Ginny Weasley Eats The Rich
Breakfast and lunch were never as strict about who you ate with, but Holly and Tracey rarely ate with Harry, Ron, and Hermione. They really only did it before big Quidditch matches, and those wouldn’t start for another two months. So, at eight o’clock in the morning, as the students slowly woke up for their first day of classes over some eggs and toast, none of them saw the red note Errol was carrying over to Ron until it was too late.
The few conversations that were happening at their table (Pansy complaining to Millicent that the bacon was too crisp and the house elves that cooked it were useless (her words) and Blaise and Tracey - both morning people - bickering over Lockhearts syllabus for the year. He thought it was stupid, which Holly had to agree with, but Tracey was enraptured for some reason…) all died instantly as soon as Molly Weasley’s voice began to boom through the hall.
“RONALD WEASLEY! HOW DARE YOU STEAL THAT CAR! I WOULDN’T HAVE BEEN SURPRISED IF THEY’D EXPELLED YOU, YOU WAIT TILL I GET HOLD OF YOU, I DON’T SUPPOSE YOU STOPPED TO THINK WHAT YOUR FATHER AND I WENT THROUGH WHEN WE SAW IT WAS GONE-”
By now, everyone was turned to look at Ron, who was pale as a ghost and near to tears, and Harry who looked about as shaken. Holly glanced around her own table, where several hushed snickers were going around. Ron would never live this one down, Holly was sure.
“- LETTER FROM DUMBLEDORE LAST NIGHT, I THOUGHT YOUR FATHER WOULD DIE OF SHAME, WE DIDN'T BRING YOU UP TO BEHAVE LIKE THIS, YOU AND HARRY COULD HAVE BOTH DIED - ABSOLUTELYDISCUSTED - YOUR FATHER’S FACING AN INQUIRY AT WORK, ITS ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT AND IF YOU PUT ANOTHER TOE OUT OF LINE WE’LL BRING YOU STRAIGHT BACK HOME!” The letter then shot across the room of its own accord and stopped in front of Ginny. “Oh and Ginny, Dear, are you doing alright in Slytherin? We’re so worried about you,” the letter then burst into flames and crumbled to ashes on the table.
“... mum…” Ginny whispered, mortified.
Holly was happy to be back in school. She loved to learn, and her classes were interesting, though, Potions always brewed drama and she already hated Lockheart. He wasn’t even teaching them anything about defense, they were just learning about him. The Slytherin common rooms were a different story that first week back, for several reasons. First off, all the time apart seemed to have icened the tentative respect Holly had earned from some of her housemates, and she wasn’t even sure she wanted to earn it back, what with how they were speaking to her now.
In fact, Their house was alight with talk of blood-purity and blood-loyalty. It had always been a topic older students entertained, but now she was hearing it from her own yearmates and from some of the first years. It gave her a sinking feeling, that she couldn’t un-feel and she kept thinking about that bloody house elf. The Potters must not return to Hogwarts this year! He had said, and Holly was starting to wonder if something bad was happening.
The worst of it though, was what Ginny had to face.
On Monday night, as the Slytherins made their way down to the Dungeons after dinner, Pansy tripped Ginny on the stairs, on purpose, and she went tumbling down two flights of stone stairs, ripping her skirt and getting badly bruised. “You should watch your step, Weasley. We wouldn’t want mummy to worry!” she taunted, and Millicent and some of the boys from Holly’s year laughed along with her.
Ginny stood up calmly, brushed herself off, and kept walking. “Ginny-” Holly started after her, but Tracey held her back.
“Not yet,” she whispered, nodding at Pansy’s stupid gang still calling insults after Ginny.
They did go to check on her, as soon as Pansy went off to shower and the boys went along to their dorms on the other side of the common room. She was badly bruised, but her head, thankfully, was fine and nothing was broken or sprained, so, when she refused to go to the hospital wing, they didn’t push it.
The next night, Holly woke to a blood-curdling scream from the next dorm over. She leapt out of bed and rushed to check on her friend, but found her and another first year standing outside their room, door barred shut, and a couple of big toothy grins on their faces. “They put snakes in my bed, but Isolde warned me what they were doing so we locked them inside with them.” Ginny said, innocently. “Fred and George did this to Ron once, only with spiders. He was very afraid of them, but I handled it.”
Holly looked at the barred shut door, where several screams could be heard. “Are the snakes poisonous?” she checked, but when both girls shook their heads, she just shrugged. “Nice one, then.” she told them.
“What on earth is going on over here?” Heather Thatcham, a sixth year prefect, was an elegant looking girl, as most of the Slytherin’s were, but she’d never once smiled in front of Holly. It made it very difficult to know if she was angry or not.
“One of the other girls was trying out a spell, but it went badly wrong, I think. Ginny and Isolde managed to get out and come ask me for help before the door got stuck but… I don’t know what to do.” Holly said, smoothly.
Heather looked between them suspiciously for a moment, before finally waving them off. “Weasley, Rosier, you will sleep in the common room for the night while this gets handled. Do not make a raucous, or Professor Snape will hear of it immediately. Understand? Potter, go back to bed.”
On wednesday, at lunch, Draco, who had not been told about the business with the snakes the night before, made the mistake of being himself in front of Ginny. Holly, Tracey, Ginny, and Isolde had gone to eat with the Gryffindors that day, because they were all confident that no other horrible thing would be put in their beds if they did.
Actually, Holly wasn’t even sure what he’d said. Isolde had gone to the bathroom and on her way back he said something to her that certainly was nothing sweet. She wouldn't tell them what it was, but Ginny must have found out, because that afternoon, when he went to change out of his school robes, there was another scream, this time from the boy’s dorm, and then he came running out of his room, covered in snakes that seemed to flicker slightly with the magick that made them. “My father will hear about this!” Draco screamed as he ran around the common room in circles like a chicken with its head cut off. Heather gave Ginny a look, but she didn’t say anything.
Holly let him run a few circles, before reaching out and grabbing him mid-turn.
“Unhand me, Potter!” he screeched, flailing like an idiot.
“No.” Holly said, amused, and steadied him. He shivered at the slithering all over his body, but he stopped running and flailing. “Your father will not hear about this. He can’t fix it for you.” she told him. He blinked, shuddered, blinked again. “But you can fix it yourself, can’t you Draco?” she added, faux sweetness in her voice.
Draco looked down at the snakes and seemed to realize that they were not, in fact, real. “Oh.” he said.
Holly let go of him.
Draco walked calmly out of the common room, presumably to go figure out how to dispel his clothes. In his wake, everybody was staring at Holly. “What?” she demanded. “You think I make Slytherin look bad, since when is crying home to daddy cool?” Most of them had the decency to look ashamed at that, but the members of her house that weren’t pigs, were all looking supremely pleased with themselves.
Pansy, a pig, decided that higher brain functioning just wasn’t for her the next morning, when she put a bright green hair coloring charm on Isolde, earning the poor kid detention for having unnaturally colored hair because she didn’t know how to dispel it. So, Ginny took a pair of craft scissors and chopped Pansy’s perfect hair into strange, inconsistent lengths, some of which were so close to her scalp, that she had to shave it all off completely. There was a hair re-growing potion, of course, but since it was made by Holly’s family, she was too proud to use it. The irony was, everyone kept going up to her and thanking her for her “show of solidarity” with Isolde.
After that, nobody messed with Ginny or Isolde. They were all too afraid of being snaked or going bald. Even better, Pansy was so incensed by it that she asked Heather if she and Millicent could trade dorm spots with Ginny and Isolde ‘to make sure those poor first years didn’t get locked in a room with snakes again’. Heather, who seemed to know exactly what was going on, sighed very deeply and asked very tiredly, “Will it mean you all will finally let me sleep?”
By Friday morning, Heather had somehow managed to get special permission from Snape. Holly had absolutely no idea how she had managed it. Possibly a hex. Or blackmail. But, Holly was more than happy to assist in moving the trunks around regardless. By the end of it, both doors read year 1-2 on the front, and had a list of which girls resided in each one, so nobody would get confused.