In early January, the Christmas holidays ended and Hogwarts students were forced to drag themselves out of the afterglow of the Yule Ball and back into the grind of their coursework.
On the first day of the new term, the grounds lay under a thick layer of snow. A bleary Draco Malfoy trudged toward Hagrid's cabin with a listless Crabbe and Goyle at his heels.
"Merlin, grant mercy upon whatever peculiar creature that man has arranged for today," Draco muttered darkly, his face like a gathering storm. "My heart, already weakened from staying up all night, cannot survive another surprise. And you two — there won't be a next time. If your homework isn't done in advance, you're on your own."
Crabbe and Goyle nodded with such obsequious vigour that they nearly walked into each other.
As it happened, it was not Hagrid who greeted them, but a grey-haired substitute professor with a prominent chin and a businesslike manner — Professor Grubbly-Plank — which eased Draco's irritability considerably. She clearly knew her syllabus and had no intention of surprising anyone.
He rubbed his temples, trying to recall what had driven Hagrid away in his other life. Something Rita Skeeter had published, some exaggerated report... He couldn't quite place it yet.
He had been up all night in the common room helping Crabbe and Goyle finish their assignments, and had managed barely two hours of sleep. He hadn't even had time to glance at the Daily Prophet.
For most students, the lesson turned out to be not only safe but genuinely interesting. Following Professor Grubbly-Plank's guidance, they made their way to the edge of the Forbidden Forest, where a magnificent unicorn was waiting.
It was dazzlingly white, pawing at the cold mud with gilded hooves, its horned head raised. The girls drew close in a chorus of admiring gasps.
"Boys, step back," Professor Grubbly-Plank said crisply. "Unicorns respond to women. Girls, approach slowly — that's it — easy now..."
Draco remained at the fence with the other boys. He stood beside a few broad-shouldered Beauxbatons students, watching Hermione. She reached out tentatively, fingers extended toward the unicorn's mane, her eyes reflecting the snow, a small, unguarded smile on her lips.
His mood improved at once.
"Draco." Harry appeared at his elbow and steered him toward a quieter corner of the fence. "You said Professor Snape was a Death Eater?"
Draco's expression shifted. He raised his wand and quietly cast a handful of Muffliato charms around them.
"You really need to be more careful about who might be listening, Harry."
"Who's going to hear us? These shivering horses?" Harry said impatiently.
"Not just horses," Draco said. "As for Snape — it's not exactly a secret. Go and ask Sirius. He'll confirm it."
"He never told me," Harry said heavily.
"Snape was a Death Eater, yes. But Dumbledore himself stood behind him. I think a wizard of Dumbledore's calibre wouldn't extend that kind of trust without good reason." He kept his tone even.
Though inwardly, his certainty was not as settled as he sounded.
Snape's actions in his other life had never stopped nagging at him — the killing of Dumbledore, the full weight of what that had meant, and the truth that had emerged only at the very end. In four years of this new life, Draco had watched Snape carefully and still couldn't trace the thread that made it all cohere. Snape had protected Harry quietly, for years, out of love for Lily Potter — that much he knew. And Dumbledore was not the sort of man who gave trust carelessly; what Barty Crouch Jr.'s fate had proved, above all, was that Dumbledore's mercy had limits.
So why had Snape gone back? Was it simply that the Dark Lord's return had forced his hand? Could it really be that simple, for a man who had spent years building something different?
Draco let the thought go. He still hadn't found the marble that fit the hole.
"But Voldemort is growing stronger —" Harry began.
"Don't say that name, Harry. Please." Draco kept his voice patient. "There's nothing we can do about this right now except trust that Dumbledore has plans in motion. And speaking of plans —" he gave Harry a pointed look — "you need to stop worrying about Snape and start worrying about that golden egg. The second task is barely a month away. Your competitors have almost certainly already figured it out."
"That's almost word for word what Hermione says," Harry said, with a slightly hunted expression. "She gives me that suspicious look every day."
"She's not suspicious of your abilities. She's worried about you." Draco watched him. "Have you made any progress with the egg?"
"I'll get to it," Harry muttered, in a way that strongly suggested he hadn't.
Draco studied the boy's expression for a moment, then shifted tack. "Sirius can't openly advise you any more, not now that he's on staff. Fair play between schools, and all of that — though I suspect the headmasters of Durmstrang and Beauxbatons aren't holding themselves to the same standard. That means your support has to come from somewhere else."
"I don't think I should be asking for help at all —"
"Harry. You weren't on the same starting line as the others. They're older than you, they know more spells, and they have years more experience. That is simply a fact." Draco kept his voice level. "Do you remember the first task? Your opponents already knew what was coming — and look what would have happened without Sirius. There are other Invisibility Cloaks in the world. There are other Animagi. You got away clean last time, but that was partly luck."
Harry was quiet.
"Try Diggory's method," Draco said. "Whatever it sounds like. He helped you before — maybe he's trying to return the favour in the only way he can without breaking the rules." He paused. "And ask us for help. That's all I'm saying. Hermione is always ready; you only have to say the word."
He glanced over at Hermione for a moment, still smiling at the unicorn, then turned back to Harry. "We'll do whatever we can. Nobody will think less of you for it."
Harry looked at him for a moment, surprised — this was not the reception he'd expected — and then smiled. "Okay. I'll think about it. I'll give Cedric's method a try." His expression relaxed. "Thank you, Draco."
A commotion from the fence interrupted them. They exchanged a glance and made their way back to find Ron holding a newspaper with a stunned expression.
Draco saw Hagrid's photograph on the front page at once.
He scanned the headline and the opening lines. Rita Skeeter. Of course.
*"...a large and menacing man who has abused his newly acquired position by introducing a series of dangerous animals into lessons... admitted to breeding a creature he calls a 'Blast-Ended Skrewt', something between a Manticore and a giant crab, and classified as extremely dangerous..."*
*"...unlike the image he carefully cultivates, Hagrid is not a full-blooded wizard. We can exclusively reveal that his mother is the giantess Fridwulfa, whose current whereabouts are unknown..."*
Ron had stopped reading. The boys around him had gone quiet.
"So what if he's half-giant?" Harry said sharply, looking around at the silence with barely contained fury. "He's still our Care of Magical Creatures teacher. He hasn't got an extra eye or anything wrong with him, has he?"
"Harry." Draco looked toward Hagrid's cabin, its curtains drawn tight. "Why do you think he didn't come in today? Just watch — the moment his bloodline becomes public, parents will write to Dumbledore before nightfall. That's how it works."
Harry yanked the paper from Ron's hand and stared at it as though he could make it say something different. Ron said nothing, gazing blankly at the table.
---
Before the afternoon Arithmancy and Divination class, Draco was resting with his chin in his hand, eyes half-closed, when Hermione appeared and dropped into the seat beside him with all the subtlety of a small storm.
She slammed the newspaper on the table between them. "Rita Skeeter has gone too far."
Draco opened one eye, glanced at the paper, and closed it again. "I don't like her either. But in this particular article, she hasn't actually lied."
Hermione puffed her cheeks out with indignation. "She called him huge and menacing! She said he brought frightening animals to terrorise his students — and that he *abused his position* —"
"His teaching ability has always been rather poor," Draco said, in the calm, even tone of someone stating an inconvenient fact. "Compare this morning's lesson with any lesson Hagrid has taught. How much did you actually learn in his classes? And how much time has he spent following his own enthusiasms rather than a syllabus?"
"That class this morning was excellent," Hermione admitted reluctantly. "I didn't know half of what Professor Grubbly-Plank told us about unicorns."
"Exactly. In Hagrid's class, *you're* the one who ends up helping teach. Has he ever given you a structured lesson?" He looked at her steadily. "And the Blast-Ended Skrewts — did those genuinely contribute to your education?"
"Fine." Her voice had dropped somewhat. "The Skrewts really weren't very useful." She looked at his arm. "Has that scar healed? The one from the Skrewt?"
"It's nothing serious."
"Good." She exhaled and turned back to the newspaper, pointing. "But *this* I still can't accept. *Giants are inherently cruel and bloodthirsty*. That's what she wrote. Hagrid has always been kind and gentle with us —"
"Giants are extremely dangerous," Draco said. "That's not prejudice — that's a widely recognised fact in the wizarding world. It's a matter of record."
Something changed in her expression.
"Pure-blood wizards aren't just wary of giants," she said, in a cooler voice. "They view *everything* with prejudice. And you — you always maintained a polite distance from werewolves. When Professor Lupin resigned, you didn't exactly look heartbroken. And house-elves — you've never once taken that seriously." Her eyes were sharp now, her tone carefully controlled. "I suppose you probably hold plenty of similar views you keep to yourself. Always assuming you're superior to everything that doesn't fit your particular category of acceptable, aren't you?"
"Werewolves *are* genuinely dangerous —" Draco stopped short. He looked at her tense, closed-off face and suddenly understood. "Wait. Are we still talking about giants?"
"We were never only talking about giants," she said flatly, fixing her gaze on the blackboard ahead of her.
"Hermione —"
"Don't."
For the remainder of the lesson, she sat ramrod straight beside him and said nothing.
---
Draco was right about one thing, Hermione thought, in the week that followed, turning the pages of yet another large book on giant populations. Factually, he was largely right. She had now read nearly thirty books on the subject and found not a single account that contradicted what he'd said about giants being violent and dangerous.
Even Ron — who she'd hoped might be more open-minded on the subject — had been remarkably unified in his response. "Giants are vicious, Hermione. It's in their nature. They're born to kill — everyone knows that."
That was the part that troubled her most, she realised, setting the book down. Not the facts themselves, but the *everyone knows*. That seamless, across-the-board agreement, from Weasley to Malfoy, on exactly which groups needed to be kept at arm's length. No room for individual exceptions. No room for Hagrid.
She dug deeper. The historical accounts of giants who had joined Voldemort, who had carried out massacres — those accounts were real, and she found herself unable to dismiss them. The world was more dangerous than she sometimes wanted it to be.
But Hagrid was not those giants. Hagrid had always been warm with her. He had once sat her down at his table with a cup of tea and clumsy, well-meaning words on a day she'd been crying. He was more family than stranger.
Draco didn't know Hagrid. He had never gone to visit his cabin, always found some reason to disappear before they got there, slipping away from Harry and Ron and her as neatly as an eel from a net. He had never seen the person underneath.
She could accept that Draco was right about the data. She could not accept the cold, flat manner in which he'd reached his conclusions — the particular, pure-blood certainty of it.
And what frightened her most, when she sat with it in the dark of the library, was the question she couldn't quite stop asking: if that was how he saw giants, and werewolves, and house-elves — and he was so certain, so naturally certain — where exactly did she fall?