Year Five - Chapter Fourteen

It took a month. A whole month of weekly updates on the incredible adventures of the two Professors of Doom, but finally it drove home into their skulls that they could either come to tolerate one another, or the pamphlets would keep on being produced, printed and distributed across the school. Even Harry was at his limits, the poor boy having actually taken away some points from his own house, just to get the students to stop laughing at him.

I remained quite calm. I was the eye of the storm. People expected something like this from the likes of me, but not only had I not made a shadow-themed nickname, I was utterly washing my hands of the entire thing.

I had decided to renounce History of Magic and the OWL that went with it. Apologies to Professor Binns, but I felt it was an utterly useless class to take. I didn't need history to learn not to repeat the mistakes of the old wizards and witches; I knew enough of human, muggle history to keep my head in the game of avoiding to assault Russia in winter, or give the plebs cake rather than bread.

Thus, in those hours I worked on the other Professors' homework.

The number of sniffling students had dwindled down. Some were actually looking forward to the adventures of the two Doom Professors, having utterly forgotten about poor Yrrah being the main focus of the two's adventure, and I had done my best to keep it so.

My Transfiguration homework done, I ended up trudging with a half-sleepy expression towards dinner, seemingly forgetting something utterly important in the meantime.

"Mister Umbrus," a small voice caught my attention, making me turn towards it. I stared at the figure, trying to parse where I had seen it before, and yet utterly failing. It had to be a random first year, or second year. The tie said Slytherin, but I didn't really care about the tie. "Professor Hagrid wants you to come by as soon as you can. It concerns your Fire Crab-"

As soon as the boy said that, I groaned loudly. I knew I had forgotten something, and in this particular circumstance, it was the Fire Crab. I gave the boy a nod, and rushed forward. I reckoned it would have died without food for a whole week, all things said and done. Or maybe Hagrid had fed it in my place? He wouldn't willfully let it die, or starve. I guessed it meant I had gotten my first failing grade of my entire career. Poor little Fire Crab, murderous and hateful, I will forget you soon enough, if my workload doesn't diminish.

Maybe Care for Magical Creatures could be dropped too?

The imagery of dead students everywhere made me rethink that option. No, without me, they'd die or be grievously wounded. I was necessary.

It was as I repeated that, as I made myself believe that my sacrifices were being observed by my fellow students, that I ended up watching the absolutely healthy Fire Crab that Hagrid had apparently been feeding in my place skitter about its cage, without the slightest worry on its carapace, or eyes.

I ended up exhaling in relief and crouching down on my knees to be at eye-level with it, its clacking pincers threatening me from behind the bars of its cage. "You little bastard," I muttered with a chuckle under my breath, "I thought you had croaked."

But then, why had I been called here? Was this an ambush?

A trap. A dastardly trap by a worthless Draco who had even gone as far as use a second year to lure me in. The bastard would pay when I got my hands on him; he was making me miss my dinner, and-

I turned, wand in hand, and came face to face with a determined-looking Slytherin girl holding a box of chocolates in her hands.

I blinked. I looked at the girl, and then at the chocolates. "Today's Valentine day, isn't it?" I said, quietly putting my wand back in its holster as the girl shyly nodded. "Uhm," I said, awkwardly scratching the side of my face. "Sorry about the wand-pointing. Thought it was one of Draco's silly bullying schemes."

The girl took a deep breath, and then extended the box in my direction, "H-Here," she said. "H-Hope you read the note!" she blushed, and then ran off faster than I could politely turn her down.

Why would she do that? I'd have to run after her. I'd have to run after her, find her name, and then tell her that I wasn't interested.

I didn't want to run. Perhaps the note would contain something interesting.

I find myself fancying you. Would you like to go to Hogsmeade together? Madam Puddifoot's tea shop makes delicious coffee cakes. Please answer me soon, in the meantime have some chocolate.

Fancying you even more,

Daphne Greengrass.

I stared at the letter. I stared at the letter like it was some kind of utterly bizarre, alien construct, and then I broke out into maddening fits of howling laughter. I snickered, shook my head, and outright wiped my eyes from the tears that threatened to come out of it.

Seriously. Seriously? Seriously! Out of all the possible cut-out cardboard students that could ever write me a silly, fancy love-letter at Valentine, it had to be the one known throughout the unnaturally creepy world of fanfiction literature as the one girl nobody knew anything apart from her name? Had it been her sister, as younger as she was, there was at least something to move on! Like her fondness for sweets, for example, or-

Her fondness for sweets.

My eyes snapped to a near-close. I did vaguely remember helping a second year Slytherin concerning sweets, but even then, I had helped a lot of first, second, third and sometimes even fourth year students, so it was ludicrous to expect that-

I took five steps towards the castle of Hogwarts before another girl neared, this time a Hufflepuff. She thrust a chocolate package in my hands, told me to read the note, and then left faster than I could open my mouth.

I began to feel dread pool into the pits of my stomach.

Ten more steps, two different girls.

Twenty more steps, a couple of third years giggling like lunatics.

I was in sight of the castle, an older sixth year Gryffindor with a nice smile.

By the time I reached the dinner table, I dimly realized a couple of boys had left their own chocolate boxes on the pile that I had begun to float behind me.

"Well," I said offhandedly as I sat down, much to the astonished shock on everyone by my side at the table, "It appears either someone mistook me for Wayne and his fondness for chocolate, or someone's published an article of sorts on some fancy teen magazine."

"Or maybe," Megan said amiably, "Someone who's been spending his time, and effort, into making others feel welcome at Hogwarts is being showered with gifts to show just how much they are being appreciated by those around them," she plopped a chocolate box down in front of me. "Thanks for everything, Shade."

"Yeah," Amanda said, plopping a box of chocolate in front of me too, "Thanks for everything."

"Aye," Wayne added his own box, "Mine are merely because I like gifting chocolate to those in need, though," he grinned.

"Thank you, Wayne," I said with a dreadful sigh, "Now, how about the love letters that came with the boxes? Am I supposed to answer each of them?"

"Of course you're supposed to!" Amanda exclaimed, hotly. "You need to give a proper answer to someone's feelings, don't you know that?"

I rolled my eyes, pulled the chocolate boxes away from my platter, and then thanked the House Elves for their pork chop dinner and sweet vanilla pudding dessert. If they had made something chocolate-themed, I would have died from saccharine overdose.

This still left me with a good twenty-seven, or perhaps even thirty-four, as some more chocolate boxes ended up delivered on my way to the Ravenclaw common room, where I'd need to at the very least answer some of those.

"I'm sorry, but my heart is not ready to accept the commitment of a relationship," I wrote down on a clean parchment. "I do appreciate the chocolate, but unfortunately I do not see a foreseeable future in which we may come together as a couple. Yours sincerely, Umbrus Shade."

Then I copied it for fifty times, just in case there were more letters than I had found, and proceeded to write a name and surname on each of them for hasty delivery.

The school owls would have to understand why I needed to use them on mass.

The look of betrayal my own forgotten owl sent me from her cage made me hiss ever so slightly.

"I shouldn't be given pets to take care of! I've been busy!" I whined while looking at her.

The owl hooted, ever so angrily, and then took one of the many rejection letters to deliver.

Once they flew off into the air, happily taking to perching on Hogwarts' rafters until the next morning, I was ready to return to the common room to finally catch some much needed sleep-eye.

Draco Malfoy stopped me dead on my track, a package in his hands.

"No!" I blurted out, making a cross-sign with my arms and taking a step back, "Not you too!"

He sneered, and then looked away, embarrassed. "My father says I shouldn't be obliged to follow the likes of Crabbe and Goyle," he continued. "He wanted me to apologize to you." He quietly extended the package in my direction, clearly looking like he wanted to do anything but deliver it.

"It's not a bomb, is it?" I asked, taking the edges of the package and then proceeding to carefully open it.

"It's not a bomb," Draco said with a huff. "It's a cloak."

It actually was a cloak. It also was of the same color as the shimmering suit I had worn during the trial. As far as apology gifts went, this one wasn't that bad.

The thought of the cursed objects Draco used to deliver trying to murder Dumbledore made their way through my head, but then I decided to ignore them.

After all, he wouldn't be so stupid as to give me a cursed cloak while at Hogwarts now, would he?

"Thank you for the gift," I said, looking at it, "It wasn't needed, but thank you."

"Whatever," Draco grumbled. "Does this mean I can stop playing the statue during detention?"

"Well, that always depended on you, Draco," I replied with a charming smile. "Will you listen properly?"

"I...I will," he exhaled. "I don't want to fail my OWL."

I grinned. "Then, let's get cracking, Draco."

Everything was turning up to be going better than I had expected.

I would still be checking the cloak for curses, though.

Forgiveness was the attribute of the strong, the virtue of the brave...

...but double-checking was that of the wise, and of the long-lived.