Written In The Stars IV -[Harry Potter xF!Oc]

Chapter Twenty-Seven: The Milestone.

"You said you'd already worked out that egg clue!" said Hermione indignantly.

"Keep your voice down! I just need to — sort of fine-tune it, all right?"

Mel snorted, sending a pillow directly to its target.

They were supposed to be practicing the opposite of the Summoning Charm today — the Banishing Charm. Owing to the potential for nasty accidents when objects kept flying across the room, Professor Flitwick had given each student a stack of cushions on which to practice, the theory being that these wouldn't hurt anyone if they went off target. It was a good theory, but it wasn't working very well. Neville's aim was so poor that he kept accidentally sending much heavier things flying across the room — Professor Flitwick, for instance.

"Just forget the egg for a minute, all right?" Harry hissed as Professor Flitwick went whizzing resignedly past them, landing on top of a large cabinet. "I'm trying to tell you about Snape and Moody..."

This class was an ideal cover for a private conversation, as everyone was having far too much fun to pay them any attention. Harry had been recounting his adventures of the previous night in whispered installments for the last half hour.

"Snape said Moody's searched his office as well?" Ron whispered, his eyes alight with interest as he Banished a cushion with a sweep of his wand (it soared into the air and knocked Parvati's hat off). "What... d'you reckon Moody's here to keep an eye on Snape as well as Karkaroff?"

"Well, I dunno if that's what Dumbledore asked him to do, but he's definitely doing it," said Harry, waving his wand without paying much attention, so that his cushion did an odd sort of belly flop off the desk. "Moody said Dumbledore only lets Snape stay here because he's giving him a second chance or something..."

"What?" said Ron, his eyes widening, his next cushion spinning high into the air, ricocheting off the chandelier, and dropping heavily onto Flitwick's desk. "Harry... maybe Moody thinks Snape put your name in the Goblet of Fire!"

"Oh Ron," said Hermione, shaking her head sceptically, "we thought Snape was trying to kill Harry before, and it turned out he was saving Harry's life, remember?"

"Whatever he did before, it must've been quite badly if it already made him lost his first chance, Dumbledore is usually quite forgiving..."

"I don't care what Moody says," Hermione continued. "Dumbledore's not stupid. He was right to trust Hagrid and Professor Lupin, even though loads of people wouldn't have given them jobs, so why shouldn't he be right about Snape, even if Snape is a bit —"

"— evil," said Ron. "Come on, Hermione, why are all these Dark wizard catchers searching his office, then?"

"Why has Mr Crouch been pretending to be ill? It's a bit funny, isn't it, that he can't manage to come to the Yule Ball, but he can get up here in the middle of the night when he wants to?"

"You just don't like Crouch because of that elf, Winky."

"You just want to think Snape's up to something."

"I just want to know what Snape did with his first chance, if he's on his second one, like Mel said," said Harry. He did a quick movement and his cushion flew across the room and landed swiftly.

"Look at that!" Mel smiled. "You're finally catching up, Glasses!"

After her talk with Flint, she felt she was lucky to have something as unimportant as a crush as her major issue. Actually, she just thought she was lucky, period. To have the opportunity to fall in love with someone who cared for her -though maybe not as much as she did- someone who was her best friend, wasn't something to be sad about.