Changed (Drarry)

Chapter 10

Harry liked the new DADA teacher, Professor Lupin, and his pet dog. The dog seemed to really like him, often coming over to him and letting him pet the dog, but he could never get very close if Ron was there, and he would always be there soon if he wasn't from the start.

Ron hated Professor Lupin, and the pet dog too. The dog seemed to dislike Ron too, but he never growled or bit Ron, so Harry wasn't sure what it was trying to convey. In fact, Ron was more violent than the dog, as Harry had seen Ron actually hex and hit the dog, even drawing blood at least once.

Professors McGonagall hadn't really done much either, other than keeping close eyes on Harry and Hermione. Natasha McGonagall had been absent for the first few days, and after that nobody had heard even a whisper about the Dementors that had attacked the train. All the teachers had seemed very angry about the whole situation.

Harry wasn't sure what they were supposed to be looking out for when it came to the teachers anyway. Sure, they had framed Dumbledore, but they hadn't harmed any of the students, and he didn't see a Dark Mark on their arms, and Minerva McGonagall wasn't wearing outfits very different to what she was last year, and Harry couldn't say much about Natasha McGonagall, but her arms were often on show.

The only real change in the action of the school was that the other houses seemed to be closer to Slytherin. Harry wasn't immediately sure why that was a bad thing, though, but Ron pointed out that it made it more likely for the Slytherins to turn the other houses to Voldemort. Ron yelled over Hermione as she tried to suggest that the people from other houses could help convince the Slytherins to not join You-Know-Who that the Slytherins had all already agreed to join You-Know-Who a long time ago, and that the other houses, especially Hufflepuff, were filled with people too weak minded for that.

Harry had remembered Ron being more kind and open minded in previous years, but now he seemed much crueller than before. Harry guessed he had never liked Malfoy, but that felt different somehow, and he hadn't been so rude about Hufflepuff. Maybe he didn't like the other houses during the Quidditch games, but that was just Ron's competitive nature, right?

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"Psst, Harry." Fred said, sticking his head round a corner, clearly in a secret passageway hiding as a wall. Ron was just around the corner talking to Ginny about something and refusing to let go of Hermione's hand, which she seemed less than happy about.

"What?" Harry asked confused.

"Come in here." Fred said again, gesturing with his head to the hidden passage.

"What's going on?" Harry asked again, his eyebrows furrowed as he slowly walked towards Fred's head.

"Merlin's beard, Harry, hurry up! I swear on George's right ear this isn't a prank!"  Fred said, looking past Harry and sounding frustrated.

"George?" Ron asked, coming around the corner, getting the wrong twin. Harry wasn't sure how he knew which twin was which, but he did. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing, Ronnikins, Harry, please talk to us later." Fred said with a grimace, his head disappearing again.

At least, looking back that's what Harry thought he said, for some reason his memory had a lot of fuzzy points recently. For example, he knew that Malfoy always called him Potter, but whenever he tried to remember what exact wording Malfoy had used he couldn't recall properly, all he could remember was that it wasn't as cruel as previous years.

Hermione also started acting odd, eventually she found her timetable, but Harry's still hadn't gotten his, meaning he just had to follow Ron around with his lessons, about half of the lessons missing his name from the register in the first few weeks, Hermione's timetable was with the head of Ravenclaw for some reason. She would occasionally disappear, and after the first time that she did she also started acting odd, trying to stay away from Ron and get Harry away from him too.

Harry didn't know what Hermione's new problem with Ron and Ginny was, he knew they were being more annoying than normal this year, and Ron was only a little bit better than Ginny was at the weekends, but she had been dealing with it for a month already before her attitude changed.

She also started spending more time with a couple Ravenclaws, specifically Luna, who she seemed to have made up with after the train, Khadija, and an older, very beautiful chaser on the Ravenclaw Quidditch team called Cho Li.

"I don't know what she thinks she's trying to prove." Ron said angrily as they were supposed to be doing their homework in the library, but Ron had spent the entire time glaring out the window at Hermione who seemed to be enjoying herself by the Black Lake as Harry had to try to work through a growing headache, his head feeling like cotton wool.

"I don't think she's trying to prove anything, she's just made some new friends, I don't see the problem." Harry said more quietly than was needed to stop them from being glared at, or at least stop him being glared at, Ron didn't seem to care about that.

"Just new friends? Really?" Ron asked, turning on Harry, making Harry try not to show that he was tense and had flinched as he tried to continue doing his homework. The weather was getting colder, but Harry was still feeling a little on the warm side. "If it was just new friends why would they all be Ravenclaw? She's trying to prove that she's better than us because she's smart."

This made Harry pause, he had been struggling more than he had previously in his subjects, like his brain couldn't think properly. He hated the idea of Hermione turning her back on him after finding out he wasn't as smart as her, in fact he hated the idea of her abandoning him at all. He thought he would have preferred to not lose Ron, but he found the time he spent with only Ron much worse than what he thought it would be like with Hermione. 

The wall preventing any words that had formed getting out was building itself again. He knew Ron wouldn't handle it well, but he had to get out.

Thankfully Ron went back to the window to glare at Hermione and her new friends, ranting about it again, so Harry could easily slip out. He ran through the halls, somehow managing to not run into anyone, looking for an empty room, any empty room that people wouldn't enter.