Courage

-66-

"I don't know about this, Hermione," Harry muttered, as Hermione had taken a seat beside him and was gesturing Layla to come and sit in the free seat on the other side of her, to which Layla reluctantly did. Harry was staring at the heavily veiled witch. "Has it occurred to you Umbridge might be under that?"

Hermione cast an appraising eye over the veiled figure.

"Umbridge is shorter than that woman," she said quietly. "And anyway, even if Umbridge does come in here, there's nothing she can do to stop us, Harry, because I've double- and triple-checked the school rules. We're not out of bounds; I specifically asked Professor Flitwick whether students were allowed to come in the Hog's Head, and he said yes, but he advised me strongly to bring our own glasses. And I've looked up everything I can think of about study groups and homework groups and they're definitely allowed. I just don't think it's a good idea if we parade what we're doing."

The barman sidled towards them out of a back room. He was a grumpy-looking old man with a great deal of long grey hair and beard. He was tall and thin.

"What?" he grunted.

"Four Butterbeers, please," said Hermione.

The man reached beneath the counter and pulled up three very dusty, very dirty bottles, which he slammed on the bar.

"Eight Sickles," he said.

"Here," Layla grabbed two sickles out of her pocket to hand to the man for her drink, but before she could, Harry stopped her.

"I can get them."

"I can get my own drink, Harry," Layla snapped.

"I'm just trying to be nice," Harry shot back in a much softer tone than Layla was using. "Accept it."

"No."

"Well, I'm buying you the drink anyway."

"I never asked you to."

"I don't care," said Harry, handing the man eight sickles and grabbing the drinks. Layla huffed and crossed her arms stubbornly. She went to mutter an annoyed 'thanks' but stopped herself, her stubbornness not allowing her to. She simply sent Harry a frustrated look and grabbed her Butterbeer from him.

The barman turned away and deposited Harry's money in an ancient wooden till whose drawer slid open automatically to receive it. The man in the dirty grey bandages rapped the counter with his knuckles and received another smoking drink from the barman.

"You know what?" Ron murmured, looking over at the bar with enthusiasm. "We could order anything we liked in here. I bet that bloke would sell us anything, he wouldn't care. I've always wanted to try Firewhisky—"

"You — are — a — prefect," snarled Hermione.

"Oh," said Ron, the smile fading from his face. "Yeah..."

"So, who did you say is supposed to be here?" asked Layla, turning to Hermione.

"Just a couple of people," said Hermione, checking her watch and looking anxiously towards the door. "I told them to be here about now and I'm sure they all know where it is — oh, look, this might be them now."

The door of the pub had opened. A thick band of dusty sunlight split the room in two for a moment and then vanished, blocked by the incoming rush of a crowd of people.

First came Neville with Dean and Lavender, who were closely followed by Parvati and Padma Patil with Cho and one of her usually-giggling girlfriends, then (on her own and looking so dreamy she might have walked in by accident) Luna Lovegood; then Katie Bell, Alicia Spinnet and Angelina Johnson, Colin and Dennis Creevey, Ernie Macmillan, Justin Finch-Fletchley, Hannah Abbott, a Hufflepuff girl with a long plait clown her back whose name Layla did not know; three Ravenclaw boys he was pretty sure were called Anthony Goldstein, Michael Corner and Terry Boot, Ginny, closely followed by a tall skinny blond boy with an upturned nose whom Layla recognised vaguely as being a member of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team and, bringing up the rear, Fred and George Weasley with their friend Lee Jordan, all three of whom were carrying large paper bags crammed with Zonko's merchandise.