"Depulso!" The stack of books flew backward, hitting the wall and falling to the ground. Neville gave an impressed thumbs up to Lydia Cooden, who had cast the spell. The fifth-year Gryffindor beamed back at him toothily.
"That was great, Lydia. Try it a couple more times and then I think you can move on to Parvati's group." Neville said, reassembling the stack for her as he tried not to yawn. He was tired, very tired. He, Susan, and Terry had snuck off late last night to sift through spellbooks in the library. After much discussion, they had come up with a list of twelve spells to begin learning at the meeting. Lots of trial and error was involved, at one point his sleeve was set on fire, but they were satisfied with their selection.
Lydia brandished her wand again and Neville looked on proudly. A couple of feet away, Parvati was leading Demelza Robins and Marcus Fenwick in learning a simple protection charm. Across the room, Michael and Terry had teamed up and were teaching a dozen members the Patronus Charm. Michael waved his wand and a silvery dolphin erupted from it, circling around Terry's already-present whale. The crowd oohed and aahed as the patronuses swam through the air. Susan occupied one corner of the room and was in the process of explaining Revelio to a group of Ravenclaws and Gryffindors. Ernie was located in another corner, teaching his group about shield spells.
"How're we doing on time, Gin?" Neville called out, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand. He turned to look at Ginny and Luna, who were watching the room with proud looks on their faces.
Ginny checked her watch and frowned slightly. "It's quarter to ten, damn. Slytherin patrols stopped at nine-thirty and they'll resume again at ten."
"Gotcha. Oi, listen up!" The activity in the Room of Requirement died down as everybody turned their eyes towards Neville and Ginny. "We're going to end tonight right now, great job everybody. We'll pick up where we left off next week. I want everybody to come to the next meeting with at least three useful spells they want to learn. Thanks for a great meeting."
Dumbledore's Army cheered. They quickly split off into small groups of twos and threes arranged by house as they had been taught to do. A wave of Ravenclaws left first. Anthony and Michael shared their goodbye with Neville before ducking out the door. The Hufflepuffs exited next in tight clusters, filing out until it was just the Gryffindors left.
"Great job, captain. See you in the morning." Ginny winked at Neville before ushering Jimmy Peakes and Natalie MacDonald out the door. Neville watched carefully as everybody slowly left the room until it was just a couple of people left. He took one last sweep of the room before muttering "Knox!" and leading the two Gryffindor girls in his group out the door.
"Great meeting tonight, Neville!" A pretty sixth year that he knew as Emilia Insley said brightly as the three of them walked up a staircase that would bring them to the Gryffindor Common Room.
"Really? Thanks." Neville said, trying not to sound too pleased with himself. "It wasn't all me, though. I can't take all the credit."
"Well, you deserve recognition," Savannah, Alicia Spinnet's fourth-year sister, told him sweetly, her tanned cheeks flushed with excitement. "You're our new Harry Potter!"
Neville chuckled smiled down at her. "Thanks, Savannah. I wouldn't go as far as to say that but I'm glad that me, Terry, and Susan are filling the spot that he, Ron, and Hermione left."
"You're doing a wonderful job," Emilia assured him, putting her hand on his shoulder. "It's only been a week and I feel much more confident with my shield spells."
"That isn't Longbottom, is it?" A voice from behind them suddenly spoke up, making Neville freeze on the spot. His fear came true as he saw a foul faced Slytherin named Malcolm Baddock approaching them, flanked by two of his housemates. He recognized Goyle as one of them, the other was unknown to him but equally as mean-looking as his companions.
"You're not supposed to be lurking the halls at this hour, I may have to report you lot," Baddock sneered. His eyes darted to Emilia and Savannah, who had emerged from behind Neville cautiously. "And what's this? Having a little rendezvous, are we?"
Goyle and the other Slytherin let out hollow, goolish laughs. Neville could feel the nerves building up in his body as the trio closed in on them. He looked around subtly, hoping to find a way out.
"Who knew you had game, Longbottom? Though this one is a little young, don't you think?" Baddock clucked his tongue in disapproval and poked Savannah with his wand. The fourth-year swatted away at it angrily.
"These two had detention tonight but were nervous walking around the halls this late so Professor McGonagall told me to find them and walk them back to the Gryffindor Common Room," Neville said quickly before Savannah could let out a nettled retort. He lowered his eyes so the Slytherin couldn't see his fearful expression. He hated the fact that any member of Slytherin, from Snape to Baddock, could make him so speechless with fear. "I am a prefect, after all," he managed to choke out.
Baddock leaned in and Neville could smell his foul breath as he opened his mouth. "Your Head of House should know that only Slytherin prefects are allowed to walk the halls past nine o'clock."
"She didn't want to bother you with such a minor request," Neville lied through gritted teeth. He could sense Emilia's nervousness and Savannah's growing temper and silently willed the two of them to follow his lead.
"I don't believe that for a bloody second," Baddock barked out through a laugh. Neville winced and waited for what was going to come next. "I think these ladies here are scared of us."
"No that's not what-" Neville was stopped by a sniffle from his left. He turned to see that it had come from Emilia, who was wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her uniform.
"That's kind of you to lie for us, Neville, but you know the truth," she said breathily, allowing her curtain of blonde hair to fall across her face. "Savannah and I knew that detention would run late so we begged Neville to bring us back. Nobody knew about it but us." The three Slytherins stared at her in wonder.
Neville opened his mouth but was once again interrupted. As if done by magic, Savannah suddenly had tears running down her cheeks. "We're sorry, it won't happen again," she seamlessly added on in a blubbering voice. She looked up at the Slytherins with wide, reddened eyes.
Two of the Slytherins had suspicious glares on their faces once they had turned away from Emilia but Baddock was still grinning stupidly at her.
"We should report this to the Headmaster." Goyle murmured to the leader of the pack.
"Nonsense, Goyle. No point in reporting such an insignificant event to the Headmaster. I think these ladies have learned their lesson, haven't they?" Baddock smirked, playing with the hem of Emilia's skirt. She yanked it out of his grip with a scowl as Savannah nodded vigorously. He turned back to the other Slytherins and jerked his head down the hall. "Let's go, boys. Patrol is ending soon." He spun on his heels and walked down the hall towards the dungeons. The unknown Slytherin boy scurried after him.
Goyle yanked Neville's tie as he walked past and pulled the Gryffindor close. "Make sure this doesn't happen again Longbottom, yeah?" He hissed.
Neville nodded quickly, pulling himself out of Goyle's grip. He ushered Savannah and Emilia away from the Slytherins as quickly as they could. The three of them hastily hurried towards the Gryffindor Common Room, not speaking until they had climbed through the portrait hole.
"That was too close," Neville gasped out in relief.
"I hate Slytherins," Savannah mumbled under her breath, wiping the small beads of sweat off her forehead.
"Where'd you two learn to cry like that?" Neville demanded, turning to look at the two girls in amazement. "You were so convincing!"
Savannah and Emilia looked at each other and shrugged. "It's a girl thing," they chorused in unison. "And a Veela thing," Emilia added as an afterthought.
Neville gaped at her. "You're part Veela?" That explained the light trance she had managed to put the Slytherins under for a brief period of time. Not to mention all the heads she turned by simply walking down the hall. "You know, that could come in handy at some point." Emilia beamed, pleased with his answer.
They were interrupted by Ginny storming down the girl's dormitory staircase towards them, already wearing her dressing gown. "Where the hell have you been?" She demanded, finally reaching them and wrapping her arms around Savannah. "Your sister would've killed me if you had gotten hurt in any way." She addressed the fourth year.
"We're only a little late. It's fine, Ginny," Savannah said, her voice muffled by Ginny's shoulder. She rolled her eyes but allowed herself to be coddled nevertheless.
"We ran into a couple of Slytherins patrolling the halls," Neville explained with a frown. "We're just going to have to get better at timing the ends of meetings."
Ginny sighed, nodding. "You're right." She hooked arms with Savannah and Emilia, guiding them towards the girl's dormitories. "Come on, Vannie, Emmy, it's late. You too, Nev, get to bed."
"Yeah, I'll do that. Night girls." He waved and watched them disappear up the staircase before collapsing at a desk chair in the corner of the common room with a heavy sigh. It was too close of a call for his liking. If it was any Slytherin other than Baddock, they would've turned them into Snape for sure. He shuddered to think what Malfoy would've done. Neville was determined to make sure that an event like that would never happen again. With a plan slowly hatching in his mind, he grabbed a loose piece of parchment and a quill from the desk and began to work.
"What is this?" Parvati asked, clearly confused when Neville slapped a piece of parchment down in front of her the next morning.
"What does it look like?" Neville whispered from beside her, glancing to make sure that Alecto wasn't looking at him from her spot at the front of the room. He was relieved to see that she was sitting at her desk, paging through their awful Ministry-issued Muggle Studies textbook.
Parvati studied the paper for a little while then said decidedly, "it's a schedule, complete with routes of the castle."
"I don't want anything like last night to ever happen again, it was too close of a call. It's getting too risky, we can't get caught by the Slytherins," Neville explained.
"Neat," Seamus complimented, leaning over Neville's shoulder to peer down at the paper.
"Stop talking!" Alecto suddenly shrieked from her desk, rising up from her chair as she glared down at the trio. Neville yanked the parchment off the table and hastily shoved it into his sleeve before the professor could get her greedy hands on it. Parvati and Seamus immediately slumped in their seats, returning to working on the assignment originally given to them.
"Distracting other students, are we, Longbottom?" Alecto dismounted the platform her desk was on, not breaking eye contact with him. She walked down the aisle of desks, dragging her wand across the wooden tabletops. Immediately the parchment that the students were working on caught fire.
Lavender shrieked, batting at her flaming paper with the textbook. Seamus cursed and pulled out his wand, uttering a spell that only made the fire grow bigger. Finally, Parvati shouted "Aguamenti!" and aimed her wand at her paper first, then at the fiasco that was Seamus and Lavender's desk. The pair, though doused in water, let out a simultaneous sigh of relief. Parvati turned to the professor with a furious look on her pretty face. "We weren't done with those," she said through gritted teeth, stating the obvious.
"What a pity, guess you'll have to start all over again," Alecto sneered, spinning on her heels to return to her desk. As an afterthought, she looked back at Neville. "Don't let me catch you being a distraction again, Longbottom. I was feeling nice this time. Next time it'll be your hair, not your assignment. Understand?"
"Understood," Neville muttered, averting his eyes.
"Good." Alecto spun around once more and slinked back to her desk. "You kiddies are much worse than I thought you would be. Seems like something will have to be done about that."