It's been a few weeks; illness and the like has really rocked me but I'm back and determined! Currently I'm still trying to get through writing Chapter 32 which has given me a bit of trouble along with the aforementioned illness, but I'm hoping uploading this can motivate me to get through that one, and then push through the following chapters to complete Year 6.
In my time away however, we've received the sad news of the passing of Dame Maggie Smith. I share a lot of the kind and positive words as the entire world has said since she has died and the world will be a poorer place without her in it. My condolences go to her family and friends, and I hope they take some comfort in how beloved she was to us all.
Moving on to this chapter then, I hope you all enjoy it! Some dialogue in this chapter is borrowed from Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince: Chapter 12 - Silver and Opals.
Despite the normality of school lessons and homework, things at Hogwarts were noticeably different even this early into the school year. A handful of students of all years were suddenly dropping out, including the Ravenclaw Eloise Midgen in Leo's own year. Professor Dumbledore also wasn't around all the time much to the surprise and whispers of most of the students, though Harry quietly swore Ron, Hermione, Ginny and Leo to secrecy before telling them about his meetings with the Headmaster, and the fact that he was learning all about You-Know-Who's past, something which sent chills running down Leo's spine.
Leo thankfully had the distraction of his new Magical Law subject, a course which was looking like it was going to be as intensive as Professor McGonagall had suggested back in his Careers Day talk with the Head of Gryffindor House. The lessons were held in a small classroom on the 6th floor, and again as predicted by the Transfiguration Professor, there were only 4 students including Leo himself.
Leo was the only Gryffindor in attendance, with the rest of the class being made up of Ravenclaw Terry Boot, someone that Leo knew mainly from the pairs involvement with the DA the previous year, while the other two in the class were both Slytherins, in Alice Rosier and Milicent Bulstrode, who Leo realised in his first lesson would be his third cousin once removed given his newly discovered Black heritage, and their first month of lessons began intensely, with the four students needing to memorise the laws implemented and upheld by the Ministry for Magic by the end of October where they would be holding mock trials led by Professor Marchbanks to give the students a clear insight into the way the judicial system worked.
The lack of students in that lesson however meant that for the vast majority of Gryffindor students, Quidditch Try Outs were the distraction to the new reality of life at Hogwarts. Fay had decided that it was her only chance to attempt to play the game she loved so much at school and had signed up to try for Beater, and Leo made his way to the stands with Anna in order to watch. There were so many people that had signed up however that Harry had to get the applicants into groups of ten to fly around the pitch once. That thinned the crowd a lot, and he could see some of the crowd were getting annoyed and agitated at the nonsense going down on the pitch.
"Look, they're Hufflepuffs." Leo pointed out grumpily at the fifth group of flyers.
Anna frowned. "Urgh, don't mention that House to me." She crossed her arms, before explaining in more detail than Leo needed about her recent break up with Wayne Hopkins. Thankfully it was soon Fay's turn to fly, and the pair of them stood up to applaud her as she successfully completed a lap of the pitch to move on to the next phase, as Leo was explaining to Anna about his latest dinner party with Slughorn later that night.
Firstly the chasers were picked, with Katie Bell, Ginny Weasley and fourth year Demelza Robins being chosen. Then it was time for the Beater specific trial. Unfortunately Fay wasn't picked, losing out to third year Jimmy Peakes and fourth year Ritchie Coote, though she had a couple of minutes chat with Harry afterwards before coming up to the stands to join them to watch the Keepers.
"Well done!" Anna cried clapping her hands as Fay squeezed in between them. "You were good!"
Fay shrugged. "Not good enough, but Harry told me that I'd be first choice if they need a reserve which is nice of him." She looked to Leo. "Was that your doing?"
He shook his head. "I haven't spoken to him about Quidditch, if he's picked you, it's on merit."
That gave her a grin that wouldn't leave her face as the final two Keepers took to the air. It was a straight shoot-out between Ron and Cormac McLaggen where they would face five shots each, and pretty much all of the Gryffindors in the stand were nervously whispering for Ron. They both did a lap of the pitch before settling into their goals, and Leo noticed McLaggen giving a leery smirk in their group's general direction. Looking around he spotted Hermione behind him looking rather green.
McLaggen would face his shot first, and by the time each Keeper had faced four there had been no goals scored. The fifth one however McLaggen shot off in the wrong direction as if he'd been confunded, conceding the goal. Leo stood up and clapped with the rest of the sixth years, but he looked back at Hermione knowingly as she was stashing her wand away discreetly. Thankfully Ron saved the last one and was confirmed on the team to the jubilation of Gryffindor.
"Don't look at me like that." Hermione snapped jovially as Leo rose a level to join her. "You saw him… he's been trying to talk to me all week as well." She shivered at the thought. "He makes my skin crawl."
"No judgement here." Leo shrugged, a feeling of elation beginning to grow in the pit of his stomach.
"I mean look at him." Hermione nodded to the direction of Harry who was being angrily accosted by the losing trialist. "We don't need that on the team, do we?"
"My lips are sealed, Hermione." He chuckled. "Changing the subject away from slimy seventh years… are you and Harry going tonight?"
Professor Slughorn had surprised him with a second invite to his so called 'Slug Club', with the Professor supposedly being impressed with the speech that Leo had aimed at him on the train, whereas Neville had seemingly been dropped from the Potions Professor's club completely.
"I am, and I'm so glad you're going too. I would have hated it on my own." Hermione nodded. "Harry's got his detention with Professor Snape though."
"Shall we walk down together then?" Leo asked, silently cursing at how lame he thought he sounded.
Thankfully however Hermione had a smile grow on her lips as she nodded. "Yes, I'd like that." With those four, simple words, his excitement for that evening tripled.
The Slug Club dinner was… nice. That was all Leo could really describe it as. It had been similar to the one on the train as new students that impressed Professor Slughorn on merit were interrogated about any famous relatives they may have, or just of boasting of certain skills and abilities that he had seen in them. The most interesting part of the dinner however was Professor Slughorn outlining his intention to host what the Potions Professor had described as 'a small, intimate Christmas Party' in a few months' time.
But aside from the interesting Slug Club meetings once every couple of weeks the days churned on. Hermione's birthday was on the third Thursday of term, and Leo gifted her with a history book about the Most Extraordinary Society of Potioneers of which she had mentioned an interest on in passing, perhaps due to one of the founders of the society having a double barrelled surname that included 'Granger'.
But the days passed and as predicted the joys of free periods turned into a standard practice of doing the excessive homework that was being set in the library or the Common Room mixed with a dinner with Professor Slughorn every fortnight. Leo was also spending a couple of hours each day practicing his nonverbal spells and was slowly getting the hang of some of the basic ones. He could now levitate objects silently as well as throw out a basic blast of magic for more offensive purposes, though more advanced magic was still alluding him.
As the first month of the school term faded and October arrived however, there was another notice appear on the noticeboard that excited all the students in Gryffindor as a Hogsmeade trip was planned for the second weekend in October, although with that excitement came nervous whispers as everybody was a little surprised that it was going ahead given all the extra security measures in place at the castle. Not wanting to pass it up though, Leo made sure he was in bed early the night before the trip and settled down, having some lovely dreams including one about Professor Slughorn's Christmas party. Hermione was wearing the periwinkle blue dress she had worn for the Yule Ball and the pair of them were dancing underneath mistletoe. As they leant in towards one another, dream Leo closed his eyes and…
He was forced awake and bolted upright as the dormitory room was filled with a flash of light, and a scream made Leo rip open his four poster bed curtains in a frenzy, only to see Ron hoisted in the air by his ankle flailing about. The scene before him was too funny to contain himself and Leo joined both Neville and Seamus in roaring with laughter, as Harry apologised and rifled through his potions book, before pointing his wand at Ron. The Weasley dropped onto his mattress after a second flash of light and Leo was still howling with laughter.
"Sorry." Harry repeated.
Ron was still face down in his mattress so his speech was muffled. "Tomorrow, I'd rather you set the alarm clock."
Leo had decided it was still hilariously funny after getting changed and ready for the trip out to Hogsmeade, and after heading down to breakfast with Harry and Ron, it was only Hermione that was unhappy at the amusing bit of magic, rightfully questioning the seriousness of testing out a handwritten, unknown spell. The kicker came when Hermione reminded them all of the Quidditch World Cup a couple of years earlier.
That had been Leo's last trip with his Grandad before Magnus MacDonald had passed away, and the fear that the old man had brought in him as he forced Leo to wake up and pack before apparating them both back to Loch Ryan haunted him to this day. Magnus wasn't a man to frighten easily, but the attack of the Death Eaters that day had chilled him to the core.
It was Leo's turn to be chilled when Hermione rounded on them about their magical blood. "The Death Eaters can't all be pure-blood, there aren't enough of them left." She was explaining after Harry had brought up the book's scribbler was a half-blood. "I expect most of them are half-bloods pretending to be pure, it's only Muggleborns they hate. They'd quite happily let all three of you join up."
"There is no way they'd let me be a Death Eater." Ron exclaimed, letting loose a bit of cut sausage from his fork towards the Hufflepuff table in his protests. "My whole family are blood traitors! That's as bad as Muggleborns to Death Eaters."
Harry agreed. "And they'd love to have me." He muttered sarcastically. "We'd be best pals if they didn't keep trying to do me in." That made Ron laugh and Hermione barely smiled, but they all looked at Leo and their mirth fell.
"Even if they'd have me, given my Father being one of the biggest Black traitors in recent history." Leo shook his head. "There is no chance I'd join them." He said, protesting.
"But they'd have you in a flash, Leo. The chance to bring the House of Black back into their ranks would be too good an opportunity to pass up." Hermione told him harshly. "So don't go telling me that this Half Blood Prince can't be a Death Eater, because the facts are that we don't know who he is, nor do we know his thoughts on Voldemort or blood supremacy…"
That sobered up the conversation, and Leo was grateful for Ginny appearing to sit beside Harry to hand him a note, as well as the arrival of Fay and Anna, whom he was travelling to the village with and paying for their drinks as a way to cheer up the latter after her break up. As he stabbed a rasher of bacon with his fork though his eyes wandered to his left arm as he wondered about how the news of his father had been received in the Dark Magic circles.
After their breakfast and an enthusiastic Filch jabbing them with the Secrecy Sensor, the students next battle was with the elements as they were getting buffeted by the wind, and the promise of an exciting trip out was growing less likely by the step. Leo's face was numb and his usually sleek black hair was in a mess by the time they escaped the wind inside the Scrivenshaft's, and from there the shopping trip that usually would have taken a few hours was done inside one, as Leo and his friends rushed around the village trying to avoid both the cold and the few still open crowded shops filled with students.
They arrived at the Three Broomsticks at just gone 11 after a second visit to Honeydukes, and nobody was more grateful than Anna as she threw her coat over the back of her seat. "We should have stayed in Hogwarts." She grumbled. Leo chuckled as he placed his own coat over the seat back and made his way to the bar to order their drinks. About ten minutes later he was back with three steaming tankards of butterbeer.
"Here we are." Leo said, placing them on the table. "The first of many… I still can't feel my toes."
Fay groaned. "I know butterbeer is really weak, but if we're going to be here for a while then I'm probably going to get drunk." She took a big sip anyway and sighed loudly in satisfaction. "That's the stuff."
Anna nodded, wiping her foam moustache away. "I could get used to you buying all the drinks Leo. Why couldn't you have got into that vault sooner?" She smirked.
"Shh." Leo whispered. "This is a one off to cheer you up. I don't have unlimited access until April, and even then I'm not using that money to fund a drinking habit." He took a sip himself and the warm butterscotch was soothing as his body started to warm up as they began to discuss everything from the Quidditch season to their lessons.
After their fifth butterbeer each the topic had gone back around to Anna spilling all about her breakup with Wayne once again. Not wanting to hear about whatever rebound plans the girls were about to begin to plot, Leo got up and made his way towards the toilets, spotting Harry, Hermione, Ron and Ginny sat around a table finishing up their drinks. He stopped for a quick chat with them before he went to the loo, almost getting knocked over by a determined Katie Bell as he went.
They stayed for a couple more hours until the drink had started to affect them noticeably, and the trio went arm in arm to protect themselves from their uneven balance and the wind, not knowing the seriousness of what had just happened on the path they were taking.
Reviews:
Lightningscar: Hermione's explanation in the book is this - "Your adversary has no warning about what kind of magic you're about to perform," said Hermione, "which gives you a split-second advantage." So there are differences that I intentionally wanted to add. That moment of Harry sass though is one of my favourite moments in the books and part of what I love about the character of Harry. Fay and Anna getting more involved with the upcoming war is something that will be gradual, but 7th year of course is going to be very important for a lot of characters. I could do a prequel I guess but most of it would literally be the canon story with Leo, Fay and Anna basically being peripheral characters. Part of why I started at the end of 4th year here is because it was the start of the Order of the Phoenix group which I wanted Mary to be involved in.
SkepticPrinceArthur: That was definitely the intention, he's concerned of course but not to the extent of perceiving a threat from it. Here is a bit more of a scene with Anna, but it's a case of Fay really being the glue to this friendship, Anna and Leo mainly poke at each other more, though would come together and defend one another from others. As mentioned above, 7th year will be big for these characters.
Dante687: Thanks!