Hello everyone, this chapter is once again unedited, and because of the guest reviewer from my last chapter I would like to point out that when I say unedited I mean completely unedited, even by me. This chapter is from my head straight to you. Also to explain the things that review brought up, I will simply say that even though I put Hermione told them everything she could remember, I intentionally left out her saying what spells were used for a reason and yes she had the same amount of points removed because while Hermione was defending herself from Pansy and Lavender, Draco and the other three didn't even have their wands drawn. That being said I need to say that I am, reluctantly, looking for a replacement beta reader. If you are interested please feel free to message me.
The girl who Lived
Chapter 10
Running her fingers over the index, Hermione smiled at finding a new subject that interested her, already expecting the teasing from Harry and Neville when they heard about yet another subject she was studying on top of the normal subjects they were studying in classes. Closing the book, Hermione ran her fingers over the black leather cover of the book, she would be checking this book out today, these artifacts looked not only interesting but useful. Even though it should have been far beyond her, Hermione had a feeling she'd have no trouble with the majority of the content and a lot of time to herself once the news broke that she was the main reason behind Gryffindor losing the lead they had just gotten in the house cup. Sighing internally, Hermione shook her head, she shouldn't have acted so rashly, she still had a great deal of work to do when it came to controlling her emotions. When she started these exercises Hermione had thought that her logical and ordered mind would help in controlling her emotions but in practise it was turning out to be the opposite, despite the order and lack of clutter in her mind, Hermione found it hard to grasp the full potency of the emotions she was trying to harness.
Leaning against the bookcase softly Hermione held the book to her chest, her arms wrapped around it as she lost herself in her thoughts, there had to be a way for her to learn how to keep her emotions under control. She sighed as her right hand came up to rub her scar softly, grimacing subconsciously as there was a twinge of pain in her scar. She was pulled out of her thoughts when she saw Lavender approaching from her left, arms crossed over her stomach, no wand in sight and seemingly alone. Gripping the handle of her wand as discreetly as she could, Hermione watched Lavender approaching but also kept her eyes open for any others who may try to ambush her. Lavender stopped in front of her and stood there, not speaking or moving, her face shuffling between anger and calm as though she was doing her best to keep herself from resorting to physically attacking Hermione since her wand had been broken. Hermione simply stood and watched her, doing her best to keep her expression neutral as she waited, as much as she wanted to hex Lavender more, she was still sporting the orange skin and pimples across her forehead so she held herself back. After a few more moments, just as Hermione was contemplating leaving, Lavender finally spoke.
"Take it off, Granger."
Hermione wasn't sure if she wanted to laugh or just walk away from the girl more, but curiosity kept her from doing either.
"Take what off?"
"The pimples, Granger, take them off, I'm not a traitor."
This time, Hermione couldn't help laughing, but knowing she was in the library kept her laugh short, ignoring the look Lavender was giving her.
"What would you call assembling a group of Slytherins to attack me from behind then? A friendly get together? They'll last about a week so get used to them unless you can convince someone to reverse it, but I wouldn't count on it, you're going to be as much of an outcast in the tower as I'm going to be, so suffer Brown, this is your own fault. If I were you I would be thanking me for not letting slip the spells you and Pansy cast."
Turning around and walking away before she could say anything else, Hermione left Lavender standing there and picked her bag up after putting her work away and walked over to Madam Pince and handed her the book on artifacts so she could check it out. Hermione was shocked to see Pince smile at her and gave her a shaky smile of her own before taking the book from Pince's hands gently. It was disconcerting for her to see a smile on the face of the woman who was known throughout the school for yelling at people for turning the pages of the books too loudly, Hermione shrugged and made her way to the charms classroom just before the bell was to ring signalling the end of lunch, smiling as she saw Filius already in the classroom and waiting for her, waving her in as soon as he saw Hermione outside the door. Opening the door Hermione looked forward to a small amount of time having an intellectual discussion before being forced to endure the cruelty of her classmates for losing them so many points.
"Good afternoon Professor, how has your day been?"
Filius smiled at Hermione, noting the lack of her normal enthusiasm for class and knowing full well why.
"Good afternoon Hermione, my day has been interesting but somehow I doubt as eventful as yours has been."
Hermione's answering groan made Filius laugh and shake his head.
"I think you'll be surprised by your classmates reactions Hermione, but I doubt you'll believe it until you see it for yourself. They're not angry at you Hermione, you're a big reason why Gryffindor had a lead at all, and from what I know most of the Gryffindors blame Miss Brown instead of you."
Any answer Hermione would have given was cut off as the classroom door opened again and the rest of the students filed in, making Hermione take her usual seat instead of answering Filius. Looking around at the class of Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs, Hermione found herself smiling, looking over at Filius after receiving warm, friendly smiles and greetings not just from the Hufflepuffs but the Gryffindors around her, all sounds and activity stopped as Lavender walked into the classroom and everyone started pointing at her forehead and whispering as Lavender went to take her usual seat only to find no room for her except an isolated seat in the worst part of the classroom that would make it impossible for her to see the chalkboard. As she hesitated Filius decided it was time to speak up, unfortunately for Lavender it wasn't in her favour.
"It's just a chair Miss Brown, it won't hurt you."
Reluctantly, Lavender made her way over to the chair, hearing the comments filled with contempt and anger as she walked to the chair and sat down. Toying with the edge of her book Lavender was just thankful that this period would be dedicated to theory instead of practical work, or so she thought.
"Alright class, now that we've all found our seats, let's begin. In light of a few things I've noticed with your class work, today will be spent improving your spellwork, it will benefit you all to cast spells more often to strengthen your magical cores, the first three years of your schooling are when you will get the best results from your efforts to strengthen your cores. While your cores will improve regardless of age as long as you cast spells, this is the most opportune time. So, today we will be practicing the unlocking charm, and you may also use this time to improve the quality of any of the other charms we've practised thus far. Off you go then."
This sparked a flurry of movement as small practise locks were placed on their desktops. It was a while before Filius finally realized that not only had Lavender not moved, she was still sitting with her mouth hanging open and a look of utter shock on her face. Confused, Filius walked up to her and tugged on her robe to get her attention.
"What's wrong Miss Brown, your normally the first to be excited at the chance to improve your spellwork."
Looking down at Filius, Lavender found herself having trouble answering his question, not for the first time but for an entirely new reason this time.
"Well, you see professor, my wand was….broken."
Following Lavender's eye to see where she was looking Filius wasn't surprised to find her glaring at Hermione as she helped Susan, who had decided to sit on her right side today instead of on the level lower with her friend Hannah, with the unlocking charm.
"I see Miss Brown, well considering you're glaring at Miss Granger, I'll assume that your wand was broken by her when you attacked her. Taking this into consideration, I'll excuse you from today's lesson but you will not receive any marks for today's classwork. Your homework will be 12 inches on the unlocking charm. Off you go."
Nodding numbly Lavender stood and decided to make her way to the Common Room, sighing as she hoped to be able to get a new wand soon, her teachers were likely to be just as sympathetic as Professor Flitwick just was for her attack on Granger. She grumbled as she walked toward the Common Room, cursing Granger for her misfortune.
"This isn't over Granger, I'll catch you off guard one day, and you won't live long enough to regret letting your guard down."
Hermione hadn't missed the exchange between Lavender and Filius, and couldn't help the smirk as she watched the other girl walking out of the room with a vacant look on her face. Turning back to Susan, Hermione smiled as she encouraged her friend as she attempted the unlocking charm again. They had moved on from this spell before everyone could cast it successfully, and as it wasn't uncommon for Filius to give the class these days to work on their spellwork, Hermione was glad for the chance to spend the class helping her friends while listening to the gossip around her. It surprised Hermione to hear that most of her classmates blamed Lavender instead of her, even for the points she had lost for attacking the Slytherins. Smiling to herself, Hermione squeaked in surprise as Filius surprised her by speaking while she was focused on helping Susan.
"Well Miss Granger, I think that will be 20 points to Gryffindor for your selflessness in helping your friends instead of improving your own spellwork and of course for your continued efforts to foster friendship between the houses."
Blushing softly, Hermione hung her head shyly as the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs cheered for her, still smiling as she felt relief flood through her, she would be alright. Finally looking up when everyone went back to their spells, Hermione looked over to Susan to see her smiling at her.
"You weren't worried were you Hermione? We wouldn't abandon you for this."
"I'll admit I thought everyone would treat me like they did Lavender, well except my friends that is. I knew you four wouldn't abandon me."
Always one to pull a joke, Harry looked over to her, his face serious as he looked at Hermione.
"That's rather presumptuous of you Hermione, I think I'll be staying away from you for a while, you've already beaten my count for points lost without even trying to. If you keep this up I'll be ruined and you'll take my place as head prankster and of course then I'll never forgive you."
Unable to keep his own face straight, Harry joined everyone in the room in laughter at his antics. It wasn't long after that the bell rang and Filius assigned their homework, reading the next chapter of their text on a charm that would produce a ball of light blue flame. Packing up her books, Hermione and her friends all decided to go to the library to work on their transfiguration homework, Minerva had assigned them a 7 inch essay on the spell they were working on that turned a block of iron to wood. They had been practicing using greater amounts of metal and turning them into wood to help build their stamina with more complex spells. Hermione, having already finished this essay, pulled the book out of her bag and began to read it as everyone else grabbed their books and parchment, instantly grabbing Susan's attention as she noticed that the book was on Alchemy, something far more complex than they were dealing with.
"Hermione, why do you have a book on Alchemy?"
Everyone else stopped what they were doing and looked at her, their eyes locked onto the title of the book. As she suspected it was Harry who spoke first.
"Really Hermione? You're not far enough ahead already you're trying to make us all look worse by skipping years ahead on us?"
Quietly snickering at his joke, Hermione softly slapped Harry's arm before answering.
"I saw Professor Quirrel reading it, but he was acting really suspiciously so I decided to check what he was reading, this was it."
Everyone shared a look before shrugging and returning to their work, silent except for the scratching of quills on parchment and the occasional question to Hermione. The only other disruption was Minerva coming to give Hermione the details of her detention.
"Miss Granger, could I speak with you for a second. I have the details of your detention for you."
Nodding grimly, Hermione closed the book and reluctantly got up and walked over to Minerva as she walked to the door. Once outside Minerva looked up and down the corridor and, noting that no one was around, smiled warmly at Hermione.
"Even though I have to give you detention Hermione, I want you to know how proud I am of you. You did exactly as you should've considering the circumstances. Now, before I give you the details of your detention, why were you reading about Alchemical Artifacts dear?"
Smiling and laughing softly, Hermione shook her head and after explaining why she had laughed, Hermione gave Minerva the same answer that she had given her friends only a few moments before. Nodding at her, Minerva smiled approvingly at Hermione's drive to improve herself.
" Just don't forget to have fun with your friends dear, reading is good but you need to relax with your friends as well. Now, tomorrow night you'll be taken down to Hagrid's hut by Mr. Filch, let me know if he gives you any trouble on the way down, at 7pm. You'll be having your detention with Miss Brown and Miss Parkinson, unfortunately I couldn't get Albus to reconsider that."
Shaking her head softly, Minerva nodded to Hermione and after wishing her a good night, turned and walked away. Walking back into the library, Hermione made her way back to the table her friends were at and started reading once again. A couple hours later and they had packed up their things and headed back to their respective Common Rooms, Susan back to Hufflepuff and the other four to Gryffindor. With Harry and Neville leading the way, Parvati decided to grill Hermione on the events of the morning, making Hermione worry again, and when Parvati turned to look her in the eye, she frowned at the look of trepidation and fear on Hermione's face.
"Hermione, what is it, what's wrong?"
"It's…I'm worried about what the others will say and do when they find out about me losing so many points, I mean I know that the others in our year weren't mad but what about everyone else?"
Rolling her eyes Parvati grabbed Hermione by the shoulders and shook her softly.
"Listen to me Hermione, I know you're worried but you shouldn't be, while we were in the Great Hall we heard everyone saying that it was Lavender who was to blame, not you. Now stop worrying about it."
Nodding softly, Hermione continued walking to the Common Room and as the portrait hole grew closer her nerves grew despite Parvati's words and instinctively her hand gripped the handle of her wand, unable to shake the feeling that there was soon going to be curses flying at her she would need to defend against. Even Parvati's exasperated sigh when she noticed Hermione still on edge didn't make a difference as the portrait opened and the group walked in, Hermione at the head of the group now as she entered the Common Room, watching as everyone turned to see her walking in. Hermione tensed up as she saw the Weasely twins approaching her, their faces more serious than anyone had ever seen either of them before. Watching the two closely as they approached, others may have said she was too cautious but Hermione paid more attention to the two pranksters than most and knew just how magically talented the twins were, but all her caution and fear went out the window when both twins, upon reaching her, bowed repeatedly to her. Between Hermione's look if utter shock and the twins on their knees bowing to Hermione, praising her greatness at leaving not only Lavender with pimples and orange skin but also having Pansy, a Slytherin forced to walk around sporting Gryffindor colours and hair bright enough to be seen in London, there wasn't one person not laughing in the Common Room.
After shaking herself from her shock and recovering from laughing so hard, Hermione finally smiled fully, glad that Parvati had been right about how she would be received. Deciding to have a bit of fun, Hermione grinned and looked to the twins who were still bowing in front of her.
"Ah, it's good to know I'll always have such loyal subjects, would you mind cleaning my shoes while you're bowing you two, Pansy got them dirty on me."
The laughter was cut off immediately, no one in Gryffindor could ever remember Hermione playing a joke like this so they didn't know if she was serious until she started laughing again at the shocked and somewhat scared looks on everyone's faces, including the twins, who looked at each other with wide grins on their faces as they spoke in tandem.
"It seems we've been planked brother of mine. I do believe I'm impressed, who knew Hermione had it in her."
The entire common room went silent as everyone gulped at the next words to come from the twins, still speaking as one.
"This means war."
Hermione's only response was to smile more deviously than the twins had ever managed which had the rest of the assembled students either running up to their dorms or diving for cover to save themselves from the war that had not only been declared, but by Hermione's answering smirk, accepted wholeheartedly.
"Gentlemen, I do believe we are agreed then. I wish you luck, I'd add in that I hope your sanity survives as well but the fact that you've issued this challenge proves that your sanity is long gone."
Another look was shared between the twins before both looked back to Hermione, sporting identical evil grins before each extending a hand out to Hermione.
"Good luck Hermione, we'll try not to take advantage of your inexperience too much."
After a quick handshake between Hermione and the twins, what would become known as the great Hogwarts prank war was begun.