Fred told me about a secret club Harry was starting, so of course I decided to go with him to check it out. We shuffled into the three broomsticks with a large group of people who's interests were piqued just like my own. I came in first, and sat down next to Ron, giving his head a little pat. Then came Neville with Dean and Lavender, who were closely followed by Parvati and Padma Patil with Cho and one of her usually-giggling girlfriends, then (on her own and looking so dreamy she might have walked in by accident) Luna Lovegood; then Katie Bell, Alicia Spinnet and Angelina Johnson, Colin and Dennis Creevey Ernie Macmillan, Justin Finch-Fletchley, Hannah Abbott, a Hufflepuff girl with a long plait clown her back whose name I did not know; three Ravenclaw boys, Anthony Goldstein, Michael Corner and Terry Boot, Ginny, closely followed by a tall skinny blond boy with an upturned nose whom I recognised vaguely as being a member of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team and, bringing up the rear, Fred and George Weasley with our mutual friend Lee Jordan, all three of whom were carrying large paper bags crammed with Zonko's merchandise.
The barman had frozen in the act of wiping out a glass with a rag so filthy it looked as though it had never been washed. Possibly, he had never seen his pub so full.
"Hi," said Fred, reaching the bar first and counting his companions quickly, planting a small kiss on my cheek, could we have ... twenty-six Butterbeers, please?"
The barman glared at him for a moment, then, throwing down his rag irritably as though he had been interrupted in something very important, he started passing up dusty Butterbeers from under the bar.
"Cheers," said Fred, handing them out. "Cough up, everyone, I haven't got enough gold for all of these ..."
I have Fred six sickles, and he gave me an incredulous look.
"You only need two y/n."
"It's for you and George, now take the money." I pushed it into his hands.
In twos and threes the new arrivals settled around Harry, Ron and Hermione, some looking rather excited, others curious, Luna Lovegood gazing dreamily into space. Fred pulled up a chair next to me, casually draping his arm around my shoulder. When everybody had pulled up a chair, the chatter died out. Every eye was upon Harry.
"Er," said Hermione, her voice slightly higher than usual out of nerves. "Well--er--hi."
I gave her a small thumbs up of encouragement and she took a deep breath.
"Well ... erm ... well, you know why you're here. Erm ... well, Harry here had the idea--I had the idea--that it might be good if people who wanted to study Defence 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 Defence Against the Dark Arts-" ("Hear, hear," said Anthony Goldstein, and Hermione looked heartened) "--Well, I thought it would be good if we, well, took matters into our own hands."
She paused, looked sideways at Harry and went on, "And by that I mean learning how to defend ourselves properly, not just in theory but doing the real spells-"
"You want to pass your Defence Against the Dark Arts OWL too, though, I bet?" said Michael Corner, who was watching her closely.
"Of course I do," said Hermione at once. "But more than that, I want to be properly trained in defence because ... because ..." she took a great breath and finished, "because Lord Voldemort is back."
The reaction was immediate and predictable. Cho's friend 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. Fred didn't flinch, but his face gave a small wince.
"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 OK, Hermione," said Harry. "What makes me say You-Know-Who's back?" he repeated, 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 won't believe me, and I'm not wasting an afternoon trying to convince anyone."
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've come to hear exactly what it looks like when Voldemort murders someone I can't help you," Harry said. His temper clearly rising. He did not take his eyes from Zacharias Smith's aggressive face. "I don't want to talk about Cedric Diggory, all right? So if that's what you're here for, you might as well clear out."
"So," said Hermione, her voice very high-pitched again. "So ... like I was saying ... if you want to learn some defence, 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 the 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 slightly 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.
The veiled witch sitting alone shifted very slightly in her seat.
"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.
"He also saved the philosophers stone from the clutches of the dark lord in his first year, to put that in context, an eleven year old beating one of the most powerful wizards of all time." I chimed in
Hannah Abbotts eyes were as round as Galleons.
"And that's not to mention,'"said Cho, she was looking at him, smiling, "all the tasks he had to get through in the Triwizard Tournament last year--getting past dragons and merpeople and Acromantula and things..."
There was a murmur of impressed agreement around the table. And I smiled up at Fred, who looked quite excited.
"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-"
"And nobody helped you get rid of those dementors this summer," said Susan Bones.
"No," said Harry, "no, OK, 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 Fred.
"Would you like us to clean out your ears for you?"enquired Greorge, 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," I smiled sweetly.
"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 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 OWLs 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 on 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-"
"We think the reason Umbridge doesn't want us trained in Defence Against the Dark Arts," said Hermione, "is that she's got some ... some mad idea that Dumbledore could use the students in the school as a kind of private army. She thinks he'd mobilise us against the Ministry."
"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 practising for the Tri wizard."
"Something tells me she won't be so accommodating this time." I smirked.
"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 wrote his signature, but plenty of people looked a little hesitant.
"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-"
"Ernie, do you think Hermione would leave the list randomly lying around?" I asked, grabbing the list from Fred and putting down my full name in large legible letters. "I trust my Head Girl ship with this list."
"I--yes, of course I'll sign." Said Ernie, looking less anxious.
Nobody raised objections after Ernie. When the last person--Zacharias-- had signed, Hermione took the parchment back and slipped it carefully into her bag. There was an odd feeling in the group now. It was as though we had just signed some kind of contract, and in a way, we did.
"Well, time's ticking on," said Fred briskly, getting to his feet. "George, Lee, Y/n, and I have got items of a sensitive nature to purchase, we'll be seeing you all later."