Neville Longbottom and the Goblet of Fire

Chapter 5: Beauxbatons and Durmstrang

Moving forward in Defense Against the Dark Arts became much less enjoyable; Moody gave students some tips and then began Casting the Imperius Curse on them to practice resisting it. Neville was relieved that he wasn't making them do strange or embarrassing things, but he struggled with trusting Moody because he was using this Unforgivable Curse on students. Having the Imperius Curse Cast on you was a strange experience; Neville felt no stress or anxiety, but it didn't stop his typical thought process. Under its influence, when the compulsion to do something struck him he automatically questioned it, but without anxiety to help him assess the right or wrong of it, he automatically refused to do it. Moody was immediately impressed by his ability to resist.

On weekends, he and Luna started on their Message Papers. From last year they knew that burning the message would be disastrous, so they tried adding an ink element to the Charm they used on the Wizard Chess Board. They tried a few different methods as well, but they all ended the same way - with the paper falling apart. On the gameboard they used a sharp object to carve the message, and realized it was the Charm not the instrument that made the difference. Even a dull quill on the sending paper would tear up the receiving paper.

Lee and the Weasley Twins continued with their product testing, and it was not unusual to see at least one giant canary wandering around the Common Room. Hermione expressed her disapproval and tried to point out how dangerous it could be, citing personal experience but refusing to give up details. They explained that they had already done all the dangerous testing on themselves, and were simply in the fine-tuning stage.

In Hermione's spare time she must have been working on her effort to get rights for House-Elves. She started handing out badges with the word S.P.E.W. on them, and asking others to join her group. Luna joined after asking one question, "What does S.P.E.W. mean?"

"It stands for the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare," Hermione explained proudly.

Neville tried to ask her some questions about it too, but she became very defensive. He decided it would be easiest to talk with her about it after joining, so he accepted the badge and agreed to join. Before she left, he wanted to offer a little help since he guessed that a name like S.P.E.W. would only cause problems of ridicule.

"Hey, Hermione," he asked, "how about a more agreeable name?"

"Oh yeah, like what?" She sounded snarky and unwilling to compromise.

"What about H.E.L.P., to stand for the House-Elf Liberation Party?"

"Humpf," she grunted and walked away. Neville wasn't sure if she didn't like the idea, or that she didn't like that his idea was better.

At lunch one day Hermione was trying yet again to talk Harry and Ron into joining H.E.L.P. She had only recently decided to change the name and had already Magically changed his and Luna's buttons. While they were trying to ignore her, Malfoy walked up waving a copy of the 'Daily Prophet' - a picture of Ron's parents in front of their shabby-looking house was featured.

"He doesn't want to help House-Elfs, Hermione," Malfoy interrupted, "he's hoping to get one. Maybe then their house would get cleaned up." Crabbe and Goyle were laughing behind him as usual.

"Shut up, Malfoy," Ron said, taking another bite of his lunch.

"Ooh," was Malfoy's retort. "Yeah, keep eating Weasley. You gotta fatten up so you can survive the summer at home."

Nevlle remembered something that Luna had done last year that worked really well, so he stepped between Malfoy and Ron with his back to Malfoy.

"Looky here, Weasley's got to have the useless Neville Longbottom stand up for him."