Butterfly Effect ; H. Potter

82. dreams and o.w.l.s.

"Well - no," said Hermione, stretching out a placatory hand towards him. "But Ron, we didn't want to leave - we had to!"

"Yeah?" said Ron, whose face was growing rather red. "How come?"

"It was Hagrid," said Harry. "He decided to tell us why he's been covered in injuries ever since he got back from the giants. He wanted us to go into the Forest with him, we had no choice, you know how he gets. Anyway..."

The story was told in five minutes, by the end of which Ron and Antheia's faces both had a look of total incredulity.

"He brought one of the giants back and hid it in the Forest?" asked Antheia, her eyes wide with horror.

"Yep," said Harry grimly.

"No," said Ron, as though by saying this he could make it untrue. "No, he can't have."

"Well, he has," said Hermione firmly. "Grawp's about sixteen feet tall, enjoys ripping up twenty-foot pine trees, and knows me," she snorted, "as Hermy."

Ron gave a nervous laugh.

"And Hagrid wants us to ... ?"

"Teach him English, yeah," said Harry.

"He's lost his mind," said Ron in an almost awed voice.

"Yes," said Hermione irritably, turning a page of Intermediate Transfiguration and glaring at a series of diagrams showing an owl turning into a pair of opera glasses. "Yes, I'm starting to think he has. But, unfortunately, he made Harry and me promise."

"Well, you're just going to have to break your promise, that's all," said Ron firmly. "I mean, come on ... we've got exams and we're about that far -" he held up his hand to show thumb and forefinger almost touching "- from being chucked out as it is. And anyway... remember Norbert? Remember Aragog? Have we ever come off better for mixing with any of Hagrid's monster mates?"

"But they promised Hagrid," argued Antheia. Ron looked at her, shocked.

"You want to teach Grawp English?"

"No, of course not!" Antheia said. "But we can't just leave him. What if Hagrid gets sacked?"

Ron smoothed his hair flat again, looking preoccupied.

"Well," he sighed, "Hagrid hasn't been sacked yet, has he? He's hung on this long, maybe he'll hang on till the end of term and we won't have to go near Grawp at all."

─ ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ─

The castle grounds were gleaming in the sunlight as though freshly painted; the cloudless sky smiled at itself in the smoothly sparkling lake; the satin green lawns rippled occasionally in a gentle breeze. June had arrived, but to the fifth-years this meant only one thing: their O.W.L.s were upon them at last.

Their teachers were no longer setting them homework; lessons were devoted to revising those topics the teachers thought most likely to come up in the exams. The purposeful, feverish atmosphere drove nearly everything but the O.W.L.s from Harry's mind, though he did wonder occasionally during Potions lessons whether Remus had ever told Snape that he must continue giving Harry Occlumency tuition. If he had, then Snape had ignored Remus as thoroughly as he was now ignoring Harry. This suited Harry very well; he was quite busy and tense enough without extra classes with Snape, and to his relief Hermione was much too preoccupied these days to badger him about Occlumency; she was spending a lot of time muttering to herself, and had not laid out any elf clothes for days.

She was not the only person acting oddly as the O.W.L.s drew steadily nearer. Ernie Macmillan had developed an irritating habit of interrogating people about their revision practices.