Disclaimer: I don't own it. Haven't I said that enough?
A/N: This is another chapter that I hadn't originally planned. I'm sorry if it's not intensely exciting or anything, but I just kind of felt like something big was happening each chapter, and it was time to moderate the giant events a little. So here's a chapter about just progressing with things and through the school year a bit. Anyway, thanks for hanging in there.
Recently I've suddenly been receiving a lot of rather negative reviews, which is why this chapter ended up so late. I'm very sorry to those of you that are really enjoying this story, but I guess I was feeling a little wary after that sudden display of dislike from several readers. I spent several more days just re-reading my story, but I don't plan to go back and change anything. At least not yet. If I ever do, it'll become it's own story, probably. Anyway, thank you to those that read and review, and sorry to those that found this story 'pathetic' or boring.
0000000000000 Chapter 26: No SNEAKS Allowed 0000000000000
Harry put the finishing touches on his transfiguration homework carefully, having twice erased portions of his essay on the side effects of human transfiguration. McGonagall had not been pleased with his last essay's vague answers, and so he had spent extra time in the library just to be sure that he included enough specific details to keep his professor happy.
"Can you read this over now?" he asked Hermione, who took it with a nod. Ron was at a quidditch meeting to discuss the schedule of the rest of the matches of the season, so it was just him and Hermione sitting at the table, trying to finish some homework.
"Read over my charms essay, please," she said. Harry sighed and took her essay, marveling at her perfect handwriting and even lines. She only requested that he read her essays because she didn't want to seem perfect, but he knew anyway that he wouldn't be able to find any mistakes in her work.
"Sure," he agreed. "I'm warning you though—I'm not that good at catching mistakes," he joked. Hermione never made mistakes in her essays. She was much too careful for that.
Hermione gave him a mock-glare, and he focused on reading her essay over. As usual, it was more detailed and clear than his own, with the smooth transitions between topics that Flitwik always noted that Harry didn'thave. "How are you and Ron doing?" he asked, reading slowly.
Hermione looked up. "Why?" she asked.
Harry shrugged. "I just don't notice much, I guess," he admitted. He didn't really want to demand answers from her, but suddenly he just had to ask the questions that had been burning in his mind.
When Hermione regarded him silently for several moments, he decided he'd better just ask his questions before he lost his nerve.
"Do you two get enough time alone? Are you having problems because of me?" he asked. "I feel like I'm keeping you from being together sometimes," he added, trying to explain. Hermione smiled, setting down his paper in order to give him her full attention.
"Harry, don't worry about it," she said. "We started dating with the single rule that we wouldn't let our relationship come between our friendship with you. Don't ever feel like you're in the way."
"Are you sure?" he asked. Hermoine rolled her eyes.
"You asked for it," she said. She fixed him with a level stare. "Why do you think we schedule our prefect duties at the same time?" she asked. "We're not patrolling the entire time."
Harry made a face. "Ew," he commented. "Please don't tell me you 'patrol' closets."
Hermione gave him an evil smirk. "There's a very nice unused classroom on the fourth floor," she told him. Harry mock-sighed.
"Whatever happened to the sweet little innocent girl that I once knew?" Harry asked aloud. "What happened to books being her only friends?"
Hermione smacked his arm. "Well, that little girl realized that boys can be much more interesting than books, Harry," she said.
"Okay, once again: ew!" he said.
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Harry informed Ron and Hermione the next day that the first general DA meeting would be that Wednesday, which he'd figured to be the only evening that no one (except for the Slytherin Quidditch team) would have conflicts with.
"How can we trust them?" Hermione asked him, as he outlined his plans. Harry contemplated the list of last year's members, his eyes gravitating towards one name.
Marietta.
"We're going to have to be less…less informative, I guess," he said. "I don't want it to be a secret organization or whatever. That's too dangerous. It needs to be more like a real club, with meetings in the great hall or something. We practice spells, things like that, and that's it."
"What about—?" Ron asked with a significant look. Harry smiled.
"That'll be the secret organization part," he said. "Only sixth and seventh years can legally start working on it, but I figure Ginny can come too, as long as she stays quiet about it. Any more underaged kids than her, though, and we're asking for trouble that we can't afford to have."
"How's the Ministry going to know?" Ron asked. Harry gave him a look.
"They found out last year, no matter how much spying and sneaking had to go into it. Dumbledore got kicked out of here because of it. We can't ruin things between him and the Ministry anymore than they have been," he explained. "This is our thing, so let's keep it that way."
Hermione nodded agreement. "I'll look up a few more advanced security charms for the list," she said. "What about the general meetings?"
"I'll make up fliers for it," Harry said. "Post them by classrooms, so people will find them. We'll see how many show up and take it from there."
"And the other group?" Ron asked. Harry hesitated.
"Recruit quietly from the sixth and seventh years that we trust. Slytherin's probably a total loss—by this time, they're all probably willing to spy on us for Volde—Tom. But Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw…well, we know most of the sixth years, and some of the seventh years," he said. "Just keep it low-key, and don't tell them what'd we'd be working on. They have to sign first."
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"Just shut up about it," Harry cut in harshly, then looked away, embarrassed. "Sorry," he said. "I just—"
"No, no," Hermione said quickly. "It's fine. Let's talk about something else," she suggested.
She and Ron had begun talking about how much of an arse Snape was almost the instant they'd left the classroom. Harry hadn't said a word, just glad to get out of the class finally, but with every mention of that name, he had grown more and more…something. He wasn't angry, really…merely frustrated.
Didn't his friends see that it was beyond words? Snape wasn't an arse or a bloody git or a ponce or anything. He was…below everything. Below recognition.
"First Quidditch match is this coming weekend," Ron said softly, as if afraid to start up conversation once more. "Hufflepuff."
"Shouldn't be bad, right?" Harry said, willing to acknowledge Ron's attempt. "They're mostly new."
"New seeker," Ron said. "Summerby was replaced, I guess. This guy's been training for a couple years in order to replace Summerby, and now they think he's ready."
"Have you seen him fly?" Harry asked. Ron shook his head, looking grave.
"They're keeping him secret as much they can," Ron said. "I don't know if it's because he's that good, or because he's that bad."
"Does it really matter?" Hermione cut in. "I know it's important, but you can't change it. Harry's never lost the snitch to someone else before."
Harry didn't correct her. Cedric had caught the snitch before him during third year…of course, he'd been falling off his broom because of the dementors, but that didn't matter. Cedric had caught the snitch fair and square. Harry had lost that one.
"I'll catch it," Harry promised. "You know I'll do my best."
"You'd better," Ron growled. Harry knew his friend didn't mean it as a threat, but he also knew that Ron was dead serious. If Harry didn't catch the snitch…he didn't want to imagine how Ron would react.
"I want to win the cup too, Ron," he said patiently. Ron smiled forcibly.
"Let's just not get our hopes up until we've won it," he said. Harry nodded, thinking about it. It'd be great to get it…it'd be something nice to have at the end of the year, even if it really didn't matter that much overall.
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"Has everyone signed the list?" Harry asked. It had been silent for the first fifteen minutes of the first sixth and seventh year DA meeting, except for the scratch of quills as students signed their names to the new and improved list.
"Everyone's on it," Hermione said, then smiled. "Except for you, that is."
Several laughed—obviously, Harry wasn't going to betray the club that he was heading. Still, he quickly signed his messy signature onto the bottom of the list and gave it back to Hermione. "The reason we're having this…other meeting," he explained, "is because there are several things that can come in handy but need to be kept…quiet."
He stood up, unable to sit and explain his ideas, and forced himself to lean against the wall. The group consisted of about a dozen, with most being those that Harry, Ron, and Hermione knew best. Cho Chang was there, as were Ernie, Neville, Dean, Seamus, Justin and several others. All had been in the DA the year before, and all were those that Harry trusted most…except, perhaps, for Cho, but he couldn't imagine her giving information to Malfoy or Death Eaters. Not after Cedric.
"Over the summer a…friend of mine…agreed to teach me how to be an animagus—" he had to stop a second as everyone whispered excitedly, some obviously drawing the wrong conclusions from his statement. "He didn't get a chance to teach me, but I think we can probably teach ourselves. That's what this group is about."
"We're going to become animagi?" Cho asked flatly. Harry could see that Ginny, the lone fifth year, looked incredibly excited.
"We're going to start working on it, more like," he corrected. "It took my dad years to teach himself how to be an animagi," Harry said. "We have some more help, but it'll still take a lot of time and effort."
"Years?" Ernie said. Harry nodded.
"From what I've read, some people have natural talent for it, while others need lots of time," he said. "And," he added, looking around, "A very important first message in all the books has been that it can take quite a long time to become an animagi. And some people never manage it."
"When do we start?" Ginny spoke up, looking excited.
"Now," Harry said. "If that's what people want."
He looked around, watching people nod agreement slowly. "Is there anyone that wants out now?" Hermione asked. No one spoke up, and Harry turned to the desk that the Room of Requirement had so helpfully provided and took up the first book on the stack; Animagi: An Intermediate Guide.
"This is the second book I read," Harry explained. "The beginner's guide is not as technical, and mostly involves talking about the history and basics of becoming an animagi."
"We're going to read?" Seamus looked a little reluctant. Harry shook his head.
"I'm just suggesting it," he said. "Of course, it really does help a lot to know what you're going to be doing."
Seamus seemed to get it that they'd have to do a lot of reading, and he didn't look too worried about it after all.
"So what are we going to do tonight?" Cho asked. Harry held out a short stack of parchment.
"Reading list," he explained. "We're going to have to meet at least three times a week in order to actually improve at all, so by the day after tomorrow I'm expecting you all to have at least started reading this. The first thing you're supposed to do is work on your ability to focus on something. You don't have to pick anything specific to focus on, because your mind will do it for you. So be prepared to start with that."
The others all nodded, taking the parchments and reading over the list of books and page numbers that he'd given them. "You've read all of this?" Ginny asked, looking surprised. Harry nodded.
"It's really interesting, once you get into it. And Remus has been able to respond to some of my questions about things, too," he explained. The others looked thoroughly interested.
"I didn't know Professor Lupin was an animagus," Ernie said.
"His friends were," Harry said. "They hung out with Remus on the full moons."
There were several more interested faces at this fact, and Harry resigned himself to the fact that he would be answering questions for a long while yet. Of course, he told himself, many of these things he wouldn't be able to answer.
He trusted most of the group, but his parents had trust Peter Pettigrew. And it had led to their deaths.
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"Big turnout," Ron commented, eyes sliding over the throngs of students seated at the tables. Harry nodded, trying to hide his nervousness.
"Guess those fliers really worked," he said. "Er…how many are there, Hermione?"
"Close to seventy," Hermione told him, finishing her count. "Mostly younger years, though there are some fourth and fifth years. No seventh years."
"I didn't expect any," Harry admitted. "Unless they're a friend of ours, are they really going to want sixteen year olds teaching them?"
"It's probably better this way," Ron said. "No one's going to question you as much, Harry."
Harry wasn't so sure about that, taking in the dubious expressions on the small knot of Slytherin's faces. "As long as it doesn't turn into some sort of brawl," he muttered. He blinked, looking over the throng at the half-open hall doors. "Is that Dumbledore in the door there?" he asked.
Hermione and Ron's heads snapped up, and Harry could've sworn he saw the old wizard wink at him before leaving. "That was…odd, but not unexpected," Hermione said. "I was wondering if any professors were going to make appearances tonight."
"It's seven thirty," Ron said, glancing at his watch. "Ready to start?"
"All right," Harry said heavily, standing up on a small table to face the crowd. "Sonorus," he said, pointing to his throat with his wand. "I'm glad all of you could make it," he said, adjusting quickly to his now-louder voice. "This club isn't set up to contradict Professor Murkwater's lessons or teach you how to take on Death Eaters," he explained quickly. "This is about getting better at what you learn from Professor Murkwater and especially about learning to defend yourself from attacks."
He turned to his friends, and gestured for Ron to come up next to him. The redhead did reluctantly, looking worried. Harry grinned, then turned back to the crowd. "Today's going to be about shields," he said. "Ron Weasley here is going to demonstrate how to block with a very simple but very effective shield," he explained.
"Er, all right," Ron said quietly. Harry turned to face his friend, first pointing his wand at the table between them.
"Expandus," he said, and held the spell on the table until he had lengthened enough to put twenty feet between himself and Ron. Then, he pointed his wand at Ron. "Stupefy," he said.
"Protego!" Ron shouted, raising his wand. Harry smiled as the spells contacted, a short burst of blue hitting the red stunner for a brief moment.
"Protego is the basic shield that almost all of you here should know by now," Harry said, turning back to the group. "It's simple to learn the basic movement and to get the spell to work, but to put enough power behind it for it to stop nastier hexes, you have to really have it down."
"We learned this already!" someone shouted. Harry shook his head.
"But how often do you practice, really?" he asked. "There's not many chances to, are there? This is that chance. To get good at a spell, you have to practice it. A lot. Do it here. Any other questions?" he asked.
A younger looking girl raised her hand. "How is this going to help us?" she asked. Harry stared at her a moment, contemplating all the times that the simpler spells he knew had saved his life.
"Protego is just one example of a simply spell that can be very effective. It's the quick little spells that can save your life. Put it this way: if a death eater tries to silence you so you can't shout for help, you can shield against the spell and get help."
There was silence, and he assumed that there were no more questions. "Okay," he said. "Everyone needs to pair up with someone about their level. Work on Protego, and I'll come around and help those that need it."
There was a little hesitation, and Harry feared for a moment that there would be no respect for his instructions. But then everyone began to pair up, and Harry smiled and stepped down from the table, raising his wand to his throat while he did so. "Quietus," he said, then cleared his throat to check that his voice had gone back to normal.
He helped out some of the younger students, letting Ron and Hermione go around and help as well, but when he reached some of the third year and above students he had some troubles. They remembered what they'd learned from the fake Mad-Eye, and were a little more surly than the others.
A boy stopped him as he came by, looking bored. His partner stood a bit away, looking bored as well. "This is stupid," the boy told him. "We already know this spell, and we can make it work."
Harry raised and eyebrow. "Care to test it?" he asked the boy.
The boy blinked. "What…against you?" he asked. Harry nodded.
"Sure," he said. The boy swallowed.
"Oh…uh…" he stuttered. Harry stepped back a few paces.
"Be prepared," he warned. He got back about thirty feet, then raised his wand. The boy was looking at him with an expression of mingled horror and worry. "Terantellegra!" he said, purposely not putting too much force behind the curse.
The boy reacted a little slowly, but managed to get a shield up in time. The curse bounced off, though the boy staggered a step. Harry nodded. "Good," he said aloud, not really realizing that an audience was beginning to form. "Again," he said. "Petrificus Totalis!" he said, this time emphasizing the spell more.
"Protego!" the boy said, sounding more confident.
But the boy didn't stand a chance. Harry smiled slightly as the boy keeled over, his shield shattered to jagged white shards by the blast of the curse. Harry sauntered forward and undid the curse. "That was good," he said, "But that's why you have to keep working. "A sixth year is to a third year what a death eater is to any of us. We have to be prepared for their strength and their skill."
The boy seemed to get the idea, and nodded silently, looking half-embarrassed. Harry let him go, and started on to the next pair, who had nothing at all to say about the spell they were working on.
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Thursday night the secret group met again. Harry had spent several hours the night before reading about the first steps they needed to take in becoming animagi, and he felt that he had it down pretty well. He hadn't tried any of it himself, forcing himself to wait until the next day, but it looked promising.
"Did everyone read what I assign—what I asked?" Harry asked, trying to avoid sounding too teacher-ish.
There were a few nods, but some looked sheepish. "Er…I got through the first twenty pages or so," Ernie admitted. "I've been really busy," he explained. Harry nodded.
"It's your choice," he said. "But we're going to go ahead and get started tonight."
His words were met with a lot of excited expressions, and everyone visibly sat up. Harry took out the book on intermediate animagus training and flipped it open, though he didn't need to look at the book to talk.
"One of the first things to do," he started, "involves a lot of mental stuff. You have to focus on just your hand or your foot. Don't think about it becoming anything, really…think of it more like relaxing into a shape that it's always known. There's an incantation that you have to say…it's kind of difficult, but we have plenty of time to practice."
He got a lot of blank stares at that, and he thought about it a moment and tried to reword it. "There's no potion to take; well, not for this step, anyway," he said. "The incantation is 'Animagus Apparato,'" he went on. "You point your wand at your foot or hand, say that, and then concentrate like I said. The book says that if it doesn't work within about a week of trying every night, then you probably need to change what you're doing. I figure they're writing more towards an audience of adult witches and wizards, so I say about two or three weeks before we try anything different."
He noticed that several looked very worried at the prospect of it taking a month just to get a start at becoming animagi, but no one said anything. He sighed, took off his left shoe and sock, and then pointed his wand at his foot. "Animagus Apparato," he said clearly, then focused all of his attention on his foot. The spell seemed to have worked—he felt a warm tingling in his limb—but it didn't look any different.
His somewhat-ability at Occlumency made it easier for him to block out his audience, and he focused all of his attention on his foot and the idea of it almost melting into another shape. Any shape.
The tingling wore off, and his foot looked no different. He looked up at the others and smiled half-heartedly. Admittedly, he felt a little disappointed that nothing had happened, but logically he knew that the spell working on his first attempt would have been nothing short of a miracle. "See?" he said. "This is going to take a lot of work, and this is only the first step."
"Oh joy," Cho said softly, but didn't argue with him. Harry checked his watch.
"All right," he said. "We've got another hour and a half," he said, "So you can just find an area in here and practice. We'll chat right before it's time to go and I'll tell you what you can work on until tomorrow night."
Everyone got up slowly, dragging cushions and chairs around to various parts of the room and sitting down. Harry settled back in his seat again and focused on his foot. "Animagi Apparato," he said, putting as much effort as he could into the spell. The tingling was stronger this time, almost a burning, and he immediately began focusing again on his foot changing.
By the end of the hour and a half, no one had gotten anything physical to occur. Hermione thought perhaps that her hand had felt a little different for a moment, but she wasn't sure. Cho looked especially put out, but, given her rather impatient nature, Harry knew that it would bother her to have nothing happen.
As for himself, he'd had no luck at all. He was trying not to worry about it yet—after all, his dad had managed to become an animagus—and he just hoped that he'd get it after another couple of weeks.
"Work on just clearing your mind," he told everyone, reminding himself strongly of Occlumency lessons. Of course, he hadn't berated or embarrassed or humiliated anyone, so that was where the likeness seemed to end. "Before you go to sleep tonight, do it, and after tomorrow's le—meeting, and so on," he said. "It will help you to learn to focus better."
Everyone nodded, looking weary, and gradually left. Hermione was frowning at her hand, looking somewhat put out that it had not changed, and Ron was stretching stiffly. "That went pretty well," Ron finally said. Harry nodded and stood up.
"You look angry," he told Hermione jokingly. "You need to whip that hand into shape. Imagine, it disobeying you."
Hermione looked up and smiled quickly. "Just frustrated," she admitted. "I know it can take years to learn, but…well, I just was hoping that I'd get lucky, I guess."
"We've got plenty more time," Harry reminded her. "I'm just happy that we've finally started now."
Ron quickly agreed, and the three left together, headed back to Gryffindor.
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Harry could tell that Ron was keeping a very watchful eye on Malfoy. It had started after Malfoy had stopped Harry in the hallway in order to tell him that 'if he ever messed in a Malfoy's business again, he wouldn't live long enough to regret it.'
Ron seemed to have taken that threat seriously, and Harry almost wanted to yell at Ron to stop being so damn protective. It wasn't like Malfoy could do anything to him at Hogwarts, and it wasn't as if he planned to let Malfoy do anything to him.
After getting his 'revenge' on Malfoy, he really didn't feel like being bothered by the Slytherin teen. There were so many other things going on in his life that he could barely imagine having the time or the energy to get into another fist-fight with Malfoy, let alone any sort of insult duel. It just seemed so…petty.
But Ron continued watching Malfoy whenever the Slytherin was around, blue gaze narrowed. Harry could just imagine Ron thinking, any minute now, any minute…
"Ron!" he said aloud, trying to catch Ron's attention. Hermione was supposed to be waiting for them to meet her in the library for some last minute studying (for their Transfiguration exam in less than twenty minutes) but Harry wondered how long she would wait, considering how much they'd procrastinated already.
Finally, his friend turned. "Hmm, Harry?"
"Malfoy's not going to do anything, Ron," he said flatly. "Give it a rest."
"He's up to something," Ron muttered, eyes sliding back to glare at Malfoy again. Harry sighed and pushed open the door of the great hall. Hopefully, getting Malfoy out of sight would help.
"Ron, he just lost his mum. His dad's a convict and a death eater, and he thinks I'm the reason behind it all," Harry told Ron. "Of course he's up to something. But nothing's going to happen!"
Ron frowned, looking unconvinced. "I'm not going to let my guard down," he stated firmly. Harry gave up.
"Fine," he said. "Let's just get to the library before Hermione comes looking for us."
Ron glanced at him, as if to say something, then seemed to think better of it and just followed Harry silently the rest of the way to the library.
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That night, the night before their first Quidditch match, Harry felt asleep quickly, having worn himself out working with the 'Animagus Apparato' spell. As such, he only took the time to swallow some of the vision-blocking potion before collapsing back on his bed. He didn't have enough time to clear his mind at all before he was asleep, body forcing him to rest.
Luckily, though, it was a mostly dreamless sleep, and when he awoke the next morning he could remember nothing of the vague forest of dark, wind whipped trees that has fluttered through his slumbering mind.
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A/N: Finally, the last of the filler chapters are done! Stuff happens next chapter at least a little, and things get moving some more. Thanks for hanging in there, and thanks for continuing to review! I'll post responses to reviewers next chapter, hopefully, but I was more interested in getting this posted than anything else. --Miss Laine