[AN]

I am late this time because I have a beta issue and also because I'm a bum and didn't get around to sending this to my other beta in a timely fashion. I promised I wouldn't give up though, and here it is, un-beta'd. If any of you grammar Gestapo need a project let me know...otherwise I know it's in need. I beta'd myself, which I know you aren't supposed to do (at least not well). Enjoy!

[/AN]

Chapter 23 - The Taste of Victory

Hermione came to Harry the following day and offered him a small, sturdy-looking bottle, which appeared completely empty.

"Uh, thanks Hermione. I think."

"Look at it!" Hermione admonished.

Harry glanced down. There were definitely no potions, flames, or insects in this bottle, but there was something...Harry peered closer. A miniature common room was in the bottle, and a tiny Ron was making his way through, talking to someone Harry couldn't see. The little Ron laughed soundlessly. Harry had seen this before; In fact he'd been the one talking to Ron. Looking closer, one of his hands might have just been visible, and he was certain that he could see Parvati's foot. "This is amazing," Harry said, as the scene gradually evolved into how it must have looked now, with Parvati, Ron, Neville, and Connor all crowding around the lounge.

"That's time in a bottle," Hermione pronounce proudly.

"That's...that's...wow!" Neville exclaimed

"It's nice, but not that nice," Hermione said, blushing slightly.

"Actually, Hermione, It kind of is," Parvati said, staring at the reduced scene in the bottle. "Does this work for anywhere then? Can I see...oh I don't know...the great hall, for example?" Harry could hear the gears spinning in Parvati's head. A way to see what other people were up to, no matter where you were? That was just up Parvati's aisle.

"No, it only works ten feet around the bottle or so. Anyway, I was thinking we could have Harry carry it in his pocket."

Harry frowned. "Hermione, that will last exactly one day in my pocket, if that. Ill break it or lose it for sure. Why should I be carrying anything like that around anyway...you should be rich with all the things you can do."

Hermione fidgeted nervously, blushing more. "Well, losing it isn't something I can do anything about...but as for breaking it, that's nearly impossible. Time doesn't exist inside the glass. There isn't time for it to break. And you should carry it around in case anything ever happens to you. Maybe we could see what."

"That really won't do a lot of good after the fact, Hermione," Harry said. The look on her face convinced him that he would be carrying around another bottle for a while. For the moment, it was still being passed around and gawked at.

"Why don't they just do that for every bottle?" Neville said, still stuck on her comment about it being unbreakable, and time not existing inside the bottle. "I could use something that will keep my plants fresh forever."

"Time doesn't exist," Hermione repeated patiently. "That means as a bottle, it's worthless. You can't put anything in there, and if you did, you could never get it out again."

Neville looked as though he didn't understand; which made sense, because Harry was in the class, and he barely understood what was going on.

"I'll hold onto it then," Harry said. "Though if something happens to me I would rather have it that you all were so far away that a few minutes won't do you any good." Parvati and Hermione appeared to be sisters for the moment, as the looks they flashed him were nearly identical.

The only thing that happened that was in any way exciting over the next few days was Quidditch practice. In spite of his objection, and Natalie MacDonald's insistence that he ought to do otherwise, he was having trouble taking his loaner broom up to full speed. The way it trembled when he was going all-out unnerved him, and he had visions of the broom disappearing in a cloud of dust beneath him as he gave chase to the Snitch. Of course, Natalie wasn't being very helpful in scolding him.

"Nobody likes a chicken, Harry...How would you rather die, Harry?" Harry quite liked chicken himself, and given his options, he'd prefer to die of old age in his sleep, over being disintegrated in a broom accident. It was cold, so at least Katie didn't push them too hard; she was far too worried about injuries. This was the first year Harry had a chance to play every match, and Katie was going to succeed where Oliver Wood failed.

"Gold three!" That didn't involve him, so he could continue to search. Nothing lasted forever though, and soon she called a play he was in on.

"Red Rocket!" The red rocket was a gimmick play....in Harry's opinion a show of flair. The play brought not only Harry in, but Ron, and therefore, the rings and Snitch were both totally up for grabs. They started clustered around the fastest player--Natalie--and rushed as one as fast as the slowest broom would go. They were pure Bludger-bait, and Colin and Dennis were under enormous pressure to keep the lead balls on the right side of the bats. They couldn't tap and drive, because the whole of the Gryffindor squad was between them, and one well-placed Bludger could take out half the team, or at least cause a fumble and lose them a certain goal on an un-defended ring. The rest of the team, including Harry and Ron, rotated around the middle player, letting the Quaffle fall through their hands to the player below them, who scooped it only long enough to do the same. It was an atrociously foolish thing to do, but it looked fantastic. Harry was to break for the Snitch if he saw it, but he didn't think he'd be likely to with everything else that was happening. They ran through this improbable drill for a good fifteen minutes, far longer than was needed. It didn't involve a lot of complicated flying or handwork, so that was a plus. Katie had scoured the rulebooks for a rule prohibiting seekers or keepers from scoring with a Quaffle, and could find none, so she reasoned by way of omission that it was allowed. Harry wasn't so sure, but he wasn't going to object over a play they would be foolish to run.

The cards enjoyed flying, it turned out. Even Uric had to admit that it had been something new; and he couldn't insist be to be incinerated yet. Harry wasn't sure why it was any different to them than it would be if he was walking, but they said it was, and he believed them.

He struggled through the next week of his classes; it was hard work taking all of these notes and being a dedicated student, and he wasn't cut out for it. The cards made a difference; Toothill, it turned out, was keenly interested on hearing about any dueling at all. She would offer a word or two of advice, but very rarely. By far the most practical had been to fire off the curses from close to his body, and to pull his body away from the wand at the same time he was pulling the wand away from his body, rather than waste time extending the wand at all. At first, Harry didn't like doing that, since there were spells that required drawing the wand back to him, but then he realized that during a duel, he wouldn't be doing most of those spells. Other cards were interesting to talk to as well, though he was sure that they didn't have quite the personalities that their living counterparts must have had. The good seemed too lazy to be crusaders, and the evil seemed as if it was too much of a bother to be evil.

Throughout the week, Harry grew more and more aggravated. By Thursday, he had decided to follow Malfoy around for a whole evening, just to make sure that he wasn't missing anything, and also because he figured that sneaking around would help him blow off some steam. It didn't help that Voldemort had returned to silence...people were starting to wonder if he really was back, or if Harry and Dumbledore had been loopy all along. The entire wizarding world was walking deliriously on eggshells...waiting for either a dark mark floating in the sky or a hearty "fooled you!" from Dumbledore and Harry. The Prophet had decided that the whole episode was mass hysteria and was painting a depressingly cynical picture of the two of them.

Up ahead of him, Draco was taking a very familiar course. He had walked it once, long ago, when Connor had seriously injured him, and eventually, Harry knew that he would end on top of the tower where he had been receiving the invisible messengers.

This time, Connor was nowhere to be found. Perhaps he had taken some type of strange potion, or perhaps he was simply otherwise occupied with Natalie. They were a strange pair; that much was for sure. That brought Harry to Parvati, and he found himself daydreaming as he shuffled silently after Malfoy under the invisibility cloak. Parvati was a saint for putting up with him as well as she had. She had earned that SkyBall, just by suffering the nasty gossip floating around the school. Harry wasn't totally oblivious; a large number of the students passed through D.A. two nights a week, and he knew what they were saying about her. As plugged in as Parvati was; she had to hear twice as much as he did. Between that and dealing with his moodiness, he had no idea why she still wanted to talk to him. He certainly wouldn't want to put up with his antics.

Ahead of him, Malfoy had stopped and was looking cautiously around, so Harry stopped, just to make sure that he wouldn't make any noise whatsoever. After a moment, Malfoy continued around the corner which marked the end of his aborted trip the last time Harry followed him. This time, he wasn't assaulted, and he continued on at a brisk pace. Harry was having a hard time following him and remaining silent enough to be assured that any noise he was making was covered by Draco's echoing footsteps.

When they came to the stairs to the tower, Harry paused. They were a worn wood, and there was no way he could walk up them without them creaking on him. He'd have to follow Draco and hope that he could make it close enough to the top to see where the Slytherin went from there. Step by painstaking step, he mirrored Malfoy's steps. The stairs creaked more than once, but the walls were stone, and fortunately they did funny things to the noises in the stairwell. Harry couldn't even tell if it was his stair or Draco's making noise. When Malfoy reached the top, Harry paused. He'd made it nearly to the top, and peeked over the edge of the floor, while Draco walked to the center of the room, which looked familiar. The blond Sytherin raised his wand, and a trapdoor in the ceiling popped open. Immediately a rope snaked its way down from above. Harry was about to scoff at the idea that Draco would climb a rope like a Muggle child, when Draco place his foot in a loop tied into the braid and flicked the wand tip up. The rope obediently tugged him up, through the hole in the roof. Harry could see stars, but there must have been some sort of enchantment to keep the weather at bay, because he couldn't feel cold air. It was definitely cold out there in the Scottish night.

After the door slammed shut, Harry waited in the swirling dust and silence until he was convinced that Draco wasn't going to spring the door open and catch him spying. After a few long minutes in the room, Harry realized that he could hear Draco's footsteps. The Slytherin was walking by the north edge of the small tower right now. Still, Harry knew better than to take off the cloak. The ceiling of the great hall was proof enough that you could see through walls, if you wanted to badly enough. What was to stop Draco (or someone else) from doing the same thing, only backwards to the roof, or even just the small trap door? It's what Harry would do.

From under the cloak he looked around, trying to remember when he'd seen this room. He didn't remember coming up to this tower before...with a jerk he realized that it was the tower from his mother's memory...the railings and partitions around the outside were gone, and it made a huge difference, or he'd have spotted it right off.

Harry walked around the room, until he was standing where his mother had crouched almost two decades ago. If he squinted his eyes, he could almost see all of the people in the room. He uncertainly walked over to the pillar Wormtail had been idly carving in the memory. At first he saw nothing, but then he brushed away some of the grime of an accumulated seventeen years, and under it he saw a very faint design. It was faded and barely discernable, as if it had been repaired at some point in time. It was quite a nice drawing of a stag...certainly much better than Harry's first effort at making a sigil. He felt sick to his stomach. What did that mean? He stared at it for a long time, until Draco's footsteps alerted him to the fact that the pale Slytherin was coming back down. Harry simply moved to the back of the room and watched Malfoy descend via the enchanted rope and stalk down the noisy stairs. Operation Ferret had once again failed to pay off, but the night hadn't been a total waste. Harry was loathe to admit it, but he was finding that he coped with life a little better when there was a little pressure. He had discovered over holiday that though he enjoyed loafing, and though he was certainly very good at it, it had certainly left him feeling somewhat empty. Maybe that was how Parvati felt when she didn't have a secret to guard.

After a long period of abstractly wondering what Wormtail had been thinking when he carved a stag in the ancient wood of Hogwarts, Harry shook his head and started back to the common room. A voice he recognized almost immediately drifted up from his pocket.

"Are you done sneaking around?" Harry fumbled with the cards and turned them over to reveal Justus Pilliwickle.

"How do you know if I'm sneaking about?"

"Give us some credit, boy," Pilliwickle sighed. "We aren't totally clueless you know. We know when to keep our mouths shut."

"I noticed," Harry replied. "You kept them shut the whole year."

"Indeed, boy!" Pilliwckle grinned. He was one of the cards that Harry enjoyed talking to the most, because he was so normal, and, Harry supposed, well-adjusted...for a card. In life, Pilliwickle was a very popular head for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Harry found that Justus had probably held that post through sheer determination...the man didn't seem like anything special, but his stories all had the common thread that he wasn't brilliant, or fast with a wand, or exceptionally hard...Bad-Ass is what Dudly's friends would have said. Justus had occasionally been fooled. He had been out-drawn and out matched, but in every story, he had simply wanted to win more than his opponent. That was something with which Harry could identify. Harry fanned them out and glanced at the cards.

"I was following someone who...does some bad things."

"Getting a start on the old Auror training?" Justus winked. "That is what you want to be?"

"I think so."

"Oh my dear boy...you'd better know so. You can't find yourself in a situation and think you should probably be there. You have to know you're the right man in the right place, even if you're the wrong man in the decidedly wrong place." Harry nodded.

"He's right," said a voice from deep within the deck. Harry almost jumped. Even thin and distorted, he would know the Headmaster's voice anywhere. Harry thumbed through the cards until he found the picture of Dumbledore, who was smiling benignly.

"There's something you're not telling us, isn't there?" Dumbledore asked.

"I believe so," said a black-haired wizard below him. Harry recognized Salazar Slytherin even before he saw his name ..a stylized version of his face had disgorged the basilisk in the Chamber of Secrets. "No boy is that jumpy...not unless he's scared out of his mind, or doing something wrong. Are you doing something that wrong, boy?" None of the cards seemed to know who he was, so Harry was getting used to being called "boy," "lad," and other derivatives. He shook his head.

"Headmaster, what do you know about....Voldemort?"

"Rather less than a useful amount, I suspect. You'll find that my image may look as if it belongs next to you, but it's be some time since the knowledge I possess was made available. I know you, but only because I knew your father and mother so well." Harry went through the collection, one by one.

"Do any of you know about Voldemort?" He was greeted by shaking heads and confused looks. "Well, it's like this..."

A solid forty-five minutes later, some of the cards were looking very downcast. Toothill was shaking her head and Tugwood was misty-eyed.

"That's terrible," the pretty witch said. Even Slytherin was looking somewhat uncomfortable.

"I commend his dedication," he said. "What he's doing though...there's a difference between keeping the blood pure and downright murder...You breed out impurity...distill it through time..."

"That is a most terrible bit of news" Dumbledore uttered at last. Justice was shaking his head. The cards were around Harry as if he was teaching a class and had his own tiny audience.

"So uh...any ideas?" Harry asked. He was looking for advice from Wizarding Cards, and that fact wasn't lost on him. All around him, the witches and wizards on the cards shook their collective heads or voiced negatives. Harry looked over the cards, his eyes settling on Justus.

"Perseverance, boy...Mr. Potter."

"I dare say he'll need a good deal more then perseverance," Rowena Ravenclaw said. Some of the witches of wizards from too far back didn't talk much, because there were so few portraits made of them that were capable, Harry supposed. The line seemed to be around 1700 or so...the ones before that would talk, but not like Justus or Dumbledore or even Stroulger, the inventor of the Sneakoscope. There were exceptions of course, but Harry had to imagine Uric was really much more odd in real life, and Toothill could have certainly given him more pointers about dueling. He suspected they couldn't remember most of what they had known in real life. If they could, Merlyn or Ravenclaw would be worth 10 galleons easily, even for only a minute of life. There probably just wasn't enough of them left to be all that useful, academically.

"Well, if I see him, I'm going to give him a piece of my mind!" Toothill said resolutely. Several voices chimed up in agreement.

"I need to pick you up and get back now...d'you mind?" Hearing no objections, he stacked the cards neatly and tucked them into his robes. He could hear their muttered voices as they chatted excitedly to each other. Perhaps this would give them enough to think about...they wouldn't have to resort to carving dirty poems into his furniture.

The next day, Natalie stopped him on the way to Quidditch practice.

"Come with me a moment, Harry." She led him around to women's side of the changing rooms. She looked at his face briefly. He was glancing at the door hesitantly.

"Perv!" She announced.

"I'm not even-"

"I'm kidding, Harry! Lighten up! I have something of yours..." She reached into the changing room and pulled forth a broom that had been leaning against the door frame.

"My Firebolt!" Harry cradled the broom as if it was a kitten.

"Yes, well, I'm sorry, but Hermione was watching me far too closely for me to risk attempting anything...unnatural."

"I really don't mind...I was afraid I'd have to ride...oh, not like it's bad...I mean, I appreciate-"

"No, I get it," Natalie said. "I wouldn't want to fly on anything but my arrow, tomorrow. Anyway, it's not like I could really squeeze that much more out of it. I mean, it is a Firebolt. Anything they can do to make it faster, they basically have; much better than I ever could."

"Well, I don't know how I can ever thank you," Harry breathed. His Firebolt felt warm to the touch, as if it wanted to be back in his hand, and was just waiting.

"Thank me after we win tomorrow," Natalie said.

"Think we will?"

"I think if we don't something is seriously wrong. Hufflepuff isn't as bad off as us, but they were never as good as us to begin with. Besides, they don't have the juice in their brooms to keep up with us the whole game. Frankly, I'd be very surprised if we didn't beat them before capturing the Snitch." She looked at his broom. "Don't be afraid to unwind that, Harry. We need to know if it acts funny, and you have to push it...it should be under stress the whole time, if you can."

Harry thought he most certainly could. He had his broom back! His most cherished possession was back with him! If his broom was a person, he'd have definitely considered hugging it. The match on Saturday held even more importance now....he'd get to fly his broom in the kind of environment it was meant for....he'd know for sure if it was back to normal.

The next day marked three special occurrences. The first two were the match with Hufflepuff and also a break in the weather. As excited as Harry was to get back on his broom, the thought of flying through absolutely frigid air was a bit of a tweak to the nose. Still, Saturday found him standing exuberantly on the pitch, waiting to jump into the match.

"Now no one take these folks for granted," Katie said in the pre-match meeting. "They want to win as much as we do, and if they get the chance...if we get lazy, they very well may. I want you to score right out of the gate. It's important that we take this game and never give it back."

Natalie looked prepared to do that. Her knees were bent and her broom was tilted up so severely that the twigs in the brush were nearly touching her ankles, and the handle, her forehead. Madam Hooch stood in the middle, and when she tossed the Quaffle into the air to start the match, it appeared to move in slow motion. Natalie was in the air faster than seemed humanly possible, and Harry followed her up.

"And Right off, MacDonald has the Quaffle...and it doesn't look like she's going to pass it off. She's taking it down the alley..." Harry, however, couldn't follow Owen's commentary. He had problems of his own. Just now, something had flitted right over his shoulder and kept pace with him on the Firebolt. He had the presence of mind not to turn his head or show that he'd seen it in any way. Down the pitch, Natalie had one person to beat, Harry couldn't even tell who. Even now, as he watched the Snitch from the corner of his eye, she was dipping under whomever it was, maybe Zacharias Smith, with a graceful swoop while cocking her hand. She released the ball, and Harry knew that it was going to miss from the moment it left her fingertips.

Harry followed the Quaffle's path as it arced through the sky. He had begun to reach up for the Snitch when the Quaffle bounced off the left-most ring and started to tumble in slow motion, as if it was an ember in the cold air, unhurried, and with no place in particular it had to be. In a moment of swiftness--even in the slow-motion that had momentarily overcome the scene--a flash of red darted from beneath the Quaffle; scooping it up and flicking it casually through the closest ring. The red of her hair out-shone the red of her Gryffindor robes, and the crowd, which seemed to have holding its breath, exhaled with a jubilant shout. A scant moment later, Harry's hand closed around the Snitch, ending the game. The whole thing happened in less time than it would have taken to have the Quaffle, with its featherlight enchantments, to fall to the ground from the center ring.

Owen was still yammering on, but Harry couldn't understand him yet. The crowed was maniacal, in part because it was so warm, compared to what it was, and in part because Gryffindor had just closed out what might have the shortest game in Howarts history. Sloper and Kirke were carrying Harry off the field on their shoulders. They had tried to carry Ginny off first, and Dean scared them away with a frightening look. Ginny didn't appear as if she appreciated him "sticking" up for her, but she was mobbed too quickly to make any kind of scene.

Back in the common room, the MVP trophy was resting on the mantle.

"We didn't get to provide many statistics for this game," Dean said. "I mean, we could look at the lines but...not really much there, is there?" The Gryffindors cheered loudly. Dean brushed the trophy, looking casually at the game's lines. "MacDonald with an assist, Weasley with a goal, and Potter with a capture six seconds into the match. I don't have the official records, but that may be a new record. Is there anyone here silly enough to think Potter doesn't deserve this award? No? That's what I thought."

Dean touched the trophy, and Harry's face peered back at him. There was a portrait of a lone figure who might have been Harry capturing the Snitch. The biggest indicator that it might be him was that the broom was definitely a Firebolt. There wasn't as big a party this time around, but that was because everyone was certain that they'd win this match, and Natalie was no longer a secret weapon. McGonagall didn't even have to remind them to wrap it up.

"I daresay...was that flying we were doing earlier?" Fulbert the Fearful asked with a stammer.

"Yep!" Harry replied proudly.

"It felt...different than all the times before."

"It was my Firebolt," Harry replied, proudly. "The greatest broom on the planet!"

"I...I rather enjoyed it, actually."

"Way to be a man," Uric pronounced boisterously. "I knew there was more to you!" Harry had since discovered that Uric was 'the oddball' primarily because he had been so bored with life; why use a jellyfish for a hat? Why not? Had he been born later, he very likely would have been a test pilot for brooms or dragon handler.

"It was...exhilarating," Tilly Toke said with a breathy voice, which reminded Harry very much of Parvati's. Parvati had been somewhat dismayed that the match had ended so soon, until she realized that no one was leaving the stands. In actuality, what Harry had done was provide her and Lavender (and their other cohorts) with a solid half hour of prime information gathering time, without the distraction of Quidditch, although she informed Harry that there were times when gathering the goods was easier when people were preoccupied with something else. Harry had been trying to make her talent useful to him, but people like Draco played the really important things too close to the vest. A holistic view might have been fine for someone like Walken, Shacklebolt, or even Ron, who could all follow strategy with apparent ease, but Harry had no delusions about his ability to divine a plan from a few randomly occurring events. He was good enough at understanding things once they had happened, but it was a bit late then.

"I promise I'll take you again then, if you don't mind being stuck in my pocket."

"Mind?" Tugwood asked. "We don't mind. It's...perfect there!" She batted her eyelashes, which made Harry feel warm. She was an extraordinarily pretty witch. Harry had actually had a long discussion with her the second or third night after he had discovered the secret of the cards. Her beauty was often a handicap to her in life...no one wanted to take her seriously, because they figured that no one that striking could be intelligent. Harry found himself wondering if things had changed since then. Sure, there were the Cho Changs of the world, but there were also the Parvatis...he'd never really given her enough credit until he actually talked to her. Regardless, Tugwood's initial intent had been to make everyone beautiful, so that people could be judged on what they said and did, rather than how they looked.

"Hello," a voice behind him said, making him jump and shove the cards into his pocket. Parvati stood there, and he was very glad that he'd managed to get the tiny portraits stowed before she saw anything she shouldn't.

"Were you about to pull a wand on me?"

"C'mon, give me some credit," he said, thinking quickly. "I have something for you. Parvati eyed him wearily and sat down. Harry reached into the inside pocket of his robe and pulled forth a rather mundane-looking quill.

"That's not one of Weasley's; one of those quills that write all wonky, is it?"

"No!" Harry insisted. "Use your thing!" She pulled the SkyBall from her shirt and paused.

"You aren't just looking for an excuse to get me in the dark, are you?"

"Of course I am," Harry proclaimed, somewhat proudly. Let her take that however she wanted. After a brief pause, she activated the ball, and the amazing globe of night rushed outwards. Harry handed over the quill, which was glowing softly.

"Not another gift, Harry! You know I can't-"

"It cost about the same as a real date, except it was even better. If I ever have to set foot in Madame Puddifoot's again, I might hex myself, just out of shame."

"Are you saying you'd be ashamed to be with me?"

"I'm just saying..." Harry paused. "Wait a minute...you're having me on, aren't you?" Parvati was giggling...not the obnoxious Lavender compadre giggle, but the lilting one that he rather enjoyed.

"You worry entirely too much about saying the right thing, Mister Potter. You can't make me happy with every waking word, or you'll train me to walk all over you."

"I'm not sure I'd mind that," Harry said pensively. Parvati punched him in the shoulder. For such a girly-girl, Parvati was surprisingly good at that.

Later on, with a warm feeling in his chest, at least for the night, Harry closed his eyes, and drifted off.

The next day saw the return of normal life; books, schoolwork, and Voldemort. The dark mark had been seen adrift in the hazy sky over York, though as of yet, there were no reported casualties, no damage, and nothing was amiss. The Prophet blamed errant ne'r-do-wells, and when into great depth describing how Y-K-W hadn't been seen in a long time, and not be more than a handful even then. Hermione was prattling on endlessly about how unfair things were, and Harry had, for the most part, tuned her out. He knew life was unfair from a very early age. It had been one of the lessons that the Dursleys had been very efficient in teaching him.

Midway through the tirade, Ron lightly punched his arm. Harry looked over, but his mouth was full, and he had also learned the rule about talking with your mouth full. Ron just nodded, directing Harry's attention to the Slytherin table. Malfoy was even paler than normal, and seemed to be quivering. He did not look healthy at all.

"What d'you reckon his problem is?"

"I missed the part where I should care," Harry said, gulping down the food he had just to answer.

"Oh, it's not like I care. It's just that strangling on a bit of sandwich seems too good for that...Malfoy." Ron spit out Draco's name as though it was some sort of curse. Meanwhile, Malfoy's day was growing progressively worse. His normally immaculate hair was sticking up in odd tufts, almost as Harry's did. He was clutching at his throat, but it was obvious that he was still breathing, and as they watched, fine hair seemed to glisten on his cheeks and hands. Other people were starting to take notice.

As they watched, Malfoy staggered back and with a shout, disappeared in a cloud of white. Ron had leapt to his feet by now, along with half of the great hall. He had the height advantage over almost all of them.

"What the..." Ron started.

"Who cares?" Harry shrugged. He was mildly curious, but he wasn't going to give Malfoy the satisfaction of looking interested. He'd catch up later...Parvati was bound to know what was up. Then he noticed a tall figure near where Malfoy had last been seen. Snape had a hold of Connor's robes.

"It's this one! He and Mister Malfoy have-"

"Severus! Release my student at once!" Minerva McGonagall was hurrying down the aisle, her tartan robes billowing.

"He used transfiguration on a student! That is an offense punishable by-"

"I have him in my class. I can assure you, he is not your culprit!" Harry had to agree. Connor was lucky he was even still in transfiguration, and had he been in another house, McGonagall likely would have bounced him already. Anyone in the great hall who could be watching now, was.

"None the less," Snape said in an oily voice, "we'll have to check the wand. Colier?" Snape held out one hand.

"Over my dead body!" Connor exclaimed, jerking away.

"Mister Colier!" McGonagall held out her hand. Connor reluctantly placed his wand in her hand.

"You'll get it back after we check it."

"Provided we find nothing...amiss," Snape added. The scowl that McGonagall shot at Snape was truly epic.

"Sit down Colier...at your own table," McGonagall added. Connor made his way through a crowd now reluctant to move. Harry's attention was certainly riveted on the situation. He didn't really care about Malfoy that much, but such a big scene had already been made that even the totally uninvolved students had to wonder what was going on. Through a break in the students he saw Malfoy just as McGonagall returned him to normal. Harry only got a glimpse, but Draco looked to have be transfigured into a very large white rat. When he regained his normal shape, he glared balefully at anyone who would meet his eyes, no doubt looking for naked wands. When he could see none, he tossed his hair and walked out with as much regality as he could muster. Ron was tapping his arm distractedly.

"What do you want?" Harry asked, slapping Ron's hand away.

"I think we've just seen Operation Ferret."