"If you are quite done with doing yourself injury," said Firenze, trotted up into the clearing they trained in. "We're patrolling the western edge today."
Sighing, Heri took up her bow.
Granger had been on the verge of cracking since that lesson with Professor Trelawney when the old bird told her that she didn't have the talent for it. She had hidden it for the most part, but Heri didn't doubt that being told she wouldn't be good at something because of her natural disposition was more than the girl could take. With the way she seemed to be using her Time-Turner ineffectively — if her frazzled, twitchy attitude was anything to go by — it wasn't surprising that her blow-up was as spectacular as it was.
Granger's breakdown came in parts actually. Her temper got the best of her after Care when Malfoy was laughing at Neville for falling into the mud when one of Malfoy's goons pushed him. Ron and his friends had made furious moves to get to Malfoy, but Granger got there first.
SMACK!
Granger had whacked him across the face with all the strength she could muster, sending the wretched boy stumbling backward. Even then, she stalked after him.
"Don't you dare call Neville pathetic, you foul — you evil —" she snarled, drawing out her wand.
"Hermione!" said Ron weakly as he tried to grab her arm as she swung it back.
"Get off, Ron!"
Malfoy made his escape, doing nothing for Granger's mood.
Heri heard from Neville later that Granger had actually missed charms as well.
They had divination that day, starting in on crystal ball reading. Heri had bought a few books on the subject when she saw it mentioned in the textbook index, and she could honestly say that she had been looking forward to this form of divining most out of all the others. Crystal ball reading was so versatile! Not only was it used for to foretell future events, it could show past events, be used to seek advice, learn more about a person, and even scry. It was like the Swiss army knife of divinatory tools, multi-purposed and less labour-intensive than cartomancy.
Unfortunately, Granger seemed to share none of these opinions.
"Good day to you!" said the familiar, misty voice of Professor Trelawney as she made her usual dramatic entrance out of the shadows. "I have decided to introduce the crystal ball a little earlier than I had planned. The Fates have informed me that your examination in June will concern the Orb, and I am anxious to give you sufficient practice."
Granger snorted audibly from the next table over.
"Honestly . . . 'the fates have informed her' . . . who sets the exam? She does! What an amazing prediction!"
"Crystal gazing is a particularly refined art," Professor Trelawney continued dreamily as if she hadn't heard Granger. "I do not expect any of you to See when first you peer into the orb's infinite depths. We shall start by practising relaxing the conscious mind and external eyes so as to clear the Inner Eye and the superconscious. Perhaps, if we are lucky, some of you will See before the end of the class."
Granger then took to sniping over every little comment Professor Trelawney made as she coasted through the room. The professor was peering into Heri's — because Heri and commented that she was seeing a shape she couldn't identify — and had once again started her scheduled declaration of, "My dear . . . It is here, plainer than ever before . . . my dear, stalking toward you, growing ever closer . . . the Gr —"
"Oh, for goodness' sake!" Granger busted out loudly. "Not that ridiculous Grim again!"
Professor Trelawney took such a declaration as well as one might expect.
Granger then took the resulting belittling of her 'hopelessly mundane mind' just as unsurprisingly.
Though they should have seen it coming, it was still a shock to all present when Hermione Granger — she of the opinion that to get expelled was worse than death — metaphorically threw her hands in the air and then not so metaphorically rage-quit divination.
It was times like this that made Heri wonder if she should find someone to write a biography on her and then market it in the Muggle world as a multi-volumed fantasy series. Boost the family coffers and all that. She could become an internationally acclaimed author. Her nom de plume could be Helena Han Boskett.
It all got bollixed up when Heri had been searching for Marcus after the exams with the Marauder's Map and had then seen 'Sirius Black' out on the grounds with 'Ronald Weasley' and 'Peter Pettigrew' being dragging along toward the Whomping Willow. There were so many things wrong with that picture that Heri didn't waste any time high-tailing it out of the castle. It was only luck that had her running into Professor Lupin on the way down.
The luck involved bordered on the edge of 'bad luck' when it appeared that Black and Lupin were pals and that they were laying the blame of betraying her parents to Voldemort and the killing of thirteen Muggles on the tiny shoulders of Ron's pet rat, Scabbers.
"So . . ." Heri had exchanged looks with the also dubious Ron, he who was so bewildered that he had seemed to forget that his leg had been broken. "Scabbers was once a wizard that decided to turn himself into a rat because he made friends with a werewolf, and werewolves are cool with rats. Werewolves are also cool with giant dogs and deer.
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