Chapter 25. Halloween

Classes continued, and every day of mine was full. Either from studying together with Professor Quirrell, or helping to teach Pansy anything I knew. It didn’t matter what topic, from spells to history. Before I knew it, two months had almost passed, and today was Halloween. “After everything we’re learning, classes almost seem obsolete.” Pansy murmured while dancing her feather in the air. Draco smirked while his stumbled a bit, but altogether remained airborne.

Over the weeks, Draco had discovered Pansy and I studying together, and asked to join in together with us. Pansy was a little unhappy about her own bought time being used by someone else, but let him join, under the condition it was just him. No Crabb or Goyle. ‘Both of those blundering fools would just slow us down.’ According to her, not that either Draco or I refuted. They both lacked the desire to learn, but still wanted to stand above others. At least Pansy and Draco both wanted to put in the effort to actually be better than others to back up their claims of being better than lower classes.

“It only proves that we are in a league of our own.” Draco said with a snide grin, however all of us faltered at the sight of another feather levitating across the classroom. One directed by the girl with the untamable hair. “Very well done Ms. Granger!” Professor Flitwick announced with a smile, before looking at the other students, not able to fully grasp the spell. Hermione smirked at us three, proud that she was just as good as us, despite being a ‘mudblood’.

Draco fumed while trying to forcefully control his feather higher. “Don’t put in more energy, ease up or your wand will damage.” I whispered to him. Draco grinded his teeth, but did as I instructed, however he only lowered his power by a small margin. I internally sighed at him, but understood his aggravated temper.

After class was over, Hermione stayed behind to collect the feathers for Professor Flitwick, and quickly hurried over to Ron and Harry after she was done. “It’s LeviOsa! Not, LeveosAW! She’s a nightmare! No wonder she doesn’t have any friends.” Ron exclaimed, Harry and the other boys laughing at her expense. Hermione felt tears instantly well up in her eyes, her smile that she had from seeing Draco’s anger vanished. Leaving only a deep frown in its place. She couldn’t be seen like this, so she rushed past her so-called ‘friends’, and somewhere nobody would see her.

Since it was the end of classes, she wasn’t going to be late for anything important. She ran past all the students in her path, bumping into many of them because she kept her gaze lowered to the ground so none could see the tears that had already begun to drop. However, one person she bumped into, crashed onto the ground in front of her. “I-I’m so sorry!” Hermione quickly lowered her hand to pull the silver haired girl back up, only pausing to sniff, and try to make her quivering voice more normal.

To her surprise, she realized the girl she bumped into was a Hufflepuff. One that she had gotten to know a little over breakfast, and astrology. “Hermione…?” Chiara asked in confusion and worry over seeing Hermione’s face. “What happened?” Hermione quickly re-lived those hurtful words Ron said, and sputtered an excuse to leave. “I- I'm sorry, I have to go.” She darted towards a girls bathroom nearby and found an empty stall to quietly bawl.

There wasn’t much time before dinner would be served, and for this special occasion Draco listed off all the sweets that would be served. “Apple Pie, Pumpkin Pie, Cakes, I even heard they would have bowls of Bertie Botts!” Pansy recoiled at that last option. “Those always sicken me. Who wants to eat troll ear wax?” I shuddered at that idea, knowing deeply what goes on in their ears, increasing the bean's repulsiveness. “I agree, the other confections sound good, but I’ll refrain from Bertie Botts.”

Draco sighed at us. “It’s not fun unless you take them together. If others don’t join in, then I’m just eating gross food.” Pansy and I chuckled in agreement. Considering our different beliefs, to my shock, I had found people I could somewhat call ‘friends’ in Slytherin. If the conversation wasn’t about bloodlines and the like they were actually good company. I still didn’t tell Draco about Val though, feeling it would be best to not spread it around that I had a pet, lest Val would be sent back to the pet shop.

Speaking of which. “OOOhhh!! I wanna try all of that! What do all these strange flavors taste like!?” Val hissed in my collar, learning to be more discrete with his hissing to avoid attention. I sighed while covering my mouth to hide myself whispering back. “I’ll let you eat some of my food, but those Botts are forbidden. They will just make you sick.” “Aww…” Val whimpered, and I felt guilty hearing his disheartened voice. ‘He’ll be fine, he’ll have some real food, and forget about the Botts.’ I thought to myself as we left the common area towards the Great Hall.

Floating Jack-o-Lanterns hovered above the tables, giving plentiful amounts of light through their crooked smiles. The storm outside howled, and shook the windows as the lightning struck in the distance. However, that wasn’t what anybody cared about. What everyone’s eyes were adhered to was the decorative and luxurious amounts of food plated all along the tables. My stomach grumbled in anticipation as I took my seat, not bothering to listen to Dumbledore’s speech as I studied each confection to see which I would eat first.

“Mmm! This is yummy! I like Jelly filled the best!” Val cheered while easily swallowing the small pieces of jelly filled confections he adored. In fact Pansy also sneakily gave him a piece herself, holding back a chuckle from him licking her finger in thanks. Over the time Pansy had known, she had ‘Spoken’ to Val and had gotten a lot more comfortable in being with him. Even seeing him as an almost pet of her own now.

“I’m going to leave early.” I announced while getting up with my plate, a few last confections still neatly stacked on top. “Alright.” “I’ll see you later.” Both Pansy and Draco said goodbye, not thinking it was strange, as I almost always left early. Pansy knew what I was going to feed Abarrane, but Draco, even without knowing, understood this was a quirk of mine, and had gotten used to it.

“I think she’ll like the jelly filled most!” Val said while his tail thumped around underneath my robes. I smirked at him, as I kept walking to the courtyard, readying my wand to protect me from the falling droplets when I went outside. However, on my way there, I heard girls screaming coming from a nearby bathroom. As soon as it happened, I felt the ground shake beneath me while another, much deeper and louder war cry erupted from the same room. “Is that-!?” I yelled while rushing over to see if my ears were correct.

As the banquet went on, Hermione, after all the other girls left for the massive feast, let herself cry. No longer needing to hide her sobs from other girls that might judge her, in her moment of weakness. However, she paused when another set of footsteps quietly walked inside. They stopped in front of her stall door before the person talked. “Hermione…?” It was Chiara. Hermione sniffled before speaking in a poor attempt to sound ok. “Shouldn’t you be eating together with your friends?”

Silence hung in the air before Chiara finally spoke again, the awkwardness in her voice clearly evident. “I… Don’t have any other friends…” Chiara was embarrassed to not have many friends, but Hermione only cared about one portion of that sentence. “Am… Am I your friend?” She asked, staring at the small shoes under the stall door. “I thought so…” Chiara mumbled, too embarrassed to really speak her mind, but to Hermione it was exactly what she needed to hear. She slowly leaned forward, opening the stall door to see the silver haired girl, nervously tapping her fingers together.

Chiara slowly opened her arms out, and placed them around Hermione, hugging her to help whatever caused her to cry. “Thank you…” Hermione mumbled while reciprocating the hug, until a shadow caught her attention. She looked up, her tears still obscuring her vision, but what she saw made her stomach sink in fear. “Ahhh!!” She screamed as a troll, easily 10 feet tall, held up a massive club, swinging it down towards her and Chiara.