Draco Reads the News

The rest of the lesson didn't go exactly smoothly. Professor Trelawney was caught in the unfortunate position of wanting to be known as the person who had personally taught the next great true Seer of the century, but at the same time she was incredibly jealous that she herself wasn't a true Seer (even though she really was one). As such, she was especially hard on Oleandra.

Even so, one didn't need to be a true Seer in order to see the future. It wasn't as if ordinary Wizards couldn't get glimpses of the future through specialized equipment such as crystal balls or runestones, as long as they had a little bit of talent. It was just incredibly unreliable, to the point that simply guessing randomly might give one a better picture of the future. Oleandra's runestones used the magic of the stars to observe the Wyrd, the web of fate, so her method of divination was already a little better than most.

Going back to the class, each of the students were given circular charts. Oleandra was supposed to use hers to determine the position of the planets at the moment of her birth, which would supposedly let her understand her destiny. However, Oleandra instinctually knew the position of each heavenly body in the celestial sphere at any given moment of time, so she didn't even need to consult the charts.

"Oh Professor, look! I think I've got an unaspected planet!" cried Lavender Brown. "Oooh, which one's that, Professor?"

"It is Uranus, my dear," said Professor Trelawney.

"Can I have a look at Uranus too, Lavender?" said Ron, causing Oleandra to snort quite loudly.

Unfortunately, this funny little comment caused Professor Trelawney to assign them a whole pile of homework at the end of the class, consisting of a detailed analysis of the way the planetary movements in the coming month in conjunction with their own birth planets would affect their lives.

With a double class of Divination out of the way, it was at last time for dinner, so Oleandra and the rest of class headed down the silver ladder and out of the North Tower to the Great Hall for their meal.

"Miserable old bat," Ron was swearing. "That'll take all weekend, that will..."

"It's not that difficult," Oleandra interjected. "What's your birth planet?"

"I don't even know!" Ron said tiredly. "Bloody charts' got too many symbols on it, couldn't find my birth date…"

"Which is?"

"March 1, 1980."

"Then you were born under Mars," Oleandra explained. "Let's see… Venus will be prominent in the following months, so you'll get in a lot of arguments with close friends."

"That's brilliant!" exclaimed Ron. "The old bat will just lap that up! Thanks, Oleandra!"

"No problem, Coz," Oleandra grinned.

"How many times have I told you, Ron?" said Hermione reproachfully, who had just arrived from Arithmancy class with Daphne. "You'll never learn anything if you keep relying on others for homework."

"Even if it's Divination homework?" asked Harry quizzically.

"Oh, in that case, it's fine, then," Hermione said cheerfully. "That subject is completely devoid of worth; unlike Arithmancy. Have I mentioned Professor Vector didn't give us any homework?"

"Well, bully for Professor Vector," grumbled Ron. From her expression, he would have guessed the opposite was true, actually: Hermione loved homework.

Now that Oleandra and Tracey had rejoined with Daphne, they could head to their seats in the Great Hall for dinner, which was sounding more and more appealing by the minute. But before they could say their farewells to the Gryffindor Trio, a familiar voice rang out behind them.

"Weasley! Hey, Weasley!" shouted Draco, who was as usual flanked by his goon squad: Crabbe and Goyle.

"What?" said Ron shortly.

"Your dad's in the paper, Weasley!" said Malfoy very loudly, waving about a copy of the Daily Prophet. "Listen to this!

FURTHER MISTAKES AT THE MINISTRY OF MAGIC

It seems as though the Ministry of Magic's troubles are not yet at an end, writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent. Recently under fire for its poor crowd control at the Quidditch World Cup, and still unable to account for the disappearance of one of its witches, it has come to light that the British Bureau of Obliviators has lost track of a Muggle child under their supervision. After temporarily losing most of the Roberts family, Arthur Peasegood, an Obliviator, reported that their young daughter had previously managed to overpower him and consequently escaped from the Obliviators' grasp before they could erase her memories, and was still on the run. Could this be the end of Wizarding society as we know it?"

'Wasn't the man's name Ernie, or something like that?' Oleandra wondered to herself. 'Also, why haven't they figured out yet that this Muggle girl doesn't actually exist? She doesn't have a birth certificate; she's me!'

"So?" said Ron in annoyance. "Is there a point to this story, or are you trying to waste my time?"

"Just wait, the good part's coming up," guffawed Draco. "And I think Skeeter mixed up your father's name with Peasegood's. Imagine being this forgettable; it's almost as if he's a complete nonentity, isn't it?"

By now, Draco's antics had managed to get everyone present in the Entrance Hall, which was in front of the Great Hall's, attention. Draco straightened out the paper and kept reading:

"This wouldn't be the last of the embarrassment the Ministry would see itself be involved in, thanks to the antics of Arnold Weasley, of the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office."

In short, Ron's father had rushed to the rescue of their new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Mad-Eye Moody, right before he came to Hogwarts. Apparently, the man had enchanted some dustbins to protect his property against intruders. Many people harboured hatred for the man, since during his tenure as Auror, he had filled half of Azkaban, the British Wizarding World's jail, by himself. Consequently, he had made himself a lot of enemies, so he had become rather paranoid in his retirement.

But obviously, this latest incident was nothing more than a false alert. Oleandra had no issues believing this, having once been attacked by him during an innocent hospital visit to a friend. And Moody's spells packed quite a punch!

At any rate, the incident with the magical dustbins had alerted the entire neighbourhood and brought down the Muggle policemen upon both Weasley and Moody, so this was quite the embarrassment for the Ministry!