Pride Crushed, Dignity Rising

    The usual disclaimers:  None of these characters except Cheria are mine...and no, Cheria is not me or some "love interest"; she is just another friend of theirs. The other characters belong to JK Rowlings.  Enjoy!
 

Pride Crushed, Dignity Rising

By: CNJ

PG-13
 

1
 

Ginny:

    "We're in our last year and if Malfoy hasn't succeeded in getting the best of us yet, I don't think he ever will," my older brother Ron Weasley told his friend Harry Potter as I caught up to them in the hallway.   Then they saw me and waved.
     "Hello..." I called.  As I joined them, our two other close friends, Hermione Granger and Cheria Radwin came up and we headed down to the great hall for lunch, talking a mile a minute.
     "...Malfoy hasn't managed to make either Ron or Harry cry yet," Hermione added.  "That's what you two are proud of."  Harry pushed his glasses up his snubby nose and grinned at Ron, then the rest of us.
 "And he won't this year," Ron added with a cocky grin.  I had to smile a bit too as we entered the Great Hall and sat that Monday in mid-November.  True, Hermione, Ron, Harry, and Cheria are in their seventh and final year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.  I, Ginny Weasley, am in my sixth year, so I'll still have one more year to go.  Draco Malfoy is a seventh-year Slytherin who happens to thrive off of making other kids' lives miserable with the exception of a few of his cronies in Slytherin.  He especially despises Harry.  Malfoy's made just about everyone cry at least once...including Hermione and Cheria and me.  Everyone except Ron and Harry.  I know he'd especially love to see Harry break down and cry, but so far Harry won't give him that pleasure.  As the five of us ate, we talked about the upcoming Quidditch game this Saturday as well as the Gryffindor retreat which is being held from November twenty-fourth to the twenty-seventh.  I'm the Seeker for the Gryffindor team; Ron is the Captain; Harry is one of the Beaters and Cheria is one of the Chasers.   This upcoming game is Gryffindor vs Slytherin.
     After lunch I had Potions.  None of the others were in that class; they have it earlier, so we parted ways.  Professor Gromer gave us an assignment that involved mixing animal hairs with transformation fluids.  Up until last year, we had a Professor Snape for our Potions teacher.  But he left last summer after a fight with one of the other teachers and being burned out from teaching.  Our group had been at Hogsmeade last summer when we ran into Snape and we talked and he said he'd accepted a position in Ireland doing potions research.  He'd had no patience with us students and seemed crabby most of the time.  None of us had cared for him much, but then we wished him well before we parted.  Looking back now, I can see why he was the way he was with his sarcasm and sour disposition.  Gromer is more cheerful and I think he likes teaching this class.

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     As I headed back to the Gryffindor dorms that evening after dinner, I heard laughter in the hall.  A loud, rather malicious laugh.  I stopped when I saw Malfoy with two of his yes-men, Crabbe and Goyle.  They were surrounding Neville Longbottom and Malfoy was clutching a notebook.
     "Give it back..." Neville pleaded.   He tried to reach out for it, but Malfoy, being taller held it just out of his reach.
     "Give it baaack..." Crabbe mimicked and he and his cronies laughed.  Neville is a seventh year Gryffindor and is often targeted by Malfoy.
     "Leave him alone!" I cut in, running up to them.
     "Oh, butt in where it's none of your business, why don't you?" Malfoy's gray eyes sneered over at me.
     "Give that back to Neville..." I said in a low voice.
     "And suppose I don't?" Malfoy glared.  He pulled out his wand and with a spell, held the notebook higher, leaning it toward the window.  Goyle went to push it open.
     "You won't...?" Neville squeaked.
     "Don't you dare, Malfoy..." growled Harry, his eyes narrowed as he came up the hallway.
     "Oh, it's you...Potter," Malfoy spat, his eyes narrowing back. "Of course as Head Boy, you think you have the right to be giving orders."  Harry is Head Boy and Hermione is Head Girl this year.  The two of them glared at each other, eyes slitted dangerously for a long minute.  Harry slowly pulled out his wand.  Malfoy must have seen it because he leaned out the window and said a quick spell and the notebook went flying out the window.
     "Oh...God..." Neville gasped.  Malfoy grinned maliciously.
     "Ooops, it landed in a puddle of mud out there," Malfoy banged the window shut and gave a shrug of false "apology."   "Never meant for that to happen, Roundbottom....I mean Fatbottom...I mean, oh, I can never remember these names of these idiots except...Potter."  Harry's fists were clenched and his eyes were still slits.  "Cool off, Potter," Malfoy brushed past him, practically pushing him into the wall.  "It's not as if it's your precious notebook I accidentally dropped."  He stalked off to the Slytherin dorms with his yes-men behind him, snickering all the way.  Neville wiped a few tears from his eyes.
     "Oh, Neville, we're sorry..." I put an arm around him.
     "I'm going to kick Malfoy's ass one of these days," Harry raked a hand angrily through his thick black hair.  "Really, that snob is getting on my nerves worse every day!"
     "I think we should just try to ignore him," I said softly as we said the password and entered our common room.
     "We've done that, Ginny and his shit is getting worse all the time," Harry's face was a patchy red.  "That jackass has no respect for anyone but himself.  I'm afraid one of these days he's going to really hurt someone."  We sat by the fireplace.
     "I'm concerned about that too," I admitted.
     "So what can we do to stop him?" Neville asked.
     "I don't know," Harry's fists twisted in his robe pockets.  "But all of us has to gather together and do something."

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     Later on that night, Hermione, Harry, Ron, Cheria, Neville, and I put on Harry's invisibility cloak and headed out into the courtyard to look for Neville's notebook.  It was rather damp, cold, and windy outside.  We eventually found it, all wet and mostly muddied.  Neville sighed and thanked us for helping.
     "No problem..." Harry told him as we headed back inside.  Good thing we had the invisibility cloak because we almost ran into Malfoy and Goyle as we were going in.   We waited until they'd gone back to their dorms before uncloaking partially to give the Fat Lady portrait the password.
     "Shhh..." Neville told Ron as we looked nervously up and down the hall, then went in quickly and headed up to bed.