Disclaimer: The characters, settings, and world of Harry Potter do not belong to me. The Harry Potter series belongs to JK Rowling.
A/N: Thank you so much to any one who is reading this fic, and/or has favorited, reviewed, or followed it. You guys are the best! It makes me so happy to know that you guys enjoy this story. I'm super excited to show you guys what happens next!
Chapter Four: Patronuses and Plots
"Hermione, c'mon. You have to understand. Umbridge is, well, Umbridge!" Ron cried. Hermione continued to ignore him, writing her Potions essay.
She knew she would forgive them eventually, but for now… there was some part of her, some Slytherin part that relished their discomfort, and wanted to make them feel the way they had made her feel.
Ron continued to plead with her, and soon enough, she looked up, her hazel eyes cold. "Listen, Ron. I have a Potions essay to write. I know you do too, so I would suggest you stop wasting your time and go write it. Or just leave. I don't care if you do it or not. But let me do my homework, Ron. Please." He gaped at her and stood, walking to the door of the now-silent Common Room. He turned back, but Hermione had already returned to writing her essay.
"Expelliarmus!" Hermione cried. Her opponent's wand flew out of it's hand, and into hers. She wiped a bead of sweat from her temple, and pushed an errant curl behind her ear, where it promptly fell back into her face again.
The downside to practicing against a wooden (albeit magical, moving, and spell-casting) dummy was that it was predictable. The upside was that it was fast, and it challenged her at least on that level. She pushed her curls away from her damp forehead, and returned the dummy's wand.
The Room of Requirement had given her books on all sorts of defensive (and offensive) magic, including wandless and wordless. She was almost done reviewing the basic spells, and was about to move on to more difficult spells, like Patronuses. After that, she'd work on wandless and wordless magic. If she finished that, she'd try to become an Animagus.
She realized that even though her classmates were too afraid of Umbridge to join her, she could still teach herself on her own. Of course, dueling with a dummy was not as helpful or realistic as dueling with another witch or wizard, but she supposed it would have to do. She moved away from the dummy, moving to the huge bookshelves on the opposite end of the large training room. She climbed the sliding latter (probably one of her favorite parts of the entire room) and pulled out a book on Patronuses.
Flipping through it, she found a chapter titled Casting Your Patronus, and began to read.
In casting one's Patronus, it is essential to hold a happy memory or thought in your mind. This is because the entire point of a Patronus Charm is to ward away Dementors, which leech happiness from anyone, Muggle or wizard, around.
After securing your happy thought, practice the words of the spell without your wand. Simply say 'Expecto Patronum!', placing the emphasis on the second 'e' in 'Expecto' and on the 'o' in 'Patronum'. The wand motion for a Patronus is simply an inverted arc…
Hermione scanned the rest of the page, but the rest of the chapter seemed to be about the effects of the spell and examples of both successes and failures.
A happy thought… That was going to be a little hard, seeing as a lot of her happy memories were with Harry and Ron, who she was currently not speaking to. So she thought back, before Hogwarts, before magic… Oh! She remembered the exact day that Professor McGonagall came to her house and told her that she was a witch, and was to go to a magical boarding school-just like something from one of her books. She'd never been more excited, or happy. Before that day, magic was something to be believed in or to not be believed in, something she read about and wished for. After that day, it had been something tangible, something real, and something she had.
Leaving her wand in her pocket for the time being, she chanted the words. "Expecto Patronum!" She tried the words a couple of times, following the author's advice. Before putting it all together, Hermione pulled out her wand, and made the 'inverted arc' motion as well.
Pulling up her happy memory, she smiled to herself, and without further hesitation, cried, "Expecto Patronum!", flicking her wand. A silvery sort of mist flew out of her wand, and evaporated just as quickly as it had appeared.
Swearing, she turned back to the book. She went to the next chapter, which was titled Practicing Your Patronus.
If you are having trouble casting your Patronus, you may want to select a happier memory. That wasn't her problem. She skipped over the next paragraph. Another thing to do is to imagine you are faced with a real Dementor, and cast the spell with more force than you would normally use in practice. Lastly, practice is something that never fails to help. If you don't get it on the first try, then do it again. If you do get it on the first try… then go in for an interview with the Daily Prophet.
Steeling herself, she tried again. And again. And again.
"As you all know, fifth year is the O.W.L. year." Snape began, sounding extremely bored. "This means that you can no longer… slack off during class, if you wish to score well on the test. Your Potions O.W.L. will be comprised of two sections; there will be an essay section as well as a section where you must brew a specific potion. Everyone's assigned potion will be different, so no, Miss Patil, no one will be able to look at what-or how-their classmates are doing." Parvati put her hand down as Snape sneered at the class. "Are there any questions? Good." He said, giving no time for anyone to even put their hand up, let alone ask a question. "Today, you will learn to brew a Babbling Beverage. There are instructions on page one-hundred and forty of your book. The instructions are perfectly clear, so if one of you idiots botches the potion, then you may find yourself in my office for detention, once you are out of the Infirmary. Have I made myself clear?" The class nodded, half expecting him to demand a proper response, as Umbridge did.
"Do you think he meant that we'd go to the Infirmary because of the potion, or because of him?" Ron asked once Snape sat back down at his desk and the class began taking out books, ingredients, and cauldrons. Hermione did not sit next to them as she usually did, but was instead seated a couple rows ahead of them. She'd hardly said a thing to them, or, for that matter, anyone. The Gryffindor girls said she disappeared every night, and Harry wondered if she was training on her own. He desperately wanted to come to terms with her, but had no idea how. Ron, of course, was no help.
"I dunno. Probably both." He said, pulling out his copy of Magical Drafts and Potions. "But I don't think you want to find out." He reminded Ron, who hadn't taken anything out yet. Harry knew that Ron was a good person, but he needed to grow up and learn to fend for himself.
Draco watched as Hermione Granger walked out of a wall.
He was hidden, of course, so she couldn't see him, but he still shrunk back even deeper into the shadows. Blaise stood next to him, eyebrows raised. He had casted a Silencing Spell when they had come across the rippling wall on their way down to the Slytherin common room, but kept his voice low anyway.
"She's a bloody genius." Draco muttered. "The Room of Requirement is perfect. Why didn't we think of that?"
"You're drooling, Draco." Blaise smirked and Draco ignored his friend. He wasn't drooling. "I hope the only reason you agreed to come wasn't to gawk at Granger. She's a Gryffindor! That's something only I would do, mate."
"Merlin, Blaise. Is everything about witches and beauty for you?" Draco asked irritably, watching Granger head towards the Gryffindor common rooms.
"I can't help being beautiful, Draco." Blaise grinned. "By the way, have you had any more ideas about who should lead our little group, since you're so opposed to leading yourself?"
"You sound as if you have an idea. Should I be scared?"
"It's nothing you haven't heard before, Draco."
"You still think we should get Granger."
"She's incredibly intelligent, she's cunning, she's ambitious, not to mention she currently hates all of the Gryffindors… She may as well be a Slytherin, Draco." Draco opened and closed his mouth, having nothing to say. "Did you have any other ideas?" Blaise asked, knowing Draco didn't.
"Fine!" He cried, throwing his hands in the air. "But how do we get her to do it?"
Blaise smiled slyly. "Leave that to me, Draco my fine ferrety friend." Draco rolled his eyes at the nickname he'd earned fourth year after being transfigured into a ferret.
"What are you going to do, Blaise." He asked flatly.
"I'm gonna make her an offer she can't refuse." He said, making his voice rough and grating. When Draco gave him a questioning, slightly concerned look, he shook his head, laughing a little. "It's from a Muggle movie."
A/N: Extra points to anyone who knows what movie Blaise just referenced! Feel free to post a review if you know what it is!