He looked down at the sheet of parchment, his mind awash with pointless facts. He hated the obsession all the teachers seemed to have with history, the page littered with the who, what, when and where of a dozen transfiguration spells. Honestly, it wouldn't bore him so much if it at least had something like how the spell was made, but spell creation was far from his grasp according to the curriculum.

Scribbling out another line, his eyes wandered to the window in the common room, showing a smattering of snow, across the dark sky. The weather had continued haphazardly since the blizzard a few days ago.

'Harry, are you okay?'

Turning his head, he found an anxious gaze upon him. 'Yeah, I'm fine Hermione.'

She smiled weakly. 'Let's get this out of the way and then there's nothing to worry about until you-know-what,' she softly said.

Suppressing a snort at the conflicting images of finishing off homework in a timely manner and drugging then impersonating a trio of students, he nodded, returning her gentle smile. 'Sure.'

Back to gazing at the dull ramblings of a scholar some few hundred years ago, it was his mind that wandered this time, his thoughts pondering why he was struggling to concentrate more than usual. The obvious answer was that only the next day stood between them and the Christmas holiday, but he didn't think it was that simple.

A huff from beside him brought his attention back to the real world. Sneaking a glance, he found his study-partner glaring across the room towards the fireplace. 'Honestly, why he spends his time playing chess while we're studying is beyond me! Merlin knows he will ask me for the help the day before it's due in and we could both be saved the bother if he wasn't so, so, so Ron.'

He smiled at her assessment, concurring silently as he knew better than to fuel the flames between those two. Sometimes, it reminded him of how siblings seemed to fight, not that he had much expertise in the area. The way they infuriated each other while caring for one another definitely seemed a prevailing property of both sibling and their relationships though.

Speaking with diplomacy gained from a little over a year of playing the peacemaker, he suggested, 'Why don't we put this off until tomorrow? After all, if we're lucky, Professor McGonagall might cancel it.'

He grinned as she fell for the bait, her scowl now firmly settled on him at the very idea of a homework being cancelled or it being a good thing, he wasn't sure which. However, it seemed that his aggravation wasn't severe enough to tempt her spite as she let off another huff, seemingly deflating her anger. 'Sure, but I think that this is interesting. I would be considering doing the same for Charms, if there wasn't so much else for us to do over the holidays.'

'Let's wait and see, eh?' His apprehension was well hidden as she gave him a quaint stare before organising her mess of papers. Releasing a breath he hadn't realised he was holding, he copied her actions, though he was less picky about the order of the pages and was acting more on getting them into a single pile that he could slide into the book to keep his place.

Shaking his head, he couldn't help but think she was a bad influence on him. After all, he hadn't gotten into any trouble in well over a fortnight. Well, besides that whole discovering the petrified Justin Fitch-Fletchley. Still, his rebellious side was getting restless.

'What should we do now?' she calmly asked, though her eyes kept jerking over to the fireplace.

While his eyes wandered to the clock above the fireplace, he wondered if she would manage to not get into an argument with the third member of their trio without his supervision. 'I think I'll go to bed.'

Frowning, she bit her lip slightly. 'Are you feeling unwell? I could go with you to see Madam Pomfrey, it wouldn't be a bother, honestly.'

Thinking about how much she used the words "bother" and "honestly", he could see why people picked up on her bookish way of speaking, but he felt endeared by it. 'I'm fine, just a bit sleepy. Me and Ron stayed up a bit too late and I don't sleep until a minute before classes like him.'

He saw her frown again and struggled to hide his amusement as she was no doubt considering whether or not to correct his grammar. In the end, she settled on a sympathetic smile of sorts and said, 'Well, okay then. Have a good sleep.'

'Will do,' he said, giving her a short mock salute before making his way over to the stairs. After contemplating informing the other members of the dorm, and deciding she would probably cover that when she chastised them, he trundled up to said dormitory.

His area was sparse compared to the others, even Neville having a collection of magazines on his table. Sitting on the side of his bed, he slid his hands under and found the handle. After a few tugs, his trunk lay before him and he opened it. The fabric felt as soft as ever as he pulled the cloak up, half-covering himself.

Returning the trunk, he stood tall and carefully enclosed himself in the cloak. He walked over to the full-length mirror by his bed and slowly rotated, pleased to find no trace of himself in the reflection as always.

His time in the dormitory was completed once his bed-curtains were drawn and a pair of transfigured glasses left on his table. It wasn't the best of matches, but the lack of lenses and slight discolouring would be hardly noticeable from across the room.

He took the stairs slowly, ears primed for anyone coming up, but they were silent. Holding his breath, he skirted around the edge of the common room to the entrance. With anxiety he waited, watching as people walked aimlessly every now and then, sometimes coming closer to him than he'd have liked.

After nearly ten minutes, his way was unbarred as an older couple entered, their appearance a little dishevelled. He slipped through before it closed again, careful in his movements to keep the cloak covering himself and away from where it could snag.

With no fires to heat it, the stone corridor was chilly. He pulled his arms close to his body and, by virtue of how he held it, the cloak, making it taught and more uncomfortable with every humid breath.

Taking a path he knew well, the time slipped by unnoticed, his mind focused on fending off his body's reaction to the numbing cold. Removing his wand, he tapped the door handle, whispering a familiar incantation, before entering their room.

It was halfway between the Gryffindor tower and its Ravenclaw sister, an ideal place for them to meet. Despite leaving greatly earlier than usual, she still beat him here and, not for the first time, he wondered if this was so much a meeting place as it was her own retreat that he occasionally disturbed.

No greeting was made as he recast the locking spell and deposited his cloak onto one of the dozen or so chairs distributed around the room. There was no discernible pattern to their layout, for him, but he felt like if he looked hard enough, then he would find one.

Rather than break her attention from reading, he sat down on the chair that opposed her. Strewn across the table between were pages of notes. Some he recognised from his previous visits and some from homework assignments the year prior, while a further few had eccentric drawings of compound creatures.

One in particular caught his attention. The main body was that of a scorpion, but thicker. In addition, the pincers were substituted with ape-like arms and its head had more of a hog's appearance.

A gentle rush of air informed him that she had finished. Like always, she had carefully lowered an end of the book onto the table and then let it pivot down.

'Have you got the spell for moving the tracking charm?' he asked, trying to find a title on the front of the book, but failing.

Her fingertips slid along the cover before finding its spine and spinning it slightly. 'Yes, along with the tracking charm, I think. We can use a few different detection charms to check, can we not?'

His eyes found "Amongst the beasts of Borneo" in faded gold, the authors name illegible from his position while he nodded. 'What did you call it before, a deductive experiment?'

A touch of a smile graced her lips. 'I believe I did.'

'We find identification spells that give us positives and negatives and compare the tracking charms you found to the one on the cloak?' he expounded with a frown of concentration.

'Exactly,' she said in a short, sharp exhale. The mismatch of papers were further misaligned as she spread them out thinner, revealing hidden treasures. 'All of them have their advantages, but we can't deduce which advantage he wants, so instead we deduce which one he has.'

Putting his wand down on the edge of the table, he asked, 'So, how many spells am I learning tonight?'

Her face was blank as her eyes darted around the organised mess in front of her. 'I think four identification spells and up to six tracking charms. After that, we can transfer it, or them.'

The lightness beneath her eyes pleased him. 'Which one first?'

He watched her rearrange the pages, no doubt her mind whirring as she tried to reconcile which she thought most likely given his previous meetings with, and general gossip regarding, the headmaster. Well, that's what he assumed, but what he knew was that anything he assumed about her had a fifty-fifty chance of being wrong.

'This one,' she intoned, pressing her finger firmly onto a sheet of parchment while her free hand snatched a book from an unsteady-looking pile. Somehow, the other books plopped down without shifting. 'Page three-five-two. "The Huntsman's Bait." You apply it to something and then chant the locator charm and your wand will gently pull you towards the target. It's subtle and not in common spell books.'

'Sounds promising,' he replied, taking a look at the book and, more importantly, the wand movements.

She nodded and relaxed her arms, bringing them to her side, with a lot less care than she used to. He knew there was more she could say, maybe even more she wanted to say, but he liked that she held back. Sometimes, it was nice to leave what could be said later until then.

'Let's get started.'

'Let's get started.'

She watched him start imitating the movements in the book. Somehow, he always managed to do it with grace she could only wish for, even when he only had the stodgy images in black and white to go by.

His wand swung through the air, weaving a shape not unlike a bow-tie. She doubted he noticed, but a weak trail of magic was left in its wake. Unsure of what exactly caused it, her thoughts usually settled on his subconscious trying to cast the spell as he read it, but failing due to a lack of will and power. That's not to say he wasn't powerful, but he was only twelve and it would be the equivalent of wordless magic, a feat not expected until his sixth year.

Fluttering her attention further north, she watched him mouth the incantation over and over again. She hadn't asked, but he'd told her that he did it because it helped him feel the magic out. Although unable to describe it well, she too felt the tug inside of her when she copied him. If pressed, she would say it was like trying to wiggle her ears (which was an ability she wished she possessed, but sadly didn't.)

For some reason he connected to his magic better than she did and it was something she didn't begrudge him. She knew it possible that he could have been born with it or that his exposure to powerful magic at the tender age of one left its mark or his existence as the battery for a ward of unknown strength and effect readied him for channelling magic properly.

Whatever it was, she didn't begrudge him. In her mind, she recounted the times they were together, his knack for picking up spells aiding her own gathering of practice. Everything from the levitation charm to the clothing transfigurations to the potion detection charms...

A glow distracted her and she lazily raised her head to find an old quill pulsing between pastel colours. Slowly, it settled to swimming through shades of blue. Looking up, she caught his eyes and smiled, one he returned.

'That was amazing for a first try,' she commented as the magic started to fizzle out of existence. He mumbled something that she ignored and opted instead to stare through him, like she usually did.

Like he usually did, he squirmed under her gaze before finally saying, 'Thank you.'

'You're welcome.' Her smile broadened slightly as it always did when he stopped trying to discount the compliment.

Their moment was quick to end, his attention returning to the book and arms regaining their precise movements. Given he was working, she decided to do the same and pulled out a book of charms from her pile.

Turning to the bookmarked page, she retrieved her wand from behind her ear. The wood felt alive to her touch, her excited magic eager for use. Drawing upon it, she pulled her magic up and through her wand, incanting, 'Disillusion,' while softly touching her head with the wand's tip.

An oozing trickled down her body, though her mind was fixed on continuing the spell rather than registering the sensation. When she no longer had the draw on her magic, she relaxed, breathing out and lowering her arm. Opening her eyes, she saw him smiling at her.

'Nearly there.'

She moved over, letting herself show in the mirror. As he said without saying so, there was still a hint of herself looking back, but it was like a noticeable smudge on a window rather than the semi-opaque ghost-like figure she was the last few times.

'I reckon you'd be fine using it like that as long as no one's looking for you too hard.'

'Perhaps I can wear nothing and pretend to be a ghost?' She indulged in observing his blush in the mirror, as he always did when she teased him. 'Most people wouldn't spare me a second glance if I did, would they?'

He coughed loudly and went back to looking at the book. 'I-I think it would be better if you didn't.'

'You can be so boring; I have no idea what that dark lord sees in you.'

She relished hearing him chuckle, but stopped paying so much attention to him as she released the spell from herself. Slowing down her breathing and closing her eyes, she ran through the theory in a moment before repeating the incantation.

The magic washed down her quicker this time and it fuelled the excitement she felt. After breaking the wand from her head, she waited a few seconds before opening her eyes. A grin took to her face as there wasn't even a hint of a trace of herself looking back.

Testing it out, her arms moved casually, picking up speed until she could see the lag in the mirror. Biting her lip, she guessed that it was unlikely for her to move that fast, but it was disconcerting that it wouldn't be as effective if she had to beat a hasty retreat.

'You're over-thinking things, I bet,' he said. 'The charms weakening.'

Blinking, she was surprised to see a weak impression of herself copying. With her negative thoughts suitably disrupted, it blended away into the background, leaving her invisible once more.

'There we go; I told you practise would make up the difference. After all, the book said most people overpower it because they don't have the will for doing it properly.'

'Shame on you, suggesting I would want to be like most people,' she said, chastising him and hiding her mirth, even if it was a bit redundant considering he couldn't see her.

'I-I didn't!' he said.

She hummed out loud, leaving him sweating. 'Okay, I'll forgive you, but don't make that mistake again. After all, most people are unable to count to ten in the language of the Merfolk.'

'That's probably right.' Waiting a moment first, he then asked, 'Can you?'

'I think so, but I haven't checked yet,' she replied. 'Am I still invisible?'

'Either that or you've found a voice throwing spell.'

Crinkling her nose, she broke the charm and felt the magic lift off her. She turned around and observed as he repeated his attempts, that most likely the third. Again a glow enveloped the quill, but this time it stayed a consistent navy blue before fading out.

His lips upturned as he looked aside, catching her eye. 'It's still too light, don't you think?'

She paused to remember before answering. 'That book tells you it should be nearly black, but there's another one that says it darkens in colour depending on the power put into it, going from a normal blue upwards.'

Nodding, he asked, 'On to the identification spells then?'

He watched the cloak glow a light red, bordering on pink.

'Four for four,' he announced, a little laughter to his voice. 'I'm glad I've learnt not to doubt you.'

Twisting his head, he watched as she dribbled back into existence. 'And I'm glad for you,' she replied, a little smile on her face.

He liked it when she, no they, were happy. It was a subtle difference, but she would smile more and it would make him smile more, not to mention she would become more playful with her words, throwing in little jokes that you had to be on the ball to catch. She became a different person to that small, broken little girl...

'The switching charm is easy to do for the Huntsman's Bait, but it was awfully hard to find, almost like someone didn't want anyone to be able to locate it,' she said.

His face fell as he asked, 'You don't think?'

She shook her head, her hair flowing. 'I'm simply saying that it's not impossible.'

With the earlier admission still fresh in his mind, he started thinking, paranoia easing its way into his mind.

'Still, there were a pair of books mentioning it, so here you go.'

Snapped back, he accepted the book, his vision barely extending beyond it. Despite his clouded thoughts, he worked through the snippet of theory. Collecting the charmed quill, he placed it beside an empty ink pot.

There was no wand motion for this, so he felt confident as he held his wand to the quill and saying the magic words. The glow that had enraptured it before reappeared, only it now clung to the end of his wand, like a droplet of ink. Carefully, while keeping his mind focused, he moved it to the pot and released it.

After a few seconds, the new target of the charm lost its luminescence. Loosely holding his wand between the two items on the desk, he muttered the associated locator charm, his wand gently tugging towards the pot.

Smirking, he stepped back and turned to the side. 'Yup, it's easy alright.'

'Or I lied as part of my nefarious plan to trick you into performing complex spells with ease,' she replied softly, her attention on the table. 'Either way, the pudding is in the proof.'

Hesitating between asking her if she was serious, informing her she got the phrase backwards and assuming that anything he said wouldn't improve his situation, he settled on saying, 'I'll just do the cloak then,' though he made it sound in between a statement and a question.

Retrieving the cloak, he placed it beside the quill.

'Er, what happens if I mess it up?'

She broke her gaze from the table and put it upon his own. 'At best, the charm returns to the cloak and you try again. At worst, it breaks and Dumbledore knows it's been broken, leading him to putting on a new, even more obscure, one.'

'I'll try not to mess up then?' he asked and she nodded back.

Taking deep breaths, he steadied himself before repeating the procedure, dragging the charm from the cloak to the quill. His unease lasted until the magic subsided.

'Phew,' he whispered.

'Another wonderful success,' she commented, patting his arm. 'What should we do with the quill? I was thinking you could attach it to Hedwig and ask her to slowly make her way to China. It would be interesting to see if she is more intelligent and resourceful than he is, don't you think?'

His resolve broke as he burst out laughing at the absurdity of the supposed greatest wizard alive chasing, and being outsmarted by, a bird, even if she was the smartest bird in the world in his humble opinion. 'Maybe...' he began, his breath hardly back. 'Maybe, we could transfigure it to a pin or a badge, so I could wear it when I'm doing boring sneaking around stuff and keep him in the dark.'

'No, that would be silly. A pair of cotton knickers would make much more sense, since you wouldn't accidentally lose them then and it's unlikely anyone else would take them from you.'

'I,' he managed before his embarrassment got the better of him and he had to look away for a second. 'I think other people may be more interested in a pair of knickers in my trunk than you think. Dean, I know, would want to know all about them.'

'You could always say they were a present from me,' she suggested.

Still unable to look back, he replied, 'I don't think he would understand and would probably get completely the wrong idea.' Slowly, he looked back, only to find her smiling, a practised innocence on her face. Scowling, he said, 'You tease me too much.'

She exaggeratedly nodded. 'Or not enough,' she then added.

Bringing a hand up to rub his face, he muttered, 'Why?' With his own practice to fall back on, he banished the blush. 'Okay, so what problem did you see with the badge?'

'People like to ask questions and it would be odd for you to have a badge you never wear,' she said. Swiping her fringe aside, she continued. 'I think if you were, make two badges and start wearing one without the tracking charm.'

'People don't usually go looking in my trunk,' he said out loud, though more to himself than to her. 'But I guess it wouldn't hurt...'

His attention was drawn to her as she started rummaging through a discarded bag. Eventually, she pulled something small out and returned to her original seat. Possibilities of what she could have running through his mind, he joined her.

She placed it beside the quill in a delicate motion. 'The Quibbler produces badges for our long term supporters.'

Surprised, he asked, 'But I'm not a long term support of the Quibbler, am I?'

'I believe daddy granted you a life-time membership in honour of your parents, but some magic prevented delivery of the issues. When I return home tomorrow, I can ask him to start sending them out to you, if you want them I mean?'

He smiled, finally understanding why she often had the paper on hand and where some of her quirkiness came from. 'Sure, I'd like that, and I'd be happy to wear the Quibbler badge, though I'm not sure if I'll help with sales at all.'

Her head tilted and she stared at him for a few seconds. 'They'll see.'

Unsure if he should ask, he instead went to work on the quill. The inanimate-to-inanimate free transfiguration was first year work and he was confident with his ability to accurately change whatever made up a quill to the same bronze as the badge. Placing his wand on the former, he concentrated on the latter, taking in all the details he could.

Slowly, the quill darkened and shortened, until it was like a wooden block. Rough gave way to smooth as it took on a shine and the brown appeared metallic and lighter. The bottom began to move into itself, but left behind a thin rod.

Struggling, his grip tightened and head began to ache, but the intricate guard and pivot part took shape along with the lettering on the top. Satisfied, he released the spell and slumped in his chair. 'That was harder than I'd thought it would be.'

'Of course it was,' she said matter-of-factly. 'It's much bigger than a matchstick and you didn't use a pre-made spell for it.'

'Huh?' he asked. 'Are you just pulling my leg again, because I'm happy being as abnormal as I am now.'

Her head swayed from side to side, like she was listening to a melody only she could hear. 'Maybe yes or maybe no.' Gently, it stilled and she stretched out a hand to inspect the duplicate. 'I was just going to give you another one so you could transfer the charm over, but I like this one. It's very impressive.'

Biting back the instinctual modesty, he replied, 'Thanks.'

'You're welcome.'

Not wanting to disrupt the silence just yet, he took the time to do a proper check up on her. As he noted earlier, the bags beneath her eyes had gone as had the usual redness. She sat comfortably, lacking the slight fidgeting and odd rash on her arms. Her socks didn't match, not that he would ever expect them to, but her shoes did.

'They've stopped now,' she said quietly.

Again, he restrained himself from speaking automatically. Locking eyes, he asked, 'Stopped trying or stopped succeeding?'

She struggled to keep his gaze and broke away. 'Succeeding.'

In an instant, it was like he was looking at the girl from a little over a month ago. He wanted to tell her that everything would be okay, that they would come around and treat her like they should've done from the start, tell her something reassuring. He couldn't lie to her, she didn't need that and didn't deserve that.

'Thank you, for everything... I feel like I have a friend for the first time in years and all I can think of is how much you've done for me and how little I've given back and...'

It surprised him, having grown used to her protective state. Knowing how important this was, he didn't want to ruin it by saying something stupid. 'I like you. I like spending time with you. It might not seem like much to you, but it's a lot to me and I've had fun learning all these spells together.'

She still hadn't looked back at him, but he was glad to see her smiling. 'I, I feel the same way.'

'Good, then we can get back to you teasing me and me acting like an idiot for your entertainment.'

When she nodded and looked back at him, a grin on her face, he felt like he'd finally done something good in his life. The warmth he got from her happiness was beyond the rush he got from besting a troll or smuggling out a dragon or saving the philosopher's stone...

'If you knew someone, someone who had a childhood like yours, would do whatever it took to help them?' she asked, a subtle urgency to it unnerving him ever so slightly.

Having lost himself in his own thoughts, it took him a moment to change tracks and, after thinking, firmly answered, 'Yes,' before adding, 'Why?'

'Curiosity,' she replied, her smile feral.

Watching him leave, her fingertips ran along the spine of the book, feeling the embossed title "Moste Potent Potions" as her feral smile returned.

Leaving the room, he ghosted back to Gryffindor tower. Although it wasn't too late, he was fairly sure most would be in their dorms by now, though whether there was much sleeping going on was another question entirely.

Barely whispering the password, he eased to the side to avoid the portrait before sneaking in. As he expected, no one was present and he made his way to his room with ease. Listening, he could make out the snores of three of his fellow lodgers, making it likely all four would be asleep or attempting to be.

Slipping through a barely open door, he skulked across the room and dropped the tracked badge onto his bedside table as well as his cloak onto the bed. As silently as he entered, he left again, ignoring the slight hiccup in one of the snores as he closed the door.

'Disillusion.' The familiar magic trickled down him. Back through the deserted common room he went, passing through the dual entrance and exit once more.

Creeping through the castle, he felt the chill worse without the cloak, but he easily pushed the cold away by increasing his pace. Down the stairs and along the corridor he went, getting closer and closer.

His heart pounded in his ear ever faster.

Taking stairs upwards, the silence of the school was broken by distant murmurings. Slowing his steps, he softened his breathing and focused on what little he could make out. Closer and closer he got, until the origins were revealed beyond a corner.

'I'm telling you, she's snuck out to that room and all we'd have to do is lock her in then go tell Flitwick we're worried about her,' whispered one girl with short brown hair and her witch's robe on.

'But he'll know someone locked her in there and we'd be the prime suspects!' whispered the other girl, this one with dirty blonde hair.

The brunette shook her head. 'No way, we'll just be the two little firsties looking out for our friend. Besides, I saw her go into the room the other day, so I know how to get to it now. She had some kind of charm on it – I dunno, you have to know about the room to see it or something.'

'O-okay, if you're sure we won't-' she began.

Having had enough, he quietly incanted, 'Mucus ad nauseam,' and sent the dark green curse down the corridor before following it up with, 'Furnunculus.' The first struck the brunette and the second the blonde; mild compared to what they did to her.

Without waiting to see the results, he retreated, taking some satisfaction from the muted scream that followed a few seconds later. He doubted they would admit the truth – they and the others hadn't before – but that didn't mean he would get careless.

Drifting back towards Gryffindor tower, he cast a dozen of the spells he could remember from his classes at the magic-resistant walls and windows, making sure to avoid any rebounds. Approaching his destination, he thought of how he'd have to remember to find a new place for them to meet, though hopefully her improvements in the Disillusionment charm would help keep the next one secret for even longer.

He didn't know what she thought of his vigilantism, but she was doing better and they were doing worse, so he hoped she didn't mind. Besides, it didn't feel as good as actually making someone happy, but it was close.

Author notes: Apologies for delay (profile has reason for it.) The pacing of time is one of the two problems I've had, but I've now settled on a fairly fractured schedule with the intention of canon running along side subtle changes I've stated, implied or left to the minds of the reader. The other problem is characterising Harry and Luna, since the first chapter was in very unusual circumstances, but it's something I've mildly planned. Next chapter shouldn't be quite as long a wait – I'm currently thinking a fortnight or so given other writing and uni exams and my thoughts on the chapter fitting into my preferred ~5k words – and will skip right along to the end of the school year.

Thanks for all the reviews for the first chapter – I promise I've read them all. First of all, for people who dislike me using ' ', I'm sorry but I'm British and, for us, using either ' ' or " " is completely acceptable; I might change it over if there's really a bunch of people who care, but it's pretty annoying to do, so I probably won't. Second of all, an eagle-eyed viewer spotted the similarity between the first chapter and an omake in Odd Ideas (ch 100;) it wasn't a conscious decision of mine, but I can't deny that it influenced me since I am a fan of Rorschach's Blot and have read most of his stuff. As such, I'm more than happy to point people in his direction. Third of all, I really won't be adding Hermione to the Harry/Luna 'ship, so don't read it if that's all you're hoping for – to be honest, I don't really even have any specific plans for Hermione beyond Harry's friend and denier of Quibbler. In the slight chance that there's any Ron fans eagerly anticipating his role in things, I'll be throwing him under the bus fourth year and Ginny, along with the rest of the Weasleys, won't be getting much script-time at all. In case I've been too subtle, Dumbledore isn't going to quite be an unassailable idol in this and there's more characters I could discuss, but that would be revealing the plot a bit prematurely. I just wanted to include this last bit so people with relevant reading fetishes can safely stop paying attention now – I know I've got a few and it sucks when you're slapped in the face completely unaware.