The Rebels

Chapter three: The day after

As Ginny made her way down to the Great Hall the next morning, her thoughts were in turmoil. She didn´t really understand what had got over her the day before. She had seen Harry sad and angry and suddenly nothing else mattered; she simply had to make him feel better. Not that she thought she had made a good job of that either; he seemed even more depressed once they arrived at Gryffindor Tower, but at least, she thought, she had made him talk. She guessed it was a good start.

But as she stood in front of the doors to the Great Hall, she realized she had absolutely no idea of what to say to him. She had no idea how she would face him at breakfast. Taking a deep breath, she opened the doors and entered the rustle and bustle of the Hogwarts´ Great Hall at half past eight in the morning. Her eyes were immediately drawn towards Harry, who was talking to McGonagall and had a pack of timetables in his hand. Was it her impression or had he looked at her for a brief instant second as she opened the door?

She continued otherwise unnoticed until she found an empty seat in Gryffindor, next to Ron.

"Morning Gin," he mumbled sleepily. Ron had never been much of a morning person.

"Morning Ron," she answered half-heartedly. Their morning conversation never went much beyond the usual "good morning", not that the rest of their conversation was different if she really thought about it. Suddenly she ached for that time when life was so much simpler, when she and Ron would sit on the porch and talk for hours and hours. It had obviously changed when Ron had come to Hogwarts; he had promised to write, which he never did. But she had expected that, Ron had never been a good corespondent. What had hurt her to no ends was that once he came back for the holidays, he had scorned her, immediately classifying her as the annoying little sister. Obviously, he didn´t realise that; Ron was never good at reading other people´s feelings. But she could not allow herself to wallow in self-pity; she had just noticed that Harry and Hermione were walking towards their end of the table, after having distributed all the timetables. It would not do look miserable in front of them, questions would be asked which she wasn´t willing to answer.

Harry put the four last pieces of parchment down on the table and sat down heavily on his chair with an audible sigh of relief.

"Thank God, I´m done. I´m starving! I swear I couldn´t hear McGonagall talk for another minute without eating something," he said while spooning eggs into his plate and taking some toast.

"Good morning to you, too, Harry," Ginny said good-humouredly.

"Good morning Ginny," he answered, grinning sheepishly, "so sorry but I´m absolutely starving,"

"I noticed that from the absurd amount of food you put on your plate and from the amazing speed in which it is disappearing."

"Harry," said Ron suddenly, "why is your timetable fuller than mine?"

"Oh, I wanted to drop Divination this year and take something a bit more useful, but McGonagall said I couldn´t, not until I passed the O.W.L. but she convinced me to start the new class this year, to catch up with other students."

"Really?" Ron seemed a little shocked, and, Ginny noticed with surprise, not a little angry. What was wrong with her brother? He was hiding it well, too. Neither Harry nor Hermione, now discussing excitedly a schedule for Hermione to help him catch up the two years he had lost, had noticed his anger. Deciding to stop thinking about it for the time being, she said, "I take Ancient Runes, if you want I can help you, Harry."

"That would be nice," he answered.

The rest of breakfast went on normally.

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Their first class of the day was History of Magic. Really an extension of his bed if Professor Binns didn´t suddenly decide to change the topic of his class. Harry had learned as much as he ever wanted to know on Goblin Rebellions during his first year, when he actually had paid attention to the Professor´s rambling.

He was seated behind his desk, his head resting comfortably in his arms, prepared to let the Professor´s monotonous voice lull him into sleep. Hermione was seated beside him, pen ready to take notes. He really didn´t know why she bothered, it was all in the textbook anyway. He noticed the ghost had started to talk.

"This year," he rasped, "we will be studying the origins of magic." Harry´s head left the comfort of his arms and he looked at his professor in shock. No more Goblins?

"The first trimester," continued the professor, "will be used to study the first magical beings that walked in this earth. Then we will continue to the formation of what we know today as the Wizarding World. The third trimester will be used to describe the major differences between the Magical and the Muggle world. The last trimester will be used for O.W.L.´s revision, that I´m sure most of you are in dire need of." Harry was surprised to see a hint of sarcasm in the Professor´s voice. He never could have believed that the boring Professor Binns was capable of sarcasm.

The origin of magic, he thought. That was an interesting topic. Maybe it was time to learn good habits and pay attention to the class.

Binns had continued his lecture. "During antiquity, before the gods and goddesses were banned to the Otherworld, they walked freely in this earth. It was a common occurrence for those gods to fall in love or be attracted to mortals. The consequence of this behaviour was the birth of what we call half-gods. Incredibly powerful beings that were neither mortal nor immortal." The professor's voice was as boring as ever; he could see most of the class falling asleep, however the tale had transfixed him, and he listened with rapt attention to the Professor's every word.

"When the gods were banned, that is when their names were forgotten and their worship no longer existed in this world. these beings were allowed to stay. Those are considered the first Magical persons to live on this earth." Hermione raised her hand. "Yes, Miss Granger"

"What about magical animals? Where do they come from?"

"The same story applies to magical animals. Some animals that usually only lived in the Otherworld somehow managed to cross the barrier between the two dimensions. Once the barrier was closed, they weren´t able to go back and settled in this world."

"Thank you professor," she said.

"Now back to the half-gods. What you must understand is that they didn´t have a little amount of magic in their blood as wizards do, they were entirely made of magic. It was a part of themselves. Unfortunately, little by little, the magical blood was mixed with human and the quantity of magic present in the blood of the heirs of those half-gods diminished considerably. After thousands of years we arrived at what we call nowadays wizards. We aren´t able to control our magic without the help of a," the bell rang, "wand. I want a one foot essay on the characteristics of the half-gods for next week, don´t forget." The whole class groaned.

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"Come on Harry," Hermione urged him, "we will be late for Transfiguration, and we can´t afford to lose this class, McGonagall is going to explain all about the O.W.L.s."

Harry seemed to wake up from the daze he had been on since the end of Binns´ class.

"Yes, of course, let´s get going," he answered.

They quickened their pace and arrived in the Transfiguration classroom just as McGonagall entered the classroom. They took the only empty seats left, in the front row. McGonagall, after welcoming them to another year of Transfiguration said, "As your Head of House, I am expected to explain what your O.W.L.s will be like. As some of you might already know, the O.W.L.s consist of two exams, one written and another one practical in each of the subjects. This means you can get up to two O.W.L.s per subject. To receive an O.W.L. you must have made at least 75% of your test correctly or have managed to complete the task assigned to you by your teacher. There are six obligatory subjects: Charms, Transfiguration, Potions, DADA, Herbology, and History of Magic. In addition to those subjects, you are allowed to choose two more subjects that will add to your total number of O.W.L.s. Those are not obligatory, you may chose not to take those two subjects, but I strongly discourage any students that may want to do this. Your O.W.L.s results are extremely important to your future and you should try to receive as many as you possibly can. Are there any questions?" A few students raised their hands.

"Yes, Mister Finnigan?"

"How are we going to do practical exams in History of Magic?"

"This, Mister Finnigan, is up to your Professor," she seemed to hold back a smile.

"Miss Granger?"

"Professor, how many O.W.L.s are necessary to pass?"

"That depends on the students, as the decision to allow you into sixth year is taken during a Staff Meeting where each case is examined separately. Usually around nine or ten O.W.L.s is a good result for a regular student."

"Thank you Professor."

"Any more questions? Good, we can move on to Transfiguration then."

The rest of the day continued without incident, except for Ron´s uncomfortable and unexplained silence during lunch, leaving Hermione extremely frustrated at his monosyllabic responses. At the end of the day, just as Harry was about to enter Gryffindor tower, Hermione pulled him inside an empty classroom and said, "We need to talk. It´s about Ron."