Hermione Granger and the Order of the Phoenix

Chapter 24 - Grawp

It took less than a week for Fred and George to become legends with Hogwarts grounds. The story of the twins' escape was told so often that Hermione heard the words "Fred" and "George" spoken more than "lesson" or "homework". Lee was being hounded by people wanting to know if it was planned, but he didn't look too enthusiastic about it. The twins seemed to have taken his usual cheeriness away with them. Hermione was sad to see him like that - after the shock of Fred and George's stunt ebbed, she had a feeling that the students would need some way to cheer up

Not right now though. The twins had left a vacuum when they left so suddenly, and everyone seemed to be eager to fill it, all vying to become the next Weasley Twins. Dungbombs were being thrown left and right, someone managed to put a Niffler in Umbridge’s office, and it became evident just how many Skiving Snackboxes, with as many as half of Hermione's peers leaving every one of Umbridge’s lessons, suddenly coming down with violent, unexplainable illnesses. If Filch had been happy about being able to whip and students he caught misbehaving (caught being the critical word), it had been overshadowed by not only the students and the swamp now in one of the corridors, that the Twins had not told anyone how to remove, but also by Peeves, who had taken Fred’s orders to heart, causing additional if not more chaos than the students

And just like with the fireworks, the teachers weren't exactly in a hurry to help out. In fact, on the way to Charms with Ron and Harry, she spotted Peeves unscrewing a chandelier with Professor McGonagall watching passively. In fact if Hermione wasn't very much mistaken she heard her whisper "It unscrews the other way” when Peeves flew close enough to hear

While they were in Charms, Hermione spotted Montague's parents storming inside the castle from through the window. Montague still hadn't recovered from his trip in the Vanishing Cabinet - he was disorientated almost all the time, and muttered to himself the rest
“Should we say something?” she said “About what happened to him? In case it helps Madam Pomfrey cure him?”
“Course not, he’ll recover” said Ron
“Anyway, more trouble for Umbridge, isn’t it?” said Harry

Ron waved his wand at the teacup he was supposed to be charming. Four tiny legs spouted out of the bottom of it, and it scuttled off the edge of the table, shattering as it hit the ground
“Reparo” Hermione fixed the cup “That’s all very well, but what if Montague’s permanently injured?”
“Who cares?” said Ron waspishly “Montague shouldn’t have tried to take all those points from Gryffindor, should he? If you want to worry about anyone, Hermione, worry about me!”
“You? Why should I be worried about you?”
“When Mum’s next letter finally gets through Umbridge’s screening process” said Ron “I’m going to be in deep trouble. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s sent another Howler”
“But-”
“It’ll be my fault Fred and George left, you wait" said Ron “She’ll say I should’ve stopped them leaving, I should’ve grabbed the ends of their brooms and hung on or something… yeah, it’ll be all my fault”
“Well, if she does say that it’ll be very unfair, you couldn’t have done anything!" said Hermione "But I’m sure she won’t, I mean, if it’s really true they’ve got premises in Diagon Alley, they must have been planning this for ages”

“Yeah, but that’s another thing, how did they get premises?” said Ron, “It’s a bit dodgy isn’t it? They’ll need loads of Galleons to afford the rent on a place in Diagon Alley. She’ll want to know what they’ve been up to, to get their hands on that sort of gold”
Hermione frowned
“Well, yes, that occurred to me, too” she said “I’ve been wondering whether Mundungus has persuaded them to sell stolen goods or something awful”
“He hasn’t”
Hermione turned to look at Harry
“How do you know?” she and Ron said together
“Because-” Harry paused and sighed “Because they got the gold from me. I gave them my Triwizard winnings last June”