Hermione knew that she would have to pay for the humiliation she caused Draco, and she was right. Although Malfoy didn't bully her himself, he certainly didn't protest when Crabbe tripped her over so she went sprawling into the mud on their way back upto the castle.
She didn't mind too much though, still feeling slightly smug over the successful capture of the swarthog... at least until someone levitated a ball of swarthog poop and flung it at the back of her head. Most of the Slytherins started laughing at that.
Daphne had gone straight back to hating her now that their temporary truce was over and the other boy who had been transferred into Slytherin, Zacharias Smith, was among those who were laughing at her. She was alone.
"You guys are pigs." she yelled at them before hurrying back to the castle. She would not cry in front of them, it would rob her of the little dignity she had left.
Her first thought was to run to the place she always went to when she was upset- the library. But she was wet and covered in mud and faeces and she would be banned from the library permanently if she turned up there like that.
Instead, she hurried to her other safe place- the Gryffindor common room. Or at least, she tried to. The fat lady wouldn't let her in.
"What do you mean you can't let me in?"
"I'm sorry, Hermione. I really am. But you've been transferred to Slytherin for this year. I can't let a Slytherin in." The Fat Lady's expression was full of pity as she took in Hermione's state of dress and it was all she could do not to start crying then and there.
"But what about my clothes and my trunk?"
"They've already been transferred to the Slytherin common room."
"But I don't even know where that is. And I have fifteen minutes left before my next class begins. I need to get changed and take a shower fast."
"I can't help you dear." the Fat lady shook her head sadly.
Hermione forced a smile onto her face.
"Thanks anyway." She debated what to do for a few seconds before she took off running in the direction of the prefect bathrooms.
Thank God. She thought as the door swung open with the password. If the password had been changed then she would be in a huge mess.
She stripped off her clothes and got into the swimming-pool sized bathtub. She dunked herself under water, scrubbing herself off as fast as she could, she only had a few minutes left for her next class and she still had to clean her clothes.
She thought she heard a sound and she froze. She was crouching beside the tub, naked, trying to scrub the mud off her clothes.
"Hello?" she called.
The bathroom was silent.
"Is anyone there?" she called again.
Suddenly Draco's head popped up from beneath a mound of bubbles in the tub. Hermione screamed and clutched at her wet clothes trying to cover herself.
"What the hell are you doing, Malfoy?" she shrieked so shrilly that it hurt her own ears. "Don't you knock? Do you have no common sense? Clearly the bathroom was occupied. How long have you been there for?"
"Relax, Granger. I was just here for the same thing you were. Besides, it's not like you have anything worth seeing to hide. You're the ugliest mudblood I've ever seen."
Hermione was almost speechless with anger and embarrassment.
"Just- just turn around so I can put my bloody clothes on."
"Make me." Draco smirked.
Furious, Hermione grabbed her wand and cast a bat bogey hex on him. Draco hadn't actually expected her to do anything so he was caught unawares. She dried her clothes quickly with a charm and tugged them on while Draco did his best to stop the bats flying out of his nose. She ran from the bathroom, more embarrassed than she'd ever been before.
She hoped he hadn't seen anything. She thanked her lucky stars that she hadn't seen anything that would have scarred her mentally for life.
She ran to her transfiguration class, barely able to make it on time.
She'd been looking forward to her transfiguration class, mostly because it was with the Gryffindors and after spending the morning with the Slytherins, she wanted to be with her friends. But when she got to McGonagall's classroom, she didn't see Ron or Harry.
Or any of her friends.
In fact, all of the Gryffindors were missing. She waited expectantly for them to come back from their potions class but they never showed. By the end of the class, Hermione was a mixture of worried and annoyed.
How could all the Gryffindors bunk class together?...Unless...something had happened.
When she gathered the courage to interrupt Professor McGonagall's class and asked her where all the Gryffindors were, the look McGonagall gave her scared her a little bit.
"You mean to say you haven't heard what happened?"
"Heard what?" she asked, alarmed.
Pansy was on fire. Literally. In every spot the potion touched, small flames erupted. The exploded potion had hit Pansy first, which was why she was the first to catch fire. The next to start burning was Ron.
Pansy was so busy screaming at Ron and being screamed at by Slughorn that she didn't even notice that her skin was burning until the flames had spread to other people and the entire class erupted in screams of panic.
Michael Corner was the first person to react. "Douse them with fire." he screamed before shouting "Augumenti"and fired a jet of water at the person nearest to him- Harry.
The flames Harry was engulfed in went out for a few seconds but then they were back with even more force.
The entire class was in chaos. The fire had spread to the other potions and three other cauldrons had already exploded. Even Slughorn was panicking.
"Never try to put out a potion-induced fire with water." he was yelling. "It might react with the potion and make the fire worse."
"So what do we DO?" someone yelled.
Students scrambled for the door, trying to get away from the flames.
It was Luna who finally figured out a solution.
"Its because of the fire wrinxes. You have to blow out the flames like birthday candles." she shouted happily, above all the commotion.
She started blowing out the small flames which covered her arms, but this time, the flames stayed out.
"I know a spell that can solve this." Michael yelled. He pointed his want at the ceiling and yelled "Ventus."
A gust of wind sped through the room, and rapidly extinguished all the flames, but not before knocking over most of the tables in the room and the remaining cauldrons that hadn't exploded.
The room was a wreck. Most people were covered in blistering red burns, half of Pansy's hair had been singed off and Ron's left eyebrow was missing.
The only sound in the class was that of Luna giggling. "It was a birthday party. For the fire wrinxes. Wasn't it fun?"
Slughorn took a deep breath. "I think we should all go to the hospital wing. And Parkinson, Weasley, I've changed my mind. Make that detention for a week."
A/N: this ch isn't the best, I know. I've been pretty ill recently and I felt like I needed to upload something. I'll probably improve it when I edit :((
