Part One / Chapter Twenty
The frigid morning of Hogsmeade approached and Venus eyed the piece of parchment with the words 'HOG'S HEAD' in large letters. Venus was relieved to have some time away from students staring at her as if she had wings sprouting, or Umbridge eyeing her like a Hunter does to a deer.
Constance, per usual, was still sleeping soundly in bed. "Cee, wake up." she whispered in her ear. But Constance didn't budge. "Get your arse up!"
Startled, Constance flipped off her bed. The top of her head perked up from the side of the mattress. She had an infuriated glare in her eyes at the unwanted awakening.
"You scared me half to bloody death," Constance muttered finally getting up to her feet. Her sleek black hair had been mangled into a frizzy disaster.
"Hurry, we have to head to Hog's Head," said Venus opening the door to her wardrobe.
"For Harley's little meeting correct?"
Venus placed her clothes atop her bed and sighed, "Are you referring to Harry or Hermione?"
"Goes for both." Constance shrugged; she grabbed her wand and performed a glamour charm. Of course, it didn't change her drastically. Although, the birdsnest that laid on her head was flattened almost instantly. She smoothed her hair down once more before smiling.
After breakfast they queued in front of Flich, who matched their names to the long list of students who had permission from their parents or guardian to visit the village. Her and Constance reached Flich, he checked their names giving Venus a displeased frown as they left. Maybe suspected half-breeds weren't his cup of tea.
"I know the squib isn't eyeing you like that," said Constance; she was visibly and audibly agitated. Venus wasn't going to risk her best friend hexing Filch, grabbing her and setting off down the wide drive to the gates.
"It's okay, it could be worse. Pansy Parkinson could throw a pie at my face." Venus joked. Constance laughed, even though the mention of Pansy made her urge to choke someone innumerable.
"I think Harry tried kissing me last night," Venus suddenly said.
Constance stopped. Literally, stopped and stared at her best friend. "Are you joking me?" Venus shook her head and an ear piercing squeal rang in the air. Constance had her hands over her mouth to muffle her yelps but to no avail, they rang through the wind. She skipped over to the girl excitedly. "Wait— what do you mean tried?"
"Well. . ." Venus trailed. "I-kinda-got-scared-and-ran-off."
"Vee!"
"I was scared!"
They paraded down the main streets past Zonko's where George, Fred and Lee Jordan now made their acquaintance. Constance stared up at George, and Venus watched as a familiar sparked set off in her eyes. Constance looked down from George and to Venus mouthing 'Oh my god'.
"What'd you reckon this meeting is about?" asked Fred fiddling witg merchandise he'd gotten from Zonko's.
"I have a hunch," Venus answered remembering the conversation of the previous night. The night she and Harry nearly kissed.
They turned up a side street and there laid a small inn. A battered sign hung from over the door: Hog's Head. Lee Jordan, Fred and George led the way inside. If the Three Broomsticks had a hell alternative, this would be it. A groups of students were inside already and more poured on. Hermione wasn't joking about this meeting being occupied. Venus and Constance walked past the Twins and Lee making their way next to Neville and Cho Chang. It was noticeable that Harry was shaking in his boots right about now, half of the school attended this meeting unknown to what they were doing there. Ron pulled up some chairs and everyone took seats around the Trio. Constance sat next to her cousin and Venus sat next to Neville, who nervously waved at her and looked back at the thee Gryffindors.
"Cheers," said Fred, handing out dusty mugs filled to the brim with Butterbeer. This had to be a health violation, Venus thought. She spun the mug around and put it back on the table. "Cough up, everyone, I haven't got enough gold for all of these."
Handing six sickles to Fred, she turned back in front of her. Constance and Cho were chattering about God knows what, Harry nervously whispering to Hermione and every other student were talking amongst themselves as more and more children filled the pub. Once the stream of kids had stopped, the chatting died down and everyone's sights were set on Harry.
"Er," said Hermione, her voice slightly higher than usual out of nerves. "Well — er — hi." The group focused its attention on her instead, though eyes continued to dart back regularly to Harry. "Well . . . erm . . . well, you know why you're here. Erm . . . well, Harry here had the idea — I mean" — Harry had thrown her a sharp look — "I had the idea — that it might be good if people who wanted to study Defense Against the Dark Arts — and I mean, really study it, you know, not the rubbish that Umbridge is doing with us" — (Hermione's voice became suddenly much stronger and more confident) — "because nobody could call that Defense Against the Dark Arts—"
She paused, looked sideways at Harry, and went on, "And by that I mean learning how to defend ourselves properly, not just theory but the real spells —"
"You want to pass your Defense Against the Dark Arts O.W.L. too though, I bet?" said Michael Corner.
"Of course I do," said Hermione at once. "But I want more than that, I want to be properly trained in Defense because . . . because . . ." She took a great breath and finished, "Because Lord Voldemort's back."
The reaction was immediate and predictable. Constance shrieked and slopped butterbeer down herself, Terry Boot gave a kind of involuntary twitch, Padma Patil shuddered, and Neville gave an odd yelp that he managed to turn into a cough. All of them, however, looked fixedly, even eagerly, at Harry.
"Well . . . that's the plan anyway," said Hermione. "If you want to join us, we need to decide how we're going to —"
"Where's the proof You-Know-Who's back?" said the blond Hufflepuff player in a rather aggressive voice.
"Well, Dumbledore believes it —" Hermione began.
"You mean, Dumbledore believes him, " said the blond boy, nodding at Harry.
"Who are you?" said Ron rather rudely.
"Zacharias Smith," said the boy, "and I think we've got the right to know exactly what makes him say You-Know-Who's back."
"Look," said Hermione, intervening swiftly, "that's really not what this meeting was supposed to be about —"
"It's okay, Hermione," said Harry.
"What makes me say You-Know-Who's back?" he asked, looking Zacharias straight in the face. "I saw him. But Dumbledore told the whole school what happened last year, and if you didn't believe him,
you don't believe me, and I'm not wasting an afternoon trying to convince anyone." The whole group seemed to have held its breath while Harry spoke. His eyes darting between Zacharias, Hermione and Venus. His expression changed everyone he looked her way.
Zacharias said dismissively, "All Dumbledore told us last year was that Cedric Diggory got killed by You-Know-Who and that you brought Diggory's body back to Hogwarts. He didn't give us details, he didn't tell us exactly how Diggory got murdered, I think we'd all like to know —"
"If you came here for Harry's sob story, I suggest you just leave because you're not going to get it." Venus belted; not taking her eyes off Zacharias Smith's aggressive face. Expecting a few students to leap out of their seats. . . . Shockingly none of them left their seats, not even Zacharias Smith, though he continued to gaze intently at Venus and Harry.
"So," said Hermione, her voice very high-pitched again. "So . . . like I was saying . . . if you want to learn some defense, then we need to work out how we're going to do it, how often we're going to meet, and where we're going to —"
"Is it true," interrupted the girl with long plait down her back, looking at Harry, "that you can produce a Patronus?"
There was a murmur of interest around the group at this.
"Yeah," said Harry somewhat defensively.
"A corporeal Patronus?"
"Er — you don't know Madam Bones, do you?" he asked.
The girl smiled. "She's my auntie," she said. "I'm Susan Bones. She told me about your hearing. So — is it really true? You make a stag Patronus?"
"Yes," said Harry.
"Blimey, Harry!" said Lee, looking deeply impressed. "I never knew that!"
"Mum told Ron not to spread it around," said Fred, grinning at Harry. "She said you got enough attention as it was."
"She's not wrong," mumbled Harry and a couple of people laughed. Venus couldn't help but let out a small chuckle. "And did you kill a basilisk with that sword in Dumbledore's office?" demanded Terry Boot. "That's what one of the portraits on the wall told me when I was in there last year. . . ."
"Er — yeah, I did, yeah," said Harry.
Justin Finch-Fletchley whistled, the Creevey brothers exchanged awestruck looks, and Lavender Brown said "wow" softly. Harry was shifting uneasily; he was determinedly looking anywhere but at Venus.
"And in our first year," said Neville to the group at large, "he saved that Philosophical Stone —"
"Philosopher's," hissed Hermione, her hand slightly crumpling the parchment underneath.
"Yes, that, from You-Know-Who," finished Neville. Hannah Abbott's eyes were as round as Galleons.
"And that's not to mention," said Cho (Harry's eyes snapped onto her, she was looking at him, smiling; Venus felt an aggressive pang hit her in the gut. An intense wanting for Cho to shut up took over.), "all the tasks he had to get through in the Triwizard Tournament last year— getting past dragons and merpeople and acromantulas and things. . . ."
There was a murmur of impressed agreement around the table. Venus sank slightly in her chair.
"Look," he said and everyone fell silent at once, "I . . . I don't want to sound like I'm trying to be modest or anything, but . . . I had a lot of help with all that stuff. . . ."
"Not with the dragon, you didn't," said Michael Corner at once. "That was a seriously cool bit of flying. . . ."
"Yeah, well —" said Harry.
"And nobody helped you get rid of those dementors this summer," said Susan Bones.
"No," said Harry, "no, okay, I know I did bits of it without help, but the point I'm trying to make is —"
"Are you trying to weasel out of showing us any of this stuff?" said Zacharias Smith.
"Here's an idea," said Ron loudly, before Harry could speak, "why don't you shut your mouth?" Perhaps the word "weasel" had affected Ron particularly strongly; in any case, he was now looking at Zacharias as though he would like nothing better than to thump him.
Zacharias flushed. "Well, we've all turned up to learn from him, and now he's telling us he can't really do any of it," he said.
"That's not what he said," snarled Venus, eyeing him from across the room.
"Would you like us to clean out your ears for you?" inquired George, pulling a long and lethal-looking metal instrument from inside one of the Zonko's bags.
"Or any part of your body, really, we're not fussy where we stick this," said Fred, he shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly.
"Yes, well," said Hermione hastily, "moving on . . . the point is, are we agreed we want to take lessons from Harry?"
There was a murmur of general agreement. Zacharias folded his arms and said nothing, though perhaps this was because he was too busy keeping an eye on the instrument in George's hand.
"Right," said Hermione, looking relieved that something had at last been settled. "Well, then, the next question is how often we do it. I really don't think there's any point in meeting less than once a
week —"
"Hang on," said Angelina, "we need to make sure this doesn't clash with our Quidditch practice."
"No," said Cho, "nor with ours."
"Nor ours," added Zacharias Smith.
"I'm sure we can find a night that suits everyone," said Hermione, slightly impatiently, "but you know, this is rather important, we're talking about learning to defend ourselves against V-Voldemort's Death Eaters —"
"Well said!" barked Ernie Macmillan. "Personally I think this is really important, possibly more important than anything else we'll do this year, even with our O.W.L.s coming up!"
He looked around impressively, as though waiting for people to cry, "Surely not!" When nobody spoke, he went on, "I, personally, am at a loss to see why the Ministry has foisted such a useless teacher upon us at this critical period. Obviously they are in denial about the return of You-Know-Who, but to give us a teacher who is trying to actively prevent us from using defensive spells —"
"Hem, hem, " said Ginny in such a good imitation of Professor Umbridge that several people looked around in alarm and then laughed. "Weren't we trying to decide how often we're going to meet and get Defense lessons?"
"Yes," said Hermione at once, "yes, we were, you're right. . . ."
"Well, once a week sounds cool," said Lee Jordan.
"As long as —" began Angelina.
"Yes, yes, we know about the Quidditch," said Hermione in a tense voice. "Well, the other thing to decide is where we're going to meet. . . ."
This was rather more difficult; the whole group fell silent. "Library?" suggested Katie Bell after a few moments.
"I can't see Madam Pince being too chuffed with us doing jinxes in the library," said Harry.
"Maybe an unused classroom?" said Dean.
"Yeah," said Ron, "McGonagall might let us have hers, she did when Harry was practicing for the Triwizard. . . ."
"Right, well, we'll try to find somewhere," said Hermione. "We'll send a message round to everybody when we've got a time and a place for the first meeting." She rummaged in her bag and produced parchment and a quill, then hesitated, rather as though she was steeling herself to say something. "I-I think everybody should write their name down, just so we know who was here. But I also think," she took a deep breath, "that we all ought to agree not to shout about what we're doing. So if you sign, you're agreeing not to tell Umbridge — or anybody else — what we're up to."
Fred reached out for the parchment and cheerfully put down his signature, but Harry noticed at once that several people looked less than happy at the prospect of putting their names on the list.
"Er . . ." said Zacharias slowly, not taking the parchment that George was trying to pass him. "Well . . . I'm sure Ernie will tell me when the meeting is." But Ernie was looking rather hesitant about signing too. Hermione raised her eyebrows at him.
"I — well, we are prefects, " Ernie burst out. "And if this list was found . . . well, I mean to say . . . you said yourself, if Umbridge finds out . . ."
"You just said this group was the most important thing you'd do this year," Harry reminded him.
"I — yes," said Ernie, "yes, I do believe that, it's just . . ."
"Hi, fellow Prefect. Question. Do you really think Hermione Granger would just have this list lying around for Umbridge to find?" said Venus testily.
"No. No, of course not," said Ernie, looking slightly less anxious. "I — yes, of course I'll sign."
Nobody raised objections after Ernie. Constance had finished signing her name and passed the piece of parchment into Venus' hands. She felt Harry's eyes burning into her as she wrote. She finished signing and shoved the parchment into Neville's hands. Not looking up once at Harry as she exited the pub.
Venus watching Harry look at Cho and trying to put the pieces together: