“Are you sure that these will work?” Hermione staring skeptically down at the candies that Fred and George had supplied them.
“Oh yee of little faith,” Fred said.
“Who’s going to turn down free candy?” George said
“Just scatter them all over the Ravenclaw table in the great hall,” Fred finished, “We’ve already enchanted them so they’ll turn invisible for a few hours when you say the password. They’ll appear alongside dinner and none of them will even think twice! We’ll scatter the normal ones among the Hufflepuff and Gryffindor tables too so they won’t be suspicious. Except Slytherin, best to pin the blame on them for the professors if we can.”
Hermione looked down skeptically into the bag filled with various candies that Fred and George had cooked up. “What do they do again?” she asked, the twins hadn’t been very clear on that part.
“All sorts of things,” Fred said, “Make you sick, make your nose become massive, make your tongue grow to over ten feet long… we’ve tested them all on ourselves, so nothing deadly in there. Made them all ourselves!”
Hermione eyed the bag for a moment longer before nodding and leaving. Her, Harry, and Ginny would be planting the candy an hour before dinner would begin. Harry and Ginny getting the normal decoy candy to spread out over the other two house tables.
It took about twenty minutes to spread them out evenly in the empty room. Hermione had used her wandless magic to unlock the door and effortlessly bypass the wards so they could sneak inside.
Job done Hermione cleared her throat and shouted to activate all the candies at once.
“Mischief managed!”
All of them shimmered and then disappeared, leaving only apparently empty tables behind. The three of them rapidly rushed out of the hall and Hermione locked the door again. They took off.
It was dinner at the great hall, and things were quiet. Just like any other dinner. When the candy appeared amongst the foot on three of the tables, most people just shrugged and didn't think much of it. After a few minutes, the first of them started unwrapping and eating the candy. There was an immediate wave of dozens of reactions as the Ravenclaws ate them.
But Fred and George had managed to add a delay to the effects on most of them. So there was a high amount of confusion when a large amount of Ravenclaws suddenly started swelling up or feeling sick out of nowhere. It took days before people eventually figured out that the candies were the cause, having been thrown off by the Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors enjoying them with no consequences.
The people who had attacked Luna were mysteriously cursed between classes. Hermione was walking nearby each time, but she didn’t even have her wand in her hand so no one suspected her at all. Those that did or saw her slightly smug look were dismissed as crazy by the others. Everyone knew that you needed a wand to do magic.
— — —
“Mr. Potter? Could you stay after class please?” Flitwick said as everyone started moving to the door. Harry stopped and waited as the room emptied. Finally, they were alone and Flitwick spoke again.
“Now, I’ve heard over the last few days that many of them members of my house were given tainted candies. Many are blaming you, given what happened with Ms. Lovegood only a few days prior. Is it something I should be worried about?”
“No, Professor,” Harry said, “They can’t prove anything.”
Flitwick sighed, “Was it truly necessary to go so far? It was only a select few that participated I’m sure, this was an indiscriminate retaliation against the whole house.”
Harry hesitated. The message was sent to the Ravenclaws. He did think Flitwick was doing his best even if he was oblivious to the scale of the problem. Harry obviously wouldn’t tell Flitwick who had helped him, but Harry thought he should tell the man the truth.
“I talked to Luna, and it was a lot of people,” Harry said, “Fifteen to twenty directly attacked her or ambushed her like those three girls when they had an opportunity. Luna’s things were regularly stolen and hidden from her by the rest. Most of the Ravenclaws regularly insult her because of the way she acts.”
Flitwick took a sharp breath through his teeth, “And why did you not inform me?” Flitwick said, “If it was so widespread then I could have handled it as head of house. There was no need to distribute vigilante justice.”
“Professor… You let those bullies go without punishing them,” Harry replied, “You would be forced to do the same here. It is Luna’s word against everyone else's. And even if you punished someone, the rest would only blame Luna and bully her more in response.”
“I…” Flitwick sighed and slumped slightly, “...I suppose you’re right. If what you say is true then perhaps my house deserves what happened to them. Is this the end of it?”
Harry nodded, “As long as the bullies leave Luna alone. But could she get a private room in the dorms? She thinks her roommates might be involved in stealing her things and she would be much safer if she had her own room.”
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Flitwick straightened and nodded, “Now that, Mr. Potter, I can do. I’ll take care of it right away. And keep a closer eye on my house, it seems the prefects are not doing their jobs properly. They are the ones that are supposed to report these kinds of issues to me. Us teachers can’t be everywhere at once…”
Harry nodded but didn’t say anything.
“Very well, on to your next class, Mr. Potter,” Flitwick said, “You’ve given me a lot to think about.”
Harry left. At least Luna would be getting her own room now. That could only be good for her.
— — —
Harry started hanging out with Luna and Ginny more often after things settled down. Luna told the both of them about all sorts of magical beasts that her father had told her about growing up. She had stacks of the paper her father ran, the Quibbler and she shared some of the stories with them. They were all strange and were all a little nonsensical, but Ginny enjoyed discussing them in detail. She seemed to enjoy hearing all the conspiracy theories in there.
Harry had no idea that Ginny was such a naturally suspicious person. But it was fun trying to justify how Cornelius Fudge was secretly a vampire despite absolutely no evidence that that was the case. Or how magic originally came from aliens that still walked among them.
After a few weeks of this, Neville joined them too. He seemed nervous, but him and Luna stared at each other a lot while Harry and Ginny were arguing about some small piece of the web of conspiracy they had built from the little snippets Luna told them and what was in the quibbler articles. One time Harry arrived early and Neville and Luna were sitting very close together. Luna was kissing Neville full on the lips while Neville was looking rather surprised and stiff as a board.
“Are you two dating now?” Harry asked as he stood there and Neville jumped in shock and tried to pull away from Luna. She kept her lips on him for a few more seconds before drawing back again.
“Are we, Neville?” Luna asked dreamily.
“Y-Yep. I think so,” Neville said, “D- Definitely.”
Ginny walked in and stared between the three of them in apparent confusion, “What did I miss?” she asked.
“Luna and Neville are dating now, I just walked in on them kissing each other,” Harry said.
Ginny’s eyes widened and she rushed forward. “Oh. My. Gosh. Luna! You actually kissed him! I thought you were joking... How was it?”
Neville sat there beat red looking incredibly embarrassed by the whole situation.
“He was rather surprised, so it was mostly me kissing him as he sat there,” Luna said, “I think we just have to practice some more to get better at it.”
Harry nodded, “That sounds about right, I’m sure its like any skill. You can’t be a master at it immediately. You two should train together now that you are a couple.”
Ginny glanced between Harry and Luna and groaned loudly, “Harry! You’re so hopeless. Let’s get out of here and leave the two lovebirds alone”
She grabbed him by the arm and Harry let himself get practically dragged out of the room.
“We’ve got to give them some time to… practice,” Ginny said loudly while smirking back at Neville. A Neville that flushed even deeper red than before at her words.
“Okay,” Harry said as Ginny shut the door. The two of them wandered around the castle for a bit talking about various things. After spending more time together, Ginny seemed to be more comfortable with Harry’s strangeness and inclination to be very literal about everything. He showed her some of the paintings and statues scattered around that he thought she might find interesting. It was more fun than Harry had thought it would be.
— — —
“Those two lovebirds are at it all the time!” Ron complained, “Neville doesn’t even want to play chess with me anymore. I mean, he’s sitting at the Ravenclaw table right now!”
Harry remained silent. It was true, Neville was spending much less time with Ron recently. But Luna and Neville seemed to really enjoy being with each other too.
“Stop complaining so much, Ron,” Hermione said, “I think it is sweet. It’s not like they’re kissing in the hallways or anything, they’re just spending lots of time with each other. You should be happy for him.”
Ron grumbled but didn’t say anything else, returning to eating his food.
— — —
Minerva McGonagall signed another form and rubbed her temples. She should really get some potions from Madame Pomfrey to fix this headache… But she still had so much work to do. The actual job as Headmistress wasn’t overly demanding. But the politics of the position was all consuming.
The Ministry was looking for any excuse to have her removed and replaced with some ministry stooge. McGonagall deeply hoped it wasn’t that toad Umbridge that they wanted to replace her. She was one of the most unpleasant people that McGonagall ever had the displeasure of meeting, excluding the actual death eaters. And despite all her efforts Minerva still couldn't find anyone that could serve as a proper replacement Defense against the Dark Arts teacher and that wasn't in the pocket of the Minister.
The latest news from Filius was… concerning. It was just the sort of thing the ministry would leap on to show how she was improperly running the school. Bullying or ‘pranking’ as most called it was rampant in Hogwarts, and had been ever since it had been founded. It was tolerated because it promoted creativity in magic and prepared young witches and wizards for ambushes.
One of the greatest weaknesses of magical people was a perfect ambush. Their bodies were no stronger or better than those of muggles besides slightly increased longevity in those especially powerful in magic. Being caught by surprise could let even a more mediocre wizard immobilize or disarm a more talented one before they could react. It was one of the reasons that war with the muggle world was so inadvisable unlike what some in the dark faction said.
As if it was clear cut that wizards would come out on top of such a war... Despite the power of wizards, it only took a single muggle waiting in ambush to kill them. And with how many muggles there were compared to wizards now, such things would make non warded areas more dangerous than most believed if the muggles began actively seeking to kill wizards like they had in ages past.
Once a magical person knew they were being attacked, they could layer all sorts of spells on themselves for protection or easily use various spells to escape or apparate away. Some people like Mad-eye moody did such things wherever they went, but most either didn’t bother or found it far too magically exhausting to maintain at all times.
So situational awareness was the next best thing to teach them, hence warding themselves from all the pranks flying around the school. But what was going on at Ravenclaw house was far beyond that. Almost an entire house targeting a single student at once for nothing more than her being strange… shameful.
But Filius was working on it and would let her know his progress.
Hopefully he could handle it fast enough so Umbridge wouldn’t stick her nose into it. That was the last thing McGonagall needed right now.