"Good evening, Miss Mckinnon, Mr. Potter."

"Evening," Harry and Erin said stiffly.

"Well, sit down," she said, pointing toward two small tables draped in lace beside which she had drawn up a straight-backed chairs. A piece of blank parchments lay on the tables, apparently waiting for them.

"Er," said Harry, without moving. "Professor Umbridge? Er - before we start, I-I wanted to ask you a . . . a favour."

Erin looked at him as if he had lost his brain on the way there.

Umbridge's bulging eyes narrowed.

"Oh yes?"

"Well, I'm . . . I'm on the Gryffindor Quidditch team. And I was supposed to be at the tryouts for the new Keeper at five o'clock on Friday and I was - was wondering whether I could skip detention that night and do it - do it another night . . . instead . . ."

"Oh no," said Umbridge, smiling so widely that she looked as though she had just swallowed a particularly juicy fly. "Oh no, no, no. This is your punishment for spreading evil, nasty, attention-seeking stories, Mr. Potter, and punishments certainly cannot be adjusted to suit the guilty one's convenience. No, you will come here at five o'clock tomorrow, and the next day, and on Friday too, and you will do your detentions as planned. I think it is rather a good thing that you are missing something you really want to do. It ought to reinforce the lesson I am trying to teach you."

"There," said Umbridge sweetly, "we're getting better at controlling our temper already, aren't we? Now, you are going to be doing some lines for me, Mr. Potter and Miss Mckinnon. No, not with your quills," she added, as Harry bent down to open his bag. "You're going to be using a rather special one of mine. Here you are." She handed them each a long, thin black quill with an unusually sharp point. "I want you to write ' I must not tell lies,'" she told them softly.

"How many times?" Harry asked, with a creditable imitation of politeness.

"Oh, as long as it takes for the message to sink in," said Umbridge sweetly. "Off you go." She moved over to her desk, sat down, and bent over a stack of parchment that looked like essays for marking. Erin raised the sharp black quill and then realised what was missing.

"You haven't given us any ink," she said.

"Oh, you won't need ink," said Professor Umbridge with the merest suggestion of a laugh in her voice.

They placed the point of the quills on their paper and wrote: I must not tell lies.

Erin felt a sharp pain on her hand. The sentence she wrote appeared on the paper in a red ink. But not only there, she still felt some cutting into her skin. Erin realised that the red ink was her own blood as she let out a hiss in pain.

Harry did too.

"Yes?" asked Umbridge, acting clueless.

"Nothing," said Harry quietly. Erin remained silent.

And it went on and on. Again and again. Pain. Pain. Pain. Then finally, it was over.

"Come here," she said to them, after what seemed hours.

They stood up. Their hands were stinging painfully.

"Hand," she said to Erin first.

She extended it. Umbridge took it in her own. Erin repressed a shudder as the woman touched her with her thick, stubby fingers on which she wore a number of ugly old rings.

She looked at Harry's hand and then, they were free to go.

***

As soon as Erin stepped into the Slytherin common room, she was met with Daphne and Astoria, who were waiting for her.

"How did it go?" asked Astoria.

"Could be worse, could be better," answered Erin as she sat on the black couch between her friends.

"You don't look very happy," remarked Daphne. Before Erin could give a sarcastic answer, Astoria gasped.

"What is that?"

"What?"

She grabbed Erin's hand and rolled up her sleeve a little. "This!"

"Merlin," gaped Daphne as she carefully took Erin's hand into hers. "What has that woman done to you?"

"Let me tell you this," began Erin. "There is a paper that has I must not tell lies written all over it at least a thousand times with my blood! Same with Harry."

Astoria clapped her hand over her forehead. "But that's illegal!"

"She doesn't care," said Daphne. "This Umbitch woman is worse than Snape!"

"Umbitch?" Erin repeated with a laugh.

"Be serious, Erin!"

"Oh, you want me to escape from this school?"

"Erin!"

"Sorry!"

***

After another few detentions with Umbridge, Erin didn't dare to speak a word unless it was necessary.

It was October while Luna, Daphne, Astoria, and Erin were in the library. The older girls were working on another Potion essay Snape assigned them while the younger ones needed some help with their History of Magic homework.

She expected a lot of people to interrupt her studying. Malfoy coming to annoy the living soul from her with giggling Parkinson by her side. She even expected that Hufflepuff boy in her year to ask her on a date for the millionth time that week, but she surely did not expect Hermione Granger to appear by the table in the library.

"Oh, Erin, hello," she smiled at the girl before greeting the others. "Can I talk to you?"

"Yeah, of course."

Hermione raised her eyebrow. "In private."

"Oh, right," Erin stood up and followed Hermione behind one of the book shelves.

"Okay, I'm about to offer something and if you won't want to do that, it's completely fine but I would rather if you wouldn't mention it to your friends," said Hermione in a whisper.

Erin raised her eyebrow and whispered, "Granger, we're in the library. . ."

Hermione's eyes widened, cheeks heating. "That's not what I— Anyway, you know that Umbridge won't teach us much this year, right?" Erin nodded. "Well, I thought that we could teach ourselves in secret."

"Under Umbridge's nose?" Erin asked.

"Under Umbridge's nose," Hermione confirmed. "I asked Harry if he wants to teach us and after some convincing, he agreed. We won't be able to protect ourselves otherwise."

"So you're asking me to join. . . this army?"

"Yes," Hermione nodded. "And I would like Luna to join too if she wants."

"Great, can I ask Daphne and Astoria too?"

The Gryffindor witch sighed. "Look, Erin, I'm not sure about them. . ."

"But they are my friends," Erin tried to reason. "I can't lie to them where I go. Look, Hermione, it's obvious that the only Pureblood Slytherins you've ever met are Malfoy and Parkinson, but I must assure you that not every Pureblood Slytherin is like them. Astoria and Daphne hate Umbridge, they hate Malfoy and Parkinson and anyone who thinks like them. You can ask Harry, he'd met them."

Hermione shook her head. "No, it's okay. . . I trust you."

Erin stared at her before nodding. "Thank you."

"Meet us on Saturday in the Hog's Head."

And so Erin went back to her friends and explained everything.

"Where do they want to practise?" Was the first thing Astoria asked.

"Hermione told me to meet them in the Hog's Head on Saturday."

"Hog's Head?" said Daphne in surprise. "That's way too small for us to practise magic, let alone other, like, thirty or more people!"

***

"You came," said Hermione happily at the sight of Erin and her friend group.

"I wouldn't dare to disappoint you," Erin smiled. "This is a big risk though. If Umbridge finds out about this, I'm totally blaming you."

The tone the girl was speaking with told Hermione that Erin was only joking. "We aren't doing anything against school rules," the Gryffindor assured. "I even asked Flitwick if students can go to Hog's head and he said we can!"

"Don't tell that to me. Tell that to Umbridge when she suddenly appears here and gives us all a detention every day for the rest of the year," Erin laughed even though the idea didn't appeal to her at all.

Erin, Daphne, Astoria, and Luna all took a seat and Hermione started speaking, her voice higher than usual.

"Er," said Hermione, her voice slightly higher than usual out of nerves. "Well - er - hi. Well . . . erm . . . well, you know why you're here. Erm . . . well, Harry here had the idea - I mean I had the idea - that it might be good if people who wanted to study Defence Against the Dark Arts - and I mean, really study it, you know, not the rubbish that Umbridge is doing with us" - (Hermione's voice became suddenly much stronger and more confident) - "because nobody could call that Defense Against the Dark Arts, well, I thought it would be good if we, well, took matters into our own hands." She paused, looked sideways at Harry, and went on, "And by that I mean learning how to defend ourselves properly, not just theory but the real spells -"

"You want to pass your Defence Against the Dark Arts O.W.L. too though, I bet?" said Michael Corner.

"Of course I do," said Hermione at once. "But I want more than that, I want to be properly trained in Defence because . . . because . . ." She took a great breath and finished, "Because Lord Voldemort's back."

The reaction was immediate and predictable. Cho's friend shrieked and slopped butterbeer down herself, Terry Boot gave a kind of involuntary twitch, Padma Patil shuddered, and Neville gave an odd yelp that he managed to turn into a cough. All of them, however, looked fixedly, even eagerly, at Harry.

"Well . . . that's the plan anyway," said Hermione. "If you want to join us, we need to decide how we're going to -"

"Where's the proof You-Know-Who's back?" said the blond Hufflepuff player in a rather aggressive voice.

"Well, Dumbledore believes it -" Hermione began.

"You mean, Dumbledore believes him," said the blond boy, nodding at Harry.

"Who are you?" said Ron rather rudely.

"Zacharias Smith," said the boy, "and I think we've got the right to know exactly what makes him say You-Know-Who's back."

"Well, Smith," began Erin. "What do you think Harry was supposed to do? Take a picture of Voldemort as he was trying to murder Harry and already murdered Cedric?" She looked at Harry. "Sorry, Potter."

"It's okay, Erin," said Harry. "What makes me say You-Know-Who's back?" he asked, looking Zacharias straight in the face. "I saw him. But Dumbledore told the whole school what happened last year, and if you didn't believe him, you don't believe me, and I'm not wasting an afternoon trying to convince anyone."

Zacharias said dismissively, "All Dumbledore told us last year was that Cedric Diggory got killed by You-Know-Who and that you brought Diggory's body back to Hogwarts. He didn't give us details, he didn't tell us exactly how Diggory got murdered, I think we'd all like to know -"

"If you've come to hear exactly what it looks like when Voldemort murders someone I can't help you," Harry said. "I don't want to talk about Cedric Diggory, all right? So if that's what you're here for, you might as well clear out." He cast an angry look in Hermione's direction.

"So," said Hermione, her voice very high-pitched again. "So . . .

like I was saying . . . if you want to learn some defence, then we need to work out how we're going to do it, how often we're going to meet, and where we're going to -"

"Is it true," interrupted Luna."that you can produce a Patronus?"

"Yeah," said Harry slightly defensively.

"A corporeal Patronus?"

"Er - you don't know Madam Bones, do you?" he asked.

The girl smiled.

"She's my auntie," she said. "I'm Susan Bones. She told me about your hearing. So - is it really true? You make a stag Patronus?"

"Yes," nodded Harry.

"Oh and were you really attacked by Dementors or did you produce it because you tried to impress someone-"

"Astoria," warned Erin.

"I was really attacked by Dementors, Greengrass."

"And did you kill a basilisk with that sword in Dumbledore's office?" demanded Terry Boot. "That's what one of the portraits on the wall told me when I was in there last year. . . ."

"Er - yeah, I did, yeah," said Harry.

"And in our first year," said Neville to the group at large, "he saved that Sorcerous Stone -"

"Sorcerer's," hissed Hermione.

"Yes, that, from You-Know-Who," finished Neville.

"And that's not to mention," said Cho, "all the tasks he had to get through in the Triwizard Tournament last year - getting past dragons and merpeople and acromantulas and things. . . ."

There was a murmur of impressed agreement around the table.

"Look," Harry said and everyone fell silent at once, "I . . . I don't want to sound like I'm trying to be modest or anything, but . . . I had a lot of help with all that stuff. . . ."

"Not with the dragon, you didn't," said Michael Corner at once. "That was a seriously cool bit of flying. . . ."

"Yeah, well -" said Harry.

"And nobody helped you get rid of those dementors this summer," said Susan Bones.

"No," said Harry, "no, okay, I know I did bits of it without help, but the point I'm trying to make is -"

"Are you trying to weasel out of showing us any of this stuff?" asked Zacharias Smith.

"Here's an idea," said Ron loudly, before Harry could speak, "why don't you shut your mouth?"

"Well, we've all turned up to learn from him, and now he's telling us he can't really do any of it," Smith said.

"That's not what he said," snarled Fred Weasley.

"Would you like us to clean out your ears for you?" inquired George, pulling a long and lethal-looking metal instrument from inside one of the Zonko's bags.

"Or any part of your body, really, we're not fussy where we stick this," said Fred.

"Yes, well," said Hermione hastily, "moving on . . . the point is, are we agreed we want to take lessons from Harry?"

There was a murmur of general agreement.

"Right," said Hermione, looking relieved that something had at last been settled. "Well, then, the next question is how often we do it. I really don't think there's any point in meeting less than once a week -"

"Hang on," said Angelina, "we need to make sure this doesn't clash with our Quidditch practice."

"No," said Cho, "nor with ours."

"Nor ours," added Zacharias Smith.

"I'm sure we can find a night that suits everyone," said Hermione, slightly impatiently, "but you know, this is rather important, we're talking about learning to defend ourselves against V-Voldemort's Death Eaters -"

"Well said!" barked Ernie Macmillan,

"Personally I think this is really important, possibly more important than anything else we'll do this year, even with our O.W.L.s coming up! I, personally, am at a loss to see why the Ministry has foisted such a useless teacher upon us at this critical period. Obviously, they are in denial about the return of You-Know-Who, but to give us a teacher who is trying to actively prevent us from using defencive spells -"

"We think the reason Umbridge doesn't want us trained in Defence Against the Dark Arts," said Hermione, "is that she's got some . . . some mad idea that Dumbledore could use the students in the school as a kind of private army. She thinks he'd mobilise us against the Ministry."

Nearly everybody looked stunned at this news; everybody except Luna who piped up. "Well, that makes sense. After all, Cornelius Fudge has got his own private army."

"What?" said Harry.

"Luna says he's got an army of heliopaths," answered Erin.

"No, he hasn't," snapped Hermione.

"Yes, he has," said Luna.

"What are heliopaths?" asked Neville, looking blank.

"They're spirits of fire," said Luna, "Great tall flaming creatures that gallop across the ground burning everything in front of -"

"They don't exist, Neville," said Hermione tartly.

"Oh yes they do!" said Luna angrily.

"I'm sorry, but where's the proof of that?" snapped Hermione.

"There are plenty of eyewitness accounts, just because you're so narrow-minded you need to have everything shoved under your nose before you -"

Erin stood up. "Alright, stop it, you two. I'm more interested in how often, when, and where are we going to have these illegal meetings."

"Yes," said Hermione at once, "you're right. . . ."

"Well, once a week sounds cool," said Lee Jordan.

"As long as -" began Angelina.

"Yes, yes, we know about the Quidditch," said Hermione in a tense voice. "Well, the other thing to decide is where we're going to meet. . . ."

This was rather more difficult; the whole group fell silent.

"Library?" suggested Katie Bell after a few moments.

"I can't see Madam Pince being too chuffed with us doing jinxes in the library," said Harry.

"Maybe an unused classroom?" said Dean.

"Yeah," said Ron, "McGonagall might let us have hers, she did when Harry was practising for the Triwizard. . . ."

"Right, well, we'll try to find somewhere," said Hermione. "We'll send a message round to everybody when we've got a time and a place for the first meeting." She rummaged in her bag and produced parchment and a quill, then hesitated, rather as though she was steeling herself to say something.

"I-I think everybody should write their name down, just so we know who was here. But I also think," she took a deep breath, "that we all ought to agree not to shout about what we're doing. So if you sign, you're agreeing not to tell Umbridge - or anybody else - what we're up to."