HEATHENS - Harry Potter ✔

CHAPTER NINE

Sixth year proved to be ever harder than what Kiera had anticipated. The amount of work expected from them was "humanly impossible" as Ron had put it, and the course work was getting more and more difficult by the day. Non-verbal spells were now expected of them in Transfigurations and Charms as well, and Kiera couldn't ever remember struggling so much with Potions which had usually come naturally to her.

Kiera was used to being top of the class even with minimal effort, but now, her position was actively under threat by (to everyone's shock) Harry. The help of the Half-Blood Prince was giving him unprecedented skill and if he hadn't already been Slughorn's favourite just for being the Chosen One, he certainly was now. Though she did her best to be happy for her friend, Kiera couldn't help but feel slightly irritated with him.

It was due to their vast amounts of work that they still hadn't got the chance to go visit Hagrid, who had aptly ignored the, and on that Saturday at breakfast, Hermione glances at his empty seat at the staff table and said, "We've got to go and explain."

"We've got Quidditch try-outs this morning!" said Ron, shutting down the idea immediately. "And we're supposed to be practising the Aguamenti charm for Flitwick. Anyway, explain what? How are we going to tell him we hated his stupid subject?"

"We didn't hate it!" Hermione said.

"Speak for yourself, I haven't forgotten the Skrewts," he retaliated. "And I'm telling you now, we've had a narrow escape. You didn't hear him going on about his gormless brother. We'd have been teaching Grawp how to tie his shoelaces if we'd stayed."

Hermione frowned. "I hate not talking to Hagrid."

"Why don't we just go after Quidditch?" Kiera proposed, to which Harry immediately agreed.

"Yeah, good idea," he said. "Though it might take all morning with the number of people who have applied. I don't know why the team's this popular all of a sudden."

Kiera and Hermione exchanged exasperated and amused glances.

"Oh, come on, Harry," said Hermione, shaking her head in disbelief and impatience. "It's not Quidditch that's popular, it's you! I mean, you've never been more interesting."

Kiera noticed Ron stop eating instantly.

"Everyone knows you've been telling the truth now, don't they?" Hermione continued, apparently not having noticed Ron's scowl. "They've all had to admit that you were right about Voldemort being back and that you really have fought him twice in the last two years and escaped both times. Obviously, people are fascinated by you."

"Plus, you've grown at least a foot over summer – I mean, I wasn't like two heads shorter than you last year," said Kiera. "Harry, you've got to have noticed that people are staring at you all the time now. I can barely go to the lavatory without hearing at least two girls chatting about you. You've never been more fanciable."

Harry seemed to choke on his breakfast, and he coughed slightly until he managed to say in a weak voice, "You think so?"

Kiera felt her cheeks burn suddenly and she turned back to her plate, grabbing her fork and knife and preoccupying herself by cutting her sausage, even though she had already cut it into more than small enough pieces.

Hermione nodded. "She's right. And you've been through all that persecution from the Ministry when they were trying to make out you were unstable and a liar. You can still see the marks where that evil woman made you write with your own blood, but you stuck to your story anyway."

"But Kiera's got scars from Umbridge's detention too," said Harry.

"Yes, but I'm not the Boy Who Lived," she said, just managing to stop an eyeroll. "Nor has the Prophet's been calling me the Chosen One all summer, which made you even more ... enigmatic than before."

Just then the post arrived, dozens of owls swooping into the Great Hall. Both Ron and Harry got parcels from Flourish and Blotts and Kiera shook her head in amusement as Harry removed the cover of his old Advanced Potion-Making and the copy he had just received, switched them, so that the Half-Blood Prince's book was now disguised as a brand new copy. Hermione scoffed and disappeared behind the Daily Prophet.