A/N: and here i am again with another chapter with the help form HowInMadeHowie. He had once again done very good work with correcting my mistakes and adding some details that deepens the story.
Thanks to you readers once again for liking this story so far. Have fun and be safe
The days moved on, and soon February turned into March, as the students in Hogwarts were doing their homework either in the library or their common room, while some sat outside and enjoyed the weather that was getting warmer after a cold winter. Well, at least warmer for the circumstances as they were still in scottland. For the second years, they also had another point on their agendas, as they needed to choose at least two of the electives Hogwarts offered for their next school year. Some of the students, mostly muggle born, needed some time to decide.
And so it happened that Harry sat in the library together with Hermione, Daphne, Tracy and Lavender with the Patil twins as well as Neville, Hannah and Susan looking at all the options they had. Harry had also invited Ron, but he had declined as they still insisted they had time before handing over their chosen elective; more annoying to Harry Ron already knew what he wanted to take.
"Does Ron still want you to choose the same things as he wants so he could spend more time with you? Reading over the classes for divination, if you do not have the ability from birth this class does not teach you much that you could use." Daphne looked over to Harry and Hermione, who both nodded and continued to read the descriptions from the classes.
Harry had something to say about this topic. "You know, I remember how John had told us about the Divination teacher, and told us that she was as accurate as if you would shoot a shotgun to hit something far away with birdshot. Something would hit the target eventually after you tried a few times, but it is pointless to try if you have something better to use." Harry looked up from his notes and saw Neville looking at him with a curious look. Harry pointed out shotguns have been in use since the 16th century, it was not a new concept only that they have refined it since then.
"What's a shotgun?" Neville asked Harry, not noticing how Hermione and Daphne grinned as they knew what Harry was referring to. While they rolled their eyes, Harry explained the principle of firearms to his friends who were purebloods and would not understand why Muggles had such weapons.
Hermione scratched the option for divination with a red ballpoint pen to show that she would not take this class. She had considered Divination at first to see how that worked, but after talking with Daphne about how interesting Mugglestudies could be, Hermione decided to choose what she could use for the future, despite her first intent to just learn as much as she could. While she did that, Daphne asked her what kind of a quill Hermione was using. Hermione looked over to her and told her what it was, and that she may need to take Muggle Studies next year with a grin on her face. Hermione grinned as she remembered something that she had to tell Daphne and the others about. "And remember how Harry told Malfoy about those things just after Christmas? I thought I had seen you laughing at Malfoy about his angry face."
Daphne looked at Hermione to remind her that this was the reason why she had also removed that class from her list. Daphne huffed in annoyance, "I told you that this class has not been updated for over 50 years, even if Dumbledore pushes for it every year. But all he can do is for the board to agree that they should hire new teachers every now and then, who then would bring new things into the class. But explaining these things is hard for someone who does not know how they worked for real. I mean, can you explain a telephone to someone like Ron? Or rubberducks?" This remark caused the table to laugh so loud that Madam Pince came to them and reminded them that they should be silent.
Harry was looking over Divination again. Faintly hearing Yen and Triss in his head telling him that this was a waste of time, he also removed it from his list of options. Seeing Daphne now looking at him with a small smile on her lips, he answered her question why Ron wanted him to take the same classes. "Well, Daphne, Ron told me that Divination would be an easy OWL in our fifth year as you just could invent some things that you would see in whatever the exam would be. I told him that I am not interested in such things and would rather take Care of Magical Creatures and Ancient Runes, but I am still thinking about a third class I want to take. Arithmancy sounds interesting, but it is very similar to the mathematical equations my great aunt wanted me to solve when I was younger to see how intelligent I am." Harry read a book about the subject, asking himself if he could do this kind of calculations. He had done some advanced calculations back in Kear Morhen, when he was beginning his training with Geralt and John, but he did not know how it would work with the math used in Arithmancy, so that would be interesting to find out.
But reading what kind of things Arithmancy can do, he was seeing the potential in the class. Callie cheekily reminded Harry that she was not his calculator and Doctor Halsey would not approve of him using her as such.
Callie was compiling all the information she had at her disposal thanks to Cortana having collected it over all these years. She wanted to help Harry to decide as fast as possible, hoping that Harry would still work together with his friends even if they would not take the same classes. Hearing Lavender and Parvati that they would take Divination, as they were interested in these horoscopes and how they sometimes hit the mark.
Soon all the students at this table had decided what they would take in their third year. All of them would take Care of Magical Creatures, with Hermione and Daphne wondering what Harry would do in it because he was a Witcher. According to the description, some creatures they would have in this class would be classified as very dangerous, so they just hoped that the teacher would have them under control so Harry would not have to intervene with his skills.
And while Harry together with Hermione, Daphne and Susan would take Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, Neville and Hannah would only take Ancient Runes with them next to Care of Magical Creatures. Tracy wanted to stay in the same classes as Daphne was taking. So, she also took the same electives, but asked her housemate to help her with the assignments they would have in the next school year.
The Patil twins decided to take other classes, while Parvati takes Divination with Lavender, Padma would take Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, being the Ravenclaw of the group she wanted to learn harder classes as they had until now.
After they had done their homework for this day, they left the library and walked to their respective common rooms; afterwards, they would return to the Great Hall for dinner.
Daphne and Tracey walked down the stairs to the dungeons, discussing their choices for electives. Tracey couldn't help but to tease her friend. "Somehow, I wonder Daphne, why did you wait to mark the electives until after Harry told us what he would take? If you behave like this, someone else who would notice this and would think that you want something more from Harry then friendship." Seeing her friend blush, Tracey grinned widely and teased her friend a bit more until they stood in front of a blank wall which hid the entrance to their common room.
Tracey rolled her eyes and shook her head at the situation her friend was in commenting absently. "Boys can be so oblivious. Well, there is the saying that we girls are grown up earlier than them either way, so I would say you still have some years before he would show interest in another girl. But please tell me, how you want to stand out against Hermione and Susan, as you must have noticed how those two were locking at him in the library." Tracey asked this question just before the door opened, so Daphne had some time before she would answer to not give the other Slytherins any indication what they were talking about.
Daphne was happy about it, as she had no answer for her friend. Of course, she had noticed how Hermione blushed every time Harry was close to her, but Susan was not as shy as she was at the beginning of the school year. But as Daphne would visit him in Kaer Morhen for a longer time than the other two girls, she hoped that it would work out for Harry to remember her fondly. And would it be only to become his main wife, as he would still have to take multiple wives because he is the heir of house Potter and Black after all. But this would still leave one of the three behind, so that would be something she needed to address soon if she wanted to have an advantage if she really would fall in love with Harry.
Harry and Hermione arrived in the Gryffindor Common room. Harry saw there that Ron was playing chess with Seamus causing Harry to think why Ron was not concentrating like that in classes, even if Harry and Hermione showed him the benefits of learning ahead in a class. Professor McGonagall gave them extra points because they had the right answers to her questions. Harry was just disappointed as it seemed that the visit last summer only benefited Ginny as she was outgoing in her behavior and had made many friends in Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. He also had seen her often on the training grounds, keeping up with some second years that would not come so often. Even John had praised Ginny for her discipline in going through the courses. Just as Harry wanted to go up to his dorm room, he heard Ron asking him if he wanted to play after Seamus. Harry shook his head and reminded Ron that it was soon Dinner time. He would not think that they could finish their game fast enough.
Ron nodded, now noticing what time it was. Ron chuckled sheepishly as he glanced back down at the board and muttered. "Ah, you're right, Harry. I wondered why I got so hungry all of the sudden."
Harry snorted at this remark while Fred and George, who were close by, asked Ron if he was not always hungry because he ate like he did.
While Harry walked up the stairs to his dorm, he heard Ron almost screaming that he was still growing and that he had to eat so much. Harry placed his bag in the dorm room, seeing Ron's rat laying on its owner's bed. Harry then noticed that his medallion was vibrating again, so now he knew that something was about this rat that was not normal. But as it still did not show any magical abilities, he would let Callie report this to John and investigate in their databases if she could find something.
Later at dinner, Harry sat at his house table and was just loading his dinner on his plate when he heard running footsteps. He noticed Daphne running in the Great Hall with Tracey just before Malfoy came in, who now looked even angrier than he should be right now. Something must have happened on their way to the Great Hall, so he asked Callie if she could contact Sisi and ask what was wrong. But just before Callie was on her way, John stood up from the staff's table and walked down to the entrance to the Great Hall.
John stopped just between the girls and Malfoy with his goons and looked down at him. Crossing his arms over his broad chest he spoke in a tone that made clear Malfoy would not forget."Mr. Malfoy, I think we told you last time what would happen if you tried to intimidate your classmates. And according to the body language from Ms. Greengrass and Ms. Davis you just tried to attack them again. Professor Snape also told you that next time, it would be me who would handle your sentence, so I will now ask those girls about what happened on their way to the Great Hall. You and your friends meanwhile will sit down at your house table." John then looked up to the staff table and asked Professor Dumbledore if he could accompany them, as he had every reason to be suspicious about this behavior from the girls.
Callie soon returned from her digital trip and told Harry what had happened. "According to Sisi, Crabbe and Goyle were waiting for them just outside their common room when they left for dinner, as if they had noticed that the portrait over the fireplace was reporting directly to Professor Dumbledore and would have told him that they were threatening the girls again. We still do not know why Draco still tries to take control of his house, but if this goes any further we are sure that he would call his father to get him out of trouble again. So, we need real evidence this time, not just some claims from the victims; that is the reason why John asked Dumbledore to accompany him. If our information about Dumbledore's ability is correct, he can extract memories from someone and see if they were tempered with, but Professor Dumbledore keeps quiet about this ability so he would not be bothered by others about it. Professor Dumbledore will ask the girls for their memories and when Lucius Malfoy would see what his son was doing in this memory, he could still bail his son out of the punishment he could receive, but John is sure that this time it would be too overwhelming for this to happen. As for Crabbe and Goyle, Cortana told us that we should not worry about them for the rest of the year, as they will stay in detention after classes until the end of this school year. Maybe John can bring them in line when they would have to go out on the obstacle courses."
Harry quietly ate as he listened to this explanation, asking himself if he should ask Daphne the next time, he would see her if he could help in any way or form.
In Professor Dumbledore's office, Daphne and Tracey were sitting on some comfortable chairs and answered the questions the headmaster had for them. "And when we left the entrance to our common room to go up to dinner, Crabbe and Goyle stood just around the corner of the next corridor and blocked our path; while Malfoy came up behind us. When we asked him what he wanted from us, he told us that we should finally cave in and submit to his rule in our house. It seems that we are the last ones who openly defy him, but we do not know how Malfoy achieved this. We managed to push through Crabbe and Goyle as Filch came down the stairs with his cleaning supplies, and then we ran up to the entrance hall in the hope that we could tell you or some other teacher what had happened. But they were soon on our tail, and Goyle even cast a spell at us but luckily, he missed us. His conjuration was the one from the full body bind jinx, so we would have been helpless until they would have lifted the jinx. We do not know what they would have done to us, but we are glad that it did not work out." Daphne explained in as much detail as she could, while Sisi was talking with Cortana and handed her the data packet for the older AI to analyze.
Dumbledore thanked Daphne and asked her if she would agree to submit her memory so it would supplement her view from what happened down in the dungeon. She agreed to it and soon Dumbledore pulled his wand back from her temple and placed it in a small vial. Asking Daphne if she was alright, Dumbledore smiled as she told him that she still could remember what happened, so everything has gone smoothly.
After telling them that they could return to the Great Hall and eat their dinner and asking the Chief if he could bring Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle up to his office, Dumbledore stored the memory in his cupboard and waited for the boys to ask for their view of the incident. He knew of course that they would try to lie their way out of the whole incident, but thanks to the memory he could show their parents that his punishment would be justified.
A short time later, Dumbledore could hear the young Malfoy was talking with John about how he would tell his father how he was treated his way up; seeing the door opened that John carried them with the collar of their robes in his hands.
John's voice was deep and vibrated in the bones of the one he spoke too, so the boys before him shuddered just a bit. "And I told you, Mr. Malfoy, that the headmaster wishes to speak with you immediately. So, I am authorized to carry you in his office if necessary, and you are trying to tell me what I could do and what not signaled to me that you would not obey the command from the headmaster, so I grabbed you and carried you. Now, be a good boy and listen to the Professor." John placed them on the ground and closed the door behind them while he stayed inside the office, standing at attention next to the door so those three boys could not leave without Dumbledore allowing them to go.
A short time later, Snape also entered the headmaster's office , being called by a house-elf that Dumbledore had called while John was getting Malfoy and his friends. Standing next to the headmaster, Snape was looking angrily at his godson, knowing full well why he was called here.
"Now that we are all here, let's hear your version of the incident in the dungeons were you allegedly threatened Ms. Davis and Ms. Greengrass." Dumbledore folded his hands on his desk, showing the young boys that he would listen to them.
Malfoy told them that those girls just wanted attention, that he and his friends did not attack them like they had told in the Great Hall. Malfoy puffed out his chest arrogantly to show his defiance to the headmaster. "Why should I, the heir of house Malfoy, let myself go down so low as to attack those two? We were just talking before Filch came out of a corridor and Greengrass ran off with Davis on her tail, only to arrive in the Great Hall to spell those lies." Malfoy watched his mouth, so he would not tell something that would be too obvious that he was lying. But the look on his godfather's face told him that he was not good enough.
Dumbledore stood up from his chair and walked around his desk, looking at the three boys in front of him. "If you just talked with each other, why were they both running with you both just behind them? Please forgive my suspicion, but it is a bit far away to run from the dungeons to the Great Hall without someone trying to hurt you, even though you must see it that way. And yes, if you now realize that Ms. Greengrass also told us where she and her friend started and you just confirmed a witness that could tell us where it was precisely, you see that we know that something does not add up. Mr. Wulf, could you please go to Mr. Filch and tell him that I want to ask him something at his earliest convenience?" John nodded and left the office and closed the door behind him again, leaving the five others in the office.
Turning back to the boys in his office, Dumbledore spoke with all the authority he possessed. "As for your punishments, I warned you last year when we caught you that I would not have any choice as to suspend you the next time you would try something like that. But as Mr. Lucius Malfoy had convinced us that we should lower your punishment last year. I can not give you all the suspension, but I will put you all in detention for the rest of the year, and you can only go to your dorms with your head of house. I do apologize for the inconvenience Severus, but it is necessary. Also, the teachers responsible for your detention will be Chief Wulf and Professor Snape so I would suggest that you behave yourself. In addition, I will deduct 50 points each from your house. Of course, if you would show us your wand so we could check for the last spell used, we would see who told the truth?" Malfoy deflated a bit, knowing full well that if they would check their wands, they would see that Goyle really had cast the full body bind jinx. While Malfoy was fumbling with his words to defend himself, Snape told them to leave the office and go to his classroom, as they would clean this space for tonight.
Snape was livid, he had warned his godson about this behavior, obviously Draco did not heed his warning. And now he had to listen to the tantrum his godson was throwing while he scooped up some leftover snail entrails from the ground with his two associates.
Malfoy whined petulantly. "Oh, my father will have the head from this mudblood lover for this. How does he dare to give me such a heavy punishment for something that did not even result in someone getting hurt?"
Snape used a ruler he had lying on his desk to smack on it, causing Malfoy and the other two to flinch.
Snape then stood up from the chair he was sitting in and inspected their progress while he told them that this was exactly what their behavior had led to. "We have warned you all last year, that such a behavior will no longer be tolerated; from you or anyone else. Do you know how many detentions I had to sit with the other Slytherins because of this? You are not the first one and if this continues, you will also not be the last one who will clean a classroom from the dirt on the floor. And as I am much against spending my free time with children, it is in my job description to do so if ordered. And you can count yourself lucky that I am the first teacher who gives you a detention worthy of its name, as Chief Wulf would have you run through the obstacle courses until you almost pass out from exhaustion. Mr. Goyle, you missed a spot over there."
Snape pointed to a table where underneath was a bigger pile than Goyle had cleaned before. "That should teach you to make better use of the ingredients, as you will notice that this is your table from today's class." Sitting back on his chair behind the desk, he watched Goyle crawl over to the spot Snape had told him and began to clean the spot with the rag they had to use.
After a few hours, Snape saw that the room was clean enough to call this a night and told the boys that they should store the cleaning supplies in the cupboard and then walk with him to their common room. Malfoy was still throwing a tantrum causing Snape to ask himself how this boy could still talk after all this time. When Snape looked at the other two boys, he saw that Malfoy would soon lose their loyalty if he continued to talk like that, but Snape did not say anything. Maybe this was the lesson the foolish boy needed to learn to become a better man than his father is. Snape internally grimaced at that prospect, 'Somehow I cannot see that happening if Draco cannot break from his Lucius' influence.'
Opening the door to the common room they noticed that they were alone as it was after midnight, so Snape brought them directly to their dorm rooms and told them that they will be watched from tomorrow on.
Malfoy was still angry and walked to his bed before removing his robe and placing it to the hamper where the Hogwarts' house-elves would collect them to clean it. He then walked over to the small desk they had in their dorm and wrote a letter to his father telling him what had happened tonight. After he had finished the letter, he was thinking about calling for their family house elf to deliver it but decided against it as an owl would be faster and so he went to bed.
The next morning the owls delivered the post like they always had, and Malfoy recognized the owl his family used, with another package with sweets in it. He took it from the leg just after he told the owl that he had a letter for her to carry, and that she should fly faster than usual.
On the other side of the Great Hall, Harry saw that Malfoy looked tired and bound a letter on the leg of his owl, while Hedwig sat on his shoulder and snacked on a small piece of bacon that Harry had given her. She had no letter to bring to him, but it was either way a daily occurrence that she flew down to him and took her breakfast on his shoulder. That caused some ahs from the female students as it looked cute according to them how he treated his familiar.
Looking over to Ron, he saw that he had brought his rat Scabbers down again to eat breakfast with them. Hermione, Parvati and Lavender once again asked him why he would not just fill a small plate with food and then place it next to him or even the ground.
Ron grunted at this request; it was getting on his nerves after all those months they had shared this table. "I told you, Scabbers is used to it from back home to eat with us on our table. Harry can witness it; he was in our home last summer." Ron then pointed with a toast towards Harry, not noticing how Hedwig was looking at it.
Just as Harry wanted to answer that he saw the rat on the table, but he was disturbed as Hedwig snapped the toast out of Ron's hand and nibbled on it while the redhead wizard was looking at the owl in disbelief. Just as Ron wanted to tell Harry to control his owl, Scabbers climbed onto his plate and ate some pancakes just in front of the rest on the table.
Harry looked at Ron's plate and told him that before Ron could tell him how to treat his owl, he should try to get this bad habit out of his rat.
Hedwig, now full and satisfied, took off and flew out the window, noticing the Malfoy family owl was just flying behind her. She asked him once again with her hooting if he would take a small break before returning home and eat something. The brown eagle owl nodded tiredly, as he was flying nonstop the last few weeks and could use a break.
The rest of the day flew by almost instantly, as today's classes were just some reviews of last year before they would tackle something harder.
Herbology was called off for today, as Professor Sprout wanted to use the time to repotting the mandrakes, as they had grown too large for second years to handle and the older students had no time right now. So she could not use the second year students for that, and the older students had something else in their education plans. She told the second years at the door to the greenhouse that they would need those mandrakes to restore Mrs. Norris and Colin Creevey back to their unprettified state.
Professor Sprout thought to close the class with one last lecture. "They both will be glad to know that we did everything we could to help them. And if you are wondering if we could not have imported some mature mandrakes or asked for the potion itself; there was an incident which had destroyed most of the stock St. Mungo's had. And as they would need the potions for an emergency as well as the mandrakes to produce more of the potion, they could not lend us some potions so we were stuck with this solution. But soon they are ready and then Professor Snape will prepare the potion to restore them."
Ron, the inconsiderate boy he is, asked if they could not just restore Collin and leave Mrs. Norris petrified. As a reaction, Ron was looked at from the cat lovers with disgust, even if they did not like Mrs. Norris for what she did with Filch she was still a cat.
Ron mumbled something of the line of why cats were so loved but rats were looked at with disgust. That was the moment where Hermione's friends were surprised at how angry she could become.
Hermione rounded on Ron pointing her finger at his face. "Just two words, Ron Weasley. Black Death. It was a pandemic outbreak that ravaged Europe for over 7 years, that killed between 75 to 200 million people. And given that it happened before the Statute of Secrecy was established it must have hit some wizarding families. And do you know how this disease was spread across the continent? By rats! Of course, now they are not as dangerous as this disease is wiped out, but the stigma still lives. And this is the reason why we ask you every time to keep Scabbers away from the table." Harry grabbed her arm to calm her down a bit, causing her to shut up instantly while blushing up a storm. Lavender and Parvati giggled as they noticed that, while Harry was just glad that Hermione seemed to have calmed down, while he looked at the others curiously why they giggled. Callie sighted in her digital space again for the fact that Harry was so oblivious.