Amongst books

Harry walked inside the library, skipping past Madam Pince's vacant desk.

'Ugh. I'll have to search for Hermione now.'

He barely wandered any deeper inside when someone called him from behind.

"Ah, Mr. Potter watch your step. I'm giving you a fair warning that you had better be careful with any of the books that you are so graciously allowed access to," she pronounced.

Harry turned around to face the vulturelike countenance of Madam Pince. He couldn't help scowling at her sight.

Sunken cheeks, skin like parchment, and a long hooked nose, leaned from behind a bookshelf.

'How does this godforsaken woman know whenever I walk inside the library?' he wondered incredulously.

In his first year, Harry quickly established that the Hogwarts librarian, Madam Irma Pince, held a particularly strong dislike for him.

Every time he'd visit the library, whether he'd be alone or accompanied by someone else, Madam Pince would scowlingly exhort him to be careful around the books.

That was one of the main reasons he didn't frequent the library much. After all, who'd willingly go to a place they were unwelcomed?

There was also that one time, in his second week at the school when he accidentally dropped a book on the floor. He still remembered the shock of having an enraged adult, not Dursley, shouting at him so suddenly and unduly.

"Yes, madam," he remarked and for the first time he was mostly unbothered by her unjust attitude.

'If she wants to be a bitch for no reason, then let her,' he mused.

A certain dungeon bat came to Harry's mind, but he slightly shook his head not wanting to think of that man.

Her lack of conviction at Harry's words was palpable, but he didn't think twice about it.

His seemingly uncaring attitude came as a surprise to Harry, but he put it in the back of his mind for now.

"Miss Granger is currently in the History section, third row," she let him know, surprising Harry.

'Was she just helpful to me?' he thought hesitantly.

What was the world coming to?

He gave the librarian a passing nod and headed towards the deeper sections of the library.

The history wing was one of the farthest sectors, bordering with the restricted section of the library.

When he turned to the third row of the History wing, he was almost expecting to find it empty. However, against all odds, Hermione was there, just like Pince said.

She was leaning over a book, between her hands, with her hair flowing down and hugging her face.

Her hands were planted on a mahogany desk that accommodated countless books of all sizes and colours, left open on random pages.

She was currently speeding through the book placed under her.

'She must have read something unpleasant,' Harry thought as Hermione's eyebrows scrunched.

It must have been worse than they both initially thought as her expression cycled from disapproval to anger and finally horror.

"Read something good?" he whispered.

Even though he suddenly didn't seem to mind the librarian's attitude towards him, he wasn't going to antagonise her by giving her reasons to reprimand him.

Hermione gave a soundless squeak as she turned her body to face him.

"Harry!" she failed to speak softly, resulting in a slightly elevated volume.

"Hermione!" he couldn't help replying, mimicking her tone.

Harry knew that would have earned him a slap, were they closer and not in the library.

"Sigh. Come and read it yourself," she whispered in mock indignation while pointing at the book.

She pushed herself off the desk and pulled out her wand to cast two wingardium leviosas, levitating two chairs for them to sit on.

'Damn, I wonder if I can do that. She has a really good control of the spell,' Harry observed as the chairs silently landed beside them.

His mind flashed to another girl's precise control of magic that he caught sight of, not too long ago.

Unwittingly, he matched the image of Fleur with the girl sitting in front of him, his mind wandering to their other similarities…

'Hermione has a slightly smaller bosom but she's also younger, so she'll probably catch up. Her arse is almost as round but definitely less toned,' he scrutinized.

'Overall, body-wise Hermione's not much behind Fleur,' he summed up, after having another good look at her body.

'But Fleur is in her own league,' he deemed.

It was then that he realised in horror that Hermione was a girl and that he was also, shamelessly checking her out.

'Thank god she wasn't looking at me,' he thought, thanking whatever few lucky stars he had.

He quickly fought off the blush that kept trying to form on his face and sat on the chair that his friend provided him.

In an attempt to stop his mind from trying to calculate the feeling of touching various body parts of his friend, Harry reached for the book.

'Holy hell, that's Hogwarts, A History, the book that Hermione keeps babbling about since the first year,' he noted as he picked up the book.

Any sexual thoughts that plagued his mind, quickly died down after he read what caused Hermione's reaction.

.

The Triwizard Tournament was last held in 1792 at Hogwarts. The first task involved catching an adult cockatrice in an enclosed space. Needless to say, it was a horrendous disaster. The first two competitors met valiant ends, both having managed to substantially harm the monster. That's what everyone thought at least. When the third competitor went in, the young man who represented Hogwarts, everything changed. It seemed that for some reason, everyone had forgotten about a cockatrice's human-like intelligence. Whether that was because it had managed to fool everyone or because no one cared enough, is a topic of speculation.

The beast opened its beak and talked! It talked in English… It called us all fools, with an accent not unlike ours, and then proceeded to go on a rampage. It once again opened its majestic beak, but instead of more words of mockery coming out of it, it breathed gas. A life-killing, poisonous gas. It went everywhere… The competitor died instantly and before anyone managed to react, the barrier protecting the spectators started cracking. The beast got out and managed to kill most of the people in the stands and was finally finished off by the headmaster of Durmstrang. Not even the headmasters managed to get out of the ordeal uninjured...

.

"Woah," Harry muttered despondently.

If the last tournament was any indication of how his first task was going to be, it'd be a good idea to get in contact with a gravedigger soon.

After a whole minute of silence, Hermione grabbed his hands.

"Harry… Don't worry about the last tournament. You've heard what Professor Dumbledore said. He said that the Triwizard Tournament was revived with restrictions in place to prevent potential deaths," she whispered.

Harry turned his head to look at her when he felt something wet fall on his hand.

His friend was silently shedding tears, probably barely holding herself from sobbing.

"Sigh. Let's ignore the fact that you are crying, which says something about what you truly think… Do you honestly think that there are good enough restrictions that are able to ensure a student's survival against something like a bloody cockatrice? Let's assume that this is the case… And that's a big assumption. Would Dumbledore, the man who put the god damn philosopher's stone behind easily surpassable obstacles, think of and I quote 'good enough restrictions'?" he asked rhetorically.

He was mad.

His chances weren't looking good.

He could die.

He would die.

He didn't need an answer; he knew the truth of his words.

Any words to defend the headmaster died on her lips as she accepted the danger her friend was in. She finally started sobbing, albeit not before flicking her wand and murmuring quietus.

'A spell to block the sound,' he supposed.

Harry didn't know why but it was him that was hugged Hermione and tried to comfort her, instead of the other way around.

Wasn't it, his life that was sentenced to a most probable death in front of an action-hungry crowd?

'Girls,' he mused.

They stayed like that for a very long time…

By the time Hermione finally got off him, her face sporting a slight blush, the sun had set.

"Sorry about that," she whispered.

"Don't worry about it. You know that I'm here for you when you need me. Best friends and all that," he replied, not bothering to control his voice level this time.

"Shhhhh," she urged, drawing a confused look from Harry.

"Didn't you cast a sound-blocking spell?" he asked quietly.

"Harry, that was more than two hours ago! You should know that spells don't last forever," she answered.

While Harry once again found himself questioning the reliability of his own mind, Hermione recast the spell.

"It's fine now," she announced at a regular volume, managing to bring Harry back to the land of the living.

"To answer your question, I did in fact cast a spell that stops the sound from leaving its area. The incantation is quietus and its hand movement is a backwards C. It's the simplest spell that I've found and that does the job reliably," she informed him.

Harry stored that in his head for future use and gave a nod to show that he got that.

"Well, since you didn't bite and ask me to teach you the spell, I'll ask instead. Did you get anything from stalking Ron?" she inquired, prompting Harry to sigh so loudly that if Hermione hadn't cast quietus again, Madam Pince would have probably heard it.

'Dodged a bullet there. Or a vulture,' they both thought.

(Last edit: 16/07/2024)