AN: Good morning everyone and happy Tuesday. I am very sorry for not updating sooner but things beyond my control made it very difficult to update. My laptop died shortly after Christmas and I had end of year filing. I have a borrowed laptop at the moment and I hope that I will be able to use it until I can purchase a replacement. Once again anything you recognize is JK Rowling's and anything you don't is mine.
Luna POV
Neville tightened his arm around my shoulder as Hermione started to talk. It was a little distracting but I tried to pay attention to what Hermione was saying.
"Well… erm… well, you know why you're here. Erm… well, Harry here had the idea — I Mean," Harry had thrown Hermione a dark glance, "I had the idea — that it might be good if people who wanted to study Defense Against the Dark Arts - and I mean, really study it, you know, not the rubbish that Umbridge is doing with us —" Hermione's voice was getting stronger and she was standing taller, "— because nobody could call that Defense Against the Dark Arts —"
"Hear hear!" Anthony Goldstein yelled, shaking his fist. Hermione beamed brightly.
"— Well, I thought it would be good if we, well, took matters into our own hands." She paused, looked sideways at Harry, and went on, "And by that I mean learning how to defend ourselves properly, not just in theory but doing the real spells —"
"You want to pass your Defense Against the Dark Arts OWL too, though, I bet?" Michael Corner asked snidely, who was watching her closely.
"Of course I do," Hermione said at once. "But more than that, I want to be properly trained in defense because… because…" She took a great breath and finished in a rush, "because Lord Voldemort is back."
The reaction was immediate and predictable. One of the mean Ravenclaw girls shrieked and slopped Butterbeer down herself; Terry Boot gave a kind of involuntary twitch; Padma Patil shuddered, and Neville gave an odd yelp that he managed to turn into a cough. I giggled and pressed my lips tightly together but I was the only one who had laughed. Everyone else had turned to Harry excitedly to see how he would react. He didn't even blink.
"Well… that's the plan, anyway," Hermione said. "If you want to join us, we need to decide how we're going to —"
"Where's the proof You-Know-Who's back?" A blond Hufflepuff player said in a rather aggressive voice.
"Well, Dumbledore believes it —" Hermione began.
"You mean, Dumbledore believes him," the blond boy said, nodding at Harry who was staring blankly out the window.
"Who are you?" Ron asked, rather rudely.
"Zacharias Smith," the boy said, "and I think we've got the right to know exactly what makes him say You-Know-Who's back."
"Look," Hermione said, intervening swiftly, "that's really not what this meeting was supposed to be about —"
"It's OK, Hermione," Harry said turning his head slowly to look at everyone in the room. There was a rather sad air of resignation about him.
"What makes me say You-Know-Who's back?" he repeated, looking Zacharias straight in the face. "I saw him. But Dumbledore told the whole school what happened last year, and if you didn't believe him, you won't believe me, and I'm not wasting an afternoon trying to convince anyone."
Everyone in the group seemed to have held their breath while Harry spoke.
"All Dumbledore told us last year was that Cedric Diggory got killed by You-Know-Who and that you brought Diggory's body back to Hogwarts. He didn't give us details, he didn't tell us exactly how Diggory got murdered, I think we'd all like to know —" Zacharias started angrily but Harry cut him off.
"If you've come to hear exactly what it looks like when Voldemort murders someone I can't help you," He snapped his eyes flashing. For a moment they looked red but it happened so fast I doubted it had been real. "I don't want to talk about Cedric Diggory, all right? So if that's what you're here for, you might as well clear out."
Harry cast an angry look in Hermione's direction. Neville's arm tightened and I shifted myself closer to him.
"So," Hermione said, her voice very high-pitched again. "So… like I was saying… if you want to learn some defense, then we need to work out how we're going to do it, how often we're going to meet and where we're going to —"
"Is it true," interrupted a girl with a long plait down her back, looking at Harry, "that you can produce a Patronus?"
My eyes widened in shock and Neville gaped at Harry.
"Yeah,' Harry said slightly defensively.
"A corporeal Patronus?"
"Er - you don't know Madam Bones, do you?" he asked.
The girl smiled.
"She's my auntie,' she said. "I'm Susan Bones. She told me about your hearing. So - is it really true? You make a stag Patronus?"
"Yes," Harry said.
"Blimey, Harry!" A Gryffindor boy with dreadlocks said, looking deeply impressed. "I never knew that!"
"Mum told Ron not to spread it around," Fred Weasley said, grinning at Harry. "She said you got enough attention as it was."
"She's not wrong," Harry mumbled, and Neville and I laughed.
"And did you kill a Basilisk with that sword in Dumbledore's office?" Terry Boot demanded. "That's what one of the portraits on the wall told me when I was in there last year…"
"Er — yeah, I did, yeah," Harry said.
Justin Finch-Fletchley whistled; the Creevey brothers exchanged awestruck looks and Lavender Brown said "Wow!" softly. Harry was blushing and shifted nervously.
"And in our first year," Neville said to the group at large, "he saved that Philological Stone —"
"Philosopher's," Hermione hissed.
"Yes, that - from You-Know-Who," Neville finished.
Hannah Abbott's eyes were as round as Galleons.
"And that's not to mention," it was the pretty mean girl talking and she only had eyes for Harry, "all the tasks he had to get through in the Triwizard Tournament last year - getting past dragons and merpeople and Acromantula and things…"
'Look,' Harry said after a moment, "I… I don't want to sound like I'm trying to be modest or anything, but… I had a lot of help with all that stuff…"
"Not with the dragon, you didn't," Michael Corner said at once. That was a seriously cool bit of flying…"
"Yeah, well —" Harry said, feeling it would be churlish to disagree.
"And nobody helped you get rid of those Dementors this summer," Susan Bones said.
"No," Harry said, "no, OK, I know I did bits of it without help, but the point I'm trying to make is —"
"Are you trying to weasel out of showing us any of this stuff?" Zacharias Smith said. Most of the people in the room turned to glare at him.
"Here's an idea," Ron said loudly, before Harry could speak, "why don't you shut your mouth?"
"Well, we've all turned up to learn from him and now he's telling us he can't really do any of it," he said.
"That's not what he said," Fred snarled.
"Would you like us to clean out your ears for you?" George enquired, pulling a long and lethal looking metal instrument from inside one of the Zonko's bags.
"Or any part of your body, really, we're not fussy where we stick this," Fred said.
"Yes, well," Hermione said hastily, "moving on… the point is, are we agreed we want to take lessons from Harry?"
There was a murmur of general agreement.
"Right," Hermione said, looking relieved that something had at last been settled. "Well, then, the next question is how often we do it. I really don't think there's any point in meeting less than once a week —"
"Hang on," Angelina said, 'we need to make sure this doesn't clash with our Quidditch practice."
"No," Cho said, "nor with ours."
"Nor ours," Zacharias Smith added.
"I'm sure we can find a night that suits everyone," Hermione said, slightly impatiently, "but you know, this is rather important, we're talking about learning to defend ourselves against V-Voldemort's Death Eaters —"
"Well said!" Ernie Macmillan barked. "Personally I think this is really important, possibly more important than anything else we'll do this year, even with our OWLs coming up!"
He looked around impressively, as though waiting for people to cry "Surely not!" When nobody spoke, he went on, "I, personally am at a loss to see why the Ministry has foisted such a useless teacher on us at this critical period. Obviously, they are in denial about the return of You-Know-Who, but to give us a teacher who is trying to actively prevent us from using defensive spells —"
"We think the reason Umbridge doesn't want us trained in Defense Against the Dark Arts," Hermione said, "is that she's got some… some mad idea that Dumbledore could use the students in the school as a kind of private army. She thinks he'd mobilize us against the Ministry."
Nearly everybody looked stunned at this news; everybody looked stunned but it didn't bother me. "Well, that makes sense. After all, Cornelius Fudge has got his own private army."
"What?" Harry asked looking bewildered.
"Yes, he's got an army of Heliopaths," I said solemnly.
"No, he hasn't,' Hermione snapped.
"Yes, he has," I said ignoring her.
"What are Heliopaths?" Neville asked, looking blank.
"They're spirits of fire," I said my eyes widening, "great tall flaming creatures that gallop across the ground burning everything in front of —"
"They don't exist, Neville," Hermione tartly said.
"Oh, yes, they do!" I said angrily.
"I'm sorry, but where's the proof of that?" Hermione snapped.
"There are plenty of eye-witness accounts. Just because you're so narrow-minded you need to have everything shoved under your nose before you —"
"Hem, hem," Ginny said, in such a good imitation of Professor Umbridge that several people looked around in alarm and then laughed. Neville slipped his hand into mine and squeezed it. I blew out a heavy breath and relaxed back in my chair. "Weren't we trying to decide how often we're going to meet and have defense lessons?"
"Yes," Hermione said at once, "yes, we were, you're right, Ginny."
"Well, once a week sounds cool," Lee Jordan said.
"As long as —" Angelina began.
"Yes, yes, we know about the Quidditch," Hermione said in a tense voice. "Well, the other thing to decide is where we're going to meet…"
This was rather more difficult; the whole group fell silent.
"Library?" Katie Bell suggested after a few moments.
"I can't see Madam Pince being too chuffed with us doing jinxes in the library," Harry said.
"Maybe an unused classroom?" Dean said.
"Yeah," Ron said, "McGonagall might let us have hers, she did when Harry was practicing for the Triwizard."
"Right, well, we'll try to find somewhere," Hermione said. "We'll send a message round to everybody when we've got a time and a place for the first meeting.'
She rummaged in her bag and produced parchment and a quill, then hesitated, rather as though she was steeling herself to say something.
"I — I think everybody should write their name down, just so we know who was here. But I also think," she took a deep breath, "that we all ought to agree not to shout about what we're doing. So if you sign, you're agreeing not to tell Umbridge or anybody else what we're up to."
Fred reached out for the parchment and cheerfully wrote his signature, but I noticed at once that several people looked less than happy at the prospect of putting their names on the list. Neville ignored the apprehensive looks people were giving each other and signed the parchment with a flourish. I followed a moment later.
"Er…" Zacharias said slowly, not taking the parchment that I was trying to pass to him, "well… I'm sure Ernie will tell me when the meeting is."
But Ernie was looking rather hesitant about signing, too. Hermione raised her eyebrows at him.
"I — well, we are prefects," Ernie burst out. "And if this list was found…well, I mean to say…you said yourself, if Umbridge finds out —"
"You just said this group was the most important thing you'd do this year," Harry reminded him.
"I — yes," Ernie said, "yes, I do believe that, it's just —"
"Ernie, do you really think I'd leave that list lying around?" Hermione said testily.
"No. No, of course not," Ernie said, looking slightly less anxious. "I — yes, of course I'll sign."
Nobody raised objections after Ernie. When the last person — Zacharias — had signed, Hermione took the parchment back and slipped it carefully into her bag. There was an odd feeling in the group now. It was as though we had just signed some kind of contract.
AN: Please Review! It helps so much more than you realize. Reviews make me happy and when I'm happy I think about the story more. The more I think about it the more I create new twists and turns for the story and I end up updating more. Which in the end makes everyone happy.
