The Meeting

Third Person P.O.V.

Hermione made a meeting during their trip to Hogsmead. It was so that everyone could be able to defend themselves even if Umbridge wasn't going to teach them.

All the demigods had their permission slip signed by Hecate, which made the Golden Trio even more suspicious of them. It was obvious to Hermione to keep her friends close and enemies closer.

The Golden Trio walked down the main street past Zonko's Joke Shop, where they were unsurprised to see Fred, George, and Lee Jordan, past the post office, from which owls issued at regular intervals, and turned up a side street at the top of which stood a small inn. A battered wooden sign hung from a rusty bracket over the door, with a picture upon it of a wild boar's severed head leaking blood onto the white cloth around it. The sign creaked in the wind as they approached. All three of them hesitated outside the door.

"Well, come on," said Hermione slightly nervously. Harry led the way inside.

Everything about the pub seems sketchy. Harry didn't know whether or not to trust this place for a meeting place.

"I don't know about this, Hermione," Harry muttered, as they crossed to the bar. He was looking particularly at the heavily veiled witch. "Has it occurred to you Umbridge might be under that?"

Hermione cast an appraising eye at the veiled figure.

"Umbridge is shorter than that woman," she said quietly. "And anyway, even if Umbridge does come in here there's nothing she can do to stop us, Harry, because I've double- and triple-checked the school rules. We're not out-of-bounds; I specifically asked Professor Flitwick whether students were allowed to come in the Hog's Head, and he said yes, but he advised me strongly to bring our own glasses. And I've looked up everything I can think of about study groups and homework groups and they're definitely allowed. I just don't think it's a good idea if we parade what we're doing."

"No," said Harry dryly, "especially as it's not exactly a homework group you're planning, is it?"

The first to arrive was the transfer students. Jason had to drag Thalia and Asteria off each other. Both fighting each as well as just being giggling girls. Hazel and Frank came with Nico following short behind standing close to Hazel. Piper came with Annabeth discussing something that Hermione might have been interested in with Leo being the third wheel. Next came Neville with Dean and Lavender. They were closely followed by Parvati and Padma Patil with Cho and one of her usually giggling girlfriends. Then Luna Lovegood; then Katie Bell, Alicia Spinnet, and Angelina Johnson, Colin and Dennis Creevey, Ernie Macmillan, Justin Finch- Fletchley, Hannah Abbott, and a Hufflepuff girl with a long plait down her back whose name Harry did not know. Three Ravenclaw boys he was pretty sure were called Anthony Goldstein, Michael Corner, and Terry Boot. Ginny, followed by a tall skinny blond boy with an upturned nose whom Harry recognized vaguely as being a member of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team. And bringing up the rear, Fred and George Weasley with their friend Lee Jordan, all three of whom were carrying large paper bags crammed with Zonko's merchandise.

"A couple of people?" said Harry hoarsely to Hermione. "A couple of people?"

"Yes, well, the idea seemed quite popular," said Hermione happily. "Ron, do you want to pull up some more chairs?"

"He doesn't need to do that," Asteria said and in a snap, there were chairs for everyone to sit on.

The barman had frozen in the act of wiping out a glass with a rag so filthy it looked as though it had never been washed. Possibly he had never seen his pub so full.

"Hi," said Fred, reaching the bar first and counting his companions quickly. "Could we have . . . twenty-five butterbeers, please?"

The barman glared at him for a moment, then, throwing down his rag irritably as though he had been interrupted in something very important, he started passing up dusty butterbeers from under the bar.

"Cheers," said Fred, handing them out. "Cough up, everyone, I haven't got enough gold for all of these. . . ."

Harry watched numbly as the large chattering group took their beers from Fred and rummaged in their robes to find coins. He could not imagine what all these people had turned up until the horrible thought occurred to him that they might be expecting some kind of speech, at which he rounded on Hermione.

"What have you been telling people?" he said in a low voice. "What are they expecting?"

"I've told you, they just want to hear what you've got to say," said Hermione soothingly; but Harry continued to look at her so furiously that she added quickly, "You don't have to do anything yet, I'll speak to them first."

"Hi, Harry," said Neville, beaming and taking a seat opposite Harry.

Harry tried to smile back, but did not speak; his mouth was exceptionally dry. Cho had just smiled at him and sat down on Ron's right. Her friend, who had curly reddish-blonde hair, did not smile but gave Harry a thoroughly mistrustful look that told Harry plainly that, given her way, she would not be here at all.

In twos and threes, the new arrivals settled around Harry, Ron, and Hermione, some looking rather excited, others curious. When everybody had pulled up a chair, the chatter died out. Every eye was upon Harry.

"Er," said Hermione, her voice slightly higher than usual out of nerves. "Well — er —hi."

The group focused its attention on her instead, though eyes continued to dart back regularly to Harry.

"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 Defense 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"

"Hear, hear," said Anthony Goldstein, and Hermione looked heartened "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 Defense 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 Defense 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.

"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."

"Di Immortals. Tom Riddle is alive and he keeps giving my father unnecessary paperwork," Nico mutters under his breath, sounding done with all the people not listening.

Thalia chuckles, as everyone else looks at Nico. He wasn't speaking in English and it was obvious that he said something to do with what Zacharias said. Asteria hits Nico in the back of his head before standing in front of everyone. They weren't allowed to interfere with anything important. More importantly, they weren't here to stir up trouble.

"Look," said Hermione, intervening swiftly, "that's really not what this meeting was supposed to be about —"

"It's okay, Hermione," said Harry.

It had just dawned upon him why there were so many people there. He felt that Hermione should have seen this coming. Some of these people — maybe even most of them — had turned up in the hope of hearing Harry's story firsthand.

"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."

~

Hermione was keeping a close eye on the demigods, who seemed to be all not there the moment that the meeting was done. Percy was twirling a pen. Annabeth was playing with her necklace. Frank and Asteria seem to be the only ones who paid any attention to the speech. And when came time for people to sign the parchment for the club, many were hesitant to sign since Umbridge would probably stop the whole club. It was argument spuing for no reason what so ever

"You think this a good idea," Percy whispers to Asteria.

"What other choice do we have? It's bad enough that Hermione thinks me and Thalia are going to rat them out," Asteria whispers back.

"What did you Ria?" Annabeth asked sounding quite angry.

"Nothing bad for your information," Asteria says.

When most of the demigods signed the paper Asteria was the one to look at Hermione with a smile. It looked fake from their point of review but Asteria was being genuine. Even if it was kind of late for that.

"You know we could split the meeting up magic and combat training," Asteria says to the trio. "Percy is our best sword fight and could teach with Annabeth."

Ron looks at Asteria suspiciously before whispering to Harry. It wasn't hard to tell that they didn't want the transfer students to help much less want them to be apart of training the other students.

"We see. We first have to figure out where we're going to meet," Hermione says firmly.

She was trying so hard not to sound like she hated their guts. But what other choice do they have other than outright saying they don't want them. It was easier to not say anything.

Asteria nods in understanding. She didn't take it personally but she did feel the need to tell the other demigods what they're up against. It's going to be a lot harder to try and protect the chosen one if they aren't trusted yet.