A True Gryffindor

Following the announcement of Hermione's new "status" in the Prophet, there was a new urgency to the DA's plans to steal Gryffindor's sword. Neville and Ginny were determined to help Hermione, Harry and Ron as much as possible; the fact that two of them were Britain's most wanted wizards made it more likely they would need help. As far as Neville was concerned, they had no time to waste. Every available night was now spent in the Room of Requirement trying to work out ways to get around the security theteachers had put in place to stop students from doing precisely the rule-breaking they were planning; first and second year students were now taking turns to hang around the Headmaster's office many hours after they were supposed to be in bed, many bribed with sweets and silver sickles to help.

-o0o-

"Now!"

Seamus prised the door open to reveal a sliver of the corridor beyond and pressed his eye to the gap. After a moment's pause he decided the coast was clear and edged out of the cupboard, beckoning for Neville to follow. The two wizards crept along the shadowy corridor quietly. Once they were sure they were out of hearing range of the rest of the castle, they pocketed their wands and ran the rest of the way to the dungeons.

The second years chained to the ceiling of dungeon six were so busy rattling their chains and shrieking that they didn't even notice Neville and Seamus enter the dungeon. Neville tried calling them at first.

"Shhh! Listen up!"

"Oi, you two! Pay attention," Seamus yelled. The shrieking continued.

"Er, boys?" Neville's final attempt was drowned out by a piercing whistle from Seamus. The first years looked down in surprise at their rescuers and Neville glanced gratefully at his partner in crime. "Listen up. We're here to get you out. Do everything we say and we'll get you back to your dorms safely."

"But," interjected Seamus, "any more of that racket and we'll get caught, so shut up." The younger pupils nodded mutely. The threat of being placed back in the shackles by a teacher, or possibly a worse punishment for escaping, was enough to quieten even the rowdiest student. "After you, mate," grinned Seamus, turning to Neville.

All right," muttered Neville, raising his wand, "Diffindo!"

The first prisoner slid down the wall and crumpled on the floor as the shackles attaching her to the ceiling split. After a few more charms she was joined by her three friends, who immediately stood and began dusting down their robes with their hands and rubbing their wrists.

"Good aim!" remarked Seamus to his companion.

"I've had lots of practise," was the grim reply. Seamus's grin faded as he turned his head back to face to second years. After allowing the younger pupils a few more minutes to recover and find their wands and schoolbags, the seventh years decided it was time to leave. Seamus went into the corridor first to check to coast was clear, before waving to the others to continue. Neville left the dungeon last, re-locking the door as he closed it.

"C'mon, time to go!" hissed Seamus. The six students hurtled breathlessly along the corridors, pausing briefly at corners to check there was nobody about before they turned. Finally, after what seemed like a mile of running, the party reached Hogwarts's entrance Hall. Neville held a finger to his lips to hush the giddy second years and signalled that the two Hufflepuff boys should leave. They waved before vanishing into the shadows of the corridor leading to their common room. Neville and Seamus then led the two remaining students - a boy and a girl, both Gryffindors - back to the Fat Lady's portrait and the safety of the common room beyond.

-o0o-

"I just wish there was some way I could do something," moaned Neville. "All those times Hermione helped me with my Potions work, and now she's being hunted by Death Eaters and bounty hunters alike, while I can't do a thing to help her or the others." The two Gryffindors were relaxing in the armchairs by the common room fireplace late one Saturday afternoon, not long after liberating the second years from dungeon six. Most students had gone out into the grounds, despite the frosty weather, to avoid homework and anything that reminded them of school.

Seamus grimaced sympathetically over his copy of the Daily Prophet.

"I know the feeling," he said. "It's like, Dean's my best friend, but he's stuck out there, alone, and I don't even know where he is. But at least we can give them the-" he glanced around to check no-one could hear him and leaned to Neville, lowering his voice "the sword. That must help them somehow, if Dumbledore wanted Harry to have it."

"Yeah, I s'pose." Neville grimaced and leaned back in the armchair. "Still, I've no idea how to actually get it to them. Where are they?"

Seamus snorted.

"That's the two hundred thousand galleon question, Neville. But, even if we can't find a way to give Harry the sword, we still have the pleasure of depriving Snape of it." He beamed at the newspaper in his hands.

Neville allowed himself a small smile in spite of himself. Yes, it would be a good feeling to see Snape's face after discovering one of the treasures in the Headmaster's office - most pupils still refused to call it Snape's office, despite his having been headmaster of Hogwarts for almost three months now. The two boys were interrupted from their musings by the fat Lady's portrait swinging open to reveal the entire Gryffindor Quidditch team, shivering and chatting about the day's performance. Most of the players climbed the staircases to their dormitories. Ginny, however, saw the two boys in front of the fire and immediately headed over to them, leaving her broom propped up against an empty table.

"What's up?" she asked, sitting cross-legged on the rug in front of Seamus and Neville.

"Not much," muttered Neville, "we're just despairing about what to do once we've liberated the sword."

"Don't be so dramatic!" laughed Ginny. "Although we do need to figure out what to do eventually, we can decide that after we rescue it if need be. Anyway," she continued, ignoring Neville who was clearly about to interrupt, "I'm glad you mentioned that. I've got the dates of the first two Quidditch matches here." She paused and smirked up at her fellow conspirators.

"And? What does that have to do with anything?" demanded Seamus.

"And Gryffindor are playing Slytherin a week today, which isn't important for our little mission - however, the Saturday after that Hufflepuff will be playing Slytherin." Ginny paused for dramatic effect.

"I'm still not seeing the connection," grumbled Seamus, but Neville was already sitting upright, eyes glinting with an idea.

"Don't you see?" he demanded. "If there's a Quidditch match on that day then the castle will be practically deserted. Ginny won't be able to miss next week's match - it'll look a bit suspicious if the Gryffindor team's captain-"

"Honorary captain," Ginny pointed out, but Neville ignored this.

"-if the Gryffindor team's captain is missing, but when Hufflepuff are playing Slytherin we probably won't be missed. And because his house is playing, Snape definitely won't be in his office! Ginny, you're a genius!" Neville stood up excitedly. "We need to get planning now; we have a deadline to work to."

-o0o-

By the time the next weekend rolled around, the plan to steal the sword of Gryffindor had taken shape. The new arrangement was for Neville and Luna to accompany Ginny as far as the gargoyle at the base of the staircase to the Headmaster's Office ("after all, I can't carry a dirty great sword all the way back on my own", complained Ginny) while Seamus, Nearly Headless Nick (who had overheard the DA whispering about the plans in the Gryffindor common room one evening and insisted that he help to retrieve the sword of his house), Lavender, Padma and Parvati Patil, Terry Boot and two sixth year Ravenclaws would be placed at various intervals along the route from the Office to the Owlery to keep watch, armed with devices from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes to create diversions if necessary.

"Why the Owlery?" questioned Terry as the DA were going over this scheme in the Room of Requirement that Tuesday night. "Isn't the Astronomy Tower less likely to have someone in it?"

"Yes," sighed Neville with impatience, "but the Astronomy Tower is higher up so can be seen more easily from the Quidditch pitch. It might look suspicious if you're standing there with your wand lit up waiting and Snape sees you. The Owlery is tucked out of sight from the Quidditch grounds so it's less likely we'll be spotted."

This reasoning seemed to please the rest of the team, so Neville continued outlining the plan. Once Neville, Ginny and Luna reached the Owlery with the sword, the owls that Terry would have already gathered would be ready to carry it - wrapped of course - to Diagon Alley, where it would be delivered to the back door of a certain joke shop. The Weasley twins were in on the plan, of course, after Ginny explained that they would be able to break school rules and help harry in one go. Once the sword was safely out of Hogwarts, Fred and George would keep it safe while Neville and Ginny tried to contact Harry, Ron and Hermione. They had already tried to use their DA coins to do so; however it seemed that the three fugitives did not have theirs with them, wherever they were.

"Is everyone all right with this?" asked Ginny, addressing the selected pupils. The Gryffindor and Ravenclaw heads alike nodded in agreement. "It's settled then," she finished, folding her arms.

"Wait for the signal next Saturday morning," Neville instructed the small crowd. "Until then, carry on as normal. See you a week Saturday, every one." The meeting finished and the students left the room three at a time.

-o0o-

"Are you all right?"

Ginny looked up from her cornflakes - which she'd left to go soggy as she stared at the bowl in silence - and saw Luna.

"Yeah, I'm good, thanks, Luna. Just a bit... worried."

"Don't worry; it's too cold today, so the flying daxins will be in hibernation. They can affect flying, you know. They distract people by chasing their..." Ginny smiled up at her friend as Luna continued talking, not bothering to tell her that it was not the Quidditch game that day that she was worrying about, but the misdemeanour planned for the following Saturday. The plan involved so many people that Ginny was sure one of them would let slip something accidentally or do something to ruin the whole set up. She wouldn't have put it past Snape to slip veritaserum into students' pumpkin juice to find out what rebellion was being planned next.

"C'mon, I should probably be going," muttered the redhead as she stood. Luna followed Ginny down to the pitch, carrying her infamous lion hat and chattering throughout the walk. Ginny was grateful for the distraction.

-o0o-

"Hi Luna! Luna, up here!" yelled Seamus, waving. Luna looked up, smiled at the sight of him and climbed up to sit between Neville and Seamus, who shifted apart to make room for her.

"You're just in time," Neville informed her. "They're about to kick off."

"Yeah, we've just found out that there's a new referee this year," said Ernie Macmillan, who was sitting on Neville's other side. He was also wearing Gryffindor red for the occasion.

Luna followed Ernie's gaze down to the pitch, where sure enough, Amycus Carrow was attempting to mount an unruly broom. The sight was so ridiculous that Luna almost laughed out loud.

"We all know what this means," sighed Neville. "Ginny's team haven't got a chance."

Much to the dismay of most of the audience, Neville turned out to be right. After twenty minutes of play he couldn't bear to watch anymore and sat with his face in his hands while Ernie described the match as it continued. There was no commentator this year; the Carrows had declared it "unnecessary", which led Neville to believe that they were determined to take as much fun as possible out of even Quidditch.

"Ginny's just dived - I think she's seen - oh no, she's been blocked by Malfoy," said Ernie. The Slytherin team were enjoying the freedom granted by the biased referee by abusing the rules as much as possible. "Now Malfoy's grabbed hold of her broom - she's swearing at him..."

Neville chuckled and looked up. Ginny was indeed shouting at Malfoy and making very unsportsmanlike gestures.

"Oh, there goes another penalty to Slytherin," Ernie deadpanned as Carrow penalised the Gryffindors for Ginny's outburst while ignoring Malfoy's rule breakage. "Ten points to Slytherin. Now it's one hundred and seventy to ten - oh dear..."

The match ended with Ginny beating Malfoy to the snitch. This still ensured a Slytherin win of nearly four hundred to a hundred and fifty, something Ginny complained about rather raucously in the Gryffindor common room that night.

"Still," Lavender pointed out to her after a particularly long rant about the Carrows, "at least we still have next week to look forward to."

Ginny looked at the elder girl. Imagining how bad the Carrows' authority would look once the public discovered that the Sword of Gryffindor was missing, she laughed wholeheartedly. She may have thought of this plan to help Harry originally, but revenge on the new teachers was definitely a great secondary motive.

-o0o-

Severus Snape was not gullible enough to believe that the students had given up their rebellious ways. After nearly seventeen years of teaching he came to hold a deep mistrust of the student body. The fact was that no pranks had been carried out by the so-called "Dumbledore's Army" for almost a week. Amycus and Alecto were gleeful, taking this as evidence that their punishments were working. Severus, however, knew the students better. That Weasley Girl was still talking to the Longbottom idiot and the Ravenclaw oddity suspiciously at mealtimes; they all seemed a little too happy. They knew something; a prank was being planned, and Snape was determined to find out what that was and stop it before it came to fruition. He had taken to personally patrolling the corridors himself on some nights, unnerved by how quiet the students were compared to the preceding weeks. Finally, one night in early November, he was forced to concede that nothing was about to happen that particular night - or at least not while he was awake and able to catch the perpetrators - and stalked back to his office to talk with Dumbledore's portrait again, when he was sure he heard a rustle in the corridor outside his office. He paused in front of the stone gargoyle and glared into the darkness behind him, but the noise was not repeated.

"Lumos!" he whispered, holding his wand aloft. The corridor appeared to be deserted.

Satisfied that he was alone, Snape turned back to the statue, muttering the password. It jumped aside to admit him and the professor swept inside and up the spiral staircase. He did not notice the small swooshing noise as a tapestry on the wall was disturbed by a passing body as he disappeared from view.

-o0o-

Ginny and Romilda were playing a late-night game of exploding snap when the Fat Lady's portrait swung forward to admit a still-disguised first year student who fell through into the common room with vigour.

"Ginny! I've got it!" yelled Brian as he ran up to the elder girls. Ginny looked at the blank space of air that had just shouted at her.

"Hold still, Brian, let me take that off you," she instructed, waving her wand. Brian's figure slowly melted into view as the Disillusionment Charm was removed.

"I've got the password!"

"Shhh! Not here, and not so loud!" she admonished, glancing about the common room. She pulled the young boy after her into a corner.

"Sorry," Brian whispered, looking abashed. "I've got the password, like you asked. I heard Snape use it to get back into his office."

"Don't say it aloud here," replied Ginny, "but can you write it down for us? Give it to me or Neville tomorrow at breakfast, if you want." The boy nodded, looking rather proud of himself for helping the big students with their plans to annoy the teachers. "Here," continued Ginny, pressing a cockroach cluster into his hand, "that's to say thanks for your help. Now you need to promise not to tell anyone what you did or why, is that understood?" Brian nodded, chewing the sweet. "Excellent! Off you go to bed now, before anyone else sees you. See you in the morning."

Ginny watched him climb the stairs, waiting a minute or more before climbing them herself. She knocked before opening the seventh-year boys' dormitory, where Seamus and Neville both sat awake. She looked directly at Neville and smiled.

"Brian's got the password to the office," she said. "We're all set."