The Hidden One

17. anxieties

The euphoria over winning the cup didn't last long for anyone. June approached and the days became so stuffy and warm that no one wanted to do anything other than lay outside with some pumpkin juice. Unfortunately, exams were practically being pushed down their throats by all their teachers. Even Fred and George Weasley were studying, which surprised Rose (and everyone else) to no end.

Hermione had so much homework that she rivaled Percy Weasley, who needed to grades to get into the Ministry of Magic where he wanted to work. Everyone had given up on asking Hermione how she was going to take all her tests as she had multiple tests at the same time.

"Hermione?...Are you sure you've got these times down right?" Ron asked. Rose and Harry share a look, knowing that this would probably start an argument.

"What? Of course I have!" Hermione snapped.

"Is there any point in asking how you're going to take all of the exams at once?" Harry asked tentatively. Rose just snorted into her book that she was barely paying attention to.

"No. Have any of you seem my arithmancy book?"

"Oh, yeah, I borrowed it for some light reading," Rose explained. The boys let out quiet laughs that were silenced by the glare sent to them by Hermione, who started moving everything around to find the book. Rose looked up as a familiar snowy owl flew into the window.

"It's from Hagrid. Buckbeak's appeal it set for the sixth," Harry announced, reading from the paper that Hedwig dropped off. The bird flew over and landed on the chair that Rose was sitting in, asking for a quick head rub.

"That's the day we finish our exams," Hermione remembered, still looking for her book.

"They're coming here to do it! Someone from the ministry and an executioner," Rose finished reading, having leaned over to read over Harry's shoulder.

"They're bring the executioner to an appeal! It's like they've already decided!" Hermione exclaimed, finally having stopped shuffling through her papers. The other three nodded.

"They can't! I've spent ages reading about stuff like this and they're just gonna ignore it all!" Ron yelled. Rose sat back in her chair with a huff. All her late nights stressing over nothing.

The next few days were tense. Draco Malfoy seemed to have heard the news and was swaggering around as if he owned the place. On multiple occasions, Harry had seemed like he was about to hex the blonde but with one small touch on the arm from Rose, he would put his arm down and just huff and complain later. What made Harry, and the others, the most upset was that there were new security measures put into place. Remus revealed to Rose that they were put into place after her disappearance but she had inferred that already. The new measures kept the quartet from seeing Hagrid and Harry refused to get his invisibility cloak from where he had left it in the passage way to Hogsmeade.

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The start of exam week caused an unnatural hush to fall over the school. The only exception was after an exam when all the students would worry over the exam.

"Mine still had a handle on its back," Rose muttered to Harry after their Transfiguration exam, which had been to transfigure a teapot into a tortoise. Harry let out a loud laugh but quickly stopped after Hermione sent yet another glare his way. After a short lunch they all went to the charms exam where Rose and Hermione both perfectly executed cheering charms while Harry made Ron so cheery that Ron had to be taken to another room for a whole hour.

The next day was Care of Magical Creatures. It was obvious that Hagrid didn't feel like doing anything as the whole test was keeping a flobberworm alive until the end of the test. The quartet decided to go talk to Hagrid.