Hermione pulled away from Peter and calmly said, "Ron, we were already all leaving. I can catch you up back in the common room later. Right now, I want to go visit the library."
"And what was… that?!" he said furiously.
"What was what?" Hermione said, trying to act nonchalant like nothing had happened so Ron might let the issue go. Besides, how was who she dated any business of his? First with Krum, now with Peter. He had no say over who she was interested in. Especially when he and Lav-Lav were always snogging anywhere and everywhere.
"The… THAT!" Ron blustered.
"Ron, perhaps you need to lie down for awhile. You seem… aggravated," Susan said, trying to ease the situation.
He just glowered at her. "Hermione, I couldn't find your book."
"Hm, well it doesn't matter now. Let's head to the library," she said, linking her arms with his and Harry's. That seemed to placate Ron a bit as they headed off to the library. Now he seemed to just be annoyed to have to go to the library again.
But Peter was still standing there, staring after them with a frown on his face.
"Pete, she just doesn't want to anger Ron right now. Which seems like a good idea when he's already felt pushed to turn to the White Witch," Susan warned, knowing he would remember how he had treated Edmund when they were first in Narnia. Peter bit his lip and nodded.
"But that doesn't mean I have to like it," he complained.
"Oh, come on," Susan said, rolling her eyes at her brother's antics. "Let's go practice those spells Hermione was talking about."
"May I accompany you?" Caspian asked, stepping up towards them. Susan shrugged and looked to Peter.
Peter looked annoyed for a second, but it was mostly now just a reflex reaction. He shrugged and said, "Sure."
It was just their luck… they ran into Malfoy on their way to find an empty classroom to practice in.
"Hello, Susan. I see your hanging out with… these people again," he sneered.
"Ah, is this the boy you were talking about?" Peter asked, his voice purposely lingering too long on the word boy.
"Peter, this is Draco Malfoy. Malfoy, this is my brother," she said. She whispered in Peter's name, "By the Mane, you better act civilly."
"Pleasure to meet you, Malfoy," Peter said stiffly, extending a hand.
Malfoy looked at it distastefully before shaking hands. Susan sighed when she realized they were both trying to squash the other's fingers.
"Well, we're going to go study," Caspian said stiffly, pulling Peter back. "Goodbye, Malfoy."
Susan grabbed both their arms and steered them out of the hallway before Malfoy or either of them could say anything else.
"Well, that could have gone worse," Caspian joked when they found a room.
"Let's just start practicing," Peter grumbled. "What was that spell again? The disarming one. Let's give that one a go."
"Expelliarmus," Susan said, pointing her wand at her brother. Instead of disarming him, he flew backwards and hit a desk, wand still in hand.
"Ouch," Peter moaned.
"Ah… Caspian, you wanna try?" Susan offered.
"Umm.. expelliarmus!" he said, making Susan's hair bristle a little but nothing more.
"Well, that was a disappointment after Susan's much more melodramatic spell," Peter commented.
Caspian glared at him, but more as a joke, not with any true malice behind it. "Well, you try."
"Expelliarmus," Peter said. His spell shot right past Caspian and made the window behind him burst into several pieces.
"Ooops…" Peter said sheepishly. After a moment, Caspian began laughing. Peter joining in ruefully a moment later while Susan just rolled her eyes, amused and opened one of her textbooks to look for a spell.
"Reparo," Susan said, making the pieces fit back together. "Well, that spell worked."
"Can't we just use swords?" Peter complained.
"Divination has got to be the worst class ever," Ernie commented to Peter. "I can't believe you actually signed up for it."
"I didn't," Peter muttered under his breath. He was fairly skeptical about non-centaurs being able to tell the future. But then again, Narnia didn't have the good sort of wizards and witches either and that had been proved wrong, so maybe it wouldn't be too bad.
"Well, I think Hannah's in that class. And you're with Gryffindor so that long-haired friend of yours –"
"Caspian."
"Yeah, him. He'll be there. Well I best get to my class. Bye!"
"Hannah!" Peter called when he saw her. "Ernie says you're in Divination. Mind if we go together?"
To his surprise, she giggled. "Yeah, sure. It's a long walk."
They chatted on their way up, Peter gleaning bits and pieces of information about the wizarding world. When they got there, Peter and Hannah joined Caspian who was apparently also in that class.
"Hannah, Caspian. Caspian, Hannah," Peter quickly introduced.
"This classroom freaks me out," Caspian whispered. "Do all human seers live in places this creepy?"
Peter and Hannah both looked at each other and shrugged.
"Welcome students. I foresaw that we would have two new students in class today and provided for them accordingly," the professor said.
"There's been extra seats all year," one of the boys called out.
Professor Trelawney chose to ignore that comment, continuing with, "And I have seen that your names are… William and Ben?"
They both shook their heads incredulously.
"Is it something close, dears?"
"I'm Peter."
"I'm Caspian."
"Oh, I see."
Some of the students in the class began sniggering.
The teacher began hastily looking for the tea leaves they were going to be using for the day.
"Peter, look," Caspian whispered. Hermione had updated their enchanted coins to tell everyone to meet in the Great Hall after their respective classes.
"What's that?" Hannah asked curiously.
"Nothing!" both boys said hastily.
They began trying to discern the tea leaves.
"Maybe your's is Italy?" Hannah suggested for Caspian's.
"What is an italy?" Caspian asked.
Hannah looked at him incredulously. "You don't know Italy?"
"He's bad at geography," Peter interrupted. "What do you think mine might be? I think it sort of looks like a centaur."
"Or a normal horse," Caspian suggested.
"Maybe a giraffe?" Hannah suggested.
Professor Trelawney made her way over to them to look at theirs.
"Oh, no!" she cried when she looked at Peter's. "Dear, you have…. The GRIM!"
"The what?" Peter said flatly. The rest of the class excluding Caspian
"The grim, my dear! The grim!"
"It means…. It means that you're going to die," Hannah said, her eyes wide.
"That's… fascinating," Peter said dubiously. He was already questioning this teacher's ability, so his predicted death didn't really bother him.
Caspian had been looking through his textbook and found a picture of what the grim looked like. Peter might be calm about his predicted death, but Caspian wasn't. With being about to face the Jadis and that being his fault, if the High King died, it would be on him. But then he saw the picture and frowned, saying, "Really? I don't think it really looks like that."
"Neither do I," Peter said, looking over his shoulder. "I still think it looks like a centaur."
"Peter, just because she had our names incorrect doesn't mean for sure she was incorrect about this," Caspian said nervously.
"Maybe it's whoever William is that's going to die," Peter said sarcastically. "Caspian, I really don't think this is a big deal. Just... don't tell Susan. She'll worry needlessly."
"Why so morose?" Hermione asked Caspian when he and Peter walked up.
The edge of Peter's lips twitched, and he said, "According to the Divination teacher, I'm suppose to die."
"The grim?" Harry asked.
"Yeah."
"She predicted the same for me my third year," he explained. "And... well, I'm still here. She pretty much just saw death for me no matter what."
"Figures. She also mispredicted our names. Apparently we're William and Ben," Peter said.
"Who's William and Ben?" Susan asked as she walked up.
"We are," Caspian said.
"Huh?"
"So why are we all here?" the Telmarine Veta said as she and her twin approached.
"Time for another planning meeting to, um, check up on where we're at," Hermione said. "And... talk about how we're going to find the White Witch."
"Ron found a new place to meet up," Harry said. "The Shrieking Shack."
They all understood the implied information. Ron had chosen to betray them now.
"Never heard of that place," Caspian offered, sticking with the pretense.
"It's a house where a werewolf used to live, but it's abandoned now," Ron explained. "But most think it's haunted, so no one'll be there. Which is why I thought it would be a brilliant idea to meet there."
"Let's check it out right now," Susan said decisively.
"Yes, let's," Harry said, starting to walk to be sure he was in the lead. Although it would be hard for Peter to take lead in getting there since he wouldn't know the way anyways. But maybe this would discourage the others from treating Peter like the leader in the attack on the White Witch.
"Wingardium leviosa," Hermione said, levitating a stick to freeze the Whomping Willow.
"Reminds me of that one dryad. The one by the river in Owlwood," Peter commented to Susan.
"He was rather obnoxious," she said dryly.
They headed into the Shrieking Shack, Ron acting more nervous by the moment.
"There's no ice anymore," Peter whispered to Hermione. She nodded with a frown, unsure what to make of it.
Ron led them into a room where there was a chair facing the other way.
"Well, well… Jadis was right in saying this trap could bring me the Boy Who Lived," a voice said as he rose from the chair.
"Who… who's that?" Caspian asking nervously.
"Bloody hell," Ron swore, realizing he had definitely trusted the wrong witch.
"Voldemort," Harry breathed.