The Order of the Phoenix Read online

  ‘An Auror’s worthwhile!’ said Harry.

  ‘Yes, it is, but it’s not the only worthwhile thing,’ said Hermione thoughtfully, ‘I mean, if I could take S.P.E.W. further …’

  Harry and Ron carefully avoided looking at each other.

  History of Magic was by common consent the most boring subject ever devised by wizardkind. Professor Binns, their ghost teacher, had a wheezy, droning voice that was almost guaranteed to cause severe drowsiness within ten minutes, five in warm weather. He never varied the form of their lessons, but lectured them without pausing while they took notes, or rather, gazed sleepily into space. Harry and Ron had so far managed to scrape passes in this subject only by copying Hermione’s notes before exams; she alone seemed able to resist the soporific power of Binns’s voice.

  Today, they suffered three quarters of an hour’s droning on the subject of giant wars. Harry heard just enough within the first ten minutes to appreciate dimly that in another teacher’s hands this subject might have been mildly interesting, but then his brain disengaged, and he spent the remaining thirty-five minutes playing hangman on a corner of his parchment with Ron, while Hermione shot them filthy looks out of the corner of her eye.

  ‘How would it be,’ she asked them coldly, as they left the classroom for break (Binns drifting away through the blackboard), ‘if I refused to lend you my notes this year?’

  ‘We’d fail our O.W.L.,’ said Ron. ‘If you want that on your conscience, Hermione …’

  ‘Well, you’d deserve it,’ she snapped. ‘You don’t even try to listen to him, do you?’

  ‘We do try,’ said Ron. ‘We just haven’t got your brains or your memory or your concentration – you’re just cleverer than we are – is it nice to rub it in?’

  ‘Oh, don’t give me that rubbish,’ said Hermione, but she looked slightly mollified as she led the way out into the damp courtyard.

  A fine misty drizzle was falling, so that the people standing in huddles around the yard looked blurred at the edges. Harry, Ron and Hermione chose a secluded corner under a heavily dripping balcony, turning up the collars of their robes against the chilly September air and talking about what Snape was likely to set them in the first lesson of the year. They had got as far as agreeing that it was likely to be something extremely difficult, just to catch them off guard after a two-month holiday, when someone walked around the corner towards them.

  ‘Hello, Harry!’

  It was Cho Chang and, what was more, she was on her own again. This was most unusual: Cho was almost always surrounded by a gang of giggling girls; Harry remembered the agony of trying to get her by herself to ask her to the Yule Ball.

  ‘Hi,’ said Harry, feeling his face grow hot. At least you’re not covered in Stinksap this time, he told himself. Cho seemed to be thinking along the same lines.

  ‘You got that stuff off, then?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Harry, trying to grin as though the memory of their last meeting was funny as opposed to mortifying. ‘So, did you … er … have a good summer?’

  The moment he had said this he wished he hadn’t – Cedric had been Cho’s boyfriend and the memory of his death must have affected her holiday almost as badly as it had affected Harry’s. Something seemed to tauten in her face, but she said, ‘Oh, it was all right, you know …’

  ‘Is that a Tornados badge?’ Ron demanded suddenly, pointing to the front of Cho’s robes, where a sky-blue badge emblazoned with a double gold ‘T’ was pinned. ‘You don’t support them, do you?’

  ‘Yeah, I do,’ said Cho.

  ‘Have you always supported them, or just since they started winning the league?’ said Ron, in what Harry considered an unnecessarily accusatory tone of voice.

  ‘I’ve supported them since I was six,’ said Cho coolly. ‘Anyway … see you, Harry.’

  She walked away. Hermione waited until Cho was halfway across the courtyard before rounding on Ron.

  ‘You are so tactless!’

  ‘What? I only asked her if –’

  ‘Couldn’t you tell she wanted to talk to Harry on her own?’

  ‘So? She could’ve done, I wasn’t stopping –’

  ‘Why on earth were you attacking her about her Quidditch team?’

  ‘Attacking? I wasn’t attacking her, I was only –’

  ‘Who cares if she supports the Tornados?’

  ‘Oh, come on, half the people you see wearing those badges only bought them last season –’

  ‘But what does it matter?’

  ‘It means they’re not real fans, they’re just jumping on the bandwagon –’

  ‘That’s the bell,’ said Harry listlessly, because Ron and Hermione were bickering too loudly to hear it. They did not stop arguing all the way down to Snape’s dungeon, which gave Harry plenty of time to reflect that between Neville and Ron he would be lucky ever to have two minutes of conversation with Cho that he could look back on without wanting to leave the country.

  And yet, he thought, as they joined the queue lining up outside Snape’s classroom door, she had chosen to come and talk to him, hadn’t she? She had been Cedric’s girlfriend; she could easily have hated Harry for coming out of the Triwizard maze alive when Cedric had died, yet she was talking to him in a perfectly friendly way, not as though she thought him mad, or a liar, or in some horrible way responsible for Cedric’s death … yes, she had definitely chosen to come and talk to him, and that made the second time in two days … and at this thought, Harry’s spirits rose. Even the ominous sound of Snape’s dungeon door creaking open did not puncture the small, hopeful bubble that seemed to have swelled in his chest. He filed into the classroom behind Ron and Hermione and followed them to their usual table at the back, ignoring the huffy, irritable noises now issuing from both of them.

  ‘Settle down,’ said Snape coldly, shutting the door behind him.

  There was no real need for the call to order; the moment the class had heard the door close, quiet had fallen and all fidgeting stopped. Snape’s mere presence was usually enough to ensure a class’s silence.

  ‘Before we begin today’s lesson,’ said Snape, sweeping over to his desk and staring around at them all, ‘I think it appropriate to remind you that next June you will be sitting an important examination, during which you will prove how much you have learned about the composition and use of magical potions. Moronic though some of this class undoubtedly are, I expect you to scrape an “Acceptable” in your O.W.L., or suffer my … displeasure.’

  His gaze lingered this time on Neville, who gulped.

  ‘After this year, of course, many of you will cease studying with me,’ Snape went on. ‘I take only the very best into my N.E.W.T. Potions class, which means that some of us will certainly be saying goodbye.’

  His eyes rested on Harry and his lip curled. Harry glared back, feeling a grim pleasure at the idea that he would be able to give up Potions after fifth year.

  ‘But we have another year to go before that happy moment of farewell,’ said Snape softly, ‘so, whether or not you are intending to attempt N.E.W.T., I advise all of you to concentrate your efforts upon maintaining the high pass level I have come to expect from my O.W.L. students.

  ‘Today we will be mixing a potion that often comes up at Ordinary Wizarding Level: the Draught of Peace, a potion to calm anxiety and soothe agitation. Be warned: if you are too heavy-handed with the ingredients you will put the drinker into a heavy and sometimes irreversible sleep, so you will need to pay close attention to what you are doing.’ On Harry’s left, Hermione sat up a little straighter, her expression one of utmost attention. ‘The ingredients and method –’ Snape flicked his wand ‘– are on the blackboard –’ (they appeared there) ‘– you will find everything you need –’ he flicked his wand again ‘– in the store cupboard –’ (the door of the said cupboard sprang open) ‘– you have an hour and a half … start.’

  Just as Harry, Ron and Hermione had predicted, Snape could hardly have set them a more difficult, fi
ddly potion. The ingredients had to be added to the cauldron in precisely the right order and quantities; the mixture had to be stirred exactly the right number of times, firstly in clockwise, then in anti-clockwise directions; the heat of the flames on which it was simmering had to be lowered to exactly the right level for a specific number of minutes before the final ingredient was added.

  ‘A light silver vapour should now be rising from your potion,’ called Snape, with ten minutes left to go.

  Harry, who was sweating profusely, looked desperately around the dungeon. His own cauldron was issuing copious amounts of dark grey steam; Ron’s was spitting green sparks. Seamus was feverishly prodding the flames at the base of his cauldron with the tip of his wand, as they seemed to be going out. The surface of Hermione’s potion, however, was a shimmering mist of silver vapour, and as Snape swept by he looked down his hooked nose at it without comment, which meant he could find nothing to criticise. At Harry’s cauldron, however, Snape stopped, and looked down at it with a horrible smirk on his face.

  ‘Potter, what is this supposed to be?’

  The Slytherins at the front of the class all looked up eagerly; they loved hearing Snape taunt Harry.

  ‘The Draught of Peace,’ said Harry tensely.

  ‘Tell me, Potter,’ said Snape softly, ‘can you read?’

  Draco Malfoy laughed.

  ‘Yes, I can,’ said Harry, his fingers clenched tightly around his wand.

  ‘Read the third line of the instructions for me, Potter.’

  Harry squinted at the blackboard; it was not easy to make out the instructions through the haze of multi-coloured steam now filling the dungeon.

  ‘“Add powdered moonstone, stir three times counter-clockwise, allow to simmer for seven minutes then add two drops of syrup of hellebore.”’

  His heart sank. He had not added syrup of hellebore, but had proceeded straight to the fourth line of the instructions after allowing his potion to simmer for seven minutes.

  ‘Did you do everything on the third line, Potter?’

  ‘No,’ said Harry very quietly.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘No,’ said Harry, more loudly. ‘I forgot the hellebore.’

  ‘I know you did, Potter, which means that this mess is utterly worthless. Evanesco.’

  The contents of Harry’s potion vanished; he was left standing foolishly beside an empty cauldron.

  ‘Those of you who have managed to read the instructions, fill one flagon with a sample of your potion, label it clearly with your name and bring it up to my desk for testing,’ said Snape. ‘Homework: twelve inches of parchment on the properties of moonstone and its uses in potion-making, to be handed in on Thursday.’

  While everyone around him filled their flagons, Harry cleared away his things, seething. His potion had been no worse than Ron’s, which was now giving off a foul odour of bad eggs; or Neville’s, which had achieved the consistency of just-mixed cement and which Neville was now having to gouge out of his cauldron; yet it was he, Harry, who would be receiving zero marks for the day’s work. He stuffed his wand back into his bag and slumped down on to his seat, watching everyone else march up to Snape’s desk with filled and corked flagons. When at long last the bell rang, Harry was first out of the dungeon and had already started his lunch by the time Ron and Hermione joined him in the Great Hall. The ceiling had turned an even murkier grey during the morning. Rain was lashing the high windows.

  ‘That was really unfair,’ said Hermione consolingly, sitting down next to Harry and helping herself to shepherd’s pie. ‘Your potion wasn’t nearly as bad as Goyle’s; when he put it in his flagon the whole thing shattered and set his robes on fire.’

  ‘Yeah, well,’ said Harry, glowering at his plate, ‘since when has Snape ever been fair to me?’

  Neither of the others answered; all three of them knew that Snape and Harry’s mutual enmity had been absolute from the moment Harry had set foot in Hogwarts.

  ‘I did think he might be a bit better this year,’ said Hermione in a disappointed voice. ‘I mean … you know …’ she looked around carefully; there were half a dozen empty seats on either side of them and nobody was passing the table ‘… now he’s in the Order and everything.’

  ‘Poisonous toadstools don’t change their spots,’ said Ron sagely. ‘Anyway, I’ve always thought Dumbledore was cracked to trust Snape. Where’s the evidence he ever really stopped working for You-Know-Who?’

  ‘I think Dumbledore’s probably got plenty of evidence, even if he doesn’t share it with you, Ron,’ snapped Hermione.

  ‘Oh, shut up, the pair of you,’ said Harry heavily, as Ron opened his mouth to argue back. Hermione and Ron both froze, looking angry and offended. ‘Can’t you give it a rest?’ said Harry. ‘You’re always having a go at each other, it’s driving me mad.’ And abandoning his shepherd’s pie, he swung his schoolbag back over his shoulder and left them sitting there.

  He walked up the marble staircase two steps at a time, past the many students hurrying towards lunch. The anger that had just flared so unexpectedly still blazed inside him, and the vision of Ron and Hermione’s shocked faces afforded him a sense of deep satisfaction. Serve them right, he thought, why can’t they give it a rest … bickering all the time … it’s enough to drive anyone up the wall …

  He passed the large picture of Sir Cadogan the knight on a landing; Sir Cadogan drew his sword and brandished it fiercely at Harry, who ignored him.

  ‘Come back, you scurvy dog! Stand fast and fight!’ yelled Sir Cadogan in a muffled voice from behind his visor, but Harry merely walked on and when Sir Cadogan attempted to follow him by running into a neighbouring picture, he was rebuffed by its inhabitant, a large and angry-looking wolfhound.

  Harry spent the rest of the lunch hour sitting alone underneath the trapdoor at the top of North Tower. Consequently, he was the first to ascend the silver ladder that led to Sybill Trelawney’s classroom when the bell rang.

  After Potions, Divination was Harry’s least favourite class, which was due mainly to Professor Trelawney’s habit of predicting his premature death every few lessons. A thin woman, heavily draped in shawls and glittering with strings of beads, she always reminded Harry of some kind of insect, with her glasses hugely magnifying her eyes. She was busy putting copies of battered leather-bound books on each of the spindly little tables with which her room was littered when Harry entered the room, but the light cast by the lamps covered by scarves and the low-burning, sickly-scented fire was so dim she appeared not to notice him as he took a seat in the shadows. The rest of the class arrived over the next five minutes. Ron emerged from the trapdoor, looked around carefully, spotted Harry and made directly for him, or as directly as he could while having to wend his way between tables, chairs and overstuffed pouffes.

  ‘Hermione and me have stopped arguing,’ he said, sitting down beside Harry.

  ‘Good,’ grunted Harry.

  ‘But Hermione says she thinks it would be nice if you stopped taking out your temper on us,’ said Ron.

  ‘I’m not –’

  ‘I’m just passing on the message,’ said Ron, talking over him. ‘But I reckon she’s right. It’s not our fault how Seamus and Snape treat you.’

  ‘I never said it –’

  ‘Good-day,’ said Professor Trelawney in her usual misty, dreamy voice, and Harry broke off, again feeling both annoyed and slightly ashamed of himself. ‘And welcome back to Divination. I have, of course, been following your fortunes most carefully over the holidays, and am delighted to see that you have all returned to Hogwarts safely – as, of course, I knew you would.

  ‘You will find on the tables before you copies of The Dream Oracle, by Inigo Imago. Dream interpretation is a most important means of divining the future and one that may very probably be tested in your O.W.L. Not, of course, that I believe examination passes or failures are of the remotest importance when it comes to the sacred art of divination. If you have the Seeing Eye, ce
rtificates and grades matter very little. However, the Headmaster likes you to sit the examination, so …’

  Her voice trailed away delicately, leaving them all in no doubt that Professor Trelawney considered her subject above such sordid matters as examinations.

  ‘Turn, please, to the introduction and read what Imago has to say on the matter of dream interpretation. Then, divide into pairs. Use The Dream Oracle to interpret each other’s most recent dreams. Carry on.’

  The one good thing to be said for this lesson was that it was not a double period. By the time they had all finished reading the introduction of the book, they had barely ten minutes left for dream interpretation. At the table next to Harry and Ron, Dean had paired up with Neville, who immediately embarked on a long-winded explanation of a nightmare involving a pair of giant scissors wearing his grandmother’s best hat; Harry and Ron merely looked at each other glumly.

  ‘I never remember my dreams,’ said Ron, ‘you say one.’

  ‘You must remember one of them,’ said Harry impatiently.

  He was not going to share his dreams with anyone. He knew perfectly well what his regular nightmare about a graveyard meant, he did not need Ron or Professor Trelawney or the stupid Dream Oracle to tell him.

  ‘Well, I dreamed I was playing Quidditch the other night,’ said Ron, screwing up his face in an effort to remember. ‘What d’you reckon that means?’

  ‘Probably that you’re going to be eaten by a giant marshmallow or something,’ said Harry, turning the pages of The Dream Oracle without interest. It was very dull work looking up bits of dreams in the Oracle and Harry was not cheered up when Professor Trelawney set them the task of keeping a dream diary for a month as homework. When the bell went, he and Ron led the way back down the ladder, Ron grumbling loudly.

  ‘D’you realise how much homework we’ve got already? Binns set us a foot-and-a-half-long essay on giant wars, Snape wants a foot on the use of moonstones, and now we’ve got a month’s dream diary from Trelawney! Fred and George weren’t wrong about O.W.L. year, were they? That Umbridge woman had better not give us any …’