The Telepath: A Hermione Granger x Male Reader Story

19) Defence Against Lockhart's Delusions

We all went down to breakfast the next morning and Harry and Ron still looked a bit unhappy.

Ron especially looked like he was dreading the post which arrived each morning.

Hermione was reading one of Lockhart's books and eating her toast.

"Why are you reading that?" I asked.

"Even if it is nonsense, it's still on the reading list, I'm not going to just ignore it. I suggest you don't either."

"I doubt they'll be anything worth reading in them, even if there is, it probably won't be on the test. Lockhart will do something stupid like make us answer questions about him."

As I finished saying this, over a hundred owls flew into the Great Hall and dropped letters or packages to their recipients. As expected a letter was dropped directly in front of Ron. Errol however fell into a bowl of cereal spraying milk everywhere.

The letter was in a dark red envelope meaning it was a Howler.

"Oh no!" Ron gasped.

"Don't worry Ron, it's still alive." Hermione said prodding the sodden owl.

"Not that - it's that." he said pointing to the letter.

"What is it?" Hermione asked.

"A Howler." I explained.

"A what?"

"You'll see."

"You better open it Ron." said Neville "It'll be worse of you don't, my gran sent me one and I didn't open it. It was horrible."

Ron was shaking as he reached out to the letter which was now smoking at the edges.

"You should put your fingers in your ears." I whispered to 'Mione.

She did what I suggested and I did the same.

Ron opened the letter and there was an explosion of noise which could easily be identified as Molly's sharp tone.

"... STEALING THE CAR, I WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN SURPRISED IF THEY EXPELLED YOU. YOU WAIT TILL I GET HOLD OF YOU, I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU THOUGHT ABOUT WHAT YOUR FATHER AND I WENT THROUGH WHEN WE SAW IT WAS GONE."

Plates and spoons were rattling on the table as the onslaught of shouting continued.

"YOUR FATHER'S FACING AN ENQUIRY AT WORK, IT'S ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT AND IF YOU PUT ANOTHER TOE WRONG WE WILL BRING YOU STRAIGHT HOME!"

It finally came to an end and there was short silence before Molly's tone became more reasonable and congratulated Ginny on getting into Gryffindor.

Chatter broke out amongst the table and a few people laughed but Ron and Harry looked like they were burning up with guilt. However they didn't have long to dwell on their feelings because McGonagall was coming around handing timetables to the Gryffindor students.

The four of us saw that we had double Herbology with the Hufflepuffs first.

() () ()

We headed down to the greenhouses and saw the rest of the class waiting outside for Professor Sprout to arrive.

In the distance the Whomping Willow could be seen with bandages wrapped around it and slings on some of it's branches. We could see Professor Sprout and Lockhart approaching from it.

"Oh hello there!" called Lockhart. "I've just been teaching Professor Sprout the proper way to doctor a Whomping Willow."

Of course he has.