The rest of the night went rather swiftly for Fairy Tail and the rest of both groups got to meet each other, culminating in the Order calling Gajeel to demonstrate his Iron Dragon Slayer abilities which he did by cutting the entire dining room table in two pieces with a single stroke of his arm. Fortunately they were able to repair it quickly and the new Fairies were fully welcomed. Though Bill Weasley had to physically pull his brother Charlie away from Wendy, since he was over-excitedly plying her with questions about Grandine.
Arrangements were made for where they would stay and to most people's surprise, Wendy volunteered to stay with Aberforth at the Hog's Head. She said that, "He's a bit grouchy but I think he's a nice old man at heart and… I don't know… I feel like he could do with a bit of company. And I'll only be a… fireplace… away… wow, I never thought I'd say that."
Naturally Charla immediately wanted to stay where Wendy was and Happy wanted to stay where Charla was - a fact which made Lisanna giggle slightly. But everyone else was rather surprised when Gajeel also immediately volunteered to stay with Wendy, swiftly claiming it was because he thought the Dragon Slayers and their Exceed partners should stay together because "it makes sense that way." What he actually meant was that he was not about to leave Wendy without another Fairy Tail member watching over her. Only Juvia caught that subtext though, and she smiled, pleased at how Gajeel was coming to care more despite his extreme reluctance to let people know about it.
Aberforth had complained of course, but Gajeel's glare had quickly told him that either he was going to stay at the Hog's Head, or he would find a way to make Aberforth live at Grimmauld Place so that Wendy would stay too, possibly by destroying the Hog's Head entirely.
Mavis decided she would take turns staying at different places, but would stay at Grimmauld Place for now as she wanted to get to know the other three from her guild a little more for the time being.
But even as Fairy Tail were beginning to settle into bed at about half two in the morning and the rest of the Order began to head home with an information overload preventing them from getting much sleep, except Tonks, who was out like a light, Ron Weasley was still up, sitting in an armchair in the Gryffindor Common Room and still looking rather wide-eyed.
After his unfortunate incident with his unknown assailant earlier that night, they'd hurriedly found and reported what had happened to Professor Sprout, who had been rather angry at the damage to the greenhouse and had hastily fixed the damage before hailing the other teachers still on campus to conduct a search of the grounds for anyone dangerous, before sending Ron and Hermione back to the Common Room since that was one of the safest places they could be.
Hermione had given up trying to convince Ron to just go to bed a while ago, but had refused to wake Harry up to give him the news. Doubtless he'd be angry about that in the morning but goodness knows he needed all the sleep he could get.
"Look, I'm not denying that you were attacked by something but are you absolutely sure that you saw what you saw?"
"Oh yeah," Ron nodded. "I really don't see how it could have been a trick."
"There are certain spells that can cause hallucinogenic effects that aren't even felt when they hit you. Or maybe you could have been caught in the pollen of a Makumura plant. You were next to greenhouse four and that was the glass you smashed through as soon as you were attacked."
"Does that cause hallucinations?" Ron asked.
"It does, yes. We should be covering them at some point this year I think, but Professor Sprout always has to cast spells on days where the plant releases its pollen to stop people from getting affected when they go in. Maybe today was one of those days."
"…I dunno… if that was a hallucination it was a bloody real one," Ron shivered. "Okay, so maybe the whole arm turning into a sword thing might not have really happened but there's no way I imagined that guy."
"But how did he get through the Hogwarts wards?" Hermione murmured.
"Do you think he got in through the tunnel from the Shrieking Shack?"
"Ron, Dumbledore knows that You-Know-Who knows about that tunnel. Peter Pettigrew would have told him. I bet that tunnel will be heavily protected by now."
"Good point."
"But he was screaming about a girl, you said?"
"Yeah, he kept asking me where 'the girl' was. For a moment I thought he might mean you because he'd seen us both patrolling earlier and then attacked only to find me alone. But then he used a name… can't remember what it was… Wendy something… Are there any Wendy's in this school?"
"I think there's one in the second year Hufflepuff house, but I'm not sure. I can't remember everyone's names."
"He sounded like he thought we'd done something to her."
"You think this man thought we were the bad guys?"
"I dunno what the heck he thought. All I know is I'm not gonna sleep tonight after all."
Hermione opened her mouth to say more before there was a sudden flash of fire over the table, which made them both yelp and almost fall backwards. But suddenly there was a piece of paper and a long red feather lying on the table. A feather that both of them recognised as belonging to a phoenix, giving them a clear message as to who sent it.
Hermione picked up the paper and read aloud from it, "Mister Weasley. I am terribly sorry for the misunderstanding that occurred outside today. I'm afraid that the man who accosted you outside the greenhouses was actually one of a few that I hired for extra security to the school this year as I am sure you know we may need. I can assure you this will not happen again, but I would appreciate it if this story did not become public knowledge."
"That Dumbledore's writing?" Ron asked.
"Definitely," Hermione sighed in relief. "Looks like there's nothing to worry about after all though. Extra security. That's a relief."
"Not so much of a relief when the security attacks the bloody students," Ron muttered. "And that still doesn't explain why he attacked me and why his arm became a sword."
"I maintain it was probably the Makumura plant pollen that made that last one happen. But if Dumbledore says its alright then I think it's alright, don't you?"
"Yeah, I guess. Still… I hope I don't run into him again. I'm telling you, this guy was a nutcase. Dunno what Dumbledore's thinking… but then again, he did have a giant three-headed dog guarding the Philosopher's Stone. Wonder what happened to Fluffy anyway."
"Well, the point is that everything's fine," Hermione sighed. "Still…" she turned to look out of the window and the moon shining high above - just gone full a few days ago and the cycle beginning again. "Extra security might not be enough one day. One day an attack like that might be from a real threat. And we're not learning how to defend ourselves thanks to that… I refuse to call her a teacher."
Ron grinned widely, before his face became more sombre. "But what can we do? She won't let us practice spells."
"Maybe. But I'm beginning to think… we should… start taking matters into our own hands."
...
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