
There were several nice things in the world that Harry was aware of, but did not think about. This was because they were unlikely, and therefore not relevant to his already challenging life.
The first was the way that Bill Weasley's ponytail suited him with that single ear piercing. Another had been the confused thrill of Cedric talking to Harry about taking a bath in the prefects' special bathroom. Then, long-standing, there was the sudden ease in how Neville could smile at him if Harry said the right thing.
They were pleasant, but did not require his imagination to be enjoyed. He kept solid thought at a distance from these feelings. If he needed to think in words or images it was not the time to feel. . .any of that. He wasn't avoiding the issue, really, it was just the safest way to engage. He walked back to the common room, tripping over a suit of armor and nearly knocking it down before taking a wrong turn and having to double back.
He eventually pushed off the feeling of Neville hugging him so that he could focus on his sense of direction. Still, Harry went to bed with the his ulterior motives multiplying. Getting back at Snape was good, but so was meeting this new version of Neville that kept getting braver.