December brought along a biting cold that the mildly inconvenienced students of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry weren't too fond of. The weather even chilled their cauldrons, making them startlingly cold to touch as groups of first-years assembled their supplies to brew the wiggenweld potion.

Harry and Ron paired up immediately, leaving Hermione to sit with poor Neville, whose skin seemed to have changed a few shades since stepping into the class. Snape's spidery cursive seemed purposefully, mockingly ineligible but they still tried their best to understand it.

"Stew the mandrake leaves for me, will you?" Ron asked, lighting a fire under his pewter cauldron. "I'll crush the chizpurfle fangs."

Harry did as asked. The pair worked in silence for a while, watching like many as Draco Malfoy continued to boast about how Snape was his godfather and couldn't possibly give him anything less than an 'O' for the assignment, which the man in question dutifully ignored.

Harry rolled his eyes, jerking his chin towards him. "Reckon he'll notice if we drop an extra pint of horklump juice in his cauldron?"

"Like his high horse would ever let his Majesty look down," Ron scoffed.

Harry snorted. "Do it."

(Ron did, but the potion only turned a few shades darker and hence, was left unnoticed by Malfoy's scrutiny. The worst part was that the blonde probably would get an 'O' regardless of its condition.)

The half-hearted potion they made sat on Professor Snape's table, slightly lighter than what it was supposed to be, but still passable. Surprisingly, Hermione had the only perfect potion in the class and unsurprisingly, this only angered Snape.

"I want a ten-inch essay on the effects of adding an extra chizpurfle fang in the wiggenweld potion on my desk," he had practically snarled. "By. Tomorrow."

The Gryffindors groaned loudly as they left the classroom.

"Twelve inches!"

-0-

"And that, ladies and gentlemen," Harry grumbled to himself, thinking of the potion class the day before as he made his way to the Great Hall more than an hour late and not mentally prepared to skip it, "is why Mr Potter had decided to take the very smart decision of pulling a sleeping-bloody-beauty."

"A sleeping-what-now?" Ron asked drowsily, rubbing his eyes.

"Nothing," he answered quickly, "muggle reference. You won't understand."

"If you say so."

"D'you suppose there are any eggs left?"

He shuddered. "Eggs? Mate, we'd be lucky to get dry toast!"

Better dry than burnt or mouldy, Harry thought wryly but did not say. Instead, he groaned good-naturedly. "At least Hermione'll save us a seat, yeah?"

"Hate to burst your bubble, but, uh, she's probably skipped breakfast to stuff her nose in some book at the library."

As expected of their bossy, bushy-haired friend. Still, he walked a little faster than before.

The Great Hall, though less decorated than when he first saw it, still had a charm to it that never left. Four tables were arranged in a large hall, an enchanted ceiling that unveiled wispy clouds rolling over clear blue skies… a complete contrast to the snow-capped whites and greys that could be seen from the windows. The smell of jams and toast and eggs permeated the air, along with chatter and laughter.

The only empty seats at the Gryffindor table were next to Neville Longbottom, who was staring morosely at the goblet of pumpkin juice in his hand, reminding Harry uncannily of a kicked baby elephant.

"'Morning," Ron said, sitting down, a motion which caused poor Neville to flinch.

"G'morning," he muttered, stabbing the last of the scrambled eggs onto his plate.

"Hey," Harry said, his voice taking the sympathetic tone it normally took around Longbottom. "Everything okay?"

"'M fine," was the mulish, egg-stuffed reply they got.

Harry and Ron exchanged an uncertain glance.

"Is someone bothering you?" Ron demanded. "You know you can tell me, right? I'll- I can set the twins on them!"

"Oh, it's not…"

"Come on, mate," Harry said, "it's herbology first period. You're never upset when it's herbology first period! What's wrong? We want to help." Ron nodded.

"It's just…" Neville trailed off, eyes glued to the plate. "Malfoy. You know how he is. I wish he could just… disappear. Stop bothering everyone with his bull."

His eyebrows flew up. Neville? Talking bad about people? What the hell happened?

"Damn, Nev," Ron whistled. "What'd Malfoy do this time?"

"You guys know Susan Bones, right?"

"Right, the blondie!" "Think so, yeah."

"Rumor says that she's Amelia Bones' daughter — but it's really not true, don't worry, Susan's lovely, and she told me Madam Bones is just her Aunt — " Neville continued " — It was just this big thing, lasted for years –"

Harry frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Oh, you don't know?" Ron asked, surprised, and he wondered whether this would become a recurring phrase. "Basically, there was some speculation that Madam Bones might've, y'know, had affairs with Mr Bones after his wife died and Susan might be their love child. No one really believed it at first, but, er, when Madam Bones was promoted to Head of the DMLE after Mr Bones passed away, some people started to voice their doubts about how much her position was won by merit and not, er, not–"

"And not her relationship with him," Harry finished, eyeing Ron's really, really red face. "What's the DMLE?"

This time, Neville frowned. "Department of Magical Law Enforcement, of course."

"Ah, right."

"Anyway, Malfoy keeps on bringing it up in front of her," Neville said, "in class, in the hallways, sometimes at the Great Hall… It's terrible. She always looks so tired when he does it like she's gotten used to people insinuating all these things about her family. And no one does anything, because Merlin forbid his father hears about his son being a total git."

"Maybe we should hex him," Ron suggested. "Bill used to be really fond of this spell, called it the Bat Bogey. He performed it once on Percy, it was wicked!"

"Oh, I've heard of that one," Neville said, perking up. "D'you know how to do it?"

"Er… no."

"What does it do?" Harry asked, hating being the one that always asked all of the questions.

"It turns your bogeys into these great bats that try to escape from your nostrils."

He stared at Ron with wide eyes.

"Don't worry, mate, it's safer than it sounds."

"I suppose we'll have to curse Malfoy in the hallway," Neville said, thoughtful, "we can't let the professors catch us."

Ron nodded. "But wouldn't he just go and complain after?"

"No," Harry declared, "he's way too proud for that."

"But… he's a bit of a tattletale, isn't he?" Neville frowned. "He'd do anything to get you in trouble."

"Maybe," he said, less sure than before, "but that just means we'll have to hide ourselves better."

"And how do we do that?" Ron sighed.

None of them had an answer.

The buzzing students of Hogwarts kept the chilling stone walls from freezing into something dour and dreary with their excitement for the break. In this time, owls had started to arrive more frequently as students sent off letters and orders in preparation.

Hedwig had arrived with Harry's package two weeks after he sent the owl order, just in time for Christmas. Snow had settled comfortably on the grounds as Hagrid struggled to maintain the heating charms on his shrinking pumpkin patch. The school had become far more excitable than it had been two weeks ago, happy chatter filling the halls as everyone got ready to go home.

Everyone except him, that is.

Ron and his brother had decided to stay this year too, so Harry was actually looking forward to having the entire castle for themselves. He had a lot to do, from homework to sending christmas gifts to reading his new books, his schedule was filled.

Crabbe's series consisted of five books that had boring titles and no pictures, spanning topics like wizarding history and culture, economy, human and non-human relations, education and careers. Not to mention, each book was about as thick as the length of his pinky. It horrified him, making it even harder to even begin reading the dreadful books.

At least he had the entire break to read it.