Chapter Eleven - The Fourth Person

Hermione

Hermione was not surprised when Draco bought a phone.

After everything else he'd bought(and his room was half-full of stuff), it was only a matter of time. So seeing the brand-new iPhone box on the counter after meeting Rosalie just made her roll her eyes.

"You can't use it at Hogwarts," she reminded him. "What are you going to do with it?"

"I'm not sure," Draco admitted. "But they're so useful!"

Hermione still didn't feel comfortable with Rosalie. She seemed extremely clever. But at five o'clock, Draco was walking out the door to meet her and she and Harry were left standing in the door as if they were his parents.

"Got plans for the evening?" Harry asked as he shut the door behind Draco.

Hermione's frown deepened. "Well, I suppose eventually we need to look for the prophecy, but with Draco so fascinated by everything here-"

"He's like a kid in a candy store!"

"Honestly!" The two laughed. Then, before Hermione could return to the kitchen, Harry caught her arm.

"Can we do something while they're out doing something?" He asked.

Well, it wasn't like there was much else to do. Hermione nodded. "Yeah, what were you thinking?"

"I've got dinner finishing in the kitchen. Want to play a board game while we wait, and then we can watch a movie without Draco needing to ask about every detail?"

Hermione chuckled. Harry had now sat through all of Season One of Sherlock with Draco and it had been a lot of explaining. Hermione had bailed halfway through episode two. They were long enough episodes without the rewinding and the pausing to explain. The best parts had been when Sherlock himself had stopped to explain, because then Draco's mouth had fallen open and swung lower and lower as the pieces clicked into place for him. For example, the revelation about the ring polishing. Draco had thrown his hands into the air and jumped to his feet in astonishment. "The ring!" he'd sputtered. "It's… it's never polished!"

"Well, I don't think you've seen Top Gun either, have you?" Hermione said, focusing on Harry once again.

"I've not," Harry agreed. "Though I think Dudley got a few memorabilia from the movie."

"Well, it does have a lot of flying in it," Hermione said. "Maybe you'll enjoy it."

"Let's try it," Harry agreed. "Have you got a game you want to play? Aside from chess – I'm not interested in continuing my losing streak at the moment."

"You'd think after losing to Ron so often, you'd be good against anyone else," Hermione said. "Let's see what they have."

Most AirBnB's came with a few games in the closet or something and Hermione had noticed some in a glass cabinet beside the dining table. She wandered over, still appreciating the heated floors through her wool socks, and opened it. "Labyrinth, UNO… actually, it's UNO No Mercy… feel like destroying our friendship tonight?"

"Sounds fun," Harry said. Hermione heard the clink of china behind her and saw he had decided to busy himself by setting out cutlery for dinner. She returned her gaze to the cabinet. "Villainous… Monopoly… I'll just pull all these out."

Maybe it was a bad shuffle, or maybe just rotten luck, but neither Harry nor Hermione won the UNO No Mercy game. They both ended up with around fifty cards in their hand, constantly playing draw cards against each other. When the chime on the oven sounded, they happily agreed to end the game where it was. Harry had made a shepherd's pie, which had been a staple in Hermione's home growing up. She thought about how Christmas was just a few days away. "We ought to take Draco to see some Muggle Christmas lights," She said.

Harry chuckled. "He's not going to want to go back at this point."

They both paused and looked up at each other. Hermione furrowed her brow, then glanced to the counter, where the new iPhone box lay. "Though," Harry said. "If that happens, I will point out the hypocrisy to him."

"No, don't," Hermione's disagreed. "Let's instead just… ask him what he's thinking. If we mock him, he may double down on his perspective."

"True," Harry admitted. "He's stubborn to a fault. Reminds me of someone else I know."

"Ron?"

"Yes, but also you."

Hermione frowned. "How am I stubborn?" she asked.

"You're uncompromising," Harry said. "When you've decided on something, you don't look away from it."

"Doesn't everyone?"

"You're different."

They set up the labyrinth game in between the two of them as they ate and Hermione quickly explained the rules to Harry. As he made his first move, he had a question for her. "Hermione, what do you want to do after you leave Hogwarts?"

"Get a job in the ministry," Hermione said. "I'd like to work my way up."

"Up to what?"

"I've been thinking… and don't laugh, I know it may sound daft… but I'd like to become the first muggle-born minister for Magic."

Despite her admonition to not laugh, Harry's lips quirked up. "Ambitious of you," he said.

"Oh, yes. I've got more ambition than the whole of Slytherin house, probably."

"Did the sorting hat consider putting you there?"

Hermione shook her head and found a path on the board to complete one of her goals. "Not that I remember. I think I troubled it, to be honest. It went back and forth between Ravenclaw and Gryffindor. Eventually, it let me pitch in, and I gave my opinion, and it decided Gryffindor afterwards."

"You argued with the Sorting Hat?" Harry's eyebrows were hidden behind his hairline, but she was sure they'd crept higher up his forehead.

"No, it just asked me questions," Hermione said.

Harry hummed and flipped over one of his goals on his side. "The Sorting Hat… and don't tell anyone, please… it debated putting me in Slytherin."

"What?" Hermione asked.

Harry flinched. "Yeah. It said later, in Dumbledore's office, I could have done well there…"

"Harry, I'm not confused at your story. It's just…" She set her tile down without playing and frowned at Harry. "I could have seen the Sorting Hat deciding between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. Because you are loyal and you are brave. But ambitious? I mean… Harry, what do you want to do after school?"

"I'm not entirely sure, but I've been thinking I could be apt as an auror."

"Head auror?"

"No, just an auror."

"Exactly!" She gestured at him firmly. "Why Slytherin for someone who is content and happy to, well, find a nice quiet career without lots of accolades and accomplishments. You've said several times Harry, that you feel all you've done is luck. A Slytherin would boast and preen." She put a hand to her mouth in thought. "Do you think… I mean, you had decided already you didn't like Slytherin, right?"

"Ron told me about it on the train and I wasn't very interested, no."

"Harry, I wonder if the hat was trying to scare you. To let you prove that you were brave."

Harry frowned down at his empty plate. "Maybe. I never considered that." After a moment of thought, he said, "You could have done well in Slytherin."

"I doubt we would have been friends," Hermione laughed. "But I always thought it was my answering the Sorting Hat's questions that landed me in Gryffindor. A Ravenclaw would have asked more questions."

Harry nodded along to her explanation. "Actually, thinking about the Sorting Hat testing me really helps. I've been thinking, for several years… what evil did the Sorting Hat see in me?"

"Didn't Dumbledore tell you that only a true Gryffindor could have pulled the sword out of the hat?" Hermione asked.

"Yes," Harry said, very shortly. "He said it is our choices that define who we are."

"That's a nice thought," Hermione said. Harry was hyperfocusing on a game tile, though. He seemed to still be mad at Dumbledore. "I suppose being a Gryffindor is all about making choices."

"I'm not sure," Harry said. "Doesn't everyone choose things all the time? Take Draco for instance. In the span of four days, he's gone from no interactions with the Muggle world ever to taking a girl to the cinema."

"Fair. It's been a big week for you, as well. New clothes… place you've never been to… you've never seen any of the shows we've watched all the way through, right?"

"I haven't." Harry drummed his fingers on the table. Hermione still hadn't played since Harry had told her the Sorting Hat had considered Slytherin. And honestly! Slytherin? For the boy who wanted nothing more than to blend into the background but was constantly standing up to fight when something was wrong?

Harry cleared his throat. "It's also… a big week… because, well, I'm hanging out with someone I admire. So… yeah."

Hermione stayed quiet and Harry slowly lifted his gaze to meet hers. "Is that your way of telling me something, Harry?" she asked.

He smiled. Something in her gaze must have broken the tension. "I guess so, yeah."

"I thought you were still hung up on Cho?"

"Oh, no. You and Draco talked me out of that… what, October?"

Hermione smiled, but her heart wasn't all the way in it. "I didn't realise." She, too, was drumming her fingers nervously. "Ron, um, may be disappointed."

"Well, uh, you aren't a race. But I thought I'd, um, put myself forward instead of waiting til the last moment." Harry, bless his soul, looked so terribly nervous. "I remember the Yule Ball, and how that didn't really turn out well."

"No, it didn't," Hermione agreed. She pulled as much of her hair back as she could and exhaled. "So, can you tell me what you're aiming for?"

"Well, you and I have this really strong friendship," Harry began, letting his gaze hit the table again. "And I've been thinking for a while… I'd like for the person I'm in a relationship with-" his voice gave such an embarrassing crack that Hermione had to press down a laugh. "Well, I want the person I end up with to be my very best friend. More than Ron. And I thought, well, I might have a shot at that sort of connection with you."

"That's sweet," Hermione said. "Overall, you're not very good at asking me to be your girlfriend, but that's… really nice."

"I'm actually… not asking you to be my girlfriend yet. But, maybe, before we get back to Hogwarts…" he put his fingertips together and shrugged "Maybe we could go out a few times?"

Hermione felt a lot more comfortable with that and so she let out a breath and nodded. "Yeah, that sounds really nice, actually. I bet… I mean, I wonder if we'll have lots of free time anyway. Though, I'm not sure how much you can really learn about me."

"What's your favourite food?" Harry asked, immediately.

Hermione laughed. "Bouillabaisse."

"Right, you had it in France."

"And yours?"

"Mine is-"

A rapping on the window paused the conversation. Harry and Hermione both turned to stare towards the sharp sound. In the darkness(because England got dark around 4:30), they could see a ruffle of shadows.

For a moment, Hermione thought it might be a bit of cardboard and a nail that had blown against the window. But Harry moved and let in a wet owl, just slightly larger than Ron's owl Pig. This owl flew in in a very dignified manner and Harry quickly shut the window behind it. Hermione picked some meat out of the shepherd's pie for an offering.

The owl perched on the oven door handle and extended its right foot forward. Attached to its foot was a glass tube, sealed on both ends. Hermione fed the owl while Harry untied the tube. "This looks like the ministry seal, but… not quite," Harry said.

"Let me see." Hermione took the tube. It was cold from the rain outside. She could see now that it was actually sealed in wax, with a wax seal on either side about an eighth of an inch thick. On one side, as described, was something similar to the ministry crest. Hermione recognised it, but still turned over the tube to confirm her suspicions. The other side said, "To be opened by Mr. Draco Malfoy only, at threat of 100 Galleon fine."

"It's from the Department of Mysteries," Hermione said. "I think this is the copy of the prophecy."

The wait to eleven was excruciating. They passed the time watching movies and playing games after the owl decided to take its leave back to the ministry, all the way casting longing looks at the tube.

"It kind of seems like a waste of time," Hermione said. "All those hours in the library."

"They were helpful to me," Harry said. "And helpful to Draco, too."

Unfortunately, eleven passed, and Hermione's eyes grew more and more tired. The conversation between her and Harry became slow until Harry literally passed out on the carpet beside the couch she was laying on. With no one left to keep her awake, she closed her eyes and quickly succumbed.

The sunlight pulled her back to reality like she was a fish being pulled to the surface. She groaned, fighting it, and buried her face into one of the furry pillows Draco had admired when they're first arrived. There was a knocking at the door, and this was what had pulled her back to reality. She opened her eyes and spotted Harry still on the floor, glasses gone and a weighted blanket pressing him into the carpet. She had another blanket on her. That must mean Draco was home.

The front door opened and Hermione heard Rosalie say, "Good Morning!"

And something about her voice rang a dull bell in the back of Hermione's mind.

Draco invited her in and they sat at the dining table. Hermione fought her way out of the blanket, stood, and snuck away to change. She wrestled into new clothes – a pink sweatshirt and comfy black trousers – and sniffed her breath with a frown. Brushed her teeth and her hair and noticed it seemed a little more curly than frizzy today. Fun.

She found new socks and opened the door to tug them on when she heard Harry's voice down the hallway. "Draco, it arrived last night."

Hermione gasped. "Right!" she said and, after sprinting down the hall with just one sock, leaned against the wall to tug the other one on. Harry was still in his clothes from yesterday and he stood holding the back of the chair across the table from where Draco and Rosalie were sat. And Hermione was only half-surprised to see that Rosalie had one hand on Draco's forearm and one hand in his.

Draco raised an eyebrow. "No need to run in the house, Granger."

"I didn't want you to, um…" Hermione trailed off, glancing to Rosalie.

Draco looked at Rosalie. "We've been waiting on some mail together," he explained.

"A prophecy?" Rosalie asked.

This time, it wasn't just Hermione who was unnerved. "What?" Harry asked.

"I didn't tell you that," Draco said with a frown.

Rosalie pointed at the glass tube Harry and Hermione had left on the counter. "The tube on the counter is a prophecy tube, isn't it?"

"Right," Hermione said, feeling a little stupid. "Yes, we're looking for the end of a prophecy that we found in Hogwarts Library."

"What's it about?" Rosalie asked.

"We only have three lines," Harry admitted. "That's why we requested the full one from the Ministry."

"Sorry, this is all a little crazy," Draco told her. "But normally, we have normal things going on."

Rosalie looked straight at Harry. "Somehow, I doubt that."

Hermione chuckled while Harry rolled his eyes, a little affronted. Draco smirked. "Fine. True. Normally, I'm not associated with them, and I have normal things going on."

"Sounds nice," Rosalie said. "So you don't know what it's about?"

"Well, we aren't sure yet." Draco glanced over to the tube. "It begins "I've never seen anything this wonderful before."

"Sounds nice."

"Well, it does, but then it goes, Something solid and very powerful and old. They'll come back to haunt you and-"

"Take the price you paid most to hold."

For a moment, no one reacted. Then Harry pulled out the chair he was holding the back of and sat. "Repeat that right now," he demanded.

Rosalie suddenly looked horrified. "It's… I dunno, it just came out."

"That's how it was for us three," Harry said. "One more time, now."

Draco took his arm back. "Price you paid… what?"

"It really did just slip out!" Rosalie was beyond apologetic.

"Just tell us," Draco said.

Rosalie took a little breath. "I said, and take the price you paid most to hold."

Hermione was positive she'd heard that before. Maybe it was just the prophecy memorisation they all had going on, but it seemed like a memory she'd made all by herself. She snatched the glass tube off the counter. "Let's see if you're right," she said, and palmed the tube to Draco.

Draco poked his finger through the wax seal with the ministry emblem and snagged the roll of parchment inside it. When he pulled it out, some of the edges had wax drips on them. He unrolled it with a little tremor in his hands. Hermione could hardly catch her breath. The parchment crinkled. Draco took a deep breath.

"Dear Mr. Malfoy, this prophecy is hereby released to you on this day, December 19th 2023. This request was approved by the Wizengamot and signed for release by Albus Perceval… oh hell, I'm not reading all those names. Dumbledore signed for it."

Draco unrolled the parchment a little further and his face went more white than Hermione thought was possible. She hadn't seen him this startled since Buckbeak had reared up and hurt his arm in their third year.

"The prophecy you requested," he choked, "Is called the Bane of Hogwarts. The Seer was Helga Hufflepuff, who died in 1053 A.D."

"You're joking!" Hermione had put a hand to her heart without noticing and now felt as if she were suffering a heart attack.

Harry's eyes were flitting between Draco and Hermione, as if the message was still sinking in. It probably was.

"Hufflepuff?" Rosalie asked. "As in, the Hogwarts house?"

Draco set the parchment down. "I need water," he whispered. "Hold on-"

Rosalie dropped a water bottle that had been stowed at her side on the table. It was bright blue and had many, many stickers on it. Hermione spotted the Eiffel Tower, a canyon, the Statue of Liberty, and the Hollywood sign.

Draco took a long drink and shook his head. "I'm not sure I'm ready for this," he admitted, then picked up the parchment anyway. Everyone held their breaths, forming a perfect silence.

"I've never seen anything this wonderful before.

Something solid and very powerful and old.

They'll come back to haunt you once more.

And take the price you paid most to hold."

Rosalie made a surprised sound in the back of her throat.

"Four spirits shall forge four homes

in war and peace their truth foretold

Against all evils on enchanted stones

Come all four backgrounds as in old.

Don't tread on these sacred grounds

Don't climb these ethereal walls

For the hand that war surrounds

Is the hand that hardest falls.

By doors unseen we stand our ground

no loyalties that shift and bend

sensing all, no secrets unfound

Barriers change until the end."

No one spoke immediately. Hermione slowly drifted into the chair beside Harry and found herself resting a hand near his on the table. Rosalie seemed to be withdrawing and Hermione wouldn't blame her at all if she completely clocked out and said she hadn't signed up for any of this and headed for the door.

"Maybe we should explain," Harry finally said, looking at Rosie. "Some older prophecies come in rhymes called couplets. Draco had a piece of paper where a few of the words appeared on it. But only pieces. He could remember the whole first, Hermione the whole second, and me the whole third. So we suspected that we were all tied in somehow. And we suspected a fourth person who would automatically know the final line, because couplets usually come in groups of four."

"Draco." Hermione snapped her fingers at the parchment in his hands. Once upon a time Draco would have sneered at her and hidden it. Now, he handed it over wordlessly, staring at the table as he thought. "There's four paragraphs," Hermione said. "Sixteen lines." Possibly a stanza for each of them.

"Honestly, it's kind of a shoddy prophecy," Draco said. "It doesn't really tell us anything."

"No, no…" Rosalie paused. She looked like she was having trouble breathing. "It sounds like a wartime poem. The hand that war surrounds?"

"Right," Hermione agreed, reluctantly. "I wonder if the last bit is supposed to be our call to action. We will defend…"

"Why is it called the Bane of Hogwarts?" Harry asked.

"It mentions enchanted stones," Rosalie said. "Something about-"

"Don't climb these ethereal walls," Hermione repeated, reading the line. "It's so strange, I feel that I could recite this thing in full now that I've seen it."

"Listen," Rosalie said, obviously nervous. "I've known you for three days and this is just… a lot. Is this dangerous?"

"Hopefully not," Harry sighed. "I feel like I should have filled my quota for dangerous by now."

This did not comfort their new friend, who spread her fingers on the table and inhaled and exhaled. Hermione elbowed Harry and peered at Rosalie. She still didn't trust her. She felt that she'd seen her before, somewhere. But Rosalie as the last person made sense. A female, their age. And not at Hogwarts, so the prophecy inkblots hadn't been able to materialise completely. Still, from America? Hermione couldn't piece that together very simply.

"I was suspecting it would be a female, because prophecies usually strike balances," Hermione said slowly. "Maybe... we are the couplets. That's why we each remember one."

"I don't like mine," Rosalie said, immediately.

"I don't like mine either," Harry added.

"I also don't like Rosalie's," Hermione said. "Because I swear, I've heard it before." She squinted at Rosalie. "When you said it, it reminded me of something. I swear I've heard it before."

"I've heard it before," Draco said softly.

"When?" Hermione pushed the prophecy back into the middle of the table.

"Our first night at Hogwarts," Draco said. He closed his eyes. "We rode across the lake. And I was looking up at the castle, and I said the first line of the prophecy. Then Granger, in one of the boats, said the other. I thought she was quoting a book." Draco's brow furrowed, but the memory seemed to be coming back clear for something that had occurred to an eleven-year-old. "I heard Potter's portion from him, getting out of the boats. And then I stepped off the path and felt this wind… and I heard it. As if it were just... carried through the air." He opened his eyes. "The gameskeeper also heard it. He asked me what I'd said."

"When was this?" Rosalie asked.

"September the first, 2019."

Rosalie picked her water bottle back up off the table and took a long drink. When she set it back down, it was with an air of finality. "Okay," she said, a hardened glint in her eye. "And I assume you're in town because you didn't want anyone knowing you'd gotten it."

"Our mail is being read at the school," Harry said. "It's… a long story."

"You seem to be full of those," Rosalie said. "So, the Dark Lord is back, there's a prophecy about us and war, and someone is reading your mail. Anything else?"

"Like I said." Draco smiled. "My life is normally pretty quiet." He put his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair.

Rosalie put her hand down on Draco's seat and snapped it back onto all four legs. "Yes, well, your life is barely worth living for, Draco. What else?"

Hermione's mouth swung a little and Draco was not much better off. He stared at Rosalie, as if finally wondering what Hermione had been wondering the whole time – where did she come from?

Rosalie pinned her gaze on each of them in turn. Finally, she turned on Draco. "Draco," she said softly. "Is there something you haven't been telling your friends?"

"Friends?" Draco scoffed. Since Rosalie's retort about his life, he'd folded his arms and retreated into himself. "I distance myself from them, remember?"

"Usually we're enemies…" Potter said, trying to help Draco out.

"You're keeping a secret too," Rosalie said, pointing at Harry. She pointed at Hermione. "She knows most of it. When I asked if there was anything, her eyes landed on you both. Yours went to the wall behind me. So what is it?"

Draco frowned at the two of them and Harry and Hermione exchanged a frantic glance. "Rosalie," Hermione said. "Like you said before, we barely know you, and-"

"What are you keeping?" Draco asked, staring at Harry.

"Apparently I could ask you the same thing," Harry muttered.

"The prophecy? Did you know before I read it?"

"No, no, nothing like that!"

"Hold on," Hermione said, trying to break in.

"It can't be about each other," Rosalie said. She drew both boys back to her. "It can't be about Hermione. I don't think it's about school, or the prophecy, because you seem forthcoming on that." She looked between the two, very, very slowly. "Are we – us four – going to have to face the Dark Lord?"

"No," Harry said quickly.

"I bloody well hope not," Draco said.

"Hope not?" Rosalie repeated. Her tone was almost innocent. But even Harry could see the corner Draco had just been put in.

Draco's hands appeared on top of the table. He dug an index finger into a groove in the table and ran it back and forth. Then he sighed. "My family is hosting the Dark Lord now, as we speak," he whispered. "We have been, since June. Which is why I'm home for Christmas. Or… here." He gestured at the beautiful home in a lame manner.

Hermione felt like bits of ice were in her veins. "Is that… why you wanted us to start the study group? Was this all some trick to-"

"No!" Draco shouted. "Shut up, Granger, you're insufferable!" He rose out of his chair a bit - almost like he was going to leave the room. "Do you know how long I've been the second best in our year? I can't get one up on you to save my life!" He huffed and some of his blonde hair moved from the motion. The rest plastered to his forehead. "My father said if I come behind a Muggleborn one more time that he'll take me off the Quidditch Team. So I decided I needed to learn your tricks."

That was a shoddy attempt, Hermione thought. She had no idea how to reply. She was rarely second-best. Draco was always.

"And the defence club?" Harry asked, in the absence of Hermione or Draco arguing.

"That really was some of the Slytherin House." Draco took a deep breath and sat again, and clasped his hands together. "We all have to go back home to Death Eater Families. We need defence skills. Me because... my mother warned me that the Dark Lord is considering me for a task of some sort. A secret way to invade Hogwarts. I think that's what the prophecy is talking about."

Hermione needed something for her hands. She couldn't stand being so still. She got up and got a paper napkin from a roll beside the sink and began to twist it in her hands nervously.

"So Voldemort is calling the shots at your house," Harry said. Hermione noticed Rosalie's face change slightly at Voldemort's name, but she didn't jump. "And you don't approve."

"As nice as it would be to see you dead, Potter and Granger, no, I don't approve." Draco's tone was hollow despite the light threat.

Harry drummed his thumbs on the table. "If it's any consolation… he's not thinking about that right now. He's become obsessed with the Department of Mysteries." Harry paused, then picked up the prophecy. "Actually… I've just made a connection. I think Voldemort wants the copy of the prophecy that is about him."

"Ding ding ding, we have a winner," Draco mumbled, though he was looking at Harry strangely. "How do you know what the Dark Lord is thinking?"

Harry paused again. "I… keep having visions from his head. What he's doing."

"That's bloody useful."

"Sure, until it's bloody traumatising."

Silence reigned over the table, until Rosalie cleared her throat. "You know, if you wanted to… it would be really easy to learn what was going on with an insider. Who happens to have a reputation as the Boy-Who-Lived." Her eyes were bright at the idea.

"Are you suggesting I become a spy?" Draco scoffed. "Pass. I'd like to keep my skin on my body, thanks."

"It'd also be great if Harry could control his visions," Rosalie said, ignoring Draco's decline. "Do you know why you're having these visions? Perhaps some sort of spell or enchanted object..."

"Well, an enchanted object could be tracked," Hermione said. "I think Dumbledore would have found it - the school headmaster, Rosalie."

"Is he in the dorms?"

Hermione pursed her lips. "Well, no, but I think he would have thought of it..."

"Or maybe not. We're brilliant. We might be a step ahead of him," Rosalie said. She was so confident that Hermione almost chuckled. Was this what she sounded like? "Perhaps there's something in the dorms... I haven't read much on mind magic."

"Harry has been studying Occlumency," Hermione explained. "But Harry's been meeting with Professor Snape for months now, and… no luck." The lessons had actually been quite brutal. Harry returned exhausted, emotionally spent, and frustrated. Ron theorised that Snape wasn't actually trying to teach Harry anything, but instead was trying to give him permanent brain damage during sessions.

Draco snorted, then began to chuckle, then shook his head and let the laugh die. Hermione furrowed her brow at him. Rosalie raised an eyebrow. "You know Occlumency?" she asked. Draco nodded. "Then why don't you teach Harry?"

Draco shrugged and looked at Harry. "Because he's a piss-poor student," he said.

"At least I'm not a piss-poor person."

Draco glared. "Glad to hear your thoughts. Really, Potter. You know what, we've got the stupid prophecy. We found the fourth person. And it's a rag. No idea why it's in the severe section, really." He stood back up and made for the hallway, towards his room. "So that's that, you owe me for getting it, and I think I'll see you at Hogwarts and-"

"Draco!" Harry got up. "You called me a piss-poor person first!"

"Well you meant it!" Draco shot back.

"So did you!" Harry yelled, exasperated. "Why are you leaving? I thought we were cool now!"

Hermione looked between everyone. Harry, red in the face, Draco, looking a little yellow and ill. Rosalie had frozen halfway out of her chair, looking as equally about to leave as Draco.

"Draco," Rosalie said, after she noticed Hermione glance at her. "Are you... safe?"

"Draco," Hermione said, "I know we were never friends before. And we all had our reasons for that. If you don't want to teach Harry, that's totally fine... we don't know what's going on with your family. We just want you to stay safe."

Draco did not reply. He turned and left the room. He turned into the hallway and the door to his room opened and closed. No goodbye. No pauses. Harry looked resolutely at the floor. "I know it just barely happened," he said, "But I don't understand what that fight was about."

"It's like I said before," Rosalie said, standing fully and pushing her chair in. "Draco's barely got a life."

"Rosalie," Hermione sighed, "We all barely know him. You least of all."

"I've got a feeling," Rosalie said. "Give him two hours to himself. Put on a movie. He'll come out to see it and still not want to talk about anything. But I bet he'll teach you Occlumency in the end."

"I don't think so." Hermione shook her head. "Voldemort would be really mad."

Rosalie's smile crooked up at the corner. "Yes, he would be. But Draco has been hanging with you for months. And the Dark Lord would be mad about that too."

Next chapter will be called Days of Christmas. I will post it early if I get five reviews. I'm serious. It's happened twice now.