Ties That Bind - Year 2

They walked the hallways towards the infirmary, proud and exhausted, Ginny holding onto Estelle’s hand and walking close to Ron, with Lockhart in tow. Harry gripped Riddle’s destroyed diary, heading the group with Nikolai, until they rounded the corner to meet face-to-face with McGonagall. They all froze.
McGonagall paused before her expression was a faint amalgamation of livid and stunned. “What- what are you doing-” Her eyes flicked over to Lockhart, practically floating as he gazed around the hallway. “Gilderoy, what-” Then her eyes landed on Ginny and relief flooded her face. “Miss Weasley. I am very glad to see you back, alive and well,” she sighed as the students continued to stand in silence, “but that rescue mission was unbelievably stupid, you all could have been killed, and do I want to know what’s wrong with Professor Lockhart?”
Estelle’s mouth cracked into a joyous smile, opening to retell the story before Nikolai quickly jumped in and said “no. Not really, not yet.” Ron and Harry shook their heads solemnly in agreement as Estelle huffed.
Well, while I wait for any plausible explanation, let’s get all of you to the hospital wing. And after that, Dumbledore will want to talk to you.”
Oh yeah, Dumbledore. Nikolai thought distastefully, remembering what Estelle had implicitly suggested in the chamber.

Madame Pomfrey checked them all over and was pleased to say that none of them sustained any major, nor minor, injuries. Nikolai felt the urge to mention the irony of this in comparison to Ginny being near-death, and Harry being poisoned by a Basilisk, but decided holding his tongue in this scenario was definitely the right idea. Pomfrey may have a heart attack.
Nikolai had been checked first, then waited for the rest to be seen. He pulled out the folded sheet of paper he had forgotten about in his pocket, information on the Basilisk punctuated with Hermione’s handwritten ‘pipes’ at the bottom. The longer he looked at it, the more it irritated him- why couldn’t he recall what book it was from? Even the information on the page felt a little familiar, maybe he read it over Estelle’s shoulder once, magical creatures weren't exactly his wheelhouse. Estelle appeared from the curtains around one of the beds, sending Harry in after her, and walking directly to her brother, noticing his unspoken question for her.
“Yeah?” She prompted him. He tilted his head up to her but stayed watching the paper.
“This was a little familiar to you too, right?”
She took the paper from his outstretched hand and reread it. “Er, maybe a little. I’ve read the book, for sure, I read it over the summer, pretty soon after year 1 finished. But I think I only read that one once.”
“Estelle Wolfe only reading a book once?” Nikolai joked, giving her a smile, “Was ist mit dir passiert?” (What happened to you?)
“Naja, wisst du,” (Well, you know,) she reciprocated the smile, but then it changed as she looked past Nikolai’s shoulder, “Le lecture, c’est pour les nerds.” (Reading’s for nerds.)
Nikolai knew what she was looking at, a few beds behind him held Hermione’s motionless body. “Professor Sprout is almost finished with the mandrakes, Hermine wird in kürzester Zeit wieder auf den Beinen sein.” (Hermione will be back on her feet in no time.)
Estelle shook her head, “Yeah, ich weiss. I just wish she could be up already.” (I know.)
“It’s a tricky potion, you really don’t want Sprout to rush it. Could be detrimental.”
Sarcastically, Estelle responded “Merci, Hugo.” (Thanks, Hugo.)
Realising his last statement was not very helpful, he apologised quickly. “Sorry.”
Estelle just gave him a small smile laced with adoration for her brother as she pulled him into a hug. Nikolai pulled his arms around her tightly and squeezed, she squeezed back harder till they were locked in an epic match of who could break the other’s ribs first. They broke away at the same time with breathless giggles.
Nikolai’s brain clicked suddenly. “Dude. We met Voldemort.”
Estelle’s eyes lit up. “Bro, we foutu Voldemort up.” (Bro, we fucked Voldemort up.)
“It was mostly Harry.” Nikolai added.
Estelle punched him on the arm. “Hey, we were there too, we metaphorically foutu him up, take some of the credit.”
He conceded, “Yeah, alright.”
Estelle laughed heartily, before grinning wider than she had that day. “You remember his face when you said ‘half-blood Slytherin’? Hugo, that was awesome.”
He felt a swell of pride.
****
They had explained pretty much anything to a mildly disappointed and silently proud Professor McGonagall, who sighed again, shook her head, and told them to go up to Dumbledore’s office. She sent Ginny to bed, and left Lockhart in the hospital wing, and warned them all that she would have to get Professor Snape involved in this since Nikolai was not part of her house. They all deflated in resignation, but they traipsed up the stairs to Dumbledore’s office all the same, and if Estelle walked with a slight bit more of a hop in her step, then that was nobody’s business but her’s.

“You four understand that in the past few hours, you have broken, perhaps, a dozen school rules.” Dumbledore paused for them all to mumble an understanding ‘yes, sir’, then continued. “And there is sufficient evidence to have you all expelled.” Ron and Harry shared a glance while the twins did the same. Before Estelle could feel too worried, she noticed a recognisable glint in the professor’s eye. “Therefore, it is only fitting… that you all receive… special awards for services to the school. They all chorused sighs of relief and Estelle couldn’t help but feel confused at the man’s antics, but she didn’t find herself in a place to argue, when the alternative may have been expulsion.
“Wolves and Mr. Weasley, if you would, have an owl deliver these release papers to Azkaban.” He stood from behind the desk and gently pushed the three to turn around, handing a pack of papers to Ron. “I believe we want our gamekeeper back.”
Quickly, Estelle inquired, “What about Harry?”
“I think,” Dumbledore began all wistfully, as he always did, placing a hand on Riddle’s diary on his desk, “we have some things to talk about.”
Squinting, Estelle went on. “Things we can’t be around for?”
Nikolai tugged sharply on her sleeve, warning her to back down. He even piped up, saying, “Sorry, Professor, Lea’s just protective.”
He glanced at them both over his half-moon glasses. “With good reason, too. Protectiveness can be a habit with infinite benefits.”
She forced a nod as Nikolai pulled on her cloak towards the door, following Ron who uncertainly made his way closer to it. “We’ll see you soon, Harry.” She told him, in a way that may have sounded a little like a threat to Dumbledore, before Nikolai pushed her through the doorway.

“That was bizarre.” Ron shook his head in disbelief.
Estelle hummed in agreement, still not trusting leaving Harry, who was surprisingly impressionable by adults in authority, with Dumbledore who may or may not have ulterior motives.
It was nighttime, they had been in the chamber for a few hours so it was still dark out, the fires lining the walls casting dancing shadows along the floor. They were silent for a while on their way to the owlery till Nikolai stopped dead and exclaimed “Mythical Creatures!”
Ron and Estelle looked at him, each other, then back at him. “What?”
“The book!” He looked as though he had finally figured out the meaning of life. “The book that the page was torn out of! Wasn’t it called something like Mythical Creatures of Dangerous Legend, or something?”
The name instantly rang a bell deep in Estelle’s subconscious. “I think you might be right.” She definitely took out a book about mythical creatures, and she remembered being interested in the ‘dangerous legend’ part. “Yeah, yeah, you’re right.”
Ron pushed his chin forward, “What are you two going on about now?”
Nikolai turned to him with a sudden surge of confidence. “You can send the owl, right?”
“Er, yeah?”
“Good. Use Murdock, he’s a fast flyer, we’ve gotta go to the library.”
“O-kay?” Ron accepted, then asked, “What?”
“We’ll explain later,” Estelle interjected, “make sure to send those papers, Hagrid doesn’t deserve any more time in Azkaban.”
Straightening, Ron nodded like a soldier given a very important task. “Alright. Good luck with whatever you guys are doing.”
The twins started in the opposite direction. “You too, Ron.”

Halfway through the journey, Estelle realised they weren’t going the right way to the library. “Where’re we going, Hugo?” She asked carefully.
“The library would be closed by now. I don’t think the librarian would let us in, so we’re going to Filch’s.” He answered, determination glaring in his eyes.
Estelle turned to him, walking sideways down the corridor. “Why is this so important to you?”
“Does it not bother you?”
“Well, of course it does, but you’re acting like this is a massive piece of some massive puzzle.” She held his forearm for sincerity, “What’s up, Hugo?”
He sighed, locking eyes with her before averting them back to the dark corridor in front of them. “I have a hunch.” Nikolai didn’t do ‘hunches’, that was Estelle’s thing. Nikolai did ‘thought’ and ‘probability’, so Estelle wondered what he was thinking, a slight part of her a little irritated that 1) he wasn’t telling her outright, and 2) she hadn’t come to the same conclusion as him. Although, the mystery of it all was also making her quite excited.
“So we’re going to steal the keys from Filch?”
“Mm, if you wanna go to the library at night, you either tell Madam Pince in advance, or you steal the keys from Filch.”
She grinned. “I don’t know what happened to you, but this is fun.”
He reflected her smile, “Gee, thanks.”
They got to Filch’s room and Nikolai easily unlocked the door with a simple Alohamora.
“He’s on patrol, how do you know the keys will be here?” Estelle inquired, genuinely intrigued in her brother’s knowledge on the matter.
“They were here last time.”
“‘Last time’?!” She almost shouted, before they both shushed her. “Sorry,” she whispered, “there was a last time?”
He smirked. “Blaise is a bad influence.”
Searching along the desks of his dingy room, Estelle responded, “I think maybe you’re the bad influence.”
Nikolai gave a fake offended noise. “I would never.”
Estelle spotted a small key with ornate markings, similar to the lock she remembered seeing on the library doors when closed. “Here, this one,” she whispered over to him, “it matches the lock, right?”
Nikolai saw it and nodded. “Yeah, definitely.”
They grabbed the key, then stuck to the shadows as they made their way back towards the library.
“Was really annoying finding out that Alohamora didn’t work on it,” Nikolai spoke in a hushed voice, “we then had to walk all the way back to Filch’s room.”
“I’d have thought you’d bring it up in one of our talking sessions, to be honest.” Estelle shrugged as they approached the grand doors to the library.
“Honestly? I didn’t want to give you any ideas.”
Estelle frowned. “Yeah, that makes sense.”
Delicately, Estelle fitted the key into the lock, turning it as it opened with a satisfying click. It was dark, even the windows didn’t let any light in with the blinds drawn tightly down, moonlight being trapped out. Simultaneously, the twins raised their wands and casted Lumos, little torches of white light appearing at the ends of their wands. They found the right section quickly, having spent much time in the library during the day. They searched the shelves from opposite ends, each mumbling the names of the book titles they read as they moved past them.
“Here, here!” Nikolai exclaimed, quietly, pulling a book from the shelf. Estelle ran over to him and held her wand over the cover to shine a light. The book was a blue, neatly leather-bound edition, it definitely stood out. Estelle felt it strangely familiar, she had seen it before but only once. The edition she had wasn’t this nice blue, it was a paperback, apparently they got a new edition in once she gave it back. Nikolai seemed to recognise it too.
“Where did we see this book before, Hugo?” Something told her that he had linked some points together.
He spoke with certainty. “Flourish and Blotts. Before we made that bet about what Malfoy would say.
She understood his implications. They had seen Malfoy put a book on a stack, pocketing a sheet of paper. She wracked her brain, in her memory, the book he put down was the same size and the same gorgeous blue colour. “Merde alors.” She mumbled. “It was Malfoy.” (Holy shit.)
“Must’ve been.”
“That was your hunch? He was your hunch?”
Nikolai paused before answering. “Yeah, I guess.”
“You really paid attention to him, huh.” She wiggled her eyebrows jokingly and he grimaced back, shoving her lightly. Opening the book, Nikolai flicked to the Basilisk page, before passing it to Estelle, who read it, the same information and the same layout. Nikolai retrieved the page from his pocket, unfolded it, and lined it up next to the spine. It was the exact same, albeit more crinkled.
In unison, they exclaimed “Merde alors” and “Heilige Scheiße” respectively. (Holy shit.)
“You’re gonna ask him about it, right?” Estelle checked.
“Er, yeah. Yeah, I’ll ask him about it.”
Estelle couldn’t see any advantage for Malfoy by doing this, so she was somewhat confused. The lines lined up quite perfectly, possibly too perfectly to be anything more than a coincidence. That’s why she thought it was so important for Nikolai to ask Malfoy about it directly.
“I’ll check the book out tomorrow.” He decided as she slid the book back in its place.
“Great. Now let’s get the hell out of here before-”
“Meow.” A quiet yowl, long and effectively drawn-out to cause students the most intense fear they should experience in their schooldays.
“Merde.”
“Sheiße.”
They stood stock still, but they knew Mrs. Norris had seen them. Estelle, having been standing in front, slowly held up a hand, counting down from three… two… one…
The legged it out of the library and down the hallway, but they knew where Mrs. Norris went, Filch wasn’t far behind so they stuck to the shadows again and kept to the alcoves when they thought they heard footsteps. Turns out most of the time it was just their own footsteps echoing around the empty halls. Once again, Estelle was reminded of the haunting yet tranquil silence of Hogwarts at night. Nikolai followed her without a word, both now fearing of getting caught by Filch, which logically seemed quite silly compared to what they had just gone through with, you know, Voldemort. In the quiet, Estelle knew Nikolai was aware of where they were going, and was okay with deciding to spend the night there.
They arrived at the Gryffindor common room having had only one close call where Filch walked about three feet away from them where they were pressed against the wall in one of the many alcoves. Estelle thought cheekily If they didn’t want us sneaking around at night, then why did they give us so many places to hide? The lady on the portrait took one look at Nikolai and sighed till Estelle spoke the password and she swung open all the same. As soon as they got into the common room, they both let out a heavy breath of relief.
“Jesus.” Nikolai exclaimed as he slouched into the armchair nearest the far fire.
Estelle cocked her head and raised her eyebrows as she followed him to the fire. She sat on the soft rug, leaning against the sofa behind her and feeling the comfort of the carpet. She took deep breaths as a smile slowly appeared on her face. She flicked her gaze up from the fire to look at Nikolai. “I’ve had a thought.”
“Uh oh.” He snickered.
Estelle scoffed. “No, really. You know, I think there’d be a really easy way of getting out of Mrs. Norris’ whole… thing.”
“Uh… huh?”
“I bet other animals wouldn’t make Mrs. Norris do anything.” She gleefully danced around the point she was making.
Nikolai saw through it instantly and he gawked at her. “You want us to become animagi?”
She grinned mischievously. “You mean to say you don’t wanna become an animagi?”
“Are you kidding?” Nikolai threw his head against the back of the seat. “Of course I wanna be an animagi, that would be so goddamn cool. But just to get out of Mrs. Norris paws?”
“I’ll take any reason.” Estelle shrugged in feigned nonchalance, looking back at the fire.
“And maybe our animagi forms will be crazy. Like what if you’re an elephant and I’m, like, a verdammte giraffe? We wouldn’t even fit in some of the hallways.” (a fucking giraffe?)
She whipped her head around to face him again. “‘Will’? Look, Hugo, you’re already planning ahead.”
Nikolai bit down a smile, pursing his lips. “Yeah, alright, maybe I thought about it before.” Estelle went to say something, but Nikolai cut her off. “But. But, when we do the whole process, we’ll have to do it over a break, and I think we should do it when we’re older.”
“I get the ‘doing it over a break’, but when we’re older? You’re such a party-pooper, Hughie.” She pouted.
He huffed at the nickname. “When I say ‘older’, I mean, like, next year, or something.”
Estelle lit back up. “Oh-ho-ho, we are so doing that, if that’s your only criteria.”

Nikolai slept curled up in the armchair that night, and despite his best efforts, Estelle slept on the sofa. She went up to grab her duvet and blanket and tried to ignore the empty bed across from her’s.
“You can sleep in your bed, you know.” Nikolai told her when she came back down the stairs.
“You kidding? I don’t trust these Gryffindors, they’ll shave your eyebrows off or something if they find you here in the morning.” She forced a chuckle, she knew Nikolai knew the real reason. She couldn’t stand to see Hermione’s empty bed.
“Are you kidding? You’re the Gryffindor most likely to do that to me.”
“Eh, maybe I still will.”
“Please sleep in your own room.”
“No way.”
****
Nikolai dragged Estelle off the sofa at 8am, just as some of the students started slouching down the stairs, giving Nikolai wary yet nonplussed looks. They were used to him being there at this point.
“Hugo…” Estelle mumbled, slowly waking, “Breakfast is in, like, half an hour.”
“I’ve gotta get to the library, Lea.” He yanked on her ankle and she fell off the sofa unceremoniously with a yelp. “We can’t risk someone else taking out the book.”
“You’re acting like it’s super important. You don’t need the book to talk to Malfoy.” She rolled over on the floor and pulled the blanket up to her chin although it wasn’t covering the rest of her body.
Nikolai agreed, he wasn’t totally sure why he felt like he needed that book, but he just, sort of, did. He did take a mental step back, though. “Okay, yeah, you’re right. But also if I leave you here, you won’t get up until after period one, let’s be honest.”
Estelle groaned and rolled on the floor again.
“Come on, Lea.” He kicked her lightly in the side. He did it again. “Come on.”
She grumbled “go away.”
He kicked her again. “I’m not gonna stop until you get up. Let’s go to the library.” He kept kicking her softly until she finally groaned once more and sat up, glaring at him, hair a mess. “You look like you slept well.”
“I’ll dislocate your shoulder.”
He held up one finger. “You only tried that once.”
Slowly, she got to her feet and started to run her hands through her hair. “Your catchphrase never falters.”
“Stronger than many things, but probably not me.”
“What?”
Nikolai grabbed Estelle’s arms and yanked her up. With another yelp she jumped up and landed upright, eyes a little glazed, like when you pick a cat up from their sitting position. “Now let’s go.” He pulled her wrist again and she staggered forward as he dragged her through the portrait hole.
“Hugo, I haven’t even brushed my teeth!”
“Me neither!”
“Alright, fine, can I put my hair up at least?”
Nikolai sighed and stopped walking, letting her arm go.
She bowed slightly. “Thank you.” She threw up her hair and did as best she could without a mirror, unfortunately, she had learnt that Nikolai’s style-conscience did not apply to her, so he was useless. Also, she didn’t really care that much, she could have died last night and survived, so she deserved a lack of judgement on a bad hair day.

The library had an entirely different atmosphere during the day, the early morning sun filtering through the bevelled windows and reflecting against the golden wooden tables. They found the book easily, all while surreptitiously smoothing out their clothes. They checked it out and brought it with them to the hall.
“I realise we go a lot of days without eating more than one meal.” Nikolai said.
Estelle responded, “Eh, not that many days, just on the ones where we almost die.”
“More than other people.”
“I don’t know, I feel like the Ravenclaws may be slowly killing themselves with the sheer number of coffees they consume on the daily.”
Nikolai nodded. “Good point.”

Their first lesson after breakfast was Potions with the student-favourite Professor Snape. Nikolai was feeling extra sarcastic today apparently. This was one of the lessons where he sat next to Malfoy. Slipping into his seat between Malfoy and Blaise, Malfoy glanced at him and shuffled in his seat.
“What were you doing last night? In the bathrooms crying about-?” Malfoy began but Nikolai cut him off by slamming the blue, leather-bound book on the table. His eyes followed it and he shut his mouth quickly.
“Just doing some reading. I’ll tell you what, though, in the copy I read originally, a page was missing.” Nikolai made sure to not sound too intimidating when saying this, but Malfoy’s face still melted a little. “You wouldn’t happen to know what happened to it?”
For a moment, Nikolai thought he was going to deny it, play ignorant, or actually be ignorant, but he didn’t. “How did you figure out that I took the page?” He sounded resigned, perhaps a little disappointed.
“We saw you rip a page out in Flourish and Blotts,” he took out the sheet of paper he had slid into the book, “and when I saw the page, I recognised it from a book Lea had read. After the chamber, we found the book in the library and luckily enough it was the same edition. I put two and two together.”
“Wolfe!” Snape’s sharp voice rang out across the room. “Do not distract your classmates.” All the other voices died out.
Malfoy had looked away, back to where he had been writing notes; they weren’t having a practical lesson today since it was almost the end of the year. But he wasn’t writing notes, he was leaking ink onto the page, thoughts elsewhere. Nikolai noticed this, he was usually so focused, especially in Potions, so he whispered, ignoring the feeling of- probably- Estelle’s eyes on the back of his head, “You alright?”
Malfoy responded quickly, still looking down. “You went into the chamber of secrets?”
Nikolai was slightly taken aback. “Well, yeah, Ginny had been taken, and Lockhart wasn’t going to do it, so who else would do it?”
“You really are mad.” Malfoy stated, looking at him. Nikolai caught his gaze perfectly and in the dim lighting, he noticed Malfoy’s eyes were a calm sort of grey. He’d always assumed they were blue. Malfoy looked away, back down to his notes, the sudden silence in the room filling the space between Nikolai’s ears. Before attending his own notes he saw Malfoy lean his head on his hand, covering the left side of his face. Maybe Malfoy really thought he was loony, totally off his rocker and wanted nothing to do with him, but one thing was still bothering him.
“Why did you rip out the page then give it to-”
“Wolfe! 5 points from Slytherin!”
A few Slytherins turned around to look at him with angry glares and he heard Blaise quietly snickering from next to him.
All the other Slytherin students must hate him now, he doesn’t get points taken away. He does stupid things, but they’re usually calculated. Except for pushing Lockhart into the hole, that was barely calculated. He forgot about that. Damn it, he had just forgotten about that and now he remembered it again, this happens all the time. He has to stop thinking about that or he won’t get anything done. Just focus on writing down notes from the textbooks. Crush the bubotuber and drop it down the ominous hole. Stir counterclockwise until the pot stops yelling- sizzling. God, he just couldn’t concentrate, he just couldn’t ever goddamn concentrate-
Something sharp hit the back of his head then dropped to the floor behind him with nearly no noise. He subtly turned around to see Estelle widening her eyes slightly and tapping her thumb against her book. He saw her hairband on the floor and he leant down to pick it up, chucking it back to her with a mouthed ‘thanks’. She smiled back, and they both went on with their work. Instead of pushing Lockhart- a teacher, into a deep dark hole, Nikolai focused on the acute pain in the back of his head from where the hairband hit. Estelle had always managed to get a lot of power behind those throws.
****
A few days later they sat at the dinner table, Ron shovelling food into his mouth while Estelle, Dean, and Seamus were locked in another football debate. Harry listened, having caught some of a few games on the telly at the Dursley’s. Estelle stayed acutely aware of Nikolai sitting next to Malfoy over at the Slytherin table. It felt strange to see, even though they had sat next to each other before, it felt different now somehow. And considering she still has no idea what his intentions were with the ripped out page, she didn’t know how to react, but his actions did help them massively, and she couldn’t deny that.
Sir Nicholas drifted up and down the table, greeting the students with a cheery voice having been ‘revived’. Estelle fidgeted in her seat, if Nicholas was back, and she was pretty sure she had seen Justin over at the Hufflepuff table, then that means Hermione wasn’t long to come. And she was perfectly right. In the open doorway to the great hall ran in a certain bushy-haired girl who stopped to be welcomed back by Sir Nicholas. Estelle looked at her instantly.
“It’s Hermione.” She mumbled, slightly stunned at the sight of the girl up and walking again, like nothing had happened. Everyone around her who heard turned to see Hermione in the entrance. The girl in question noticed all the faces pointed to her, and picked out her friends, and then she started running.
Estelle jumped up without a second thought and ran towards her, they met in the middle and crashed into a hug that in hindsight was possibly a little too tight from Estelle, but in that moment, Estelle could not care. Hermione was exactly the same, and she was back, smiling, laughing, and running, she was back.
“Oh my God, Mione,” Estelle pulled back, much to every part of her body’s disagreement, “I swear, don’t ever do that again.”
Hermione gave her a sheepish smile. “Just doing what you would.”
“No, you were far more clever.” Estelle looked at her for another moment before pulling her into another hug. Hermione giggled and squeezed as tight as she could and Estelle couldn’t have felt happier.
When they next parted, Hermione ran on to hug Harry with fervour and awkwardly handshake Ron which still ended with genuine smiles. Before she said anything, she turned around to find the Slytherin table. She waved enthusiastically when she found Nikolai watching them, and he waved vehemently back. Turning her attention back to the three in front of her, she said happily “Congratulations! I can’t believe you guys solved it- well, actually, I can believe it.” She looked directly at Estelle who tried to fight the warm feeling that spread throughout her chest.
“We had tons of help from you.” She responded earnestly.
“Yeah, we couldn’t have done it without you, Hermione.” Harry added, still smiling. Estelle wasn’t sure she had seen Harry smile for this long before.
Hermione’s sheepish smile returned as she murmured “thanks.”

Then there were three clinks from a knife on glass, and everyone fell silent, turning to the head of the room.
“Could I have your attention, please?” McGonagall’s voice washed over the hall easily. The four of them took their spaces along the Gryffindor table.
Dumbledore stood from his ornate chair. “Before we begin the feast, let us have a round of applause for Professor Sprout, Madam Pomfrey, whose mandrake juice has been so successfully administered to all who had been petrified.” The hall erupted in claps before dying down again for Dumbledore to continue to speak. Estelle couldn’t even find it in herself to care about whatever implications about Dumbledore they figured out, in that moment, she was just so elated to be sitting next to a grinning Hermione again. “Also, in light of the recent events, as a school treat, all exams have been cancelled.”
Estelle watched as Hermione’s face dropped, indignant to the vastly contrasting response from the rest of the school, clapping, cheering, even whistling. Estelle felt a little joy from cancelled exams, she had been pretty preoccupied with the whole ‘enemies of the heir beware’ thing, that she really hadn’t been focusing on her classes all that much, but she did enjoy feeling smart, so she didn’t quite know if she should whoop or boo.
Then, just after Dumbledore had sat down, the great hall doors opened to reveal the half-giant himself, gameskeeper of Hogwarts, noted carer for any magical creature- Estelle should probably shut down the fanfare in her head- Hagrid. He stopped just a few steps into the hall, announcing, “Sorry I’m late. The owl that delivered my release papers got all lost and confused.” He started walking down the aisle between the Gryffindor and the Hufflepuff tables. “Some ruddy bird called Errol.”
Ron went a deep red and Estelle whispered to him, not ignoring how Harry’s face lit up once again, “We said to use Murdock.”
“He wouldn’t let me attach the papers.” Ron admitted, which did not surprise Estelle at all.
Hagrid stopped again next to the overjoyed group of four. “And I’d just like to say, that if it hadn’t been for you Harry, Ron, and Stella, and Hermione,” he turned around and raised his voice a little, “and Nik o’course,” Nikolai smiled at him and gave him a small wave before hiding his face in his hands. “I would- I’d still be you-know-where… so I’d just like to say… thanks.” His voice went soft at the end. Harry and Estelle shared a look and stood at the same time.
“There’s no Hogwarts without you, Hagrid.” Harry said, looking up to meet his face.
Estelle did the same, saying, “We missed you.”
Harry stepped forward, and spread his arms around Hagrid’s waist, who patted his head. Estelle thought about joining, but decided that this was special for Harry, and Hagrid too, she was sure, until Dumbledore began to clap, bringing everyone else to start another round of applause with cheering and shouting, students standing up, some standing on their benches, Hagrid was nearly in tears and Hermione was in tears. Estelle wrapped one arm around Hermione’s shoulders, smiling up at Hagrid.
Hogwarts really was back to normal now.