A special double feature: Lavender pursues a scientific curiosity, and Neville's feet are planted firmly on the ground
Experiments in enchanting
Hermione's dorm mates had been aware that she was not a regular human child like the rest of them well before she ever revealed herself to the rest of Gryffindor house. By the time the impromptu Q session in the common room rolled around they had already had several weeks to panic, discuss the situation amongst themselves, get used to all of her strange animalistic behaviors, weigh the consequences, and had ultimately come to the decision that they all actually rather liked her.
Unbeknownst entirely to the child herself, Hermione Greyback was an enormously forceful presence amongst the girls she shared a dorm with. Thinking she was doing little more than establishing an appropriate social heirarchy, she had growled and flashed her eyes on their very first night at the castle after a moment of tension between them. Little did she realize what an aggressive display of dominance it was. The poor girls had gone to bed that night trembling in their beds like frightened sheep who knew a predator was mere feet away. Needless to say, she was the only one who slept well that night.
To suggest that she terrorized them in the days to come would be incorrect, but only because there was no malice present whatsoever on her part. That being said, with no popular vote of the people, she very openly considered herself the captain in charge of their little ship. All groups naturally incline towards an individual who has the final say on things, but no other girls dorm in the entire castle had an alpha female at the helm running things with quite the same hands-on approach she chose to employ.
For all the downsides to her particular brand of leadership, and there were many (being subtly growled at whenever they left their things lying around, regularly getting sniffed and occasionally even licked, their periods all having synced up to hers, the way she always seemed to know about the people they'd talked to and the conversations they'd had that she hadn't been there for), there were also some incredible perks that made it all worthwhile.
When a third year Gryffindor boy had started bothering Lavender and not leaving her alone, Hermione had silently and without hesitation come to her defense like a member of the queen's own secret service. Before he even realized what was happening he had found himself in the lake getting up close and personal with the giant squid. It hadn't gone without any of their notice the way she'd deftly lifted and thrown a boy who was more than twice her size. She'd earned the informal title 'defender of girls' for her chivalrous act, and the places in the castle where girls gathered were still abuzz with whispers about the very cool way she'd ignored his pathetic splashes as she walked away from the scene.
When she realized that Parvati was having very real separation anxiety from her twin sister, Hermione had marched over to the Ravenclaw table and collected Padma herself, bringing her back to sit with the other Gryffindors and making it plain to them that this was to be the new arrangement. Forcing family apart was unthinkable to her, she'd said, while glancing a bit forlornly at the only Weasley at the Slytherin table. He seemed happy enough over there with the other snakes, but his presence was clearly missed.
When Sally Anne had woken up so congested and snotty one morning that she could scarcely breathe, a terrified Hermione had rushed her to the hospital wing, certain it was pneumonia. Madam Pomfrey had chided her for overreacting, but it had still been sweet how worried she'd been over a runny nose. She'd been hyper alert to their health and general wellbeing after that, and the sniffing had unfortunately increased. It wasn't terribly invasive, but it was still a little embarrassing to have another girl come over and take a deep whiff. It was for a good cause though, and they'd all been glad of her vigilance when she caught a rattle in Lavender's chest that Madam Pomfrey had been shocked to discover had actually been the beginnings of bowtruckle fever.
Even if she steadfastly refused to ever do anyone else's work or give them any of the answers that they hadn't figured out themselves, she was always willing to help and explain things they didn't understand. She was quite a good study partner, keeping them all on track and organized and encouraging them to find books and sources to use to learn more about the things they didn't know. She had enlarged a blackboard to create a giant section of the wall of their dorm that was a calendar of their classes and homework so no one forgot anything, and the girls frequently referenced it for the day's agenda. She had even sent for a pack of muggle rainbow chalk to make it color coordinated, and when she had opened the package of it Lavender and Parvati had both fallen a little bit in love.
So when she transformed in the Gryffindor common room for their entire house to see that she was in fact a werewolf, for three first year girls this was less a revelation of any kind and more a sign that they could finally address the open secret they'd been otherwise content to keep for their little unelected leader.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
For Lavender this presented itself as a chance to get the answer to a question that had been burning in her mind for nearly the entire time they'd been at school so far, and for the next few days she tried to figure out a way to casually bring it up in conversation. At lunch on Friday afternoon that week she struck - they had the entire rest of the afternoon free and there was ample time to convince the girl to play along if she was resistant. Her plan of attack was well thought out, and she cleverly planned to use the other girl's own sense of academic curiosity against her.
"Say Hermione," she started, easing her way in slow "I can't help but notice you never wear nail polish, do you just not have any? You can borrow some of mine if you like," she offered, sweet as pie.Friendly. Deferential. Eager to assist. She tilted her head innocently, subtly displaying her neck in an act of minor submission that she knew always pleased the other girl.
Hermione blinked and for a fraction of a second her eyes dilated and took on a molten glow before she looked down at Lavender's hands. Her nails were neatly trimmed and shaped, buffed shiny and painted a lovely… well, lavender. The other girl hummed a bit, looking slightly embarrassed "Single dad thing I guess, I haven't a clue about most girl stuff if I'm being honest" she said softly, and Lavender felt a pang of sympathy that bled into guilt at unintentionally targeting something she didn't realize the other girl was sensitive about. She'd thought their fearless leader was just a tomboy, but it seemed there had been no guiding female hand to teach her the feminine secrets all girls should know. To Lavender, a devotee of such things, it was nothing short of a tragedy.
Her roundabout approach seemed foolish now, and she deflated a bit "I'm sure he did his best. If there's anything you'd like to know I can always show you. But listen, I only asked because.. well really, there's something I'm dreadfully curious to know," she leaned in closer lowering her voice, looking around to make sure no one else was listening "do you know if you paint your nails as a human if they'll still be painted as a wolf? It's all I've been able to think about since I saw you… you know. I heard your toenails tippy-tapping on the stone in the common room like my dad's dogs' do on the hardwood at home, and it just shot into my brain like a bolt of lightning. I have to know the answer now that I've thought of it. Do you want to experiment and find out?" She asked in a rush, a bit nervous but quite sure her appeal to knowledge would be too much for the brainy girl to resist.
To Hermione's credit she didn't laugh. In fact she took it rather seriously "I've never even thought about it. I don't actually know," she admitted slowly, looking down at her hands as if they held a mystery. She looked back up straight into Lavender's eyes and they flashed silver again with excitement as a grin grew on her face "Let's go find out!" She said enthusiastically, and they quickly gobbled down the rest of their lunches in record time.
When they collected the other first year Gryffindor girls to join them, Parvati cleverly suggested that they bring her sister as well. Having a swotty Ravenclaw around while they did their experiment would more likely than not help them keep things properly scientific. There of course also ran the unfortunate chance that she could manage to turn the entire affair into a glorified homework session if they weren't careful, but that was a risk worth taking.
They didn't have to tell the girl much to convince her to join them when they asked, as she was thrilled to bits just to come along and be included in an afternoon of shenanigans, let alone to be involved first hand in magical experimentation on a live willing subject.
They all would have preferred it if she hadn't phrased it that way, but her heart was in the right place.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
When they reached their tower and scurried up to their dorm room, there came the awkward business of swearing Padma in as a knower-of-secrets. Though Parvati was a notorious gossip, she had clearly neglected to tell her sister much, as the first words out of her mouth once they had all settled in on Lavender's bed were "Are you finally going to let me join the coven you've been forming?"
It took a moment for them to recover from such a statement, and to the other girls' amusement Hermione shrugged and said "Not exactly, but… yeah, I guess," with a sheepish grin. They took turns telling her about the Greyback twins' past and secret and how everyone in Gryffindor knew all about it because of her reckless display. Realizing she was making girlfriends for the first time in her life and that this relationship very well could evolve into a coven someday (although her heart whispered pack), she took a leap of faith and bared it all, telling them a somewhat abridged version of her romps in the woods and how she had met centaurs and a unicorn.
As they began getting ready to actually start conducting their experiment, Hermione hesitated "You should know I've had a bit of… an unexpected overnight growth spurt after this week's full moon," she said enigmatically, avoiding their confused gazes "my wolf is just as sweet and tame as before, I'm just… quite a bit bigger. So please don't be scared," she said proudly but with begging desperate eyes. For all she'd done for them they would never have rejected her for the world, but realizing sadly that she didn't know that, they crowded around her and enveloped her in a warm and affectionate group hug. Even Padma joined in to comfort her, patting her shoulder gamely from a bit of a distance.
Lavender organized the experiment into a tidy table on an unused section of their blackboard wall that she labeled as clearly and orderly as possible "This is about nail polish because painting your nails is fun, but really it's more about the effects of semi-permanent appearance alterations and how they last through a werewolf's transformation. I was thinking we could start by painting one hand now while you're in your human form to see if it lasts through that transformation, then collect those results when you're in your wolf form. Then we'll paint the other hand… paw, sorry… while you're transformed, and have you shift back to see if it lasts differently transforming in the other direction," she laid out.
The girls were nothing short of enormously impressed if their wide eyes and slack jaws were anything to go by. "Lav, you've really put a lot of thought into this," Hermione said with awe in her voice, and to hear it and know she put it there filled her chest with warm pride. She nodded happily "I have! Like I said it came to me so suddenly, and I had to push away the doubt that said it was a stupid question because the thought just wouldn't leave me," she said with a smile.
She reached under her bed for her basket of polishes, and the little glass bottles clinked and clacked against each other. She had a lot more at home but she had only brought a conservative twenty or so to school with her for the year "For your first manicure you should really be able to choose whatever color you want, but unfortunately I'm going to have to request you pick something bright so that we'll be able to clearly tell if it's there on your toenails or not. I'm sorry," she offered with a sad smile, passing her the basket to pick from.
"There's so many to choose from! And that's okay, I'd have been perfectly pleased to let you pick whichever was best. My wolf nails are really dark so the best color might be… hmmm, I like this one, and it's quite bright. Will this do?" She asked Lavender, handing her the sunshiny goldenrod yellow. She grinned huge enough to feel it stretching her cheeks "That's gonna look so good with your brown fur!" She squealed, bouncing a bit and reaching out for the other girl's hand.
Suddenly a thought occurred to her as she was shaking the bottle, and she looked down at it as if it were a rattlesnake in her hands "You always get lightheaded in the potions classroom. Fair warning but you might really hate the way this smells. It's very strongly chemical, and some people just can't stand it," she said, biting her lip and wondering if their experiment would fail before it even started. Sally Anne rushed to open the window to get some ventilation in the room, and she praised her quick thinking. Padma had taken the piece of yellow chalk and in an unused spot on the blackboard wrote a reminder for them to look up and practice scent-dampening charms. They all nodded in agreement and her sister drew a star next to the note.
Hermione mulled it over "Everyone has to put up with bad smells sometimes, right? It won't be for long, and it's just one little bottle, and you're only doing one hand. I can use the other to plug my nose before you even start, and that should help," she reasoned, making no move to pull her hand away or shut it all down. Lavender sighed in relief, "Okay, good. I usually leave it open the whole time I'm using it, but I'll just get enough on the brush for a couple nails at a time and close my thumb over the opening of the bottle in between to be safe," she said, and proceeded to do just that.
Their fearless leader clapped her free hand over her nose right before she broke the seal of the bottle and grimaced when she opened it fully, but made not a single peep of complaint. She did still seem awfully anxious though, and as Lavender swiftly but efficiently painted each of her nails a bright cheery yellow she said casually to the room, a bit nasally with her nose plugged but audible all the same, "I just want to make sure that you're not frightened when I shift. Tell me something I can do so you'll know right away that it's still me in control, just bigger than before," she told them.
They all thought about it for a bit, and as Lavender finished painting the nails on the girls hand she cast a minor beauty charm on them that her mum had taught her to get it to dry faster. "How about you howl a Celestina Warbeck song - that one about the werewolf? That'd be absolutely aces," Sally Anne said, and the other girls all laughed and agreed. When her nails were proclaimed dry, she scooted back away from them and prepared to shift.
She breathed in and out, psyching herself up. Padma was holding her sister's hand and sitting back a bit as this was her first time seeing Hermione transform. She'd try and make sure to be extra puppy-like in her mannerisms. Her magic invoked in bright green shimmery sparkles and ribbons around her, and she went from girl to wolf as easily as breathing. Her girlfriends all sputtered and exclaimed when they saw just how big she was, and Padma let out a bit of a frightened sounding peep. Quickly, she laid down and started softly howling the song they'd agreed on and soon they were laughing again and singing along with her.
"You're chasing me like a werewolf to show me your love, I run and run but you never give up!" They all chorused together in giggles.
Hermione crept forward on her belly and extended her paw out for the girls to inspect. As Parvati pulled it into her lap her sister shakily remarked at the sheer size of it, that her paw was nearly the size of a dinner plate and the toe pads beneath were the size of her fists. To their delight and Lavender's cheers of success, when they pushed the fur back to examine the nails beneath they found that the toenails on the enormous paw were in fact bright yellow. "This is incredible! So we know that there are at least some changes that will transfer over through the shift… Gosh Hermione, if you dyed your hair do you think all of your fur would be the new color or just the fur on your head?" She asked absentmindedly, reaching for the girl's other paw to paint the toenails on that one for the other half of their experiment.
As she opened the bottle Sally Anne lunged over and put her hand over the girl's enormous wet twitching nose, and it was licked wetly in gratitude. Parvati dutifully took up the task of holding back the thick fur around the toes so Lavender could get polish on the entirety of each nail. "Say Lav, if you just painted what you could reach with the fur in the way do you think it would look more like French tips when she shifted back, or just like you didn't go all the way back to the cuticle?" She asked rather philosophically, to which the girls were all stunned into thoughtful silence for a moment. "That is such a bloody good question Parv, you absolute genius," she responded "I'm gonna do two of them like that - just the end bits, alright Hermione?" She glanced at the enormous wolf on her bed who nodded placidly, her tongue lolling out into a very doggy grin.
Sally Anne petted the girl's huge head with her free hand, "Your fur is so soft, do you ever get a bath and brush out while you're shifted into this form? Or does it just stay nice and clean when you wash as a human?" She asked, and then giggled when she realized the girl didn't exactly have a way to answer. She changed her questions "Okay one woof for yes two woofs for no - has wolfy ever had a nice bath?" She asked with a cheeky grin and laughed uproariously when Hermione woofed once a bit sullenly, as if vividly remembering being subjected to such a thing.
"You spend ages in the shower though, I know it takes forever washing all that hair of yours, but you clearly love the water. Does wolfy not enjoy a bath the way you do?" She questioned, and Hermione tilted her head back and forth in a very doggy fashion, giving a bit of a whine. She woofed once, then a moment later woofed twice "What does that mean!?" Sally Anne asked with a laugh "I guess a bit of yes and a bit of no?" And the girl laughed again when Hermione nodded her big head.
The paint had long since dried by the time she was finally encouraged to shift back, and she held out her other hand for them to inspect. They gasped and cheered - the polish was still there! "This is fascinating," Lavender said breathlessly, "look at the last two nails, Parv - just the tips are done, it's like you hypothesized!" She exclaimed, and they all excitedly admired the fact that it did look rather like a tidy yellow French tip along just the ends of those nails.
"I can't believe my silly guess turned out to be right after all!" Parvati said happily, shaking her head in disbelief. Padma jostled her shoulder, looking more excited than she had so far "That's how scientific research works, magical or muggle, it's just making guesses and seeing if we can prove them right. It looks like I'm not the only one in the family with the mind of a researcher," her sister told her with a bit of a smirk. Ravenclaws could be so smug sometimes. Parvati seemed to give it some thought, "I suppose so long as it's something interesting like this I could be interested in finding out the answers to questions. Maybe we can figure out the answer to Lavender's other question about your hair and fur color. We could try and charm a lock of your hair a different color to see if it works the same way?" She suggested a bit shyly.
To all of their delight Hermione shrugged and grinned "I could shift back and forth all day long and not get tired, I certainly don't mind using my abilities to add to the pool of human scientific understanding. Plus it'd just be useful to know I suppose," she said good-naturedly "we could do it now if you're willing to try another right away?" And they nodded eagerly.
After some deliberation, their next experiment would simply be to see if color transferred in the hair via the wolf transformation at all. They would charm a small lock of hair near the front of her fringe a bright contrasting color, and she would shift and they'd see if it stuck and where it was in her fur. Hermione was more impressed by the complexity of the spells they were using than their methodology "I just still can't believe you all already know how to do magic like this, my tutor got Hogwarts curriculum from professor McGonagall and he said we wouldn't start any kind of human transformation spell work until sixth or seventh year!" She exclaimed.Lavender and Parvati both flushed with pride, but Padma and Sally Anne rolled their eyes and looked bored.
"They might be technically complex, but certain types of spell work can be taught to anyone who wants to know it easily enough. Certain talents for different categories of spellwork also run in families. Mrs Brown is so famous for her beauty charms it'd be more surprising if Lavender had come to school not knowing them, and our mum works for a high end witch's cosmetology line so we were always going to end up learning how to do these types of charms whether we wanted to or not," Padma said a bit tartly. "Case in point - wanted to," she pointed at her sister who had on mascara and shadow and gloss and a hint of blush "and not," she pointed to herself who had a bare face.
"Why did your tutor get curriculum from the professor, did your dad not teach you about magic while you were growing up?" Sally Anne asked like a freight train, her voice itching with poorly concealed curiosity. The other girls blanched at the tactless question. There was so much room for tragedy and trauma in between the reasons why a single father might have raised his daughter the way he did.
Hermione sighed a bit wearily, but there was thankfully no heartbreak in her voice when she spoke "My mum died when I was a baby and there's so much I never learned because of it. Dad tried to teach us what he knew, but he didn't have a formal education - he's been a werewolf his whole life so he never came to Hogwarts. I know he has magic, he has a wand and he's good with it, but I'm pretty sure he mostly taught himself just about everything he knows. I think he must have moved around a lot before settling down and building our home compound. Professor McGonagall gave our tutor official curriculum and a set of school books so he could teach the other magical children in the pack that didn't get their letters. There were two our age that should have been first years with us - Rainy and Tim. Two older ones, Bobberty who would be a fourth year and Melvynthia who would be a sixth year. None of them got their letters, plus more than half of the younger ones are magical as well. There's even a few babies who we're not sure about yet, and their mum is hoping they don't have magic because she doesn't want them to feel left out. It's really frustrating," she said breathing as normally as she could through gritted teeth to keep herself calm. It was hard to talk about, but her friends were good listeners and put supportive hands on her from all around.
"Doing stuff like this, making friends and playing with nail polish and hair charms is something I never had a chance to do. I get the feeling I'm not the easiest to live with, and you've all taken my quirks in such great stride and been good sports about it. I really adore all of you girls," she said, her voice thick as she was beginning to get a bit choked up. They cooed and cried with her and it was a wonderful thing to feel at the center of a little home away from home they were building together.
Lavender wiped a tear away from her eye "Let's get that hair charmed shall we? I'll teach you the incantation, it's really not as hard as it seems," she said, and cast the colovaria slowly onto a lock of her own wavy blonde hair, turning the end a lovely pastel pink. Reaching over, she extended her wand and did the charm over a piece of Hermione's fringe. The other girls giggled a bit and she did too when Parvati held up a mirror for her to see - it was a shocking Weasley ginger that stood out distinctly from the rest of her dark brown hair. She actually quite liked the way it looked, and thought that maybe she ought to keep it like that for a while afterwards.
Letting her magic rush over her, she shifted and almost immediately scrambled and fell off the bed backwards, not having remembered to leave herself enough room for her much larger wolf mass. The girls all laughed uproariously, and although it was embarrassing she was glad it broke the tension. She crept around the bed and sat on her haunches, head hanging low with a paw over her snout to play up her shame. Remembering their gag from earlier she howled a few bars of the chorus of "Werewolf Lover" and the girls giggled up a storm.
She sidled up to Lavender, nosing playfully into her side and letting the other girl inspect her. The girl's fingers brushed through the strands of fur around her face looking for the orange lock "Ha! I found it," she said excitedly. Between her thumb and forefinger, she gripped a piece over her brow roughly in the same area as it had been in her fringe. It was apparently also the same length as it had been on her human head, and as such had been rather well hidden in the rest of her fluffy face.
Pretending to push a pair of glasses up her nose, the girl sat up straighter and dictated to Parvati who was writing what she said down on the board "Results are clear that there's visible transference of the color changing charm. We made a strip of ginger hair, and there's a strip of ginger fur in the same spot, next we'll transfigure the whole head of hair and see if it changes fur all over the body," she said officiously, looking down at Hermione and raising a brow as she waited for her to shift back. She huffed a wolfy laugh at the girl's gall and transformed back, ending up flat on her belly on the bed halfway into Lavender's lap. "Ha bloody ha," the girl said with a wheeze, slumping under the unexpected extra weight.
She scrambled up to her knees with a grin, and closed her eyes very trustingly. She felt a little wash of magic over the top of her head as the charm was cast again, and shivered. Opening her eyes and glancing into the hand mirror, she turned her head this way and that "My complexion's not quite fair enough to blend in with the rest of the Weasleys, but I do look remarkably like my aunt Molly with my hair this way," she said, impressed and pleased with the way it had turned out. She let herself shift, and the girls were clearly unprepared for the sight that greeted them as the wolf returned.
They were briefly rendered speechless, none of them daring to say what was on all of the tips of their tongues until Sally Anne finally broke. "Sh-she looks-" the girl started but was cut off by Parvati "don't say it!" She whispered. Their wide eyes all met and the wolf started to whine "You should shift back and we should fix it so no one ever knows about this," Lavender told her quietly but firmly "I don't know if the image you've built could survive this, Hermione," she said quite seriously.
The wolf yowled frustratedly, and pawed at the hand mirror where the girl had it clutched to her chest so she couldn't see herself. The girl shook her head emphatically "It's-… it's quite shocking," she warned her friend, "but I guess you should see it for yourself," she said reluctantly before turning the mirror around and letting her look. When she registered her reflection in the little mirror she reared back and sat heavily on her haunches in disbelief before rushing over to the loo and scratching at the door, plainly wanting to see herself in the bigger bathroom mirror. Padma was closest and she opened the door for her and switched the light on.
From inside the bathroom came the tippy tapping of toenails on the tiled floor, then a whine and a yowl that transformed into uproarious laughter. Their friend came out on two legs nearly doubled over she was laughing so hard, clutching at her stomach as if it were cramping. "Pl-please tell me… that one of you ha-ha-has a camera" she gasped out between chuckles and giggles. "That's the best thing I've ever seen in my entire life, why in the goddesses names did you silly mares think I'd be upset?" She asked in genuine confusion.
Lavender seemed lost for words and so Parvati spoke up "You weren't upset? I mean it was really cute, but… not exactly the most dignified look," she said carefully "for a giant wolf," she added quietly. This confused Hermione even more "What in Helga's green garden are you getting at, Parv?" She said, her brow twisting into a furrow "I just looked like a toasted marshmallow, was there something else I missed?"
"They're being melodramatic," Sally Anne said, her voice breaking through the other girls' awkward hemming and hawing, and Padma nodded in agreement. "You look ruddy adorable, you do. Just about the cutest thing I've ever seen in my whole life. Like one of the queen's corgis got hit with an enlargement charm. It's hysterical, and they're too busy running around worrying about your tough reputation getting besmirched to enjoy it while it lasts," she said, crossing her arms and frowning. "Personally I'd have liked to see it for the rest of the afternoon or until the charm wears off," she added testily, glaring at the two girls.
Hermione held her hands up placatingly, her laughter had died down and she looked at her friends fondly "Look let's not get heated over this girls. Thanks for the perspective, Sally Anne. Lav, Parv, I appreciate your concern but everyone gets hit with weird jinxes and hexes from time to time, and I think with all things considered my reputation can probably survive looking like this for an afternoon," she said with an earnest smile, and it worked to calm the tensions that had been building. She reached down and held a hank of her hair up in front of her eye, considering the color of it.
"I honestly can't believe our little experiment turned out the way it did. Who'd have thought the charm would have made the different colors of my fur look like that? It's really quite funny. In fact, I'd like to find my brother and cousins and show them if you're not still worried about it," she said with a playful grin that finally won Lavender and Parvati over and brought bright smiles to all of their faces.
They made it all the way to the common room before their house mates started asking about her new hair color. She waited until she was in the middle of a sofa between the Weasley twins, the two of them chuckling and tugging on her curls and calling her little sister, before winking at her girlfriends and shifting right on top of them. Fred and George were still expecting her to be the size of a German shepherd, and when she was instead roughly the size of the sofa they had been sitting on the air punched out of their lungs with a wheeze.
Then they got an actual look at her and shouted in unison "GIANT CORGI!"
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
As they were all getting ready for bed that night, Hermione began a long prayer to the goddesses for their wisdom and generosity in sending such good and loyal and clever friends her way. She soon realized she had caught the other girls' attentions. Parvati had slowed to almost a stop where she was brushing out her long and already-silky inky black hair, and was making no attempts to hide her open curiosity. Lavender, who had been painting her own nails, swore as a drop of polish landed on her coverlet.
"So that's a relatively new thing you're doing, huh?" Sally Anne offered, always willing to be the one that poked at the hornet's nest. Both other girls huffed exasperatedly at her for being so tactless as to come right out and ask, but were clearly hanging on every word. Hermione grinned into her clasped hands, she had them right where she wanted them. From friend group to coven to cult was shaping up to be little more than a series of carefully placed baby steps. The moon goddesses would have three more worshippers before the night was up.
"I'm so glad you asked…"
A Fear of Flying
For the first time in as long as he could remember, Neville was proud of himself. In the last month he had adjusted remarkably well to life at school, made loads of friends, gotten his own wand, finally connected with his gran, and performed better in his classes than he could have ever dared to imagine in his wildest dreams. His new wand alone had changed his spell casting so drastically the results were like night and day. Where he had struggled to even produce sparks with his father's old wand, the one that had chosen him lit up like Christmas morning in his hands without hardly any effort at all. In a single weekend he had gone from dead last in charms and transfiguration to third behind Hermione and Draco.
That was another major accomplishment he was proud of himself for, standing up for himself to Draco and Ron. That had taken nearly every single ounce of self-esteem and assurance he'd had rattling around in his body. It had been awful, but he'd gotten through it and could see himself befriending the other boys someday. Maybe not quite yet. He'd make them work for it.
Of all the many unbelievable triumphs he'd achieved in such a short amount of time, he was most excited about one in particular. He had met the witch he now confidently believed was the love of his life. He'd discussed it with his gran when she had come to take him to get his new wand, and she had told him over dinner that his dad had also met his mum on the train and written home about her that very same night nearly twenty years ago. It made him blush just to think about following in their footsteps - having a young whirlwind romance in the same place his parents had fallen in love, maybe even someday holding Hermione's hand and going to Hogsmeade together!
She was so good and kind and funny and friendly and smart and brave and pretty and wonderful and wild and he simply couldn't imagine ever adoring anyone else more. In the thirty three days and sixteen hours that he'd known her, she had turned his life utterly upside down and backwards. She was a fiery little trouble magnet, and to his own surprise he found it rather charming. For as many long afternoons of quiet and peaceful study as they had shared together in the library, there were also adventures with her crazy brother and cousins all over the castle and grounds.
The strangest and most spectacular by far was when they had been escorted by a professor into the forbidden forest at night to go meet centaurs, and he had ridden on her back while she was transformed into a giant wolf. He still couldn't wrap his head around how she had managed that one. Sometimes he wondered if her well behaved and polite personality wasn't a bit of a funny trick, because for all intents and purposes when push came to shove the rules seemed to slide off of her like melted butter. She had a queer way of not pushing him past his comfort zone, but rather making him want to be brave enough to follow along into hers.
Given how highly he thought of her and her insurmountable indefatigable courage in the face of adversity, he was quite surprised and secretly rather delighted to find out on their first Friday afternoon flying lesson that she had a powerful aversion to all things broom-related. She had been tense and quiet all morning during potions class, and had finally quietly admitted to him at lunch that as a being who was more comfortable on four legs than two, the thought of her feet leaving the ground altogether thoroughly terrified her. Although he had initially been quite pleased to discover that she did actually possess a sense of fear, he quickly felt an intense pang of sympathy when she quietly admitted to him that she had a nearly pathological fear of heights.
"I had a bad experience falling out a high window a few years ago. I didn't get hurt, but I've been scared of heights ever since. You're not alone Hermione - I've honestly been dreading flying, I'm absolutely terrible at it," he said comfortingly. She inhaled sharply and reached out to grab his arm "Oh Nev that's terrible. That's why I'm afraid too, I tried to ride one of my older brothers' racing brooms when I was too little and shot straight up like a hundred feet. I only survived the fall because I had a burst of accidental magic and started bouncing," she said quietly, covering her face with her hands and shuddering.
Meanwhile Neville's heart thumped oddly in his chest and his brain seemed to go on the fritz for a moment. He looked at her askance "You bounced? What are the odds of that, when I fell that's what happened to me too! My gran said the ground turned to jelly underneath me but was solid when she tried to walk on it. I kept jumping on it like a trampoline after the first bounce," he said a bit breathlessly. Next to him she froze, then peeked at him over the edge of her hands "The ground turned bouncy? Nev… How old were you when you fell?" She asked slowly, as if doing maths in her head.
"I think I had just turned eight. Why?"
"I was nine when I fell. How old are you now?"
"I'm still eleven… but you're older. Didn't you just turn twelve?" He asked, knowing full well that her birthday had been exactly fifteen days ago on September 19th. As forgetful as he knew he could be, he was fairly certain that date was now practically seared into his heart.
"I did, I'm the oldest in our year. You said your birthday is at the end of July, so I must be nearly a whole year older than you," she said, and a thrill zipped through him that she had remembered when his birthday was. He couldn't remember when he'd let that slip but it must've been ages ago. Her memory always impressed him tremendously, her mind was like a steel trap. He imagined that one day when they were together he might tease her on her birthday about being an older woman. Hang on, she had said something important. He thought about it for a second until it came to him.
"So if I was eight and you were nine then it was the same year. Do you remember when you-" she cut him off and he tried not to pout. She didn't do it to be mean like others sometimes did, her mind just worked too fast for her mouth to keep up. "August. It was August I'm sure of it," she said as confidently as anything. She was so confident.
"Yeah, same for me. It has to mean something that we both fell the same way and had the same accidental magic at roughly the same time in different places, right?" He thought aloud, feeling as though he'd put together a blank puzzle. The pieces were there but what was the picture supposed to be?
"I-I'm not sure. It's definitely a weird coincidence" his best friend in the whole world told him, pointedly looking down and away, a light flush rising to her cheeks. He didn't have to be the fastest broom in the shed to tell that she was being unusually evasive. She knew something but she wasn't sharing! How could he get her to tell him…
"Do you want to go try and look for answers in the library after our lesson?" He asked innocently, knowing such a suggestion was like kneazlebait for her. Maybe she would let slip whatever she was thinking after a few good hours of research.
She nodded weakly, and he was taken aback by her lackluster reaction. Either whatever it was must be serious, or she was more nervous about their upcoming lesson than he had realized. Putting his arm around her shoulder he jostled her a bit "Don't worry, I'm sure we'll have it figured out in no time. And if you don't want to go up in the air today… well, then I won't either" he said, resolved to make sure she wasn't embarrassed by herself on the ground.
Looking up at the hall around them, Neville suddenly had a jolt of inspiration "Hey look, madam Hooch is still at the staff table, let's go talk to her before the lesson. Maybe she'll understand!" He suggested enthusiastically, and she brightened at the idea "Hey, yeah! Maybe we can convince her to let us write a report or something instead of actually flying" she said, and he didn't want to tell her not to get her hopes up, but that sounded like a bit of a stretch. He was thinking more along the lines of coming for a smaller two-on-one practice over the weekend instead of having to humiliate themselves in front of their classmates - but he supposed it couldn't hurt to ask.
The two of them abandoned their lunches and scuttled together up to the front of the hall and to the hawklike flying instructor. She really did look like an eagle with her slicked back white hair, her sharp nose, and her bright yellow eyes. Neville couldn't help but be intimidated by her, and when she gestured for them to speak he cursed internally that his words came out with his blasted stammer. It always came back to him at the worst times possible.
"G-good aft-t-ternoon profes-s-or. We, well- the two of us are in your c-c-class th-thi-this… today. B-both of us are… well…" he looked at Hermione desperately and she instantly covered for him "Sorry to bother you professor, it's just that we're both really nervous. You see, we're both terribly afraid of heights. We both had awful falls from high heights when we were little and just the idea of flying is very traumatic. Is there any thing we can do to avoid having to get on a broom? Could we write a paper or do some other assignment instead to prove we understand the mechanics?" She asked hopefully, and Neville winced.
He should have stopped her, he could tell as clear as day that they'd initially had the professor's sympathy, but that it had all but evaporated when Hermione had implied they be allowed to not actually learn the skill at all. Now the instructor's face was harsh, and he braced himself for words that would be too. Her eyes narrowed and her head tilted suddenly like a bird of prey "Miss Greyback I am normally willing to understand and accommodate for fears, but I will not allow you to use yours as an excuse. You will learn to fly young lady, whether you like to or not. There will be no assignment or essay. I expect to see the both of you in the training yard in a half hour sharp, ready to learn," she demanded dismissively, turning back to her meal.
Next to him Hermione bristled, and her back straightened ominously.
Just as he thought she might start rumbling or growling at the professors, she instead cocked her hip and crossed her arms over her chest "I beg your pardon? You said you accommodate for fears, but not ours for some reason? Interesting, I'll certainly remember that. And as for getting me in the air, I'd just love to see you try and make me, madam," she said rather loudly, and the professor and the other staff members on either side of her all froze, slackjawed. He swore under his breath, and when she turned to look at him he was beyond relieved to see that her eyes were still their lovely light grey. She winked at him, and he groaned in anticipation of the trouble they'd soon be in.
From halfway down the table, their head of house exclaimed wordlessly and stood and marched over angrily "Miss Greyback, whatever has gotten into you? I'm afraid I'll have to take points and assign a detention for speaking to a professor in such a way!" She said, drawing a fair bit of attention. Bugger and blast, everyone in the whole bloody school was going to know they were a pair of broom babies. He wanted to dig a hole in the floor and die in it, but Hermione just stood up even straighter next to him.
Clearing her throat primly, she locked eyes with the deputy headmistress "I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean, professor McGonagall. After rejecting mine and Neville's request for reasonable accommodations due to our shared fear of heights, Madam Hooch has informed me that we'll be learning to fly whether we want to or not. I was simply encouraging her efforts, as there are very few things I do that I don't want to," she argued with every inch of perfect politeness Neville had seen her use to her advantage several times before. If he hadn't known for a fact that she wasn't raised to be a little pureblood society princess, he'd have been sure she was one of them from the cradle. Lady Malfoy and her sister had done a frighteningly fantastic job with her.
The wind quite visibly left the professor's sails, and she turned a suspicious eye toward her colleague "Rolanda, is that true?" She asked incredulously, to which the hawkish instructor rose to her feet and slammed her hands onto the table "Of course not, Minerva! This rude little creature is just trying to make excuses and get special treatment on top of that ridiculous contract," she barked, and the rest of the staff gasped. Her face fell as her own words caught up to her.
Hermione's face rapidly transformed before his eyes as well, from quietly triumphant to uncomfortable and withdrawn. This hadn't been her plan A, B, or even C. She had just wanted to get them out of something that might be awkward and nerve-wracking. He so regretted suggesting coming to the professor, what a mistake that had been. Suddenly needing to defend his friend, his mouth started working before his brain could process the words coming out of his mouth "Professor McGonagall, that's not true at all! Hermione was telling the truth. She offered to do extra work to make up for it, and Madam Hooch wouldn't hear a word. She even said she makes exceptions all the time, but wouldn't for us," he announced loudly, to wide-eyed murmurs throughout the hall.
Although the hall was abuzz with whispers, the staff table had fallen rather dramatically silent. Even ancient old headmaster Dumbledore had leaned forward curiously to watch the exchange, a little frown taking shape on his face. Professor Snape was outright scowling, and professor McGonagall's face was as bitterly cold as a snowstorm in the dead of winter. From the other side of the flying instructor, Professor Sprout piped up "That's certainly what I heard, Minerva. Mr Longbottom, five points to Gryffindor for standing up for a friend," she praised with a pinched smile directed his way.
Neville just wanted to sit down and be out of everyone's sight. He felt extremely exposed, and was on the verge of beginning to hyperventilate. Without even needing to look at him, Hermione reached out and grabbed his hand, holding it tight and squeezing in the pattern he knew good healthy breaths were supposed to be in. He fought to match it, and felt himself starting to calm. The professors had begun to talk amongst themselves in voices too low for him to hear, and madam Hooch was frowning with her arms crossed.
She turned to look at the two of them and her sigh sounded more like a frustrated scoff "I shouldn't have dismissed your phobias. I expect to see you there for today's lesson following along on the ground, but you needn't go any higher than a simple three foot hover if you aren't ready to today," she conceded grudgingly, before storming off across the hall and out onto the grounds.
Looking much less confident, Hermione's hand trembled in his grasp and she shuffled her feet nervously "I'm sorry for causing trouble professor McGonagall," she told their head softly, her cheeks starting to color as she realized how much of a scene she had caused. He sympathized as he was usually the one feeling mortified by his own behavior, and he knew this was a relatively new sensation for her.
The professor's head snapped up in the direction of the pair of them and she breathed out heavily through her nose "Come along to my office, you two. I'd like a further word about this," she said much more gently. Coming around the table, she lightly led them by the shoulders out of the hall and up to her office above the transfiguration classroom. When they got there, they sat heavily and the room was silent for a few minutes as they processed everything that had just happened.
"I'm so sorry, Hermione-" "I'm so sorry, professor-" they both began at the same time, and all three of them laughed as the tension was broken. "I shouldn't have pushed her the way I did, I was just upset that she dismissed us so casually. I hope I didn't make a problem for you professor," his friend said, and he was proud of her humility in the face of her own mistakes, even though an adult had been cruel to her.
"You have nothing to apologize for my dear girl. Rolanda should have shown more empathy than she did, and it was certainly not appropriate for her to call you that or to mention your… medical accommodations in front of the entire school. As much as I hate to even suggest you taking action against any one of my staff, I am obliged to inform you that should you so wish it you are well within your rights to summon Mr Rowle here for a legal consultation before you see her again for your lesson this afternoon," she said quite seriously.
Hermione's brow furrowed and she chewed her lip "Do you think I should, professor?" She asked in a small voice "I've only ever used his services to help protect my father, I've never actually met the man. The one run in I've had with his son, he called me a filthy half-breed to my face, so needless to say I'm not exactly sure what to expect from his father," she said anxiously, and Neville's heart clenched in his chest. He still couldn't believe someone would say something like that to her, but hadn't he just seen it happen? One of the teachers at their school had called her a creature in front of hundreds of students.
"That's certainly worrisome, but I saw the man in action at the board of governors meeting where your… Accommodations were negotiated. He fought for you like a bulldog, and he supported your father every step of the way. I think you know your father would want you to have him here after something like this. Isn't it why you acquired his services in the first place, dear?" She nudged gently, more so than he'd seen her address anyone else in their house. Somehow he wasn't surprised she had ended up as one of the professor's favorites, she was his favorite after all. He put his hands on his cheeks and tried to banish that thought before it made him blush.
Next to him Hermione was nodding, and called for an elf he hadn't met before "Tootsie?" She called out softly. An adorable little elf popped into the room on the professor's desk, wearing a sweet gingham poncho and landing in a perfect curtsy "Greetings, missy Lady Black! How cans Tootsie be serving?" She asked in a voice like a little flute. "Hello Tootsie, thank you for coming. Is Mr Rowle busy this afternoon?" she asked anxiously, to which the elf shook her head.
"Then could you please let him know that I need to have an urgent meeting with him before my next class starts? There was a bit of an incident I'm not sure how to handle. Professor, can he floo here or should I go there? He's set up offices in Hogsmeade," she added, and McGonagall shook her head firmly "I'm afraid that as you haven't yet gotten permission to leave school grounds to go down to the village on your own he'll simply have to come here. Tootsie, the address is Hogwarts Deputy Head's Office, he's welcome to come through any time in the next half hour," she told the elf, who nodded and popped away.
They only had to wait a few minutes before the floo lit and a very tall and broad man crawled out of the fireplace. His hair was greying blonde and he had a bushy beard several shades darker covering the bottom half of his face. He wandlessly banished the soot from his robes and Neville was impressed, people usually relied on hearth charms to do that for them. The man came towards the two of them with a low bow "My lady, as pleased as I am to finally meet you I'm sorry it had to happen during difficult circumstances," He said, seeming genuinely apologetic. The professor conjured an extra chair for him, and he sat with a nod of thanks in her direction.
From the briefcase at his feet, he summoned a roll of parchment and a self-inking auto-dictation quill that he set up on the professor's desk "Now I'll just set this to scribe for us, one moment please, my Lady. Begin record… transcript of conversation at Hogwarts school, in the office of professor Minerva McGonagall on the fourth of October 1991 at roughly noon. Participants are myself and first year student Lady Hermione Elena Greyback. The professor is present as well as another student… Pause record. I'm sorry my boy, who are you?" he asked a bit absentmindedly.
"Neville Longbottom, sir. Also a first year. I was there and saw what happened," he said, and the man's brows rose and he grinned.
"Excellent thinking to bring a witness, that's the kind of client I love to defend. Resume record… The child present is Neville Longbottom, eyewitness to events. Now that that's taken care of, can you please explain what happened my Lady?" He asked, and Hermione looked at the parchment to see the quill diligently taking down what had been said verbatim. She nodded and cleared her throat. She went on to give an incredibly long-winded and detailed description of what had transpired in the great hall,
Mr Rowle blinked a few times and seemed rather taken aback, and Neville fondly recognized the face of someone who had just been witness to one of Hermione's word storms for the first time. He quickly composed himself though, and nodded "That was a fine job my Lady, thank you. Very thorough, sometimes even the smallest details can be important later in ways we might never initially expect," the man praised her professionally.
The lawyer turned his eyes towards Neville, and he tried to remember all of his gran's society lessons. He refused to shrink under the man's intense gaze, and he straightened and prepared to answer whatever questions were asked of him. "Did you notice anything that she may have missed or forgot about, lad?" He inquired thoughtfully, and the boy gave it some consideration.
He was about to shake his head no, his friend had been quite thorough after all, when he realized she had in fact left something out and he nodded slowly. "It wasn't just me who saw and heard everything. Professor Sprout was sitting right on the other side of madam Hooch, barely a foot away - she was there for the whole thing! And now that I think about it… When madam Hooch first started lecturing Hermione she was already frowning and looking like she didn't approve, I'm sure of it," he said confidently. He thought for another moment "In fact… when Hermione talked back to madam Hooch and all the other staff members were gasping, I'm positive I saw her hiding a smile," he added, a bit stunned by his own recollection.
From behind her desk professor McGonagall sighed and shook her head with a wry twist of her lips "Pomona does have a bit of an odd sense of humor," he heard her mutter under her breath.
Mr Rowle clapped and rubbed his hands together "So we have a credible senior member of faculty who witnessed the entire event from the very beginning, this is fantastic! Professor, when we're done with these children here may I have permission to go and collect a statement from professor Sprout?" He asked politely, but with a gleam in his eye that Neville had only ever seen before on a goblin. She nodded, and told him she'd arrange a meeting between the two of them for later in the afternoon.
He turned back to his young client and crossed his legs neatly, folding his hands over his lap "Now that I understand the situation my Lady, what can I do for you - is there any particular action you'd like to take?" He asked, that gleaming in his eye making him look more like a shark than anything else in that moment, despite how genteel he was posed.
Hermione ducked her head and wrung her little hands "This is all so embarrassing Mr Rowle, I can't believe this all happened because I'm too chicken to get on a broom. All I wanted was to get out of flying class and I've made all this trouble… Maybe I should just grit my teeth and face my fears. She did say we didn't have to go above a hover. Even just thinking about getting my feet off the ground reminds me of the time I lost control of my older brother's broom though, and suddenly I was so high up in the air I was sure I'd die," she started breathing quickly, and to Neville's despair he saw tears roll down her cheeks. Yet again he reached out without thinking, grabbing her hand and holding it in his own. His throat felt tight and he couldn't stand to see her beat herself up like this.
"You're not a chicken, you were so brave standing up to madam Hooch like that. Anyone else I know would have hung their head and put their tail between their legs and let that be the end of it as soon as she dismissed us. It's not your fault you're afraid, you can't help it. If you're a chicken then I am too, I don't want to fly either, remember?" He said, hoping it would help his friend feel less muddled up guilt and embarrassment. She covered her face with her hands and sniffled, and then launched herself at him for a proper bear hug "Thanks, Nev," she said quietly "you're the best friend I could have ever asked for!" The warmth of her affection was nearly a tangible thing he could feel in his chest, like a little glowing ember. He smiled into her shoulder and whispered the same sentiment back to her "You're the best friend I've ever had too," he said, hugging her back just as tightly.
The lawyer was smiling, and talking quietly with the professor when they came back out of their little bubble. He cleared his throat "As madam Hooch is a tenured instructor, I'd discourage trying to take any action against her as it would be unlikely to stick and might just make the situation worse between you going forward. It sounds like she's already resentful of you having an educational contract in place, which sets me ill at ease but is ultimately her own personal problem until the moment she breaks it, which she came close to by mentioning it in front of the student body. Her own magic and the binding magic of the contract would see fit to punish her should she actually break it. Would you like me to go with you to the lesson and help you negotiate with her on your behalf?" He offered helpfully, which Neville thought was quite decent of him. But Hermione was shaking her head emphatically.
"No no no please, the last thing I want is more attention on me about this. I already feel utterly humiliated by it all, Mr Rowle! Is there any way we can go to the lesson and listen and pay attention and just not have to get on the brooms? I'm more than willing to write as many essays on brooms or aerodynamics or whatever else she thinks is appropriate. Professor, please?" She begged, turning her big wet eyes on McGonagall, who looked sympathetic but ultimately shook her head. "Not unless you're willing to forfeit your grade for it, lassie. The practical skill of flying is one of your core educational requirements for your first year. I wish I could help but I told you, I can't risk showing you unfair favoritism or people might try and question your other genuine accommodations guaranteed by the contract. I'm sorry, dear. I feel as though my hands are tied on this matter," the professor said with a sad sigh.
"How big a part of our grade is it?" She asked in a small voice, and he turned to her with jaw hanging agape. Was she suggesting-? He whipped his head back to the professor, who had pulled out an old mechanical calculator that looked like it functioned like a typewriter and started clunking through calculations, muttering under her breath. After several lines of typed arithmetic, she pulled the long thin sheet out of the device and inspected it with a growing grin, then held it out for Hermione to see and began explaining it excitedly.
"Students receive a grade for each of their classes separately which is then averaged into their final grade for the year. Your seven core subjects make up 95% of your overall grade, with 5% remaining for flying. Each class has an equal weight in calculating your final grade - 13.6% of it to be exact. Your current grades for your classes are 105% for transfiguration, 112% for charms, 105% for defense, 102% for herbology, 104% for history, 102% for astronomy… and an absolutely astounding 125% for potions. I don't think Professor Snape has ever even given any Slytherins grades that high. But anyways! According to my maths, getting even as much as 4% above a perfect grade in each class will be more than enough to make up for getting a zero in flying, should you so choose to take that course of action."
As he followed along Neville's brows rose, he didn't exactly understand all of the professor's maths but Hermione clearly had significantly more than 4% extra in each class. It sounded like she was set already."If you can maintain the impressive grades you've earned for the rest of this term, you shouldn't have to worry about this at all my dear! Flying isn't even a part of your grade for the second half of the year, there are only four lessons which all take place during the month of October," she leaned back in her chair, smiling impishly "I can't believe I'm even suggesting this to a student, but in my professional opinion you could attend your flying classes and never leave the ground and still be the top ranked student in your year, Miss Greyback," she said. "In fact as your head of house you have my explicit permission to do just that!"
Hermione covered her face once again, but this time her eyes peeking over her hands were crinkled with delight "Oh professor, thank you so much," she cried earnestly "I don't know what to say, other than how much I appreciate everything you've done for me," The professor reached across her desk and took Hermione's hands in hers, and Neville's eyes widened "I'm glad I could help, my dear. I'm sorry that one of my staff treated you so unkindly. I'll talk to her again about this before next week's lesson. Rolanda isn't an unkind woman, but her words aren't exactly her greatest strength. For now, I want the two of you to head out to the training yard and attend the lesson as two of my best behaved and most polite little lion cubs."
She turned an insightful eye to Neville "Mr Longbottom, you should know that your grades are perfectly adequate, but if you choose not to participate at all in your flying lesson your final grade could be impacted. Like Miss Greyback you also have a remarkably high potions grade, but the rest are more standard. If you can maintain your 125% in potions until the end of the term, then a zero in flying would only lose you 2.5% at most. What you do with that information is up to you, lad," she advised wisely. He was quite gobsmacked to hear that they had the same potions grade, that first lesson must have made an even better impression on professor Snape than he had realized.
Processing what she had just said, he turned to Hermione with a huge grin "Did you hear that? Let's go sit in the grass and watch a bunch of lunatics take to the air!" He said excitedly, and Hermione laughed so hard she fell out of her chair.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
They had been a few minutes late to the lesson, but had arrived with passes officially signed by the deputy headmistress, and madam Hooch had huffed but said nothing. Neville was more certain and glad of his decision than ever when he saw the state of the school brooms they were expected to use. Merciful mother of Merlin, but they were practically falling apart! There were a handful that had less than half as many twigs as they should, and even the ones that did have all of their twigs weren't all straight-handled. A phenomenal quidditch player could kill themselves on a broom like that if they weren't careful. It was shameful. He'd be owling his gran immediately, the board needed to know the sorry state of these things.
Still, he and Hermione both dutifully took one, and practiced summoning them from the ground with the rest of the first years. His sort of wobbled and hers rolled on the ground, and both ultimately refused to rise to their call. He had a feeling it was less to do with their poor quality than the brooms being able to know they didn't actually plan on using them. When madam Hooch wasn't looking he crouched and picked his up, and she giggled at him and then did the same.
When everyone else was preparing to hover, they sat astride their brooms but made no efforts to kick off. Instead they walked around in circles on the grass holding their brooms between their knees, mimicking their classmates who were slowly hovering around the training yard like enormous fat bumblebees. Once the class had all mastered controlled hovering, madam Hooch let them take off higher into the air and begin training drills and simple obstacle courses. At that point, he and Hermione sat down on the grass and watched. Her brother and cousin were by far the best fliers, taking those horrid old brooms and maneuvering them like pros, doing quicker and flashier dips and dives by the moment.
Madam Hooch seemed begrudgingly impressed by the two boys, and awarded them both house points. Standing not far from where they had settled down, she shot Hermione a measuring look "Shame, girl. Talent like that usually runs in families," she said a bit nastily, but then appeared thoughtful "Your cousins Sirius and Regulus both flew like birds, they did," she said wistfully "and James Potter was one of the best chasers this school has seen besides Charlie Weasley in decades."
He wanted to do nothing more than ignore her, but he could see that his friend had other ideas. Heaving herself to her feet, Hermione approached the cantankerous instructor seriously, her face determined "Madam, I'm sorry for not coming to you privately before this lesson. I shouldn't have approached you in the hall while you were eating. My nerves got the best of me and it didn't occur to me to reach out to you about our options until just earlier. I swear I'm not lazy and I wasn't trying to use my fear as an excuse. You know what I am, I'm a creature of the earth. I like to keep my paws on the ground and I'll admit that I'm bloody terrified of heights and falling. I don't know if I'll ever be able to change that. But what I can do is run and jump and twist and climb. I'm strong and I'm fast and I'm sturdy. If you can make an obstacle course on the ground for me like you've made for them to fly through in the sky, then I guarantee I can beat anything you can come up with. And if not I won't make a single peep if you fail me entirely. Do we have a deal?" She asked with a smirk, holding out her hand to the woman.
Despite wanting to groan in exasperation, Neville was grudgingly impressed. She hadn't actually apologized for defending herself, she had apologized for wrong-place-wrong-time. She had shown the professor respect and extended an interesting olive branch that would be irresistible to a fellow sportswoman. It was calculated and clever, and he adored her sheer nerve as much as it aged him prematurely.
"I shouldn't have said what I did in the hall, I haven't a thing against what you are as long as you're in control of yourself. I've never gotten a chance to experiment with the natural athleticism of a werewolf before," the woman said quietly enough for none of the other students to hear, with a grin building on her face.
"Show me a little bit of what you've got on the ground here so I have an idea of where to start," she challenged, and Hermione took off without a word like a shot. She did several laps around the grounds at a pace that resembled a dead sprint - much faster than he'd seen another witch or wizard run before. For all that they were a long-lived and sprightly folk they tended to be rather sedate, and it was more common to see a portly old mage than a particularly trim one. If he had tried to run a single lap as fast as she was going he'd be keeled over panting for breath halfway through.
After clocking a dozen or more laps around the perimeter of the yard, she made for the center and started doing forward and backward flips, jumps, rolls, she even launched herself into a few high leaps that nearly took his breath away. She did spins and twists and cartwheels and hand springs and back bends performing like a circus acrobat. Suddenly she stopped and turned back to madam Hooch, still not out of breath but looking a bit sweaty "I'm not sure what else I can show you without some equipment," she called, and the class that had been watching from the air broke into uproarious applause. She blushed and giggled, clearly having forgotten they were there, and waved them off.
Making her way back over to him and the instructor, he finally took note of just how excited madam Hooch looked. As soon as she was within range for their voices not to carry too loud the previously chilly instructor eagerly bombarded his friend with a seemingly endless barrage of questions.
"What's your vertical leap?"
"Uhhh, maybe fifteen feet?"
"…Horizontal?"
"At a run? Probably closer to thirty,"
"Really? That's well over the muggle world record. And how's your upper body strength, can you do pushups and pull-ups?"
"Yes I can, like I said I'm very strong,"
"How strong though? What's your upper limit?"
"I once dead lifted a muggle car for fun. A big one, too!"
"Cor blimey! Alright, now how do you feel about spike pits?"
"How do I- …that they're against the Geneva conventions, professor… But then again, I suppose I do appreciate a challenge,"
"Okay okay, have you ever done swinging exercises?"
"Like on the monkey bars or on hanging ropes? I'm quite familiar, they're very good fun,"
"Now if you ran up a steeply curved ramp, do you think it would give you enough lift to leap and catch the edge?"
"Definitely, that sounds quite simple,"
"Drat, alright well… hmm, do you have any idea what your top speed is?"
"Erm, my most comfortable running speed is generally between five and ten miles an hour. I can run for hours at that pace before getting tired. In shorter bursts I've gone as fast as 35 miles an hour before, and maintained it for almost ten minutes before having to stop,"
"That is absolutely astounding… yes I've got some very good ideas brewing Miss Greyback. Very good indeed. Give me until the next lesson, while they're off faffing about in the air you'll be running a course I'll have built right here on the ground. Brilliant idea really, my girl. Fifteen points to Gryffindor!"
If Neville were a muggle, he'd have recognized the dangerous sight of two gym rats bonding for life over a richly anticipated grueling workout. As it was he just felt a little uneasy at how eager they both were, but overall pleased that the two fiery females had managed to put their differences aside for the time being.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
In the week that passed, the training yard was closed off to the student body. Loud noises could be heard coming from within, sawing and hammering and earth excavating. The most exciting for all the nosy little eavesdroppers were the sporadic bouts of vehement swearing that followed crashes or bangs. It became particularly alarming when noises that the muggleborn students recognized as industrial power tools started joining the foray.
Needless to say, Neville was distinctly less pleased that Hermione and madam Hooch had resolved their disagreements when their second Friday afternoon flying class finally rolled around and they were finally allowed entrance back into the training yard. He had seen her flip around like a bloody acrobat so he knew his friend could jump and tumble, but when their instructor proudly revealed her creation he struggled to imagine how it could function as anything other than a death trap. It was frightening to his eyes, a monstrous obstacle course of wood and rope and metal all painted garishly bright colors and spanning the entire grassy yard in neat linear fashion. There were even large pools of standing water, and he couldn't begin to imagine what purpose they served.
He wondered if the instructor had only been pretending to apologize, and if this wasn't in reality her very convoluted method of attempting to murder his dearest friend. Like Neville, all of the other purebloods, most of the half bloods, and even a few of the muggleborns seemed profoundly bewildered by the sight before them. Only a handful of the first years present seemed to have any idea of what they were looking at, and of those only two of them were excited about what they saw.
Those two were thrilled enough for all of the rest of them though, and their classmates startled as Justin Finch-Fletchly and Dean Thomas let out twin bellows from deep in their chests."It's the Ninja Warrior course!" they cried in unison, and started jumping up and down and punching and kicking at the air. "Yassu!" shouted Dean, and Justin wailed "Hoayah!"
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Hermione was amused by her classmates' antics, and thrilled to bits by the course itself "Madam Hooch it's absolutely incredible!" She announced, and the woman grinned with delight "Thanks, I'm excited to see you try and run it. Took a bit of inspiration from that Japanese show on the telly that your fellow Gryffindors recognized right away, but most of it's based on what I remember from boot camp. Flew air force during the Second World War and I was mighty impressed by how the muggles trained their lads. Got their hearts and lungs pumping, blood flowing, physically conditioned the body. Only thing we do in the wizarding world that remotely compares is training for quidditch, and it's a damn shame," she said, her voice thick with emotion.
She turned to Hermione and addressed her more seriously "You make it through my course, I'll call it having passed my class and give you the average score of all your classmates. Call it fairs fair for how I spoke to you, wasn't proper of me. For every other student you get to try my course? I'll raise your grade by a percentage point. And if you train em and they make it through? Full marks for you and them both. And before you get any big ideas your brother doesn't count! But - you manage to get Longbottom through it, and I'll buy you both tickets to any pro game you want to see for the next year. Deal, girlie?" She challenged with a smirk, holding out a weather-beaten hand.
Hermione didn't hesitate for even a split second before taking her hand and shaking the life out of it "You might end up regretting that, madam!" She said with that puckish grin on her face that spelled trouble. She looked at him with glee and he whimpered, suspecting he knew exactly what she had in mind for him.