Malfoy Amongst The Chaos

Out In The Open

<11>

Wanda

News at Hogwarts spreads like wildfire. 

Katie and I were hot topics at the minute, you couldn't pass a single person in the corridor without catching word of either situation. But the noise wasn't just on the outside, it was on the inside, too. I was really trying to block it out, but there were so many minds at once and so many thinking the same thing.

If I walked into a room, the air barbed with curiosity or disapproval or fear. If I spoke, all ears were listening. If I moved, all eyes were watching.

"It'll pass," Harry told me, "It always does." And he was probably right. He knew better than anyone, of course. "Trust me, in a couple of weeks, The Prophet will be saying you're a hero – you've just got to go on as normal."

But my normal is not quite the same anymore. With every goddamn article and every piercing stare, my magic riles and batters at the boundary of my skin, unflinchingly, unafraid – just angry, a constantly weathering storm. Rings no longer cage it, Dumbledore's first set were reduced to pieces, his second, splinters, and the third, smouldering cinders.

Iron doesn't even hurt as much.

Yes, it still burns, yes, I still avoid it like poison. But whereas before, my magic would tremour in its presence and reel for days after contact, now it is back to peak in mere hours.

I know because Snape made me test it.

Despite the layered blisters it burned into my hands. Despite the horrendous headaches it gave me. "Iron is a weakness you are capable of overcoming," he said very softly, enjoying every moment of it. "Like the illusion, you are denying the possibility. When you start using this magic like someone deserving  you might find that nothing cages you. Not even iron."

Undeserving, uncontrollable, dangerous... Snape was almost as bad as The Daily Prophet, a personal favourite of mine.

"A bigger threat to the Wizarding World than Voldemort? That's ludicrous!" Hermione shrieks, looking troubled. She slammed the paper down on the table, shaking the golden plates, "We can't let people think this is true!"

"They already do," I said, glancing over at a group of Ravenclaws who dashed away the moment they caught my eyes on them. "Don't bother."

Harry scowled at something and Ron was busy shoving toasted sandwich in his mouth – when Hermione glared at him, he claimed he needed as much fuel as possible to get through this afternoon's Potions lesson.

"You do?" she hissed. "I expect Wanda will be an exclusive member of The Slug Club within seconds-!"

I felt my stomach tense and threw my fork down at this reminder – Ron scowled, his face growing sulky. An irritable silence plunged upon us, Ron hated any mention of Slughorn's ridiculous 'Slug Club' as he was never invited and, from day one, had been known to the magpie-like professor as 'Wetherby'.

He glanced, side-long, at Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil who were hunched together over a barely concealed newspaper, whispering and throwing pointed looks.

"Oh, give me that!" 

At last, Hermione's temper boiled over and she snatched yesterday's copy of The Daily Prophet from under their noses, hissing furiously as she screwed it into a ball.

"We were reading that!" cried Lavender.

"Yeah?" she retorted, angrily, raising her wand, "Well now you're not." she snapped, igniting the paper ball into a puff of amber flames which died out immediately after devouring the scrunched-up paper; the ashes fell pitifully to the table.