Magic and Mischief | Fred x Hermione

Chapter 3: The First Dream

So much for coasting, Fred thought glumly as he trudged out of his first class of the day. It had been history of magic, and he was already laden with several short essay assignments due the following week.

"I mean honestly, who cares about that bloke who tried to teach trolls ballerina," Lee Jordan complained.

"Tell me about it," said Fred. "I'm heading over to Ancient Runes now, I'll see you for lunch," he nodded to Lee, and with that, he headed off in the direction of the sixth floor. He took long strides up the moving staircases, trying his best to reach his destination before they decided to change and left him stranded on landings. 

By the time he had arrived, he was red-faced and huffing from the exertion. He had to stop for a few seconds by the landing to catch his breath.

"Looking a little winded there Weasley," Angelina Johnson said to him with a wink, coming from the direction of the divination classroom.

She flipped her brown hair over her shoulder as she passed him and gave him a wide smile.He grinned back.

Weird though, thought Fred. She seems to be flipping her hair quite a bit of late. Oh well, must be a twitcher, he surmised. Angelina was a chaser on the Gryffindor quidditch team. Great at the sport, but clearly a little odd.

With that thought, Fred pushed off the banister and entered Ancient Runes.

Not even five minutes into the course introduction Fred felt his jaw going slack with horror. The small sample of rune work that had been handed out to the class looked (and was) like an alien language. 

Professor Bathsheda Babbling did her best to explain the "simple" characters, but Fred felt himself drifting off almost immediately. Bronze age wizards had clearly hated the future generations, and wanted students of runes like him to fail. Odds were clearly stacked, nothing to be done.

In an effort to keep himself awake in the very first lesson of the year, Fred began ripping off small pieces of paper, enchanting them to fly at the head of Roger Davies, the Ravenclaw quidditch team captain who was sitting in front of him. 

When the second piece flicked him in the neck, Davies swung around angrily. Fred donned his most innocent expression, feigning interest in the words of the babbling Professor Babbling. That was perhaps too far-fetched for a Weasley twin, so Davies looked at him more closely with narrowed eyes.

Fred met his gaze and conjured his most confused, unjustly accused pose.

Davies shrugged and turned back around. He raised his wand slightly again, planning to carry on for the rest of the boring lesson in the same fashion, but the professor announced a small quiz that would take place at the end of the week.

Fred grimaced, already anticipating his failing mark.

The rest of the day went by mostly without incident. That was, until he was walking back to classes after his lunch break. He had just left the great hall when to his left he caught a glimpse of a group of first years huddled around something. 

Curiosity piqued, he got closer to observe the scene. A smattering of Ravenclaw and Slytherin students surrounded a figure curled up on the ground. 

One boy in particular was lording over the huddled mass, holding what looked like a strip of fabric in his hand. He was round, his broad, flat face gleaming with delight at the obvious distress of the person on the ground. 

Fred pushed his way through the group to the figure, and asked a nearby Slytherin first year what had happened.

"I think his name is Maxwell, he was bothering that guy over there about sitting with him, so he had to teach him a lesson about who's allowed to sit with who.