SUMMERY - Did you know that Phoenixes can take human form? My father did.
DISCLAIMER - I do not own Harry Potter or any affiliated trademarks. Nor do I get paid for my writings.
CHAPTER WARNINGS - None
WARNINGS - OotP spoilers later on
Chapter 2 -
(The next morning)
"What's the matter?" asked Hermione, catching up with Harry and Ron halfway across the common room as they all headed toward breakfast. "You look absolutely- oh, for heaven's sake."
She was staring the common room notice board where a large new sign had been put up. Phoenix, who had just come down the stairs, threw back her head and laughed. Hermione shot a glare at her before taking down the Weasley twins' advertisement.
Harry noticed that in the daylight, without the glow of the candles, Phoenix was not nearly so striking as she'd first appeared. With her golden hair braided around the crown of her head, her face was too thin to be beautiful. Her skin no longer had its own luminescence; with a hair cut, and in the right clothes, she would have easily passed for a boy. But there was still something about her, an aura just at the edge of feeling; a faint sense of hauting, half remembered melodies and flames dancing in the night.
Abruptly, Harry realized that Ron and Hermione were waiting for him at the portrait hole. He pulled himself together and followed them out.
"Anyway, what's up, Harry?" Hermione continued her previous line of questioning as they walked down a flight of stairs lined with portraits of old witches and wizards, all of whom ignored them, being engrossed in their own conversation. "You look really angry about something."
"Seamus reckons Harry's lying about You-Know-Who," said Ron succintly, when Harry didn't respond.
Hermione, whom Harry had expected to react angrily on his behalf, sighed.
"Yes, Lavender thinks so to.." She said gloomily.
"Been having a nice talk with her about whether or not I'm a lying, attention-seeking prat, have you?" Harry said loudly.
"No," said Hermione calmly, "I told her to keep her big fat mouth shut about you, actually. And it would be quite nice if you stopped jumping down Pon and my throats, Harry, because if you haven't noticed, we're on your side."
There was a short pause.
"Sorry," Harry said in a low voice.
A thought suddenly occured to him.
"What did Phoenix say?"
Hermione grinned.
"She said that she was new here and didn't wish to presume, but it seemed to her that we wanted a hero only to throw trash at him when we didn't like what he said. And also, that anyone who has the ability to ignore every fact to the contrary in order to hide thier heads in the sand, and thereby escape from the rumors of peril, only to encounter the real thing, deserves an award for cowardice."
"Opinionated little thing, isn't she?" Ron asked.
"Very." Hermione's expression became rather odd. "You know, she asked me a very strange question. Last night, for a few minutes, she and I were the only ones in our dorm, and she asked me the name of the boy who sits at the center of Slytherin table. She seemed shy about it, too. But why would she ask about Malfoy? And when I told her his name she thanked me and practically bounced to her bed."
"I saw her staring at him last night." Harry offered.
"Don't tell me she likes the git, " Ron groaned. "He's a Slytherin, for Merlin's sake, not to metion the pure-blood poster boy."
"If she does, it can only be for his looks, and that attraction will fade as soon as he opens his mouth in her presence."
Ron and Harry nodded, accepting Hermione's wisdom in the area of female crushes. The discussion over for the time being, she turned thier talk to more important things than one Greek transfer student.
Nothing signifigant involving Phoenix happened during Potions. Snape treated her the same as he did most of Gryffindor house, with a nonchalant condesension. She, in her turn, ignored him. But in Divination, there was an incident which none of those present were likely to forget.
The class started out as it ought, with Trelawny greeting the students in her misty voice and telling them which book to take out. At the end of the class, though, just before dismissal, Trelawny seemed to remember that there was a student in her class whose palm she hadn't read. She called Phoenix to the front.
Long moments passed with the professor bent over Phoenixes hand. When she looked up, her huge eyes were nearly the size of plates. Her voice trembeled when she adressed the transfer.
"My dear, you are cursed."