Chapter 106 — The Things I Could Still Say

Luna kept saving me a seat. Sometimes it was beside a window, sometimes at the end of a bench with her book occupying the space until I arrived. She would move it onto her lap while I found my small notebook, then continue whatever she had begun telling me on the way.

One afternoon she described an argument in Ravenclaw about whether a cloud resembled a hare. The sketch she showed me had too many legs, which I pointed out in writing. She explained that this was why she thought it might be several hares, making me stop a laugh before it threatened the leaf.

Her eyes brightened as I wrote that she had done it deliberately. She admitted to planning only the last part, then drew another ear to see whether that helped my interpretation. It did not, though explaining why occupied enough of the page for her to propose keeping the picture as evidence.

Another day she brought the paper I bought in Hogsmeade. Two names stood at the top, with a space beneath each, and she offered to write together. I told her she need not stop speaking because I had, but she knew that already. She settled closer and added a question beneath my reply.

Soon arrows joined crossed-out words where one discussion interrupted another. It was slower than speaking without feeling like another exercise in delay. When my hand ached, I put the pencil down and let her slide her fingers between mine. She leaned against my shoulder while I studied the page for something I wanted to add.

Deciding what belonged in writing took longer than wanting to whisper it. Eventually I used my other hand to write that this was the part of the day I looked forward to, producing letters which required Luna’s full attention. After reading them, she lifted our joined hands and kissed my knuckles. For a while the leaf occupied less of my thoughts than usual.

We still had separate work and friends. When Luna could not come, she told me, and I saved a page for another afternoon instead of treating it as a lost one. I had ingredients to check too, although the notebook was proving more useful than anything in the recipe required.

Sprout checked the dark collecting space and the recorded period of being undisturbed before allowing us to take the dew. The pupa arrived through Tom, labelled and properly packed, and I compared it with the approved description. The crystal vial waited in its protective case while I considered how unusually convenient my own hair seemed beside the other ingredients.

As the next full moon approached, the sky became more interesting than any Divination exercise. Clouds gathered on Saturday, and by Sunday afternoon I could supply several reasons they ought to move elsewhere. Hermione doubted the weather could be persuaded by a list, so I showed it to Luna. She added that Oswald would be very grateful at the bottom.

The clouds began breaking before evening. McGonagall checked the workroom and our arrangements before leaving us to finish the leaf stage. Moonlight would enter through the window; the cupboard stood well away from it, fitted doors keeping its interior dark. Nobody else would use the room while our mixture rested there.

Hermione laid out the checked materials. I washed, examined the vial and read the instructions again without letting the clear sky hurry me past them. When the time came, I removed the leaf and stared at it lying intact in the vial. After a month in my mouth, it looked disappointingly ordinary.

I swallowed freely and announced that I had several complaints. Hermione briefly closed her eyes before asking me to put them in writing until we finished. The leaf and saliva received the clear moonlight, and we added the hair, measured teaspoon of dew and pupa in the checked order.

I sealed the vial and placed it on the support prepared inside the cupboard. It would remain there undisturbed while we continued towards the storm. Carrying it in my pouch would still mean moving it about, however dark the inside might be, so I shut the cupboard and recorded the time instead. Hermione agreed that this part was done, stressing the same qualification I had been about to make.

Luna waited downstairs with a book on her lap. I said hello, discovering how much I missed directing an ordinary word at her, and she looked up smiling. When I announced the absence of the leaf, she admitted I sounded less leafy. I sat beside her to describe what happened.

She asked about the clouds and whether I kept my complaints to myself. After answering, I began explaining something from four days earlier because I could finally tell it at a sensible speed. She reminded me I did not have to say everything that evening, then promised we could make time for the considerable backlog I mentioned.

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I put an arm round her. She turned towards me, and the kiss we had carefully postponed needed no written explanation. For once I could enjoy an ordinary moment without calculating what moving my mouth might ruin.

The next morning came too soon. McGonagall met us at the workroom before sunrise, with the vial still untouched in its cupboard. I stood on clear floor away from the desk, holding my brush and the first of ten strips prepared for the daily repetitions. We checked the direction and release once more before the light changed.

I aligned the brush towards my chest and released the charged paper into the space before me. ‘Amato, Animo, Animato, Animagus.’ The strip burned through as warmth touched the place I indicated, then faded. I waited with one entirely familiar heartbeat and no second one to complicate it.

McGonagall asked what I felt, compared my answer with what she observed and had me record it. The spell reached its intended subject through the paper, establishing that much without proving the rest of the preparation successful. I glanced at the closed cupboard, where a month’s effort had brought me to the beginning of another wait.

By Friday morning, nine prepared strips were gone. Each sunrise or sunset release had an entry recording what followed, with the warmth becoming less remarkable and the absence of anything more increasingly familiar. I had checked the inscription often enough to picture it while looking elsewhere.

McGonagall reviewed the early entries and reminded me that patience could still be required after successful preparation. Apparently the month already spent did not purchase a shorter second stage. At least I could eat toast while waiting, a considerable improvement over contemplating it from beside Pomfrey’s arranged meals.

Defence should have offered a welcome interruption. Instead, I stopped in the doorway at the sight of desks arranged in neat rows again. A screen and old lantern projector stood at the front, and the room was quiet in a way which made Harry ask whether it felt familiar.

‘As though we’re about to be told we’ve all disappointed someone?’ I suggested. Ron surveyed the desks and protested that we had done nothing yet. The door opened behind us before I could explain why that might not matter, and Snape passed close enough to make me step aside.

He drew the curtains after reaching the front and ordered us to sit. I raised my hand once seated, waiting through the pause before his eyes reached me. When I asked where Lupin was, he said the professor was unwell and he would take the lesson, then opened his book at page three hundred and ninety-four.

A werewolf occupied most of that page. For a moment I remembered Lupin’s boggart, the moon and his urgent movement between Harry and the dementor. Snape’s suggestion in the hall followed, giving me an uncomfortable collection of thoughts with gaps between them. A picture in a lesson and a report of illness did not supply everything missing.

I looked up at Snape, whose expression offered no assistance. Hermione spoke beside me, hand raised, explaining that our recent work concerned Red Caps and Hinkypunks. Ron turned towards her as quickly as I did, beginning to ask when she arrived before Snape ordered him silent.

I had watched the doorway and then the book, with enough distraction between them to miss her entering. The private arrangements behind her timetable would have to remain private for another lesson. Snape could find sufficient trouble for us in the present without help from that particular question.

He placed a slide in the lantern. An unfamiliar illustration appeared on the screen as he asked who could distinguish an Animagus from a werewolf. Hermione raised her hand higher, while mine stayed on the desk despite weeks of reading that could have supplied a long answer. I recognised the look of a question whose asker might prefer leaving it unanswered.

His gaze travelled across the other side of the room. When he asked whether nobody knew, I caught Hermione’s eye and made a small movement with my head. She spoke anyway, explaining the learned, controlled transformation of an Animagus and its retention of human identity.

‘A werewolf changes involuntarily at the full moon,’ she continued. ‘In an uncontrolled transformation they lose ordinary human judgement and can attack people they know.’ Snape finally turned to her, and I watched her raised hand begin to lower before he answered.

He asked whether she was uncertain that he had called on her. Five points came off Gryffindor, followed by a remark that memorising a book did not excuse speaking out of turn. My jaw tightened as she looked down at her notes. He had asked, ignored the offered answer and then made receiving it an offence.

I leaned towards her and said the answer was right. Snape asked whether it was, bringing my eyes back to him, and I confirmed it. If so, he said, I should have no trouble producing two rolls of parchment distinguishing voluntary human Transfiguration from the dangers of an uncontrolled werewolf.

They were due on his desk on Monday. I agreed and wrote the assignment before another reply could lengthen it, while he returned to the slide. The rest of the lesson provided plenty to use: recognition, defensive precautions and detailed notes which kept our quills moving. Hermione’s hand stayed down, and Harry pressed hard enough for me to hear his writing.

Outside, Ron waited for the classroom door to close before commenting on the two rolls. I said I had heard, but he thought I looked ready to offer a third. Hermione moved her books higher against her chest and thanked me for saying her answer was correct, making the assignment seem slightly less aggravating.

She still thought I chose a dreadful time to say it. I admitted to noticing a flaw in the delivery, which earned a small smile before Harry glanced back towards the classroom. He hoped Lupin would recover soon, and I agreed. More than one reason occurred to me, but none justified turning the corridor conversation into an accusation I could not support.