Harry Potter and the Order Of the Phoenix [28]
“Shut it Malfoy!” yelled Ron who stood up and pointed his wand at Malfoy. He hated being insulted because of his family being poor. Hermione, who was used to such taunts of her being Muggle-born just sat there watching.
“Oh! Standing up for yourself are you now?” smirked Malfoy looking at Ron’s wand. “Just know this Weasley, I know more curses than you have brain cells.” With that, he brandished his wand, ready to fire at Ron, when suddenly, a teacher walked by their compartment. Harry recognized him as the tiny wizard, Professor Flitwick, their Charms teacher and head of the Ravenclaw House.
“Hello boys, oh! And girl,” he smiled spotting Hermione. “Not practicing Defense Against The Dark Arts against each other now, are you?” He smiled, not realizing that they were.
“Oh, no. Not at all professor,” smarmed Malfoy. He hid his wand behind his back.
“Professor,” asked Harry, “why are you on the train? Professors never used to normally ride on it.” Professor Flitwick’s smile faded.
“Oh well, we need to take some… err… extra precautions due to… well… you know…” He walked away and started mumbling incoherently. Harry knew what he was referring to, the fact the Voldemort was back meant more security everywhere. Even if the Ministry of Magic wasn’t doing anything about it, Dumbledore certainly was going to.
“We’ll finish this later Weasley,” said Malfoy. He spun around, and left. Obviously, he didn’t want to fight in front of teachers, lest he get in trouble. The door to their compartment closed by itself.
“What happened Harry?” asked Ron immediately. “I mean, with Sirius and all. The paper says that you were with him.” Hermione nodded, she must’ve wanted to ask the same question. Harry sighed.
“I don’t know Ron,” answered Harry. “One minute, Sirius was there with me as a dog, then the next second people were screaming all around us saying they saw Sirius Black and then some Aurors came down and took him away.”
“How did they know that dog was Sirius?” asked Ron. “Did they know the type of animal he could turn into?”
“I don’t think so,” said Harry. “The Auror who spoke to me said he saw Sirius Black in the flesh. That means they must’ve somehow seen through his transformation.”
“Is that possible?” asked Ron. Both he and Harry looked at Hermione, the smartest of them all. She, however, had her face buried in a book.
“Is it Hermione?” asked Harry, looking curiously at her.
“What?” she looked up from her book and shook her head. “Sorry Harry, what did you say? What was it?”
“Is it possible to ‘see through’ an animal transformation?” repeated Ron.
“No, of course not! That would defeat the purpose of transforming in the first place!” she said as she buried her nose back in the book. Harry’s curiosity came over him:
“Hermione,” he asked, “what are you reading?”
“Oh, just looking over the standard spells for this year. Getting ready for our O.W.L.s you know,” she smiled and started reading again.
“WHAT!?” yelled Ron, dumbfounded. “Hermione! We don’t take our O.W.L.s until the end of summer! We’ve still got almost ten months!”
“Yes, well, never too soon to start studying,” she said, “and the O.W.L.s make up most of our grades, and they determine Head Boys and Girls.”
“Speaking of prefects, Hermione,” said Ron slyly, “what’s that in your pocket?”
Harry noticed it to, there was something shiny and circular popping a little out of her pocket.
“Huh? Oh! That! I totally forgot about that with all that’s been going on with Sirius lately,” she took the circle out of her pocket and pinned it onto her chest. It was a badge that read: ‘Hermione Granger: Gryffindor Prefect’.
“Hermione? You’re a prefect?” stuttered Harry. Though, now that he was thinking about it, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to him. Hermione had always gotten the best grades