The Slytherin Common Room, the rest of the day, was a tense place.

Draco and the others involved with the fake dementor scheme had lost fifty points from Slytherin and all been assigned detention. The rest of Slytherin was shooting them dirty looks whenever they were seen, though Marcus Flint was determinedly ignoring them all. He'd gathered what looked like half of the Slytherin Quidditch team into the center of the common room, and he was drawing something on a chalkboard he'd conjured. Hermione managed to overhear 'Firebolt' as she walked by – possibly they were already trying for some sort of mitigation plan to compete with Harry's broom.

It was rather unfair how much of the game depended on a player's broom, Hermione mused. Whoever had the better broom had a significant advantage over others, regardless of skill level. It'd be fairer if everyone played on the same model of broom. She wondered why Quidditch wasn't played that way.

Kickbacks from the racing broom industry, she wondered cynically, only half-joking to herself.

Harry had assured her that the Gryffindor party would go on all day and night, so Hermione took her time, finishing several assignments in the afternoon before heading out to accept his invitation. On a whim, she took a detour to the Kitchens to see if she could bring some sort of party tray with her – it was only polite, wasn't it?

Once she tickled the pear and entered, however, she stopped short and stared.

The scene before her was very… unusual.

The House Elves were all there, working on dinner for the school, but Hermione was struck to see that nearly half of them were not wearing their pillowcase-style uniforms, but wearing black robes of some sort. The robes were too long on all of them, but those elves wearing them continually pushed up their sleeves with beaming smiles, and anytime an elf tripped on the hem, they managed to levitate whatever they were carrying just before they crashed into the floor. Even the elves that hit the ground never stopped smiling, just pushing themselves back up or doing a somersault back onto their feet before cheerfully carrying on.

Hermione glanced around, curious, before she pulled an elf aside.

"Is Tolly around?" she asked politely.

The elf lit up.

"I goes and gets her," it assured her, and the elf hurried off.

As Hermione waited, she continued to watch the House Elves scurry about. The robes they were wearing were odd – they clearly weren't long enough to be wizards' robes, but they still weren't short enough to be made for a House Elf. The black of them seem vaguely faded as well, as if the dye hadn't quite held fast, even though the robes looked new.

The moods in the Kitchen varied wildly as well, Hermione observed. The elves wearing robes seemed nearly incandescent with happiness, beaming from ear to ear, while those not wearing robes seemed to be bitter and angry over something – though, incredibly, it didn't seem like they were jealous of their peers. There were glares given to dough being kneaded and pies being prepared, but small, fond smiles for their kin. It was all very odd.

"Missy Hermione!"

Hermione looked down to see Tolly looking up at her with a smile, and Hermione smiled back.

"Hello Tolly," she said. "How are you?"

"Tolly is good," Tolly said, leading her over to the small table set aside for visitors. "I was being very angry earlier, but I is being happy now. "

"Very angry?" Hermione probed carefully. "Is everything all right?"

Tolly's face twisted with annoyance.

"Headmaster Dumbledore was being nosy about breakfast this morning," she said. "He was making a big deal over there not being as many foods as there usually is, even though there was still enough." She made a face. "Then he was being mad that many House Elves were not here. He wanted to know where they were being."

"The other House Elves went somewhere?" Hermione blinked. "That's… unusual, isn't it? I thought you all live at the school. Where did they go?"

Tolly gave her a sly look.

"Tolly was telling Headmaster Dumbledore that they is going to visit family," she said. "By agreement with Hogwarts, House Elves is allowed to go and visit family so longs as their duties is being covered by other elves."

"And Dumbledore didn't like that?" Hermione guessed.

"Dumbledore was not believing Tolly," Tolly said. "He is saying that that many House Elves is not having family outside of Hogwarts and needing visited all at once." Tolly smiled impishly. "Tolly took a vow on her magic that they was visiting family, and then Dumbledore was having to give up and go away."

"And they were visiting family?" Hermione asked. "All at once?"

Tolly's face split with a wide, devious grin.

"House Elves is having new family we is only finding recently," she said, her big eyes glinting. "It is being a secret, but Tolly is telling you – Tolly was sending the House Elves to be visiting with the goblinses."

Hermione's jaw dropped.

"That's where they got the robes from?" she asked. "Those are goblin robes?"

"The goblinses is giving them as a thank you for the House Elves helping them with their silly issues," Tolly said, nodding. "Everyone is being very happy – the goblinses is very happy for a bunch of moss and some simple spellwork to be helping clean up some things, and the elves is very happy for new clothing and new friends and family!"

Tolly beamed, and Hermione grinned back.

"That's great!" she told her, heartfelt. "I'm glad you're getting along with them so well."

"Tolly is too," Tolly said, nodding vigorously. "The goblinses is very good at figuring out sneaky ways of working around restrictions and rules. Like abouts what clothes House Elves can be wearing."

"There's a rule about that?" Hermione asked, blinking.

"House Elves must be wearing their uniform at all times," Tolly told her. "House Elves also cannot be accepting clothing or their bond with the school is breaking."

"Then how are they wearing robes?" Hermione asked. "Are they wearing the standard uniform underneath the robes?"

"That might be working," Tolly said, blinking. "Tolly is not thinking of that."

"Then how?" Hermione pushed.

"The goblinses is explaining it to us," Tolly said. She grinned. "House Elves is not having separate uniforms – we all share, as a big family. And the goblinses, they is our family too, so that makes them part House Elf, and these robes is their uniform. So we is still wearing House Elves' uniforms – just a very far away relatives' sort of uniform – and we is sharing them all collectively, not taking them personally, so nobody's bond is breaking from anything of personal ownership."

Hermione was highly amused that the goblins had referred to themselves as distant House Elves, but she didn't doubt it – in her experience, goblins were very precise with wording and excellent at finding loopholes.

Tolly was all too happy to arrange for a tray of biscuits to be ready for Hermione after dinner for her to take to the party, before shooing her out of the Kitchen so the Elves could finish cooking. Hermione left, amused at Tolly's gentle scolding, her mind wondering at the Elves' association with the goblins.

It sounded like House Elf magic was helping the goblins with some basic things, perhaps the same Hermione had helped with – repairing houses and such. And bringing them moss sounded like something helpful for them, too – to put on new roofs and such to maintain the oxygen level in their Hold.

Still, though. She wondered at the goblins. It had taken her years to earn their trust to the point of letting her into their Hold. The House Elves had taken less than a week, it seemed.

It was probably because House Elves weren't wizards, Hermione surmised. There was a lot of bad blood there, between wizards and goblins, so she couldn't exactly blame the goblins for their overabundance of caution regarding such things.