cycle

Maybe it was the mead, but I slept so well that night that I got up the next morning thinking the sun was coming in through the window.The following days at 12 Grimmauld Place became less uncomfortable, although the house was still decayed and gloomy, and every corner of the living room was filled with vixen's eggs and velvet that had been dead for an unknown amount of time .I guess Tonks revealed at least part of our conversation to Mom, and she finally stopped talking to me in that wary manner and gave Vivien back to me - which wasn't a good idea, Vivian kept chasing Hedwig to play with her, but Hedwig ignored her, and she just flew around and got owl droppings on top of the wardrobe.

I also celebrated my 31th birthday with Harry on July 15st—maybe the adults reached a tacit understanding, my dad was there at dinner, and Mr. Potter waited until the cake was cut and my dad said he had something to leave first. Long overdue.I have to say we're all relieved that Ron's gloomy prediction that Mr. Potter and my dad will duel at our birthday celebration will turn the cake into something dripping poisonous juice on each other's faces and hair. wipe.

I have never received so many gifts, they almost covered my little bed, in addition to Hermione's gifts, the adults of the Order of the Phoenix also gave me things: Tonks gave me a big box Ice mouse with a smiley face drawn on it; Moody actually sent me a mini looking glass too, but it seemed so sensitive that the Weasley twins started screaming like crazy as soon as they walked past it until they pulled it out of their pockets A large bowl of Hu Meizi's eggs that was stolen.There are also many gifts that are the same as Harry’s. For example, Mrs. Weasley gave me and Harry a large jar of homemade cheese candy, with big “I” and “H” on the glass jars.

After eating the gigantic birthday cake, Mrs. Potter pulled me aside and thrust a dainty little box into my hand.I opened it and it was the cat's-eye emerald-encrusted barrette I had returned to Harry more than a year ago.

"It's too precious." I shook my head and still felt that I couldn't accept it, "Ma'am, this is just an ordinary birthday..."

"This is to thank you for protecting my son and Neville from the Death Eaters." She said calmly, "It doesn't mean anything else, James and I want to express a little gratitude, you just need to accept it .”

I subconsciously turned around to look at my mother, who was listening with a soft smile to Mrs. Weasley yelling at the twins for stealing vixies, and she couldn't understand why they were interested in this pest (no one Dare to tell her that the twins are working on quick-acting skipping sugar), and when Mrs. Weasley seems overly agitated, his mother will talk to him by the side.Mom gave me a slight nod, so I had no choice but to accept the box and thank her politely.

"Wearing is the best respect for jewelry." Mrs. Porter looked very happy, she raised her hand to straighten the broken hair on my forehead, "I hope you don't lock it in the drawer, it suits your eyes very well .”

Neville finally came to join us at the beginning of August, maybe because he was worried about his parents, or maybe because he had encountered the resurrected mysterious person head-on not long ago, he seemed more taciturn than before.He really wanted to see Professor Dumbledore before going to the Ministry of Magic, but Professor Dumbledore didn't come here very often. Bumiebo - a plant that looks so emaciated that it might die at any moment, he said it was a birthday present from his uncle, and he wanted to make it better and bring it to Hogwarts for Sprout Professor Te has a look.

"Mrs. Black told me not to get my hopes up." Neville said anxiously, "We can't mention the Order of the Phoenix to the Ministry of Magic, not a single word, they are trying to catch Professor Dumbledore secretly The handle of the event, I am really afraid that I will say something wrong. It would be great if I could communicate with Professor Dumbledore in advance. This is the list of reasons they gave, and I'm going to recite them all over again..."

"I don't think Neville is in a good state." Hermione said softly before going to bed that night, "I asked him, and he said that his scar still hurts and he can't sleep well... I don't understand why Professor Dumbledore Can't meet him, he can obviously give Neville a lot of encouragement and comfort. And the annoying Daily Prophet-they don't satirize Neville between the lines, saying that he is an incompetent and desperately trying to gain fame, who the hell? They are fishing for fame!"

"Maybe Dumbledore is very busy." Ginny was also a little frustrated. "I heard from my father today that they have little hope of transferring Mr. and Mrs. Longbottom. They can only say they are trying their best."

"I think even if they fail, they have backup measures." I reassured them, "Didn't we overhear them saying they were going to be on duty somewhere, maybe it was St. Mungo's."

"Girls, go to bed." Mrs. Weasley's reproachful voice suddenly came from outside the door, "I expected you to be more obedient than the boys!"

"We're asleep!" Ginny closed her eyes and said to the door. "You heard us talking in our sleep, Mom."

As the adults expected, the hearing ended in failure, and the Ministry of Magic simply and rudely dismissed the checklist he had recited many times on the grounds that Neville was underage and not old enough to apply for his parents.We tried a lot of ways to make Neville happy, but all had little effect, he even seemed a little irritable, let's not bother him to fertilize and water Mibu Mibao.

"We came out of the hearing and met Lucius Malfoy." On the second day, Neville was finally in a better mood, and he said to us, "What was he and Fudge talking about, and finally Fudge invited him to his office."

"Will he cast the Imperius Curse on Fudge?" Several boys straightened up instantly, and Hermione glanced at me worriedly, but I found that I didn't feel any emotional fluctuations anymore, and even thought of what the boys blurted out question.

"I asked Mr. Weasley, and he said that Dumbledore believes that Fudge is not currently under control—but this is not a good thing." Speaking of Dumbledore, Neville seemed a little depressed again, "He believes this , believe that, but now I feel that he doesn't believe me anymore."

The summer vacation was coming to an end day by day, and everyone else expressed their thoughts of missing Hogwarts. After all, it was too uncomfortable compared to the Gryffindor tower.But I wasn't expecting much - Gryffindor still had several lessons with Slytherin.The thorn in my heart was melted away by the sweet and delicious mead that night. Now I no longer easily fall into the guilt of feeling that I have done something wrong and the loss of everything that has changed suddenly. A bed of birthday presents, I still can't help thinking back to the time when I could only get two gift packages - now there won't be a simple Draco Malfoy in the assortment of gift boxes .There's nothing to complain about, I said to myself, it's fair.

The owls sent us the book list as usual, and there were two shiny prefect badges in the envelope for Hermione and Ron - Mrs. Weasley was so happy that she almost said in tears that the family Every boy is a prefect ("Did we buy the cauldron, Mum?" the Weasley twins asked resignedly, beside them).

"Perhaps Dumbledore felt that you violated too many school rules." Tallus patted Harry on the shoulder. He never cared about such things. "You can't let the prefects take the lead in breaking the school rules, can you?"

Harry smiled, although it seemed a bit forced, I guess he was thinking that Ron followed him and broke all the school rules.In fact, many people thought that this year's prefect would be Harry. After all, he had always been outstanding in Gryffindor and had just won the Triwizard Tournament. Hermione looked at Harry holding Ron's badge, He also thought that his future partner would be Harry, which once made the scene a bit awkward.

But they seem to have quickly forgotten about it. After all, the arrival of the owl means that we will soon be back at Hogwarts to start a new school year.Hermione read the new book eagerly, and she finished "Standard Spells, Level [-]" in no time, but she kept frowning when she read "Defense of Magic". In her words, "This book doesn't look useful at all. No".

"Dad wasn't a prefect back then!" I heard Mr. Potter say that when I went upstairs that day, and he laughed heartily, "Sirius is still convinced that Dumbledore chose Lupine as a prefect so that he can control us ——Of course this calculation failed. It’s no big deal, son, you don’t need a badge to prove your excellence to us, you have already proved it!”

In order not to look like I was eavesdropping, I hurried upstairs, and after a while Harry came up, looking a lot more relaxed, and he didn't have any hesitation when the Weasley twins made fun of Ron's prefect badge He laughed out loud.

On September 12st, [-] Grimmauld Place fell into chaos, everyone's boxes got stuck on the narrow stairs, the owl in the cage yelled restlessly, and the Weasley twins wanted to get their boxes out of the way. Everyone's heads were flying overhead, only to hit Ginny, who tumbled down two flights of stairs, causing Tallus' Granny and Mrs Weasley to scream at the same time.Both Neville and Harry needed guards, and the Order didn't think You-Know-Who would let them both go, but all of us going together might draw the attention of the Ministry of Magic again.

We were divided into several batches, and finally caught up with the time. I always thought that Grimmauld Square was very far from King's Cross Station. It turned out that it only took 10 minutes to walk.Dad returned to Hogwarts early as usual, and Mom hugged me tightly before I got into the car-almost all parents in the Order of the Phoenix did this, Mrs. Potter held Harry in one arm and hugged Harry in the other. Looking at Neville, the circles of his eyes were completely red; Mr. Black briefly patted his son on the shoulder after his wife and Talus hugged; They hug each other.

"Mom assures you, Dad and Mom will be fine." Mom kissed my forehead, "I know you must be worried about us, but I hope this kind of worry will not make you feel stressed and sad every day, we all do Take care of your own business, will you Liz?"

I nodded desperately, not wanting my mother to see my red eyes.

"Goodbye!" The train started to move, and we kept waving to the adults. Mrs. Potter broke free from her husband's arms and ran to the window in tears, saying to Harry, "Take care of yourself, take care of Neville—you guys Everything is fine, fine! Don't let anything happen again!"

The train turned a corner and they disappeared from our view.Harry ruffled his hair, and when he caught me looking at him, he turned his head awkwardly so I couldn't see the red corners of his eyes.

The boxes looked full and we wanted to find an empty box so no one would point fingers at Neville, after all the Daily Prophet had been maligning him all summer.Finally we managed to find a car with only one person. A messy, dirty girl was looking at an overturned book in the corner. Neville seemed to recognize her and muttered that we could look for it again. Elsewhere, but Ginny had already greeted the girl.

"This is Luna Lovegood, Ravenclaw at the same level as me." Ginny introduced to us, and Talus showed a surprised expression when he saw the carrot earrings on the girl's ears: "So you don't Something weird like that at the Yule Ball?"

"They're not strange things." Luna's slightly protruding eyes made her look surprised, but her tone was vague and ethereal, "They allow me to hear the voice of another world."

"Luna, this is Harry—" Ginny was about to introduce her, but Luna had already put down the book, looked at us and said, "I know it, this is the magical warrior Potter, this is the one who survived Boy Longbottom."

"Hermione Granger." Hermione introduced herself, pointing to Ron beside her, "This is Ron Weasley."

"Well, then here's the guy from the Yule Ball." Her eyes glided calmly across Talus, "wearing the dangerous blue triangular weed—"

"That's a pansy!" Tallus corrected her.

"They are often disguised as pansies." She looked at me after answering, "This is the Snape that those boys often say, you are often compared with Qiu Zhang by them, they think you I will win in the future, but I like Qiu more, and intelligence is the greatest wealth of human beings."

After she finished speaking like singing, there was an awkward silence in the box.After we took out our clothes and changed, Hermione and Ron were going to the prefect's box to receive instructions from the presidents of the Boys' and Girls' Students' Councils. students sat down.

Luna seemed interested in Neville's Meebo, and Neville breathed a sigh of relief and began to introduce her to the characteristics of Meebo, saying that although it looked stunted, it had amazing self-defense mechanisms— Before the rest of us could figure out what happened, we were sprayed with a dark green foul-smelling juice all over our heads and faces.Harry was fine with his glasses on, but I felt like I got splashed in my eye too, and it hurt instantly.

"Neville!" Harry hurriedly stood up and cleaned the box, I felt the smell of soap in my mouth, "Alice, show me your eyes?"

"It should be gone." I covered my eyes, but they were still hurting, "The liquid is a bit irritating, maybe it will be fine after a while - I'll go find a place with water and wash it off."

"I'll go with you," said Harry, standing up.

"It's okay, I only have pain in my left eye, so I can see the road." I muttered, turned around and fumbled for the door of the box, "There's still a little bit on Luna's hair—you can clean it up again."

The compartment door was violently pulled open, my hand was still on the door handle, and I almost couldn't stand still because of the train's jolting.

Draco stood at the door, the prefect badge on his chest was shining, making his face paler, he looked into the compartment as if he didn't see me, with a triumphant sneer on his face: " The prefect is on routine patrol, what made such a big noise just now?"

"You can't wait to abuse your power before you get to Hogwarts?" Harry's voice was full of provocation.

"How else is Malfoy?" Tallus sneered.

"Polite, you two." Draco drawled, "I'm different from you now, I'm a prefect, and I can put you in confinement at any time."

I felt the pain in my left eye gradually lessen, and it seemed that Draco and the two boulder-like Crabbe and Goyle behind him were not going to make way for a while, so I just sat back.Luna did not know where to take out a handkerchief with a strange smell and stuffed it into my hand. After hesitating for a while, I wiped my eyes with it. Miraculously, the pain was relieved by more than half immediately, and the eyes were like As if blown by a breeze.

"Daddy's secret recipe." She didn't seem to care about what was going on around her at all, Harry, Tallus and Draco were still teasing each other, Neville's face was so tight that he seemed to want to Joining the battle, she still said in a singing tone, "A little bit of the saliva of the horned snorkel, plus the squeezed colorful salamander..."

"It's very useful." I interrupted her quickly, thinking that if she said a few more ingredients, my eyes would hurt again.

"I know you too." She pulled out an exaggerated pair of glasses from nowhere and put them on her face, which made her look like a giant bat. She turned to Draco at the door and interjected, " You two are always together."

"Of course, Crabbe and Goyle obviously can't live on their own," Tallus sneered. "They can't even walk without Malfoy's orders."

"No, I mean, you two." Luna pointed at me and said calmly, "I think about why I think Cho is better, she has a good eye, Cedric Diggory A very nice guy, this guy looks so bad, in every way."

The carriage fell into a suffocating silence for at least half a minute. Luna looked very happy. She obviously thought that she had successfully ended a dispute between the boys. Dirty magazines are read upside down.I felt like I was going to lose my breath if I continued to sit here, so I stood up and said dryly, "I'm going out - get some food, uh, I heard the food truck... yes, I heard it."

In fact, all I could hear was the howling of the wind outside the window. The weather was cloudy and cloudy, and bursts of raindrops slid across the window, drawing crooked lines on the glass. Gloomy clouds cover it all.

Before I could say "please step aside" to Draco, he let go of the arm that held the door frame of the box, and strode forward with Crabbe and Goyle ahead of me.Originally, I wanted to go to the bathroom at the front of the car to clean my left eye with water, but I changed my mind and ran forward a few steps to keep up with him.

"What's the matter?" Before I called out his name, he suddenly turned around and asked me coldly, "I'm very busy, and I have to meet the president of the Boys' Student Union, unlike Potter who is an idler with nothing to do."

This was the first conversation we had after we parted in the auditorium last semester. He was still growing like other boys of his age, and his face looked almost bloodless.

I was startled by his sudden turning back, and froze for a while to organize my words. He kept looking at me with a very impatient expression, but he didn't turn around and leave.

"That notebook... can I have it back?" I took a deep breath and said, "I want to get it... back, can I?"

Although the expression on his face didn't change, I could see that Wei Wei's eyes widened: "You just ran out—just wanted to tell me this? A broken notebook?"

I instantly breathed a sigh of relief. He talked about the half-book of Occlumency notes in such a disdainful tone, which meant that it was not an important thing in his mind. I was worried that this thing would fall into the possession of the mysterious person all summer. In my hand—although I think the mysterious man should look down on this level of magic, but what if he got some key information from it that I didn't realize?

"Yeah." Because of the sudden relief, I nodded with a little joy, "Then can you pay me back now?"

His complexion became worse than before, and he left without looking back after saying "I'll give it to you when I remember."

It was better than I expected, I thought he would just ignore me, or treat me like everyone else - because I am just a normal "other person" to him now.In my prediction, I would have to go through a lot of trouble to get back this half of the notebook, and I even had a prototype of a plan to pretend to be Pansy Parkinson with Polyjuice Potion in my mind (of course I sincerely hope not Parkinson's Polyjuice Potion must taste disgusting with this plan), but he said yes so easily.

Maybe he also wants to throw away everything related to me as much as possible. I thought of the constellation ball he threw out of the window that night, and felt a sense of sadness in my heart.But soon the trolley came to me full of all kinds of snacks and lunch, and I took out my pocket money to buy some pumpkin pies and chocolate frogs and took them back to the box.

I spread out the pies and chocolate frogs on the table and told them they could take whatever they wanted, and Harry asked me, "He didn't bully you, did he?"

"How can an old lover who can't wait to deliver it to your door be willing to bully you?" Talus didn't reach for the things I bought, he smiled meanly at me, "I thought you had at least confirmed your position after a summer vacation."

"Alice was just out to get something to eat—" Harry's words sounded very forced.

Tallus sneered, "Why do you say things you don't believe?"

"I did not only go out to buy food, but I also had a few words with him." I sat down calmly and tore open the pumpkin pie packaging bag, "I went to him to return a note, which I lent I lost him, and now I want to get it back - that notebook is more important to me, and I don't think it's a good idea to keep it with him, because it belongs to my dad, is my report satisfactory to you, Blake gentlemen?"

Luna poked her head out from behind the magazine. "Can I have a chocolate frog?"

"Of course." I tried my best to show a smile, grabbed a few chocolate frogs and put them in front of her, "You can take whatever you want."

"Thank you." She took out a few coins from her pocket and put them in my hand, "This issue of "The Quibbler" is so exciting, I think interrupting reading will affect my perception."

There was another moment of silence in the carriage, and Talus muttered, "I'm sorry, I just thought Harry—"

"Talus, you said a long time ago that this is my own business." Harry looked helpless, "You don't need to be like this."

"I know that no one is more important than Harry in your heart, and I don't expect you to care about my feelings, but—" I shrank into the corner of the car, turned my head to see the rain still rolling from the window Luo, "You said that you thought that after one summer vacation, I had at least confirmed my position, and I also thought that after one summer vacation, we had at least become friends who could trust each other."

The door of the box was pulled open suddenly, and Hermione and Ron looked very hungry. Ron sat down and tore open a pumpkin pie without saying a word and started to gobble it up.

"Malfoy's in trouble," he said beamingly when he had eaten half his meal. "Diggory—ha, he's Head Boy this year! He waited so long for Malfoy to accept his responsibility." He's on his rounds - late before school starts! I wish he'd had his badge forfeited at Hogwarts."

"I don't think it will be easy, Parkinson will work for him." Hermione was obviously unhappy that Pansy Parkinson had received the same honor as her. Shocking trolls and stupid cows as prefects—what's the matter with you?"

She felt that there was something wrong with the atmosphere in the box, folded her arms, and said in a tone very much like Mrs. Weasley: "What happened?"

Neville opened his mouth, but chose to remain silent. Luna said, "They had a fight."

"You're going to quarrel with Tallus?" Hermione looked at Harry in disbelief. "Why are you crazy?"

"No." Luna sang and recounted our conversation from Draco to us just now. I found that although her tone was funny, what she said was objective and clear.

"I've already apologized." Maybe Hermione's increasingly ugly face reminded Tallus of Mrs. Weasley's angry reprimand to the twins this summer, he raised his arm, "Hey, I know I was wrong Alright, can all the snacks be counted on my account today?"

"Dumbledore said that the more dangerous we are, the more we have to trust each other." Even though Hermione sat down, she still hugged her arms tightly, "I thought you all listened very seriously that day, but I didn't expect that in the end it was Only I remembered his speech."

I pressed my forehead against the window, the train was heading north, and the night was gradually falling, but it was not a night with a moon, and there was no way to look at Hogwarts from a distance with golden lights jumping from the window.For the rest of the journey, only Luna in the box told Neville that Fudge was actually the voice of a secret goblin killer in a serious tone. What she said was so ridiculous, and her tone was so serious, I couldn't help laughing Get up, and then find that other people are actually trying to tense their faces, and secretly look at other people's expressions - the tense atmosphere disappeared in an instant.

"Where do you need so many silver Sickle-Golden Galleons, are you serious?" I reached out and took some of the handful of coins that Talus had just poured out of his purse.

"If it makes you any happier, you take it." Tallus looked relieved, looking at me and Harry like a puppy - I found it really hard to treat someone like that. His face was angry for a long time, especially when he showed such wet eyes.

Ron muttered something under his breath that sounded like "I hate rich people".

"Slow down." Neville seemed to be more energetic, he carefully held his Raffles with one hand and picked up the Meebu Meebo with the other, "We are about to arrive at Hogwarts!"

"We have to keep order." Hermione stood up nervously. "Ron, hurry up—stop rubbing your badge!"

The surrounding gradually became noisy, Talus insisted not to let me lift Vivienne's cage by myself, Harry held Hedwig securely in his arms, and stopped Talus from trying to push Vivienne on his head.

The train stopped, and even through the night fog, we could see the faint light of the castle in the distance—a new school year had begun.