'Are you sure?' said Sirius, looking at him with concern.
'You'd better tell them, Sirius,' said Lupin, suddenly. He had been very quiet up until that point and was looking uneasy.
Sirius glanced over at Lupin, and then back at Harry and the rest.
'Tomorrow, Professor Dumbledore and Cornelius Fudge are coming here to talk to you,' he said, to all of them. 'As I said before, this is a serious situation. Perhaps we can leave further speculation until then-'
'I'm sorry,' said Hermione suddenly, and stood up. 'I'm not feeling well.' She was aware of Harry glancing up at her, and of the room swinging around her in a coruscating blur of colors, but mostly she was aware of the pain in her head. It felt like two hot red pokers were pressed against the backs of her eyeballs. 'It's my head.'
She was vaguely aware of a murmur of voices, and of Harry's voice in particular. She heard herself tell him that she was fine, just tired.
She heard Lupin say something in a worried tone about shock and stress, and she heard Sirius say that she should lie down. Then she was aware of a hand on her arm, and that the hand seemed to be attached to Draco. 'I'll show her where one of the bedrooms is,' he said. She thought about protesting, but her head hurt too much. She heard Harry push his chair back, and then heard Sirius say, 'Harry, wait just a minute,' and was, guiltily, briefly thankful that Harry couldn't follow her.
Draco turned her towards the door. Her vision cleared a little as they crossed the room. As they passed by Lupin, she saw him recoil sharply back from Draco. She blinked in surprise, glancing back over her shoulder. Now why would he do that? she wondered, as the library door closed behind them.
'Harry, would you not fidget for just one second?' said Sirius exasperated.
Harry made a concerted effort to sit still. He was worried about Hermione, she had looked extremely pale and ill just now. And, of course, sending her off with Malfoy to look at bedrooms didn't sit too well with him either.
Sirius looked at Ron and Ginny. 'I owled your parents this morning,' he said.
Ron and Ginny let out identical wails of horror. 'Sirius!' said Ron, looking betrayed. 'How could you?'
Despite himself, Harry felt a small smile creep across his mouth. Ron wasn't used to the new, more parental Sirius; he was used to a Sirius on the run from authorities, a Sirius who lived in a cave, ate rats, and never, ever, owled anyone's parents.
'Well, I haven't heard back yet,' said Sirius.
'Maybe the owl got lost,' said Ron, hopefully. 'Maybe it couldn't find them on holiday.'
'Ron, owl post doesn't go missing,' said Ginny, irritably.
'But, in the meantime, you can dream,' pointed out Sirius.
'And we might as well tell you, Harry,' said Lupin, walking over to the desk and looked at Harry with his arms crossed, 'that you've been expelled from Magid school.'
Harry made a sort of choking noise. 'Expelled?'
'Well,' Lupin pointed out gently, 'you did break about thirty school rules, run away while classes were in session, and destroy school property.'
'Expelled,' Harry repeated, looking horrified. Then he glanced up at Lupin, and asked, 'Is Malfoy expelled, too?'
'Er, yes,' said Lupin, blinking in surprise.
'Good,' said Harry, with immense satisfaction.
'Really, Harry, is that all you care about?' said Sirius, looking amused.
'Well,' said Harry. 'Actually. Yeah.'
Sirius looked at him and said, 'Harry. If you really hate him, you don't have to live here with him, you know.'
There was a short, acute silence. Ron and Ginny glanced away, as did Lupin. And Harry looked merely astonished. Finally he said, in a startled sort of voice, 'I don't hate him.' He looked around, a bit defensively, and shrugged. 'I don't.'
Sirius looked over at Lupin, unable to conceal a slightly triumphant smile. Ron looked dubious. And Ginny suddenly bolted to her feet, announced in a strangled sort of voice that she wanted to check on Hermione, and left the room.
As soon as the library door shut behind them, Hermione wrenched her arm out of Draco's grasp and glared at him.
'What are you doing?' she hissed.
'Taking you to your room,' he said, and started to walk down the corridor.
She followed him, scowling. 'You know we shouldn't be alone together.'
'Correction. You shouldn't be alone with me. I can control myself perfectly well around you.'
'Oh, so that was just me last night,' she began waspishly, realized how she sounded, and stopped. 'Never mind. It's not your fault, I know you didn't choose this.'
'Just what Freud would have said, only possibly without that know-it-all attitude.'
Hermione was relieved to note that the love potion did not prevent her from becoming very, very angry. 'What is your problem?' she snapped. 'As if we don't have enough to deal with.'
'We?' he echoed, and stopped dead, glaring at her. 'This is not my problem. This is your problem. These are your friends. These are your lies. You,' he said, and now his voice snapped with anger, 'have to realize, Hermione, that there are repercussions. There are consequences to your actions. There are-'
