An Opus Alchymicum Vol 2: The Witch-Consul's Riddle

A Birthday Secret

A row had broken out in the Gryffindor Boys Tower top dorm. That was to say it had re-erupted, having kicked off the night before, continued on into breakfast and showed no signs of a ceasefire anytime soon. Hermione sagely advised Harry to follow the roving battleground and try to play peacemaker, and Harry thought he ought to go along with her suggestion, for - as she rightly pointed out - his Aunt Minerva would be quite displeased if there was a death in the first-year dormitory and Harry hadn't at least tried to prevent it.

For Neville Longbottom and Ron Weasley had been at each others throats since they first tried to claim one of the four-poster beds in the circular tower dorm. Ron was still being grouchy with Harry for the rebuke in refusing to shake hands, and Neville was still very cross with Ron for terrorising him with the threat about troll wrestling. So Ron didn't want a bunk near Harry, and Neville didn't want a bunk near Ron, and Harry wasn't sure he wanted a bunk near either of them, for his own conflicted opinions about both.

In the end, though, Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnegan - the other first-year boys - got so thoroughly annoyed with the squabbling that they took the two central bunks and confined Ron to one end of the dorm and Harry and Neville to the other. Suitably chastised, all of them accepted and went to bed.

But Neville was still angry the next morning. He was dreadfully homesick already, having been shunted from one set of fears about the troll to another, when Professor Snape sneered at him during the Feast. Neville seemed to take this as the Potions Master deliberately picking on him already, and he was now terribly nervous about their first Potions class.

Hermione had tried her best to pacify him over breakfast, and even pompous Percy Weasley chimed in that Snape looked like that at every student from time to time, so Neville shouldn't take it personally. Then Ron muttered something incoherent under his breath, which Neville took as a dig at him, and the row from the previous night started all over again.

Harry took over Hermione's role as Keeper of the Peace when they parted in the Common Room, to get ready for their first class of the day. Ron and Neville continued their spat all the way up the stairs and into the dorm, and eventually Harry decided he had to step in before things got ugly.

"Look, Ron, why cant you just admit you were wrong, say sorry, then all this can be forgotten?" Harry implored. It was strange for a moment that he'd chosen to side with Neville, but he thought that's what Hermione would probably prefer him to do, which had ultimately made up his mind.

"Me! Say sorry!" Ron cried, rounding on Harry now. "Why should I?"

"What ... apart from it being the right thing to do?" Harry shot back incredulously. "Do you need another reason?"

Ron's cheeks were tinted pink a moment, but he was far from done. "Just because you've got a girlfriend in that know-it-all Granger girl, doesn't make you right, either."

Harry choked back a surge of something, though whether it was anger or weird embarrassment he wasn't sure. But he was stirred by Ron's attack on Hermione nonetheless.

"Firstly, she's not my girlfriend, just a friend," Harry began acridly. "Second, this has got nothing to do with her, or being a know-it-all, it just happens to be right for the sake of being right. And third, if you carry on insulting Hermione you and I are going to have a serious falling out, and that might involve you falling out of a very high window or down the longest staircase of the castle! Do you get that?"

"Harry, he's not worth it," Neville tried to pacify, switching roles with Harry and becoming peacemaker.

"Oh, ganging up on me now, are we?" Ron spat. "Great. Really nice, that."