Magic? || Years 1-5

Cabin Seventeen: Year 3

Ron and Hermione pushed through the crowds, Hermione grabbed Crookshanks and dragged him away, and Ron flattened himself on the floor and pulled Scabbers out from underneath.

"Look at him! He's skin and bone! You keep that cat away from him!" Ron hissed, holding up Scabbers with his eyes blazing.

"Crookshanks doesn't understand it's wrong! All cats chase rats, Ron!" Hermione replied shakily.

"There's something funny about that animal! It heard me say that Scabbers was in my bag!" Ron argued, trying to convince Scabbers to get in his pocket.

"Oh, what rubbish. Crookshanks could smell him, Ron, how else d'you think -- " Hermione rolled her eyes.

A few people were starting to laugh.

"That cat's got it in for Scabbers! And Scabbers was here first, and he's ill!" He snapped, tucking Scabbers away fully and stomping up to the boys' dormitory.

-=+=-

It was very tense between Ron and Hermione the next morning. Herbology was very quiet, with him not talking to her at all. They were working with puffapods that day, stripping the pink pods from the plants and putting the sparkling beans into a pail.

"How's Scabbers?" Hermione asked gently as she emptied her batch of beans into the pail.

"He's hiding at the bottom of my bed, shaking," Ron snapped back, missing the pail and sending beans all over the floor of the greenhouse.

Almost immediately the beans started to bloom, covering the floor in flowers.

"Careful, Weasley, careful!" Professor Sprout exclaimed, trying to clean up the mess he had made.

Next was Transfiguration. They were crowded around the classroom, waiting for the door to open, when Amisty picked up the sound of... crying?

She stood up on her tiptoes, peering over the heads of the crowd.

Yep, definitely crying.

Lavender Brown was bawling her eyes out, Parvati's arm thrown over her shoulder. Seamus and Dean were standing by them, looking very solemn.

"What's the matter, Lavender?" Hermione asked gently as they came close to them.

"She got a letter from home this morning. It's her rabbit, Blinky. He's been killed by a fox," Parvati whispered softly.

"Oh... I'm sorry, Lavender," Hermione patted the crying girl's shoulder, her eyebrows creased with concern.

"I should have known! You know what day it is?" Lavender wailed, her eyes distressed.

"Er -- " Hermione started to reply.

"The sixteenth of October! 'That thing you're dreading, it will happen on the sixteenth of October!' Remember? She was right, she was right!" Lavender cried, burying her head in her arms.

Seamus shook his head sadly.

Hermione paused, biting her lip, before speaking once more, "You -- you were dreading Blinky being killed by a fox?

"Well, not necessarily by a fox, but I was obviously dreading him dying, wasn't I?" Lavender looked up, tears streaming down her face.

"Oh," Hermione nodded, pausing again. "Was Blinky an old rabbit?"

"N-no! H-he was only a baby!" Lavender bawled, burying her hands in her arms yet again.

Parvati tightened her hold on Lavender.