Meles Malfoy

Had Harry really tried to burn Draco to death? He didn't even know how he had managed to produce those flames. In Charms class, it had been much harder. Now he was on his way to Professor McGonagall's classroom, praying that she didn't have a class on at that time. If he had just messed up his one and only chance to get away from the Dursleys then he didn't know how he would be able to live with himself.

Much sooner than he had really wanted, he arrived at the Transfiguration classroom. Taking a deep breath, he raised his hand and knocked on the door.

"Enter," came the reply, thankfully unaccompanied by any other voices; she was alone.

The classroom looked twice as big now that it was empty and McGonagall, looking up from the exercises she was correcting, waited for him to reach her desk before speaking. "Mr. Potter, what are you doing here?"

"I was sent here by Professor Sprout. I was late for class and there was this plant which I didn't know about and it shot some sticky stuff on my hair and I thought it was Malfoy. So I turned around and shot flames at him from my wand but it wasn't him, it was the plant and I set it on fire."

Professor McGonagall's lips suddenly went very thin. "And why did you attack Mr Malfoy? What had he to do with this?"

"Malfoy has been giving me evil looks all week. I thought that he was planning to do something."

"Was he involved in any way?"

Harry opened his mouth to answer that Malfoy had had it in for him ever since they met on the train but McGonagall's expression told him that this wouldn't be enough. "No," he replied.

"Then he's a red herring, so stop trying to blame him. You behavior was very reckless, not to mention extremely stupid. What condition is the plant in?"

"Most of the leaves are gone and it's soaking wet."

"This is very serious, Potter; I'm very surprised at you. I had heard such a good report of your flying lesson from Madam Hooch."

"Really?" asked Harry brightening.

"This is not the time to be celebrating. I am going to have to come up with a suitable punishment..."

Suddenly the Professor gave her wand a quick flick, sending a rather ugly, haggis shaped paperweight flying directly at Harry's head. Without even thinking, Harry reached out and caught it before it hit his face. With a second flick of her wand, Harry's hair felt warm and fuzzy for a few seconds. Running his hand through, he found that it was now completely dry and free from any trace of the sticky pulpsap.

"Come with me now," was all that McGonagall said.

Harry followed the professor along numerous corridors, up two flights of stairs and down another until they reached a classroom in a part of the castle that Harry didn't usually visit. McGonagall knocked on the door and entered the room, leaving Harry outside. "Professor Vector, may I borrow Wood for a few minutes?"

'Wood,' as it turned out, was the Gryffindor Quidditch Captain. Over the next few months, however, Harry would have occasion to rue the day they ever met.

Professor McGonagall and Wood began discussing Harry's physical stature and reflexes saying things like, "He has exactly the right build for a seeker," and "He'll need to have a Nimbus Two Thousand or at least a Rafale Mark Two." In Harry's opinion, they may as well have been speaking Greek.

After McGonagall and Wood had finished discussing Harry's future career as the, "Savior of the Gryffindor First VII," Wood left him alone with the professor

"Now Potter," she began, "I want to make something very clear right from the outset. Being given a place on the house team is both a great honour and a great responsibility. If I hear that you aren't giving your full attention to your training and your schoolwork, you'll be off the team and cleaning out U-bends for Mr. Filch for the rest of your time here at Hogwarts. I also want to see a real improvement to your general behavior; you just can't go around flying off the handle all the time, eventually you'll end up in a fight with a much more powerful wizard. I don't expect that sort of behavior in anyone in this school especially not my Gryffindors."

Harry nodded dumbly at this and said, "Thank you Professor, I'll try not to let you down."

"You had better do a lot more than try, Mr. Potter. Now run along for dinner."

Harry's route back took him past the Transfiguration department, where he found Ron waiting for him. Harry told him the news as they walked towards the Great Hall for dinner. Harry was congratulated by Ron's twin brothers who promised to, "keep shtoom about it."

Hermione, sitting nearby, kept trying to tell them off, but couldn't get past the first syllable before Harry or Ron would begin speaking over each other. Just then, Draco Malfoy and two others entered the hall and walked straight up to where they were sitting.

"You're looking pretty cheerful for one who is about to be expelled. What's happened? Are you getting the whole train to yourself or something?"

"Shows what you know Malfoy. Harry's just been... ow!" replied Ron as Harry cut his friend off with a kick under the table.

"Just been what?" demanded Draco.

"None of your business Malfoy," replied Harry.

"You owe me for what happened today."

"What?"

"You ruined my robes and you are going to have to pay for it."

"Pay for it? I barely singed them," retorted Harry.

"Well, I demand a Wizard's duel. Midnight in the Trophy Room." Draco paused to take in the pair's shocked reaction to his challenge. "That is unless you don't even know what that is..."

"Of course he knows about dueling," interrupted Ron. "I'm his second, who's yours?"

Draco's face paled, he clearly had not banked on things going this far and looked to the boy on his left (who scowled back) and then to his right (who looked much more enthusiastic).

"Finch-Fletchley," he replied at last. "You'd better not chicken out tonight."

"You wish, Malfoy!"

Malfoy put on what he thought was a confident expression. Harry was far from scared at this; he had seen the flames he'd produced earlier so he knew that he could at the very least try that trick again.

While Ron was busy muttering indignant things about what he should do if Malfoy hit him with an Impediment Jinx, Hermione slid along the bench to sit opposite Harry.

"I couldn't help overhearing..." she began.

"Bet you could!" replied Ron, annoyed at having to sit next to this uninvited guest.

"I can't believe how stupid and selfish you two are being. Think of the points that Gryffindor is going to lose when you are caught."

"Do you hear someone talking, Harry?"

"I think someone must have been breathing in the fumes in Potions class, because I didn't hear anything," replied Harry.

Hermione got up noisily and left them alone. Ron rolled his eyes and shook his head as he watched her walk huffily towards the other end of the table.

After dinner, they returned to Gryffindor Tower with Neville Longbottom just ahead of them on the stairs. The stairs in Hogwarts were notorious for their bizarre rules about trick steps. Harry knew out that the flight they were currently on had a slippery thirty-second step every odd numbered day of the month between four and eight P.M. Unfortunately, Neville, who had forgotten this, slipped, and tumbled head over heels backwards past Harry and Ron.

When Neville finally came to a rest at the foot of the stairs, Harry winced as he saw that he had been knocked out cold. One of Neville's arms was twisted around the wrong way and looked broken.

"Out of the way! Prefect coming through," called Percy, Ron's older brother. "It looks like he's twisted one of his arms around the wrong way and knocked himself out. He'll need to go to the hospital wing. Did anyone else see what happened?"

After Ron and Harry told him how Neville had slipped on one of the trick steps, Percy proudly conjured a stretcher for Neville and headed towards the hospital wing. "Do you reckon he'll be alright?" Harry asked Ron.

"What? Neville? Madame Pomfrey will be able to fix him up in about a minute but he might need a bit longer if he's been badly knocked out. Fred and George have never needed to spend more than a few hours at a time in that place and they've broken just about every bone in their bodies since they became Beaters for the house team."

Being reminded about how dangerous Quidditch could be made Harry quite uneasy. Putting all thoughts about Neville out of his mind, he spent the rest of the evening plotting strategies and tactics to use against Malfoy and receiving evil glares from Hermione, who was watching them from across the Common Room.

Later on, Harry and Ron waited until Seamus and Dean had gone to sleep, Neville had taken much longer to get back than Ron had predicted earlier. Then they waited for any sounds from older pupils to cease. Then they waited a bit longer just to make sure before they got up as quietly as they could, grabbed their wands and crept downstairs.

Halfway across the Common Room, Hermione got up from a high-backed armchair and began hissing at them about how irresponsible and stupid they were being and how they were going to lose so many points. Ron and Harry pointedly ignored her so she followed them through the portrait hole.

"Well, don't come crying to me when you are both expelled!" she said finally, turning to go back inside.

"Don't worry, we won't," replied Ron as he and Harry continued along the corridor.

Just then, Hermione came running back to them. "The Fat Lady has gone and I can't get back inside."

"Wait here until she comes back then," replied Harry.

"No, I'm coming too to make sure you don't do anything foolish."

Reluctantly agreeing, if only because they were beginning to run a little late, Harry, Ron and Hermione now continued along until they heard a noise.

They stood stock still for what felt like hours until they realised that it was just Neville who had returned from the hospital wing but hadn't been able to get back in either. Once roused, he begged to be allowed to come too. The three agreed that he could, so long as he kept lookout from behind. They really didn't have any time left to argue.

After several wrong turns and more than a few hissed arguments, the four Gryffindors arrived at the entrance to the Trophy Room.

"I bet they didn't have the nuts to show up!" said Ron.

"What?" replied Hermione.

"I said, 'I bet they didn't have the guts to show up!'" he replied.

"Quiet, you two, or we'll have the whole school awake!" whispered Harry.

As the group entered the room, Harry noticed that there were three Hufflepuffs instead of just Justin and Draco. Malfoy had obviously brought reinforcements.

"Well now, Potter, decided you needed backup, did you?"

"I could say the same myself, Malfoy," replied Harry, glaring at one of the Hufflepuffs who had tried to hide himself in the shadows.

"Let's just get this over with," said said the boy.

"And who died and put you in charge?" retorted Ron.

"Surely as Seconds, we should be trying to resolve this without resorting to violence?" said the other Hufflepuff to Ron.

"There's not much chance of that is there? Malfoy wants a fight and Harry's going to give him one. What is there to discuss?" replied Ron.

"Can't you boys all just wise up? If we get caught, we'll all be in trouble," said Hermione.

Just as an argument was fomenting they were all cut off by Longbottom who cried, "Look, it's Mrs. Norris!"

They all turned and for a few seconds, stared in shock at the lantern-eyed cat. The animal was rarely seen without her master following closely and they all knew what would happen should Filch catch them out of bed. Harry was the first to recover, "Run!" he shouted.

All seven fled away from the cat until they reached a staircase with Harry taking the lead. "Split up! We'll go upstairs, you go down," he shouted. Without breaking step, the Gryffindors fled upstairs towards the third floor leaving the Hufflepuffs to make their way back alone.

The four fled in terror until they found a locked door, got it open and waited while Filch, who really had been chasing them, argued with Peeves outside. Eventually, it went quiet outside the door and the group were able to relax slightly.

That was, until they realised where exactly on the third floor they were. Turning around, they three Gryffindors saw that they were sharing the room with the owner of six huge eyes and three sets of very sharp teeth...