The sun on the next day had risen and laid stagnant in the sky, indicating it was mid-afternoon. The normal bustle of students throughout halls during the morning and evening had ceased, as they presently attended their respective classes. Today was the day lessons officially started.

Meaning, it was officially time for students to 'receive punishment', as Dolores Umbridge says.

As opposed to previous years, the atmosphere within the fifth years was one of tension, as the Ordinary Wizarding Level, or OWLs, were taking place during the end of this school year. This meant increased homework, increased stress and increased anxiety.

Although it was yet to come for another couple of months, some students were right on top of their work, a few even managing to complete assignments ahead of time.

Currently, Cecelia is dying. Schoolwork was slowly but steadily piling up, despite it only being the first day. The year was full steam ahead due to the upcoming big exams, so much so that at this rate, she might have to do her schoolwork over the next couple of breaks.

Most of her free time was spent doing homework or studying. She found the library to be her second home of sorts within Hogwarts, spending nearly as much time there as she did her dorms, perhaps even more.

Despite this, it seemed as though she were making no progress. With every assignment she completed, another two popped up in its place. Essays were sure to be her downfall, as they were an unfortunately beloved assignment given by nearly every professor in the school.

The sound of her quill scratching against parchment was starting to fray at her nerves as the clock ticked closer and closer towards curfew. The monotonous motions of writing her essay was slowly but surely lulling her to sleep, but she wasn't even halfway done.

She didn't notice when her head slumped against the desk, smearing fresh ink across her paper and the side of her cheek. She only realized she'd fallen asleep at all when she felt a hesitant hand tap at her shoulder gently, startling her awake.

Cecelia glanced over tiredly at the vaguely familiar face of Estella Woodrow. She blinked tiredly at the girl, confused as to what she was doing there.

"Um," she said intelligently, "hello?"

Estella smiled softly. "You were asleep and it's almost curfew. Didn't want you getting into any trouble."

It was then that Cecelia remembered she was still in the school library and not the Slytherin common room. She should have realized sooner—the usual warmth of her thick comforters was lacking in the near empty library. Despite there being only a few straggling students remaining in the room, there was still a low buzz of conversation permeating the room that she normally wouldn't have heard at night in the dorms.

"Oh," she muttered. She rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, ignoring the feeling of something sticky on her cheek that she didn't feel like identifying just yet. "Right, thanks."

Estella nodded, graciously scooping up her bag and waiting patiently as Cecelia gathered her ruined parchment and ink. She sneered down at the smear of ink on her paper where her head had fallen—she'd have to restart now.

Noticing her annoyed expression, Estella patted her shoulder consolingly. Normally, Cecelia might have gotten annoyed with her, but the sheer kindness Estella radiated made it hard to be mad at the well-meaning girl. A slight twitch of the eyebrow couldn't be escaped, though.

"Want us to walk you back?" Estella offered. Cecelia shrugged, not quite caring either way. Estella took her non-answer as a yes, corralling her gently over to a table with two other girls in Ravenclaw colors, both slumped over a book but eyes out of focus. "Hey guys! You remember Cecelia, right?"

One of the girls, Cecelia remembered from the train, was named Faye. She didn't respond to Estella's question besides a vague flick of her fingers, not bothering to look up from the book she wasn't reading.

The other girl glanced up, tilting her head slightly at the sight of Cecelia. "Can't say I do. Nice to meet you, though. I'm Irys." She offers a shy smile at the end of her introduction.

Cecelia offers another nod in response, and after a while of silence, looks toward Estella and taps her wrist twice. Understanding her signal, Estella motions for everyone to get up to start heading back toward their respective common rooms.

The walk out of the library was awkward. The silence was deafening. Estella tried to get them to all talk by starting some weak conversations, but after getting one worded responses, eventually gave up.

After a couple more minutes, the girls finally arrived at a junction in the halls of the school. "Well, this is where we part ways," Estella speaks up, breaking the silence once more, to which Cecelia gives a nod and parted ways with the Ravenclaws.

Cecelia makes her way down the winding path to get to the Slytherin common room. She spoke the password and stepped inside the common room, taking a seat near the fireplace. After her impromptu nap in the library, sleep evaded her the rest of the night.

She'd just settled down with a good book in her lap when an annoying voice sounded from the common room entrance.

"Finally, a competent professor at this school," a whiny voice said from her left. Cecilia's eye twitched in annoyance, but she otherwise didn't react. "All the previous ones were much too flippant about our education. Glad to see someone finally taking it seriously."

There was a vague grunt of agreement which probably came from either Crabbe or Goyle. Even after five years, Cecelia still couldn't tell the two apart.

"We'll be off," one of them said, before both of them headed upstairs to the boys dormitories. That was probably the longest sentence she'd ever heard either of them say.

Draco surveyed the now near empty common room, before his eyes landed on Cecelia. She kept her eyes steadfastly glued to her book to avoid making awkward eye contact, but he approached her regardless.

"Nadir! You agree with me, don't you?" He asked petulantly, hoping to gain someone else's sympathy.

"Yeah, sure, Malfoy," she agreed snarkily, eyes glued to her book, though he didn't seem to pick up on her sarcasm. "Whatever you say."

"Glad someone here has some common sense," he said amiably, the corners of his lips turning up in a victorious grin. To Cecelia's utter annoyance, Draco took her mockish agreement as an invitation and took a seat directly beside her. "Some of those other, lesser houses just don't seem to get it. But I knew a fellow Slytherin would understand."

Cecelia sighed and set down her book, figuring she wouldn't get much more reading done tonight with Draco's sudden talkative mood. She turned her head to face him partially, her expression one of slight indifference.

"What do you want, Malfoy?" She asks boredly, shifting her position to have her head resting on her hand. "I was reading, if you couldn't tell."

"I just wanted to hear your thoughts," he said, hands gesturing around, "It gets a bit tiring hanging around with idiotic brutes like Crabbe and Goyle all day."

"And who's to say I'm not some idiotic brute as well?" Cecelia asks easily, "Seems to be a common Slytherin trait."

Draco huffed in irritation, turning his nose up at her. "Slytherins are often very intelligent, you know. I don't get the best marks in potions solely on Snape's bias."

"But don't you?" She asked earnestly. Snape's treatment of the other houses had bothered her from the first day. He'd often failed students or overlooked properly teaching them simply because they weren't sorted into Slytherin. "You're good, I'll admit, but there are many others with the potential to be better. Only if our professor wasn't a biased fool, and actually bothered to teach them."

"You say that like he teaches any of us," Draco retorted with a raised eyebrow. "I haven't learned a damned thing in that class. He's too busy reprimanding the other houses or commending me on something menial. I've taught myself everything I need to know to succeed in that class. If others can't do the same, then that's their issue."

Cecelia was struck by a moment of silence as she contemplated his words. In a way, he did make a surprising amount of sense. More sense than she ever thought Draco Malfoy could make. After all, why depend on someone when you really only need yourself?

"For once, Malfoy, you may have a point," she conceded, crossing her arms together with a slightly surprised eyebrow raised.

"For once?!" He huffed, crossing his arms like a child. Cecelia rolled her eyes at the all-too-familiar action. "I always make a good point. Maybe you just don't listen. Have you gotten your ears checked recently?"

"Usually when I do listen, it's always 'Potter' this, and 'My Father' that," she mocks, attempting what she considered a pretty spot on impression of Draco's voice. "You tend to get a bit repetitive after having lived around you for five years."

"I hate Potter! I would never talk about him so often," He retorted immediately, a look of disgust crossing his face.

"Of course that's what you latch onto," Cecelia teases. "At this point I'm convinced you're half in love with him."

Draco turns an alarming shade of red, and Cecelia couldn't tell if it was from anger or embarrassment. Likely a bit of both. Cecelia, on the other hand, had a blithe smile.

"I feel as though that blush only further proves my point," Cecelia continues to tease, features lit with a mischievous smile.

"Shut it, Nadir," Draco grumbled out furiously. "My Father—"

"See!" She cut him off, smiling in triumph. "Are you religious or something? Always on about this Father."

The last thing Cecelia expected to happen that night did—Draco snorted. He immediately covered his mouth with a hand but it didn't do much to contain his laughter. Surprisingly, Cecelia found herself joining in with him. She never thought she'd find herself alone with Draco at nearly midnight laughing uncontrollably, but here she was.

After a while, they got themselves back to a reasonable state. Cecelia was surprised at how hard she'd laughed with someone she'd formerly thought so little of. She still had her apprehensions about Draco, but she was starting to see him from a new, more human perspective.

They stayed there talking for much longer than she expected, but it felt like no time had passed. The only indication of how long it had been was her drooping eyelids and Draco's intermittent yawns. When she next checked the time, it was well past two in the morning and encroaching on three.

Draco huffed when he noticed the time. "I probably ought to head to bed," he concedes, making moves to stand. "It's fairly late."

"Need your beauty rest?" Cecelia prodded with an impish grin.

"It takes a lot of effort to look this good, I'll have you know." He sniffed, turning his nose up at her, and combing his hair back dramatically. "I'm sure you wouldn't know anything about that."

Cecelia rolled her eyes, but could feel the effects of drowsiness tugging down her eyelids. "I probably ought to sleep, too." She stood, keeping a loose hold on her book that she'd long abandoned. "I'll see you around, Draco."

To which he responded, "Later, Cecelia. Don't think about me too much, though I understand it may be hard." He smirked teasingly, throwing in a light wave and a quick wink before disappearing out of sight down the hallway to the boys' dormitories.

It was only when they had parted ways, and reached their respective dormitories upstairs, that she realised she hadn't bothered calling him Malfoy, and he registered calling her Cecelia.

-

The next day of Hogwarts wasn't anything special, considering it was only the second day of school. Devara had gotten up and had a hearty breakfast before making her way to her respective classes alone. She tended to arrive much earlier than her fellow housemates who preferred to stay behind and talk in the Great Hall.

First on her schedule was Divination. She entered the class, and took a look around her at the empty seats. It seemed as if she were the first one there for the time being. She knew Professor Trelawney was likely hiding in one of the shadier corners in preparation for one of her "grand" entrances.

Taking a seat in one of the middle tables, she brings out her class materials and sets them before her. Students began trickling in only a few minutes later. She was quickly joined at her table by Dakeira Vakara, a Slytherin whom she'd worked with frequently over the years in both Divination and Care of Magical Creatures. He greeted her with a quiet, "Hey."

She realised that among the students who were the last to arrive, she saw another familiar face. "Aurora, over here!" She called out to the girl. Aurora jumped in surprise at the sound of her name, but her eyes lit up with recognition when she caught sight of Devara.

She hurriedly climbed over the top of the ladder and was by her side in three long strides. Aurora was quick to swoop down and engulf her in a tight hug. "I'm so glad we're in the same class!" She says excitedly.

Devara reciprocates the hug immediately. "Right? At least we both have someone we know." Devara pulls back and scoots her seat over to make space for Aurora's.

Aurora sat next to her eagerly, leaning across the table to grab Dakeira's attention. "Vakara, right? I've seen you around class and the common room sometimes. You're so quiet!"

Dakeira nodded, "Yeah, that's me. Good to see you, Aurora." He then went back to staring intently at something on the table, otherwise ignoring the two girls beside him.

Devara leaned in slightly closer to Aurora, whispering to her. As she did, Trelawney stepped out of her chosen hiding place for the day and announced the beginning of class.

"Have you seen Faye?" She asked in a low voice. "Class is about to start, and she always takes divination." They'd been working on the subject together for the past year. Neither of them were any good, however, but she doubted Faye disliked it enough to completely drop the subject, especially since the class was so easy to pass.

Aurora shrugged, though she seemed a bit annoyed. "Probably skipping," she whispered in return. "Not like Trelawney cares about attendance, anyway. I'm just glad you're here, or else I'd have no one I know well to work with today."

"You'd think she'd have been sorted elsewhere with her distaste for attending class," Devara joked.

"She may miss lessons often," Aurora conceded, "but she's definitely clever. I certainly wouldn't want to play a game of chess with her."

Devara snorted, about to retort once again when a light cough sounded from their left. She turned to face Professor Trelawney, who was looking down at them with an airy expression. "Page 234, please," she prodded gently before wandering off to another table.

They both flipped open their textbooks to the page, which was a chapter discussing the method of palm-reading. The pages talked about things that made no sense to either of them, like heart lines and life lines. Devara didn't bother trying to piece together any sort of meaning from the text. Trelawney would only bother grading them well if they predicted something unfortunate or tragic.

After making up some bull about Aurora's lonely, desolate future and Dakeira's tragic fate for their classwork, class was over. Devara walked with Aurora and Dakeira to their next class as it was along the way to hers.

She then made her way to Herbology where they spent over an hour reviewing safety protocols within the greenhouse. They also reviewed basic methods of care for the plants in order to keep everything safe and healthy. It was a lecture she'd heard three other times by now, but she'd seen the effects of misconduct in the greenhouse before and knew well enough that ignoring the rules would earn her a one way ticket to Madam Pomfrey.

Her next class was easily her most dreaded one—Defense Against the Dark Arts. The past three years had been surprisingly insightful regarding that class, though she didn't know how to feel about Professor Moody turning out to be one of Voldemort's underlings in disguise. He'd been the one to set the trap leading to Cedric Diggory and Harry Potter's presence in that graveyard that night, and was a major cause of Cedric's death in her mind. They'd never been close, but he'd always been nice to Devara when she'd been introduced to Hufflepuff house. He wasn't someone that you could easily forget.

She didn't know how to feel about Umbridge. She was certainly a character, but so far only seemed to pose a threat to Hogwarts. The Ministry had been very anti-Harry Potter ever since he'd started talking about Voldemort rising once again. Devara didn't know what to think of someone like Umbridge, but she knew she believed in Harry Potter. Someone like Cedric Diggory doesn't just fall over dead without cause. And someone like Harry wouldn't have killed him, she's sure.

If Umbridge stands to oppose that way of thinking, then Devara was certain they wouldn't get along. She didn't know Harry, and she didn't know Cedric besides a vaguely kind member of her own house, but she knew logic and she knew reason. And she knew that if Voldemort was back, a war was brewing and the only way for everyone at this school to stay safe was to stay aware.

Class with Umbridge trickled by horribly slow, and although each class was the same length, she felt as if this one dragged on too long. She rested her head on her palm, eyes drifting to the clock again and again, counting down the minutes. How much longer was this class going to be?

In reality, it had only been about fifteen minutes since class had started. Most of Defense Against the Dark Arts so far had been notetaking and Umbridge explaining to the students why learning defense was important, as well as lessons in which witches and wizards had successfully defended themselves.

This had started to rouse the interest of the Hufflepuff and Slytherin students there, believing that they were finally getting into the exciting part of class. Aurora and Devara shared an excited glance, and Dakeira had seemed to sit up even straighter in his seat than he already was. A bout of energy seemed to breathe new life into the bored students.

However, they didn't get to actually practice anything, further proved when Umbridge had, in her shrill voice, told the students to put their wands away, and instead passed thick books around. Everything was textbook work, explaining the theorem behind Defense against the Dark Arts. This raised multiple eyebrows around the class.

Low murmurs permeated throughout the classroom, before in a sickeningly sweet tone, Umbridge yelled for silence. The class went quiet immediately, resulting in a forced giggle from the professor. Although they had forgone speaking, the students looked at each other from across the room.

Suddenly, a hand shot up into the air. The person who raised their hand was someone Devara was fairly close with as another member of her house. They weren't best friends or anything, but she could hold a conversation with the girl. Umbridge had turned her head to face the student who was willing to talk to the disturbing professor directly.

The woman had her hands spread out in a seemingly placating gesture, contrasting to the slowly building yet tightly leashed anger of the girl. Her raised hand had slowly curled into a fist as she brought it back down to the desk.

"Yes, Miss..?" Umbridge had started, intending for the girl to finish the invitation to speak, her hands returning behind her back, a false smile proudly decorating her toad-like features.

"Susan Bones," The girl said with a surprising air of calm. "Why, exactly, are we not practicing Defence? Your course aims mention nothing about actually practicing magic. Rather, simply learning the theories behind them, despite the fact that danger is out there?"

Her words had been a fresh wave of common sense, breaking some of the quieter students' silence. Murmuring started popping up around the class, whilst Aurora, Dakeira, and Devara had all shared a wary look.

The off-putting giggle which erupted from Umbridge, suddenly and quite loudly, had caused chills to run down the spines of some of the kids, and raised the goosebumps of others.

"Why, pray tell, would you children ever need to use actual spells? You lot are perfectly safe in these walls, and knowing that type of magic could very well place you all in danger. Danger that simply wouldn't exist without. I'm not sure what other danger you could be referring to, Miss Bones." Umbridge said with ease.

The girl named Bones had raised her hand in the air again, this time unable to keep some of the tears out of her eyes. She had waited until being called upon again to express her grievances.

"With all due respect, Professor," She took a pause to release a shuddering breath, as well as to intake a calming one, her face of steel determination. "My family was murdered. By He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. And now my senior housemate as well? There is much to fear out there, and I cannot stand by and let my classmates fall victim to these horrors because you refuse to teach them what they need to know to survive."

Her confession resulted in pandemonium breaking out within the class. Some students exclaim out loud in surprise, and fear at the reminder. Others, simply occupying an expression of pure shock and disbelief at her outburst. Some seemed skeptical, and many of the Slytherins seemed completely dispassionate towards her speech.

Aurora had gasped and covered her mouth with a hand, her expression of utter shock. Dakeira, though less audible in his reactions, was given away by his facial expressions. Devara clenched her fist, already well aware of the tragic fate that had befell the Bones family. The fact she'd gotten to know Susan at all during her time here at Hogwarts was a miracle considering how close she'd come to dying before Voldemort had been defeated by Harry Potter.

Umbridge had seemed at a loss of words for a couple moments, whilst the class's volume had risen to great heights. She gave a quiet 'hem', as she cleared her throat hoping to recall the students' attention.

Upon realising that her method had not worked, she raised her voice with a shrill, "Silence!" The chaos within the class had dissipated immediately. A forced, tight, smile now appeared on her face. "Wonderful."

She smiles insincerely. "Truly unfortunate, what happened to your family. But their deaths and what happened to Cedric Diggory last year have no connection. It was simply a rather unfortunate accident, and his death serves as no sort of threat to any of you," she said. Devara clenched her fists at the woman's clear dismissal of the circumstances of Cedric's death. It was no accident, of that she was sure. "Now, dear students, another outburst like that, and you all shall serve time in detention with me. We wouldn't want that, now would we?"

Another bout of silence among the students permeates the room, and her false enthusiasm grows. "Lovely," she says, returning to the centre of the class and standing before the blackboard.

Susan had sat down in her chair harshly, small droplets of tears managing to escape her eyes. She gripped the table with enough force to colour her knuckles a stark white. Many of her housemates had sent her sympathetic glances, Devara included. She had every intention of approaching the girl later to check on her, but she'd wait until they were far away from this class and this woman.

"Now," Umbridge started, her form rigid as ever, pointing a finger to the letters plainly written out on the board. "Open your textbooks. I will not repeat myself. Disciplinary action will be taken the next time we have a ridiculous disruption such as the one we had just witnessed."