you raise me up || harry potter

chapter 44

"Gotcha," he whooped. 

Pansy squatted back down and whispered to Harry, "We're gonna make the biggest snowball the prat has ever seen and crush him, got it?"

"What are you whispering back there?" Draco asked suspiciously as Harry gleefully nodded.

"Oh, nothing," Harry called back. "Just a little strategizing."

"I'll give you strategizing—" Draco muttered.

Harry crawled army-style away from the fort so Draco and Millicent wouldn't see him, and spotted the welcome sight of a red-head and bushy brown hair.

"Psst," he hissed. "Ron! Hermione!"

They looked over.

Harry jabbed his finger over at the chaos behind him. "We've got to destroy Draco and his gang," he said. "Join forces with us!"

"Join forces with Pansy Parkinson?" Hermione asked in disbelief. "I don't think so—"

"I'll ally with anyone if it means taking down Malfoy," Ron decided, army-crawling with Harry back to the fort. "C'mon, Hermione! Let's get him."

And thus the Great Snowball Fight ended with the largest snowball any of the onlooking students had ever seen, with substantial assistance from the rest of the Gryffindor third years as they kept the smaller snowballs coming as distraction. The Ravenclaws, who had stepped in to help Draco's group, slowly started looking like haggard snowmen. The monstrous snowball just barely floated into the air with the combined "Wingardium Leviosas" of Harry, Pansy, Blaise, Ron and Hermione, and came crashing down at their command right on top of the opposing fort.

Draco Malfoy didn't stand a chance.

It didn't seem strange to any of them at first to turn to the neighbor standing next to them and offering a high five or a grin. Cassius Warrington had pumped his fist in the air and grinned at Ron, who had seemed to forget that they were mortal Quidditch enemies. Pansy impulsively gave Hermione a side-hug, not seeming to realize that she was touching a Muggleborn. Terence Higgs bumped shoulders with Dean Thomas from Gryffindor, who gave Harry a thumbs-up.

Strange how a snowball fight can be so unifying, Harry thought. Even only for a few minutes.

♢

"Ah, students having a snowball fight, I see," Dumbledore said, eyes twinkling as brightly as the festive pixie lights around them. He did so love to garishly decorate his office when the season called for it.

"Hm," Snape grunted. 

"A rather interesting mix we have here... is that Gryffindor and Slytherin against Ravenclaw and Slytherin? With Harry leading the Gryffindors?"

Snape couldn't help himself—he looked out the window. Indeed, Dumbledore was right.

"Seems to me we have a natural-born leader on our hands," Dumbledore said.

Snape narrowed his eyes. "I don't like the way you worded that," he said. "He's not your clay to mold, Albus."

"Nothing of the sort," Dumbledore said airily. "Merely commenting on the antithesis at play. A Slytherin, a leader... it's been years since a clear ringleader came out on top in that House."

"I think you've forgotten Voldemort."

"I'm talking about leaders who care naught for power," Dumbledore said, a touch of seriousness in his voice. "Those are the people that wear leadership the best."

"You declined the post of Ministry of Magic more times than people would like to count, as I recall," Snape said.

"Yes, well," Dumbledore turned away. "You'll find, Severus, that I wear leadership as well as I wear black. Which is to say, not well at all."