The Untold Story of the Witches of Hogwarts

Patronuses

A few seconds later, a giant silver hawk joined the beautiful swan patronus in its flight around the room.

"Congrats!" Elphaba clapped as Galinda admired her handiwork with a satisfied smile.

"I thought about you too," she said, before Elphaba could ask. "I may have had so many friends, but I've only ever had one that truly mattered..."

The next day, as the DADA class finished up, Elphaba remained behind.

"I believe I owe you a patronus," she told Umbridge. It was clear that just speaking to the fat pink toad was a huge strain on her. Not that anyone could disagree. Even quite a few of the Slytherins found Umbridge to be quite unbearable. It was one of the only times when Galinda was not the odd-snake-out. Umbridge seemed to be nearly universally hated across all of Hogwarts and it was the closest thing the four houses had ever come to reaching complete and utter unity. There were still a few Slytherins out there that did like Umbridge but, for once, they were in the minority. Pretty much everyone hated the new DADA professor, and it didn't matter what house anyone was in. This hatred transcended house barriers.

"I do believe you do," Umbridge agreed cheerfully. The moment Galinda heard that too-happy-note in Umbridge's nasally voice, she sat back down. Although she technically wasn't part of this deal between Elphaba and Umbridge, there was no way she was going to leave her hot-headed best friend alone with a monster like Umbridge. Instead, she only observed from the back of the room as Elphaba summoned her patronus.

"And now, how did you learn this spell exactly?" Umbridge asked sweetly as Elphaba's silver swan flew around the room. She pulled out a little glass vial of Veritaserum. In that one question, both Elphaba and Galinda realized that they had been tricked. It was no secret that Umbridge wanted to know where some of her more avid enemies keep hanging out and meeting up. Doubtless, she had realized that Elphaba was among this number and had, likely, practiced her patronus charm in this secret location. With all that Veritaserum at her disposal, it wouldn't be hard for Umbridge to drag a confession about the Room of Requirement out of Elphaba. This was not good...

"I taught her!" Galinda quickly interjected, revealing her presence to both Elphaba and Umbridge. For a moment, anger at being spied upon shot across Umbridge's face, but it was gone faster than it had come and that "pleasant, innocent" smile returned to her flabby face instead.

"Oh, you did? Did you?" she asked conversationally, innocently tapping on her little glass vial and feigning interest in Galinda's remark.

"Yes, I did," Galinda tried to hold her ground. "In the Slytherin commons! The other Slytherins usually ignore us, so we were able to practice there, alone and in peace," she continued to lie, but this was not entirely untrue. Because of that deep-seeded rivalry between the Slytherin and Gryffindor houses, whenever a Gryffindor would enter the Slytherin dormitory, that Gryffindor would be aggressively shunned, as was the case with Elphaba.

Of course, the first time Elphaba had ever entered the Slytherin dorm, nearly every student had tried to attack her and it was only Galinda's intervention that saved her from needing a trip to the hospital wing. From that first visit on, however, the Slytherins typically just ignored her. But this was not out of any grudging respect. They just did not want to anger their little Arduenna-Upland. Galinda had a lot of powerful connections and she had made it all too clear that she would gladly use every single one of them if anyone tried to cross her. Since no one wanted to test those limits, Elphaba was mostly left alone, provided that she stay practically glued to Galinda's side. Not that she wanted to be anywhere else.

So Galinda was not telling a 100% lie when she said that she and Elphaba were able to find a surprising amount of peace and solitude when they went to the Slytherin dorm. But despite Galinda's best efforts, Umbridge managed to see through Galinda's lies. Galinda was not one to go down without a fight, though, and she continued to press Umbridge, begging her to listen. It finally reached a point, though, when Umbridge lost her temper with Galinda and whirled around, slapping the girl hard across the face. Big mistake on her part.