Earlier that week at Hogwarts, circumstances had quickly changed. As they met that night for practice- Hermione was a bit late as she said goodbye to Skeeter – they had no idea what was about to happen. They were practising Patronus charms when they heard a great banging at the door. They stopped and turned round, and the door came flying off of its hinges straight back at them. In the doorway stood a short, toadlike woman. Umbridge. There was nowhere to go.

'Got you now, aren't we in trouble.' Umbridge Grinned nastily at them.' Cornelius will be concerned to hear this.'

'Hear what?'

Umbridge pulled out a long sheet of parchment, which had in big, bold letters upon the top the words Dumbledore's Army inscribed.

'This. He'll be gald to know I've discovered your treachery, Potter!'

'What!'

'We at the Ministry have long known that you only claimed that The Dark Lord had returned to cover your own rebellion. Come with me, Potter, Weasley, Malfoy, Granger, Longbottom. The rest of you, I know who you are.' She waved the list. 'So I'll deal with you later.'

'She marched them up to Dumbledore's office. Inside a grim scene awaited them. Half a dozen aurors had their wands pointed squarely at Dumbledore's chest and Cornelius Fudge, despite the precarious nature of his position, was playing out the final power game of his ministership.

'What do you call this Dumbledore. No don't answer that! You know what I call it! Open rebellion against the ministry, that's what I call it!' Fudge Bellowed. Dumbledore smiled back at him bemused.

'Ah, Cornelius, is this what it has come to? Trying to secure your power by arresting me? Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I don't intend to, ah, how to put it? Yes, come quietly. No indeed. You may have me as a traitor, yet you may not have me.' Dumbledore raised his gaunt and wizened arm and Fawkes flew to him. A few quick spells knocked out all of the aurors and in a flourish Dumbledore vanished. Within a few minutes, Fudge had brought the aurors round.

'What happened?' one muttered.

'He escaped you halfwit.'

Fudge blustered angrily from the fateful office, appointing Umbridge as headmistress as he left. Within mere days he was no longer minister.

Despite Dumbledore's disappearance the everyday school routine carried on as usual. Umbridge gave notices when necessary, not that it was often, and took all of the headmaster's duties, yet none of his rewards, since the headmaster's office locked her out. Rumour spread that Dumbledore had returned and was locked inside.

Rumour spread like wildfire throughout the many corridors and passages of might Hogwarts castle, rumours of the exiled headmaster, rumours of offices and titles, rumours of meetings clandestine and secret, and above all, the most fearful rumours of careers advice.

The dreaded day dawned for Draco and he had a strange knot in his stomach, as if he was about to do something really important. At the preordained time he strolled into McGonagall's office where he found not one, but two women sitting opposite him. One was expected-McGonagall, the other wasn't- Umbridge.

'Well, sit down, Draco.'

'Thank-you, Professor.'

'Well, do you have any ideas for what you want to do?'

'I haven't really thought about it.'

'I see. Well, what do you enjoy?'

'Cricket.'

'How about a different tack, what interests you?'

'Well, everything really. I don't really care that much about potions, but beyond that I'm not fussy.'

'I see. So from your perspective the issue of jobs is not so mucha case of who'll have you, but one of the agony of choice?'

'I suppose you could put it that way, Professor.'

'What about a ministry job?'

'With your father's connection I would have thought you could get almost any job you wanted.' Umbridge interrupted.

'I've never really fancied a ministry job, though.'

'Well, that certainly cuts down the field.' Professor McGonagall said, humourlessly.

'I suppose so.'

'Well, there's the usual jobs in bars, shops and so forth, or else there's the more unusual broomstick design, if you're interested in charmwork , that might be a bit more down your street. Then there are jobs in the muggle world, but you haven't done muggle studies.'

'I wouldn't need to to play cricket, would I?'

''No, but are you sure that you're good enough to make it? It can't hurt to have a back up plan. After all, what happens if you have a career ending injury before you've earned any money?'

'I suppose you're right. I suppose my favourite subject is either charms or transfiguration, but I don't know what I want to do.'

'Transfiguration and charms, eh? Well, there's plenty of things available if you do well at those, so I'd advise you take them at NEWT level, as for other subjects, I'd take what you enjoy. You're certainly very able, so there should be no trouble with you doing the full set of NEWTs, since you don'thave anything particular in mind I'd say take something that you enjoy, but in the name of Merlin, Draco, I beg you to do something challenging.'

'OK Professor, thank you.'

'No problem, send the next person in.'

'Thanks, Professor, see you later.'

'Goodbye, Mr Malfoy.'

The weeks continued as per usual, potions lessons were their usual tormentative selves, charms lessons were useful, defence lessons about as much use as a chocolate teapot. In all of the subjects however, everything was becoming significantly harder, as the preparation for OWLs went up a gear. They were now writing twice as many essays as they had just three months ago and the work showed no sign of letting up, if anything, the opposite was true. Many times Draco found the set of textbooks that Dumbledore had given him to be incredibly useful, as they covered everything he needed and the recommended textbooks were more often than not taken out of the library by someone else. Lunch was now starting to be Draco's favourite part of the day, with its hour break giving welcome respite from the cares of the day. Normally draco would meet up with the rest of the gang at lunchtime, even when they had been in different lessons. Today however they didn't show. Why was that? When the bell rang to mark the end of lunch and the restart of lessons, Draco made up his mind to ask about it later.

'Hermione? How are you?'

'Fine,thanks. Why d'you ask?'

'I didn't see you guys at lunch, so I thought something might be up.'

'Well.' Hermione looked about, to check that no-one was paying them any attention. 'We had Care of magical creatures just before lunch. Hagrid wanted to show us something.'

'What?'

'The reason he wasn't here at the start of term, the reason he's had all of those black eyes. His brother.'

'Hagrid's got a brother?'

'Well, he's a half brother really, all giant.'

'And you got introduced? I don't envy you.'

'Grawp's alright. Hagrid only showed him to us because he thinks Umbridge is going to sack him.'

'But with Fudge gone...'

'Crouch's hands are tied. Fudge has an arrest warrant out on Dumbledore for rebellion, and unless evidence comes up to the contrary, Crouch can't do anything. That's what Hagrid says, anyway.'

'So until He-who-must-not-be-named shows his ugly face, we're stuck with Umbridge and she can do pretty much whatever she likes.'

'Seems that way.'

'Great.'

'You're telling me.'

The next day dawned and Hagrid's suspicions were proved correct. Umbridge had summoned a squad of hitwizards to take Hagrid away from the castle. The only person to stand up for him was Minerva McGonagall, who got hit squarely in the chest by at least four stunning spells and had to be taken away to St Mungo's for treatment. With McGonagall gone, the last strand of resistance to Umbridge melted away. McGonagall had been at the troublemaking's head, her position as deputy headmistress protecting her from any official reprisal from Umbridge. Now no teacher dared to cross her, either to her face or behind her back, even if they all wanted her gone. The school fell into a silent and sullen obedience to its new regime. All except for two individuals. Fred and George.

Fred and George disliked Umbridge as much as the next pupil, but they didn't care about their futures at Hogwarts- ever since Harry had givent hem his Triwizard winnings of a thousand galleons, they had been looking to open up a joke shop. Their research reached new heights and soon the school was full of free samples of skiving snackboxes –sweets o get you out of lessons by causing nosebleeds, vomiting and so forth – as well as fake wands that turned into rubber chickens and the traditional punching telescopes. They had taken up a personal vendetta against Umbridge and were beginning to make her life a misery. Soon the whole school was being led by them in a rebellion of noncooperation. Fred and George would do something, and no one else would do anything about it if not for Umbridge herself, or Filch, who seemed to have found a liking for the new headmistress- it was probably something to do with her encouraging him to keep the thumbscrews oiled on the grounds that they might need using.

Their campaign was not to last however, and culminated in a spectacular last victory. Noone expected it, except for the two who planned it. A successful attempt to create magical fireworks in the early weeks of the term had led to a long-winded plan to leave their mark before disappearing for good.

Early one morning, a disposable swamp appeared outside of the charms corridor. Flitwick, despite being able to clear it up in a heartbeat, ran to Umbridge to get her to do the work instead. Every time she cast a spell on it, it grew and grew, until soon the entire floor was covered with the thick bog. By the time she finally gave up and asked Flitwick ton help, she was covered from head to foot in thick, deep, stinking mud. Her day was only just starting.

By lunchtime, Snape had come to her, complaining that the dungeon was full of Peruvian instant darkness powder, and he couldn't see to teach. He went on to explain that there was also the matter of students losing digits in the dark, as they tried to slice roots and ended up slicing fingers instead. Umbridge went down to the dungeons to deal with that, as she had been asked, and soon found herself stumbling around, bumping into things and knocking things over. By the time she reached lunchtime, she was battered and bruised all over, and still hadn't had time to clear the mud off of her, which was beginning to dry and itch slightly.

Lunchtime in the Great Hall looked like it was going to be normal, although every Umbridge went, a strange silence in the whispers followed her. Whenever she appeared, people started talking about the weather, instead of whatever they had just been whispering about. Very soon, the whole school knew what a day she'd had. It was about to get worse.

From their positions on the Gryffindor table, Fred and George had yet another trick up their sleeves. The fireworks they'd created since their previous breakthrough were now a considerable stock. Each had a bag, enlarged on the inside, which held dozens of huge fireworks. They started off subtly, with a small roman candle. They levitated it, invisibly, behind the great throne of the headmaster, upon which Umbridge sat. A quick flick of a wand beneath the table set it off. The whole hall burst out in nervous giggling. Umbridge, seeing nothing to cause it, seemed unsure at first whether to keep her reservation and carry on looking forward, or to look wildly around for why everyone was laughing. It must have been at her after all. Finally, her composure all gone, she looked about and saw the last of the sparks die away behind her. Furious she looked forwards, her beady eyes scanning the hall for the culprits. She couldn't find them. Then, another dozen rockets exploded in the hall. The student body screeched and ran away, benches and tables being turned over in the mad rush to escape the explosions. Draco was caught up in the rush, which was less at the Gryffindor table than anywhere else- some of them knew exactly what had been going on. After years with Fred and George, how could it be otherwise? The markedly casual exodus from the Gryffindor table was in steep contrast to the other houses, yet Umbridge could do nothing. Every spell that hit the fireworks made them multiply and grow larger. A couple of extra fireworks and soon the room was full of deafening explosions. The school waited outside the hall, nervously looking in. Every so often they all ducked as a firework would come shooting out of the hall, but for the most part they stayed inside. Looking round for the twins to congratulate them, Draco noticed that they had disappeared. Soon they were back, brooms sloped over their identical shoulders. They waited for Umbridge to leave the Hall, lobbed the remainder of the fireworks at her, mounted their brooms and flew off. One final firework lit up the sky elegantly in a vast display of celebration as the greatest disruptive influence that the ancient school had seen in years disappeared over the horizon as tiny black dots. The school body cheered them on their way, with even the remaining staff quietly celebrating. Umbridge was blackened by the smoke and seemingly deafened. She had definitely had a bad day. Thankfully, with exams so close, there was little she could do in way of retribution, so she let the day's events pass. Indee, only one person seemed troubled by the spectacular exit of the Weasley twins- Lee Jordan.

'Tell you what, Draco, we're buggered now the twins have gone.'

'What? Why?'

'Cricket. We're going to have to find another opening bat and another bowler. George was a spinner as well- where are we going to find another one of those? I'm going to call an emergency session in the nets for selection. I want you there- you should be able to help a lot with selection, after all, you're going to be vice-captain.'

'Thanks, Lee. When are the nets going to be?'

'With exams coming up, probably best that we do it as soon as possible before ht holidays, but with Hagrid gone, I don't know how we're going to get the nets up.'

'We could ask Filch- he may hate students, but he does love his cricket. We might be able to persuade him.'

'I suppose it's worth a try. Nice idea. Well, I've got an essay to write for the next period, so I'd best be off. I dare say you're supposed to be in lessons.'

'Transfiguration.' Draco said, by way of explanation – all of McGonagall's lessons had been cancelled since her hospitalisation.