Suffocating In Darkness

Chapter 7

We all met in the common room before breakfast next morning, minus Lyra of course. Hoping for some support in our theory, Harry and I lost no time in telling Hermione what we had overheard Malfoy saying on the Hogwarts Express.

"But he was obviously showing off for Parkinson, wasn't he?" interjected Ron quickly, before Hermione could say anything.

"Well," she said uncertainly, "I don't know. It would be like Malfoy to make himself seem more important than he is ... but that's a big lie to tell... "

"Exactly," I said, but I could not press the point, because so many people were trying to listen in to his conversation, not to mention staring at us and whispering behind their hands.

"It's rude to point," Oliver snapped at a particularly minuscule first-year boy as we joined the queue to climb out of the portrait hole. The boy, who had been muttering something about us behind his hand to his friend, promptly turned scarlet and toppled out of the hole in alarm. Oliver sniggered. "I love being a sixth year. And we're going to be getting free time this year. Whole periods when we can just sit up here and relax."

"We're going to need that time for studying, Oliver!" said Hermione, as we set off down the corridor.

"Yeah, but not today," said Oliver. "Today's going to be a real loss, I reckon."

"Hold it!" said Hermione, throwing out an arm and halting a passing fourth year, who was attempting to push past her with a lime-green disk clutched tightly in his hand. "Fanged Frisbees banned, hand it over," she told him sternly. The scowling boy handed over the snarling Frisbee, ducked under her arm, and took off after his friends. Ron waited for him to vanish, then tugged the Frisbee from Hermione's grip.

"Excellent, I've always wanted one of these."

Hermione's remonstration was drowned by a loud giggle; Lavender had apparently found Ron's remark highly amusing. She continued to laugh as she passed them, glancing back at Ron over her shoulder. Ron looked rather pleased with himself.

The ceiling of the Great Hall was serenely blue and streaked with frail, wispy clouds, just like the squares of sky visible through the high mullioned windows. While they tucked into porridge and eggs and bacon, we told Hermione about their embarassing conversation with Hagrid the previous evening as Lyra joined us, I think she wanted to be away from her house like last year.

"But he can't really think we'd continue Care of Magical Creatures!" she said, looking distressed. "I mean, when has any of us expressed... you know... any enthusiasm?"

"That's it, though, innit?" said Ron, swallowing an entire fried egg whole. "We were the ones who made the most effort in classes because we like Hagrid. But he thinks we liked the stupid subject. D'ya reckon anyone's going to go on to N.E.W.T.?"

Nobody answered; there was no need. We knew perfectly well that nobody in our year would want to continue Care of Magical Creatures. We avoided Hagrid's eye and returned his cheery wave only half-heartedly when he left the staff table ten minutes later.

After we had eaten, we remained in our places, awaiting Professor McGonagall's descent from the staff table. The distribution of class schedules was more complicated than usual this year, for Professor McGonagall needed first to confirm that everybody had achieved the necessary O.W.L. grades to continue with their chosen N.E.W.T.s.

Hermione was immediately cleared to continue with Charms, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Transfiguration, Herbology, Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and Potions, and shot off to a first period Ancient Runes class without further ado. Neville took a little longer to sort out; his round face was anxious as Professor McGonagall looked down his application and then consulted his O.W.L. results.