HARLOW SAT UNDER A tree in the courtyard, a black notebook in hand. she looked up from the notebook to see cedric walking towards her. he sat down next to her and looked at the notebook.
"i didn't know you could draw." he said.
harlow shut the notebook and placed it down at her side, "that's because i can't."
"can i see it?" he asked.
harlow laughed, "trust me you don't wanna."
cedric reached his hand over to the other side of harlow and grabbed the notebook.
"cedric give it back!" she ordered.
"nope," he opened the book and saw dozens of sketches. some of the architecture of hogwarts, some of trees and landscape. he turned to the page she was just open to. a woman was sketched out onto the paper, beautiful yet unfinished.
"whose this supposed to be." cedric asked.
"no one." harlow grabbed the book out of cedrics hand and placed it on the ground next to her. "you are so annoying, you know that?"
cedric smirked and looked down, he looked out onto the courtyard and furrowed his eyebrows. "what's happening over there?"
harlow looked over, there was the gryffindor and slytherin quidditch teams standing facing each other. she saw hermione and ron walk up to the quidditch teams.
cedric got up and extended a hand to harlow, who took it and pulled herself up, unknowingly leaving her notebook by the tree. as cedric and harlow walked closer to the two groups she saw draco emerge from the crowd of slytherins.
"no one asked your opinion, you filthy little mudblood!" harlow heard draco spit out.
"you'll pay for that one, malfoy." ron pulled out his broken wand, "eat slugs!"
there was a burst of green light that sent ron flying back a few feet. ron groaned on the ground.
"ron!" harlow shouted. she ran towards ron, hermione and the rest of the gryffindor quidditch team following behind her.
"you okay, ron?" hermione asked, "say something!"
ron looked as if he was going to throw up, he turned over to his side and a slug came out from his mouth. harlow turned around and looked at cedric with a disgusted face, she shook her head at cedric. harlow turned her attention back to ron and rubbed his back.
there was a flash of light, harlow looked up to see colin creevy. "wow! can you turn him around, harry?"
"no, colin! get out of the way!" harry scolded. "let's take him to hagrid's."
"i'll catch up to you guys," said harlow, she turned back to cedric and walked back to him.
ϟ
harlow and cedric paced through the halls of hogwarts, "what does that word mean? the one draco called hermione?
cedric sighed, "mudblood means 'dirty blood.' it's a slur for muggle-borns used by pure-bloods."
"that's lovely," harlow said sarcastically, "but why? why does that matter if they're muggle-born or pure-blood?"
"im gonna give you a history lesson in pure-blood supremacy, okay?"
harlow nodded, "okay."
"pure-bloods are the original families who have no muggle-born witches or wizards in their families, now there are only twenty eight of those families left that claim to be completely pure-blood."
harlow furrowed her eyebrows, "wait, but aren't you a pure-blood? so your family is one of the twenty right"
cedric nodded and put his hands in his pockets, "yes and no, i'm a pure-blood but my family isn't on the list of the sacred twenty eight."
harlow gave him a confused look, "why's that?"
"my family sympathized with muggle-borns during the first wizarding war and didn't side with you-know-who. we don't believe in that pure-blood bullshit." cedric looked down then looked at harlow stopping. "your father was a pure-blood you know."
"oh." harlow said, she was cold to the subject of her parents. she still felt as if if she talked about it her aunt and uncle would come to yell at her.
"yeah, they sympathized with muggle-borns to, like your mother."
"is that why they were killed during the first wizarding war?" harlow asked.
"don't you know? has no one ever told you the story?" he inquired.
"no, i didn't even know what their names were until last year." harlow admitted shamefully. "i- the people i live with don't allow me to talk about them."
cedric frowned, "i'm sorry lo, and to answer your question, no he wasn't after your parents that night. he was after you and harry."
ϟ
harlow walked to hagrid's alone, deep in thought. her talk with cedric had opened up a great deal of new questions. she approached the door to hagrid's hut and tapped on the door lightly before letting herself in.
inside of the hut was ron, harry, and hermione sitting on a bench that was against one of the walls. ron clenched a large wood bucket in hand, retching up a new slug every other moment.
"ah! oh, okay." hagrid said, hagrid turned around to see harlow, "heya harlow."
"hi hagrid," smiled harlow. "how's ron?"
harlow looked over to ron who threw up another slug, "oh."
"i'm doing just brilliant harlow, thanks for asking." remarked ron sarcastically, throwing up another slug.
"better out than in. who's ron tryin' to curse, anyway?" asked hagrid.
"malfoy." harry told hagrid, "he called hermione, ...um, well, i don't- i don't know exactly what it means."
hermione got up from where she was sitting and paced to the other side of the room, "he called me a mudblood."
harlow walked over to where hermione was and put a hand on hermione's shoulder, in an effort to comfort her somehow.
a shocked look came upon hagrid's face and he gasped, "he did not!"
harlow removed her hand from hermione's shoulder and sat next to ron, giving ron an encouraging smile.
"what's a mudblood?" quieres harry.
hermione turned around to face the four of them. "it means 'dirty blood.'" said hermione. mudblood's a really foul name for someone who is muggle-born. someone with non-magic parents. someone like me. It's not a term one usually hears in civilized conversation."
harlow could see the tears beginning to form in hermione's eyes. she couldn't help but feel guilty, these were the people in harlow's house, the people she was supposed to be friends with. the thought of hermione thinking that harlow thought of her as less than the rest of the pure-bloods or even half-bloods purely because of her blood-status made harlow nauseous.
"see, the thing is, harry, there're some wizards, like the malfoy family, who think they're better'n everyone else because they're what people call "pure-blood.'" explained hagrid.
harlow looked down, she couldn't help but wonder what her friends in slytherin thought about her. she came to the realization that she was the one of the only ones in slytherin that wasn't a pure-blood. pansy, daphne, even draco, crabbe, and goyle were all pure-bloods. what if that was the reason draco was such an asshole to her, because she wasn't like them.
"that's horrible!" exclaimed harry.
ron retched out another slug, "it's disgusting."
"and it's codswallop, to boot. "dirty blood." why, there isn't a wizard alive today that's not half blood or less." hagrid informed them. "more ter the point, they've yet to think of a spell that our hermione can' do. come here" hagrid held out his palm, hermione put her hand in his, hagrid enclosed hermione's hand with both of his. "don't you think on it, hermione. don't you think on it for one minute eh?"