Chapter 190

The venue for the said event will be at the Malfoy Manor in Wiltshire and dress code will be formal robes with the theme being 'Beast'. We wish that you will find time for you to be present on the party. Please let us know whether you can or cannot join us for whatever reason.

Hoping to receive an acceptance letter at your earliest convenience and to see you in the ball.

Best Regards,

Lucius Malfoy

Head of The Most Noble House of Malfoy

And so when Christmas morning dawned, cold and white, Harry was woken very early by Hermione, who burst in, fully dressed and carrying presents.

"Wake up," she said loudly, to the otherwise empty boy's dorm, pulling back the curtains at the window.

"Urgh," Harry grumbled, shielding his eyes from the light, "Hermione, you're not supposed to be in here you know"

"Merry Christmas to you, too! Up you get now, Dean will be waiting for us in the Hall," said Hermione cheerfully, and Harry gave her a small pitying glance.

The girl had taken Terry's leaving the worst. For the first few days, she refused to come out of her dorms for anything other than food. And after that, she had suddenly turned completely cheerful and normal. It hadn't taken Harry or Dean too long to realize that she had decided to completely ignore what had happened and was trying to act normally. Not knowing what else to do, they simply decided to go along with it and let her come to terms with it in her own time.

Harry's Christmas presents did a lot to brighten his day.

Hagrid's treacle fudge, combined with the Weasley's gift of homemade chocolate cake and a green hand-knit sweater were beyond awesome. The lot of ancient books from the Flamels were very much appreciated, as were the works and chocolates that his friends had sent him, although Harry did feel a twinge of sorrow as he read through the book on Dragons that Terry had given him.

The Great Hall looked magnificent.

Not only were there a dozen frost-covered Christmas trees and thick streamers of holly and mistletoe crisscrossing the ceiling, but enchanted snow was falling, warm and dry, from the ceiling.

Lockhart was leading the students that stayed through a few of his favorite carols, and Hagrid was booming more and more loudly with every goblet of eggnog he consumed. Hermione and Dean had decided to head back to their common rooms as soon as they finished breakfast, not wanting to torture their ears anymore. The promise of infinite Christmas pudding was too good for Harry to pass up though, and so he stayed.

Harry had barely finished his seventh helping of Christmas pudding when suddenly he caught sight of who was skipping towards his spot on the table, and a foreboding chill traveled down his spine.

"Oh hello, Mr. Toadinger! How do you do?" the blonde merrily asked while plonking herself down next to Harry.

"Um…"

"I'm doing fine as well Mr. Toadinger," she carried on, "Thank you for asking. The Nargles haven't come after me since you fended them off for me, and I really wanted to thank you for that."

"Er…You're welcome…?" Harry tentatively replied.

Luna gave him a wide grin, before bringing her hand up to scratch Harry behind his ears, making her bottlecap necklace jingle around. Harry's left eye developed a severe twitch before he gently pushed her hand away from his face and forced the twitch to stop, making her frown a bit.

"I wanted to say thank you, but I didn't really know what Umdingering Toadingers liked to eat, so I just had my daddy add you to a year's subscriptions for the Quibbler," Luna continued, pulling out a garishly purple copy of the Quibbler and handing it to Harry.

"Thank you," Harry automatically replied as he looked at the featured article on the cover.

EXCLUSIVE!

Fudge pregnant with Mongoose babies!

Read the Mongoose's testimony about how he was forced to impregnate Fudge!

Article by Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Seas and Conqueror of the British Empire in The United Kingdom in General and Wales in Particular Sir Xenophilius Lovegood the Second.

Only on Quibbler Christmas Special Edition!

Harry's eye twitch somehow mysteriously decided to re-emerge and was showing no signs of receding. Luna simply gave him one last pat on the head before getting up and skipping off to who knows where.

The only other thing of note that had happened on the Christmas day was the half a dozen people who had started setting up a large golden net looking thing under the tallest tower. When Harry had asked one of them what it was all about, he had come to know that it was for the Publicity stunt that Lockhart planned to hold in the first week of January. Harry's observe on the net had finally alleviated his worries about having to somehow save Lockhart from the fall.

Enchanted Industrial Grade Breaking Safety Net

A very powerful enchanted safety net capable of protecting people from any injury after falling from great heights by limiting the distance they fall, and deflecting to dissipate the impact energy. Charmed to be Unbreakable, this net can catch a falling overweight troll from a height over 700 meters without any harm to the subject at all.

And so, with quite a few worries off his chest and feeling overall better and happier than when he had woken up in the morning, Harry headed off towards the Ravenclaw tower.

However, his happy mood wasn't to last. About halfway to the tower in a third-floor corridor, a bunch of urgent muffled voices from a nearby classroom caught his attention. Harry frowned before he put his ear against the door and listened to what was going on.

"For the last time," a weak trembling voice said, "I am not the Heir. You are making a mistake. When Snape-oomph"

A sudden thump of flesh meeting flesh and a sudden crack echoed through, and the voice shut up completely.

"Oh shit!" another, a deeper voice said, panic evident in his voice, "Oh no no no! He's bleeding Richard! Is he dead? Please tell me he's not dead!"

"Shut up and check his pulse Rudy!" another panicky voice snapped at the first.

There was a small silence before either of them spoke.

"He's alive. Knocked out I think. But this is it, Richard. You wanted to rough the kid up, you roughed him up. I'm out now. I can't be tied back to this. My mum would kill me. I'm leaving, whether you're coming or not."

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