Harry Potter lay in bed in the dormitory in Gryffindor Tower, staring at the ceiling. He was certain that Neville Longbottom was awake in the next bed to his left. Ron, in the next one to his right, was snoring incredibly loudly, limbs hanging over the side of the bed, his mouth open wide against the pillow case.
Harry clutched the parchment that Hedwig had delivered the night before.
I'm flying north immediately...
Harry felt sick, just holding the parchment and imagining Sirius somewhere in the air on the back of the hippogriff, Buckbeak. He pictured Sirius dodging searchlights and bullets from muggle guns like some sort of cartoon character version of an escaped convict and he furrowed his brow with concern. If Sirius was caught, it would be his fault for not being able to keep his mouth shut. A little twinge from his scar and he'd gone and caused all this.
Then again, the smallest part of him, the part he didn't want to acknowledge in case it inflated by being given a voice, was a bit excited to think that Sirius might be near by again soon, that maybe he, Harry, might even get a chance to see his godfather, that perhaps the letters might become more frequent again, like they'd been the first week or so... He had so many questions for Sirius still to ask and he so wanted the chance to talk to Sirius face-to-face about his parents.
What were they like, Sirius? he pictured himself asking.
And he lay, imagining Sirius's answers - details descriptions of James and Lily Potter would be given, and wonderful stories of adventures they'd all had when they were his age.
Did they fall in love the first time they saw each other? Harry would ask.
Yes, Sirius would say, he imagined, and he'd tell Harry all about some fairy tale romance that would make Hermione swoon.
You said he'd be proud of me, Sirius, that night in the Shrieking Shack? You said he'd be proud? Harry would remind his godfather.
He would be, Harry, very proud, Sirius would answer. At least, Harry hoped that would be the answer...
When will the house be ready for us? Harry would press... and he'd tell Sirius about the horrid things that happened to him every summer at the Dursleys... and Sirius would say that he, Harry, never had to go back there ever again... and Christmas would be spent with Sirius. He pictured a house in some countryside somewhere, decked with holly and lights, and even though he reckoned there wouldn't be any presents under the tree, it didn't matter because Sirius would be there and he, Harry, would be, too, and maybe Professor Lupin, too... and they'd have a grand Christmas...
Harry fell asleep picturing it, picturing a warm fireplace and the smell of the tree...
But the dream turned to nightmares at some point in the dark, wee hours of the night, and Harry found himself filled with a high, cold laughter ringing in his head that he couldn't shake out. His skin was clammy and he peeled himself out of bed shakily, trying to be quiet, and slipped out of the door and down the steps to the common room, where he sat on the couch and made himself a cup of tea, staring at the hearth of the fireplace.
His and Ron's divination homework still lay on the table in front of the couch, having been too preoccupied by the arrival of Hedwig and the letter from Sirius to remember to bring it with them up to the dormitory. He stared at the ink on the parchment reflecting the orange flames of the fire and drew a deep breath.
It was selfish to want Sirius to come, he decided. Selfish to want that conversation, that Christmas, so much as to risk his godfather being caught by the Ministry. If they caught him, what then? He'd never have his godfather again. They'd kill him... kill him for something that Harry knew now without a doubt that Sirius Black would never, ever, ever have done.
He let himself imagine for just one more moment the shining, smiling face of Sirius Black, rounded and healthy, more like the version of Sirius that existed in that old wedding photo of his mum and dad than the Sirius he'd met in the Shrieking Shack...
We're a family now Harry, he pictured Sirius telling him, catching him up in a bone-crushing hug - the sort of hug that he, Harry, had craved for years... the sort he saw other kids get from their parents on Platform 9 3/4 every year... the sort that he, Harry, had never felt before.
Harry pushed the imagined hug away and sat forward, taking a piece of the parchment and wrote the following letter:
Dear Sirius,
I reckon I just imagined my scar hurting. I was half asleep when I wrote to you last time. There's no point in coming back, everything's fine here. Don't worry about me, my head feels completely normal.
Harry
He stared at the words on the parchment as the clock on the mantel chimed a deep, ringing note of the half-hour, and he stood up, sighing deeply, and slipped out of the Portrait hole, headed for the Owlery.
By the time he'd climbed the long stairs down from sending Hedwig off on her next journey - hopefully a shorter one than the last, he thought - the smell of breakfast had permeated the corridors. Harry trotted down the staircase into the Great Hall, feeling a bit sorry for himself, and found Ron and Hermione at the Gryffindor table. Hermione was talking about S.P.E.W., the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare, which she'd come up with the night before.
"...so I thought we could tell some people from other houses about what we're working to do; after all, recruiting more members is absolutely essential to get a real movement started. We need to strike while the iron is hot, as they say, seeing as the unfair treatment of Winky at the World Cup is still fresh on everyone's mind," Hermione was saying.
"I know I certainly can't stop thinking about it," Ron said.
"Nor can I," Hermione sighed heavily, missing the sarcasm in Ron's voice. "Perhaps later on we could go to the library and --"
"Harry!" Ron said, spotting him coming down the table to the seat next to Hermione. "There you are! You were gone when we got up, we thought you'd be down here, but you weren't."
Hermione looked frustrated at the interruption, but she turned as Harry sat. "Morning Harry!" she chimed. "I was just telling Ronald that we ought to be drumming up new members today for the Society of the Promotion of --"
"Where were you?" Ron cut across her words.
"The owlery," Harry answered, choosing to answer Ron's question rather than listen to Hermione prattle on.
"The owlery?" Hernmione asked. Then, "Oooh, were you writing back to Snuffles, then?" she asked.
"Yeah," Harry said and he told them about his letter. He left out all the hesitation he'd had about it, deciding that he'd rather they didn't know what a horribly selfish person he'd nearly been.
"Oh but that was a lie, Harry," said Hermione sharply. "You didn't imagine your scar was hurting and you know it!"
"So what?" said Harry.
"So Snuffles can't help you if you don't tell him what's going on and I think it's rather very important that he knows the truth about what's going on. That's what having parents and godparents is all about. They can't help you if you don't talk to them!" She said this in a tone that Harry was sure probably sounded exactly like Mrs. Granger.
Ron glanced at Harry, his mouth drawn up in a half concerned, half apologetic purse, eyes studying Harry.
Harry tried very hard not to let any of his selfishness show on his face. "He's not going back to Azkaban because of me," he said lowly, "Or worse."
Hermione opened her mouth to argue again, but Ron cut in, "Drop it," he said, and his tone was firm enough that Hermione did drop it. He eyes met Harry's and Harry had a feeling he'd let his disappointment show a bit more than he'd meant to.
Cedric Diggory was bent over his parchment in the library, doing his homework, when there came a very urgent feeling tap on his shoulder.
He looked up from the scroll he was scrawling out weather charms and found himself looking into the face of Hermione Granger, the bushy haired fourth year he knew mainly from hearing the professors talk about her exceptional grades. She was holding an old fashioned wooden cigar box in one hand and a sheaf of papers and her wand in the other. "Good morning, Cedric," she said in an important tone.
"Er - hullo Hermione," Cedric said.
"I was wondering if you might have a moment to talk about an important subject matter with me? It won't take very much time, but it may prove to be simply life changing. Not only for yourself, but perhaps for those less fortunate as well."
Cedric glanced at the watch on his wrist and shrugged, "Yeah, I guess so. What's on?"
Hermione set her box down and hurried 'round the table to sit opposite of Cedric. "Does your family have any house elves, Cedric?" she asked.
Cedric hesitated, "Erm... no. Not at the moment, no. My dad was talking about getting one..." He flushed. His mum and dad had had a bit of a row when his mum had found out about his dad wanting to look into getting an elf. She'd accused him of only needing one because he'd realized how much work she did, unappreciated, around the house and how of course he would replace her with one because he didn't like having to say thank you to anybody. Cedric felt his stomach twist just remembering the sound of their voices carrying through the house - he'd been fetching his trunk and things to go and visit his mum for a weekend when the row had broken out and moving as quickly as he could to do it. It took hardly any time at all for the pair of them to start fighting these days. Mere seconds in each other's presence.
Hermione, of couse, had no idea what Cedric was thinking about, and she said, "Oh well you ought to tell him to think twice about it!" Her voice was terribly solemn as she peeled one of the sheets of paper from the stack of them that she held cradled in her arms. She held it out and he took it, looking it over. "This is a fact sheet showing statistics concerning house elves. See here, nearly eighty-seven percent of them are enslaved by wizards." She tapped importantly against a bulletpoint on the sheet. "No wages whatsovever!"
"Wages?" Cedric asked, looking up.
"Yes! Wages!" Hermione answered. She drew a deep breath. "Every day house elves are expected to cook, clean, and do all sorts of boring, nasty house hold chores in wizarding house holds --"
"You know they don't - they don't ask for wages, yeah?" Cedric asked.
Hermione sighed in a way that told Cedric this probably wasn't the first time she'd gone through this speech, nor the first time someone had interrupted her here to discuss the idea of a house elf earning wages. He half expected her to click her tongue at him.
"So because they've been mistreated for centuries, and they've learned not to ask for basic rights, you believe it's alright for the wizarding community to go on taking advantage of our brothers and sisters from other species simply because that's the way it's always been done?" her voice was inflected to indicate the correct answer for Cedric, her bushy eyebrows narrowed.
"I - er --" Cedric spluttered.
Perhaps having a debate with Hermione would be one of the Triwizard Tournament challenges, he thought. What could be scarier?
Meanwhile, across the library, Ron sat with Harry at their own table, S.P.E.W. badges already attached to their robes, struggling through an assignment for Divination together and already falling back on their reliable standby of making stuff up to entertain Trelawney.
Harry was biting his tongue as he wrote down some horrible form of misery that was caused by juxtaposition of some far off moon. "I was thinking we ought to make some of these a bit less obvious that we've made them up. Like I think my losing the bet on your fight is good, but Hermione might be right about the getting trampled by a Hippogriff lot, don't you reckon? I was thinking maybe instead of that you could fall victim to a prank - I mean with Fred and George about, you likely will. Maybe because of the placement of Uranus?" Harry laughed at his own joke and when Ron didn't laugh, too, he looked up in concern. Ron was staring off across the library. Following Ron's gaze to Hermione and Cedric, Harry raised an eyebrow at his mate. He kicked Ron's foot under the table rather violently.
"Huh?" Ron turned back to Harry.
"What d'you think? Prank victim? Uranus?"
"Sure," Ron answered distractedly, turning back to Hermione and Cedric. "What do you reckon she's doing talking to Diggory?" Ron demanded.
"Probably recruiting new members to spew," Harry muttered.
Ron grimaced. "Bloody hell, she can't be embarrassing us like that, talking to blokes like Diggory about that ridiculous club!"
"At least she's not making us do it with her."
At that moment, Hermione pointed toward their table and Ron groaned. "Now he thinks we're nutters, too," he complained.
"Maybe we should put sudden loss of popularity due to overzealous friend on our charts," mused Harry, biting his lip and looking down at the new entry he'd written in about getting pranked on Tuesday because of Uranus.
Ron sighed heavily, then turned back to the table. "You know Fred and George are still trying to sort out a way to enter the tournament despite the age limit Dumbledore mentioned?"
"Yeah?" It was Harry's turn to sound distracted.
"Yeah," Ron still sounded distracted, too. Honestly the whole conversation was hanging by a thread. "Everyone thinks Diggory's going to enter, and maybe Roger Davies." He stared and stared, then he turned back to Harry. "If you could enter, would you?"
"No," Harry said decisively. Then, "There, I've fixed both our charts..." He pushed Ron's back toward him. "This rot should be at least a little bit more believable."
"I think I would enter," Ron said.
"What? The Tournament?" Harry asked.
"Yeah," Ron answered. He was looking at Cedric Diggory and Hermione again.
Harry looked over at them, too, then back to Ron. "Are you waiting for him to turn her into a toad or something?" he joked.
Ron stared on. "I just think she ought to leave him alone and come back over here with us."
Harry raised an eyebrow.
"Why's she got to try to recruit him for anyhow?"
"He's very popular," Harry shrugged. "And if he's really going out for the Tournament, perhaps she thinks he'll have some sort of platform to speak from on it. She's probably imagining him telling the whole school about it while holding up some trophy or something." He mimed holding a trophy up, "I did it all for the house elves!" he said in a low voice that was supposed to sound like Diggory but didn't.
Ron snorted judgmentally.
Hermione was doing exactly that at the table with Cedric, however, despite the fact that Harry had thought he'd been joking about it.
"Our short term aims are to secure a fair wage and good working conditions for the elves, including respectable uniforms and changing the law about non-wand use."
"You know giving them clothes sets them free, don't you?" Cedric asked.
Hermione's face was pink, "Well that's the point isn't it? They should be free to work for whom they please, not bound as subpar creatures without even clothes! That is exactly why we're hoping to have a representative in the Department of Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures in order to promote fair representation."
Cedric glanced at his paper he was supposed to be writing.
"Being an older student - and one with as much popular influence about the school as you have - you could use your platform to be a voice to the voiceless, to really be heard. You could help to change the mind of the entire generation that makes true and lasting change at the Ministry for Magic!"
"I don't know about popular influence," Cedric murmured, flushing with humility.
"And your father works for the Ministry, doesn't he?" Hermione pressed, "You have important contacts that could be utterly invaluable in the future as the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare grows."
Cedric asked, "Look, Hermione, if I buy the badge will you let me finish my homework?"
"They're only two sickles. Mainly to cover costs of materials, but all the proceeds after cost go directly to the efforts of S.P.E. --"
"Here," Cedric had fished out two sickles from his pocket and shoved them into Hermione's hand. He'd never found that Slytherin boy that had lost the sickles to Fred and George, he realized, as he handed the coins over to Hermione.
She looked at the shiny silver coins in her hand, then very officially opened the cigar box and placed them into a small coin purse before removing a badge that said S.P.E.W. on it. She handed it to Cedric, "Thank you very much for your donation," she said formally.
"Yeah, no problem," Cedric nodded, taking the badge and putting it on the table next to his ink pot. He started to turn back to his scroll.
"Aren't you going to wear it?" Hermione pressed. "Representation of S.P.E.W. among the students is very --"
Cedric snatched the badge up and quickly attached it to his robes. "There you are."
Hermione beamed.
("Oh no," Ron was saying to Harry, "He's bought one of these stupid badges! What is he, mental? Encouraging this?")
"Now excuse me, I've got to sort out this paper," Cedric said apologetically and turning back to his work.
Hermione nodded, "Of course, not a problem. I'll be in touch about the next official meeting."
"There are meetings?" Cedric asked, looking up from his parchment.
"Well how else are we to organize and realize our goals?" Hermione asked, closing the cigar box.
Cedric shrugged, "I dunno..." He wondered how he was going to fit S.P.E.W. in amongst everything else he would hopefully be doing this term.
Hermione smiled. "See you soon!"
Cedric watched as she turned and walked off, headed across the room to where Roger Davies sat, pouring over his own homework amongst a cloud of Ravenclaws. He shook his head and turned back to his work.
Ron groaned at his and Harry's table.
"What?" Harry asked.
"She's going for Roger Davies now!" Ron said. "Harry, the whole school is going to think we're mad!"
Harry looked up and sighed. "I mean, it's not awful, what she's doing... The house elves aren't treated very kindly..." he shot a glance toward Draco Malfoy, who was holding court at a table with a load of Slytherins gathered around it. "I mean, just look at Dobby."
"Now there's somebody who's mad," Ron said heartily.
Harry shrugged. Then, meeting Malfoy's eye for a split second, he said quickly, "Hey let's go back up to the common room, yeah? We can sit by the fire and finish this rubbish."
"Yeah, alright," Ron nodded, "Let's get out of here before 'Mione decides we ought to be helping her talk people into joining spew or something!"