Chapter Thirty:

Shapeshifter

Laughter suddenly rang through the library, and Harry turned towards the sound, listening carefully as a far off but a familiar voice said, "Come on Granger - reach for it! Don't you want it?"

"Please, stop..."

"Make me."

Harry narrowed his eyes. "I know that voice," he growled.

Neville nodded with him. "Raven Labelle."

Harry stood up, Susan moving so that her feet were planted back on the ground as she stood as well. "She's at it again, bullying Hermione Granger."

"That frumpy Gryffindor we saved before?" Draco shrugged as he stood up, hands going to rest inside his pockets. "She's a pretty good target for Labelle, Harry. Doesn't fight back, a Mud -" he stopped, shaking his head as he corrected himself, "I mean, Muggleborn, and doesn't have any friends except for that other Muggleborn fellow. What's he's name, Dudley? And they can't be together all the time."

"Well, I'm not going to let it keep going on," remarked Harry. Even if Granger wasn't a part of his tight-knit group of friends, or part of his pack, it didn't mean he could stand by and let her get treated this way without doing anything to help. It felt wrong to do so. He glanced at his three friends, Susan and Neville standing while Draco was still in his seat, lounging. "You guys don't have to go with me; I can handle Labelle by myself."

"Fine -" started off Draco, but then after he saw the angry stare he was getting Susan, he trailed off and sighed, waving a hand to dismiss himself as he stood. "Never mind. We'll go with you. Better in numbers and all that. Plus, Gryffindors always act so irrationally, and after her last failed attempt to duel you it's probably better not to be around Labelle alone," the Slytherin reminded him.

"Plus, I can bet those three other Gryffindor boys will be with her," put in Susan, with Neville nodding in agreement. "At least this way we can even things out."

Shaking his head, Harry looked at his friends with a half smile. "Did I ever mention that you three are the best?"

"No - but you need to do that more often," remarked Draco with a smug look and a cross of his arms. "Now, are we going to do this or not?"

The group of friends followed the voices, the voices getting louder to Harry as they got closer, and Susan whispered that she was surprised that the librarian, Madam Pince, hadn't started investigating the noise - since she was usually so protective of the silence of her library. Harry shrugged in answer - he had only heard the noise because of his sensitive hearing, he doubted Pince heard it; unless she had alarms set for when noise rose above a certainly level. He didn't doubt that idea at all.

Rounding a corner of a stack of bookshelves, Harry saw a Gryffindor boy guarding the entrance to a narrow aisle between two bookshelves, not yet noticing the Hufflepuffs - and the lone Slytherin

- as he stared towards the front desk, only thinking of the head librarian to watch out for. Growling lowly, Harry shot forward and came face to face with the youngest Weasley brother that had been following Labelle like a puppy, and was currently acting as the lookout for the bully. Ronald Weasley yelped and jumped back, back up painfully into the side of a shelf with a wince, and four heads snapped towards the intruders.

The two other cohorts of Labelle's were circling Granger, the grins on their face slipping away at the sight of Harry and his friends. Granger had her arms up, hands grabbing for a letter just out of reach and tears running down her face. With one arm high in the arm as she held the letter just above Granger's fingertips, Labelle narrowed her eyes at the sight of Harry. "Oh look, Granger, it's your Hufflepuff boyfriend," she sneered, her glare skipping over the three Hufflepuffs and single Slytherin. "Looks like they've come to save you again. Isn't that right, Potter? You've just got to be a knight in shining armor."

Growling lowly under his breath, Harry stomped forward and yanked down Labelle's arm. She gave a yelp in shock, and he grabbed the letter from her hand. "Will you just leave her alone, Labelle?" he huffed, handing the letter over to Granger, who thanked him with wide eyes. "Granger hasn't done anything to you to deserve this treatment."

"Oh, you think I need a reason to pick on Granger?" Labelle grabbed the letter back, and before Harry could stop her, she crumpled the letter into a ball and tossed it to one of the other boys. "Hm, let me think here for a moment. Should it be because she's Muggleborn? That she doesn't even have one magical parent and shouldn't even be here?" She snapped her gaze towards Granger, who shrank and turned her own gaze towards the floor. "No, that can't be it at all. Because she gets better grades than I do? I don't care about that. Or maybe because of her stupid hair and big beaver teeth?" She shrugged. "If I have to pick a reason, maybe I feel like she doesn't belong in Gryffindor - maybe the hat should have put her with those freaky bookworms in Ravenclaw instead."

With a hiccup, Granger started to cry, tears rolling down her cheeks. Snarling, Harry snapped forward and tried to punch Labelle, but his anger made him swing wide and she dodged it with a laugh. "I don't need a reason, Potter. She's there and just so easy to pick on. Doesn't fight back or anything, it makes her a perfect target."

"Told you," mumbled Draco lowly under his breath.

"It doesn't give you the right to bully her like this," snapped Harry.

"And I don't care," shot back Labelle. "If she wants me to stop so badly, maybe she should try defending herself!" She tossed her hair over her shoulder and turned to walk off. "Come on, boys. Let's go."

The three boys followed her, and Ron Weasley dropped the letter he had been tossed to the floor without a backward glance towards them. Apparently, the warning his mother had sent him had not been entirely effective.

Harry went on over to the letter, picked it up, and held it out to the sniffling Granger. "Are you alright?"

As Granger wiped at her eyes and nodded, a few terrified screams filled the library, and the group jumped in shock. "What the bloody hell was that?" questioned Draco with wide eyes, searching the stacks of shelves.

"Oh, Madam Pince is going to angry that someone is yelling her library," mumbled Susan, and Granger nodded with her.

"Really? People are screaming and you are more concerned that the library is going to get pissed at the noise?" Draco asked dryly. "Really, you girls are weird."

"Well, I guess I would worry if Pince heard that, since if she comes investigating she just might blame us?" snapped back Susan.

"Um, guys? Didn't that sound a little bit like Labelle?" put in Neville.

"Cause it was," said a voice before a Ravenclaw appeared from the stacks - Harry recognized her as the second year that had sat at the Gray Table a few times, Tory Moon. "My fault! Sorry if their screams freaked you out a little bit, just a bit of payback."

"Payback?" questioned the group.

Nodding, Tory held up a finger. "Just a sec." She closed her eyes, grimacing. And Harry watched with awe as her mouth got a little wider, accompanying for her quickly growing teeth, her top incisors like fangs. Her ears pointed at the tips, and her short brown hair was suddenly long and pitch black. Then she opened her eyes, showing off bright red eyes whose pupils were slit like a cat, and hissed. In a matter of moments, she had changed from plain to terrifying.

"Holy shite!" stammered out Draco, almost covering Neville's own yelp of surprise. "What the hell?!"

"You're a Metamorphmagus!" Susan said suddenly. "That's - That is just amazing!" Harry looked at his friend with confusion. Tory had mentioned that she was... whatever that was - before when they first met. That still didn't explain how she could do what she just did, though.

"Thanks. It's wicked, huh?" asked Tory with a crooked grin, still looking rather frightening. She blinked, and her features started to slowly change back to her original plain looks. "And it's a better use of my abilities than just making sure I have a good hair day."

"Why were you scaring Labelle and her friends?" Neville asked with confusion.

"Oh, that bully and her cronies? I figured that someone should teach those meanies a lesson," Tory replied with a shrug, but her eyes were gleaming with delight, and they flashed for a long moment into a dark blue, like the water of an ocean before a storm. "Plus, no one calls Ravenclaws freaky on my watch... I mean we are, but that doesn't mean she can call us that," she added with a roll of her eyes. She turned to Granger, who was eyes and cheeks were red as she looked at her with a blink, and reached into her pocket. "Here." She handed her a handkerchief. "You look like you could use this."

"Thank you," sniffled Granger, taking it and dabbing at her eyes. "I'm Hermione - Hermione Granger."

"Victoria Moon - but you can call me Tory. Second year." Tory smiled brightly at Granger, her eyes momentarily turning warm gold. "Listen, if you need to talk to anyone, or just want to hang out, come find me at Ravenclaw tower, alright?" As Granger nodded in acknowledgment, Tory gave everyone a little wave as she turned. "Got to go - I'll see you all later!"

"You sure you're alright, Granger?" asked Susan, frowning. "We can walk you back to Gryffindor tower if you'd like."

"Hermione," spoke up the Gryffindor quickly. "Um, you can call me Hermione. And it's alright - I think maybe I'll take a walk for a little while." She looked to Harry. "Thank you for defending me like that," she rushed out before quickly walking away, clutching her crumpled letter tightly in her hand.

"I like her," announced Susan abruptly.

"I still don't understand," said Harry slowly, confused. "What is a... whatever the heck she is? Meta-what?"

"Oh, I forgot that you probably don't know," apologized Susan. "Tory is a Metamorphmagus - she has the ability to change her physical appearance at will, kind of like what you can do as an Animagus, Harry. But instead of turning into an animal, she can change her hair, eyes, and so on. If she wanted, she could look like anyone she wanted."

"Oh," Harry replied with understanding. "That's pretty awesome. And at least she isn't going to take Labelle's bullying lying down either."

"Why do I feel like I'm becoming a Gryffindor?" Draco suddenly asked out loud, questioning himself with an added sigh and turning to the Hufflepuffs. "You three keep dragging me into these situations - guard the Stone, protect the weird girls." He threw his hands into the air. "What's next, fighting those dragons in the dungeons?"

"I think the chances of getting near a dragon are pretty slim to none," reassured Susan. "But at really think you won't have to worry about them in dungeons at least."

"We just have to worry about three-headed dogs instead," put in Neville, and Harry snorted in laughter.

Authors Note: Introduction (or actual, re-introduction) of a new character that I hope will make future appearances. Thank you, everyone, for the reviews and I hope you enjoy this chapter! Next chapter will be posted on September 16th!