It was Harry who told me about the secret meetings he was planning on having, in the Room of Requirement. Since Hermione didn't know of our friendship, I hadn't been invited to the group discussion in the Hog's Head.
But I arrived at the pre-arranged time inside the Room of Requirement, for the first time. And found myself surrounded by a group, mostly made up of 5th year Gryffindors, but I found comfort that I wasn't the only Ravenclaw.
Cho Chang and her best friend Marietta Edgecombe were both there. As was Luna Lovegood, in my year, who seemed very excited to see me when I arrived.
"Hello Zoe. I didn't know you were coming, otherwise we could've come together" said Luna, coming over to my side.
"Hi Luna. I'm an old friend of Harry's, so he invited me along" I told her.
Luna smiled. "This is going to be fun".
Her confidence was a little overwhelming, but I smiled and nodded, confirming my own excitement.
Once we had all officially selected Harry as our leader, we came up with the name for our group. Dumbledore's Army, or the DA for short.
We then began practicing the Disarming Charm, Expelliarmus, which was a bit basic. But it makes sense that we were starting at the beginning.
At the end of the meeting, I stayed behind to talk to Harry, and he decided to officially introduced me to Ron and Hermione.
"Guys. I'd like to introduce an old friend of mine, this is Zoe" he said.
I smiled awkwardly, unsure of how to react to them. "Hi".
"Nice to meet you" replied Hermione.
"We met before I came to Hogwarts. She grew up in a muggle orphanage, and we bumped into each other" Harry explained.
"Oh. I'm sorry about your parents" apologised Hermione.
"Don't worry about it" I replied.
"Do you know much about them? Did they have magic?".
Harry opened his mouth to reply, but I kicked him in the shin, to shut him up.
"Yes. They were killed in the first Wizarding War" I explained, bending the truth slightly.
"Oh. Well I'm glad you came today Zoe" replied Hermione.
"Me too. It may not be my OWL year, like you guys, but I still don't want to fall behind in my defensive magic. I think this group is going to be very good" I admitted.
"So you think it went O.K?" Questioned Harry nervously.
"Yes, I think it went very well" I answered.
Harry sighed. "That's good. I was very nervous, that I wouldn't be any good at teaching"
"You were a natural Harry. Much better than that toad faced, pink woman"
"Thanks Zoe. Though I would have to be pretty terrible to be worse than her".
I enjoyed my DA sessions, much more than my weekly conversations with Malfoy. As both of us hated them, we had shrunk them down to about 5 minutes. He asks me if I'm O.K, I say yes, and we leave it at that.
Once I realised I was not pregnant, I was filled with fear and relief at the same time. I was glad I was not carrying a child, but I knew as soon as I got back to the Malfoy Manor, we would have to try again.
My feelings towards Draco had also begun to change as well. When it was just the two of us, I didn't mind him. But during school, when he had Crabbe and Goyle by his side- he was a prat.
Which is why I cheered when Harry punched him in the stomach, after the Quidditch match. Draco had been insulting Ginny and Harry's families, so I was completely on Harry's side.
I may have even smiled, when I watched Draco roll around the floor in pain, after the incident.
Unfortunately, this meant that Harry was given a lifelong ban from playing Quidditch, by Umbridge. But this gave Harry even more reason to hate her, and to put even more fire into his teaching.
We learned many spells with his guidence, not just defensive spells, but all sorts of usefull ones.
I even started making friends with the other DA members, as we had all become rather close, due to our secret duelling group.
However, I often felt like I was in the enemies camp. My parents were Death Eaters, and I currently lived with two other Death Eaters. And was only being Harry's friend, because I'd been told to, by Lord Voldemort.
In my last private lesson with Snape, before Christmas, he handed me a large bottle filled with a familar looking liquid. There was a lid on top, so I couldn't smell my favourite things, but I knew that it was Amortentia.
The size of the bottle filled me with dread, as it was clear that Snape thought I would be needing a lot of it.
I hadn't spoken about my situation to him. But he was a family friend of the Malfoy's, so I assumed that he had some ties to the Death Eaters. But the two of us never mentioned it.
We had decided that somethings are better off unsaid.