After Kevin talked Draco back from the edge, the boy got his head straight. Whatever lingering grudge Harry and the others had nursed toward him dissolved with it.
Draco remained thoroughly arrogant, of course. "As the future head of the Malfoy family," he announced, "you should all be currying favour with me immediately."
Kevin answered this with a firm kick to his backside.
Draco decided he wanted to get stronger and badgered both Kevin and Snape to train him. Snape knocked him flat in a single move and sent him home for warm milk.
Meanwhile, Kevin's sessions with Snape had escalated. Snape had clocked his rate of improvement and stopped pulling punches entirely. Kevin came out of every session black and blue, barely able to walk. Madam Pomfrey had taken to expecting him.
Hermione confronted Snape about it more than once. He responded by flicking his hair out of his eyes and pretending she didn't exist.
She was furious enough that Kevin had to physically hold her back from a duel.
Without the Chamber of Secrets mess swallowing up the year, Kevin threw himself into training. It consumed him. Outside of classes, meals, and Saturday afternoons, he was either in the dungeons or in the infirmary.
Hermione noticed the urgency in it. The way he drove himself. Tom Riddle, the train attack — something had lit a fire under him. She didn't ask. She refused to be dead weight if things went wrong again, so she doubled her own hours and started running drills without being asked.
Draco found out Kevin was coaching Hermione on Saturdays and invited himself along. Kevin let him. Hermione was less charitable — she didn't hold back when they sparred, and Draco ended up in tears inside the first ten minutes.
He dragged Harry and Ron in to share the suffering.
They all cried together. Team bonding.
Life rolled forward.
Kevin's combat skill grew fast. Snape pushed hard enough that Kevin had to push back just to keep up. By spring, probably only Dumbledore could take him comfortably at Hogwarts — and even that was becoming less certain.
What Snape taught was more than spells. It was when to use them. How to shift mid-fight. How to read an opponent and respond before they finished moving.
Kevin also got Dumbledore's approval for runs into the Forbidden Forest. Perfect training ground for someone with a body that healed faster than it should.
He tore through Acromantulas until Aragog himself fled the forest to complain to Hagrid. He harassed the centaur herds until they chased him and then discovered that catching him was impossible. He made friends with a hippogriff using every trick Hagrid had ever taught him.
Dumbledore, following from a discreet distance, felt privately like he was watching something he probably shouldn't be watching.
Kevin was too valuable to risk — but watching him in action, Dumbledore relaxed, marginally.
Then Kevin ran into a genuine werewolf. Not a cursed wizard — a fully transformed beast. He fought it bare-handed while Dumbledore shadowed him, biting his tongue to keep from interfering. One bite and wolf venom would ruin everything.
Kevin won. He smashed it with the crowbar until it stopped moving. Dumbledore quietly cleared the rest of the werewolves from that section of the forest afterward. There were limits to what he was prepared to observe.
"Kevin, you found this hippogriff in the Forbidden Forest?"
Hagrid stared at the creature with the expression of a man trying very hard not to grab it with both hands. His fingers were actually twitching.
"Found her last week. Named her Snowdrift."
She was something to look at. Pure white feathers with a faint silver sheen, tall as a carriage horse, amber eyes bright and steady. There was something almost luminous about her.
"Oh, she's beautiful!" Hagrid breathed. "Can I pet her?"
"Go ahead. Brought her to meet you."
Kevin hopped down and gave Snowdrift a gentle stroke along her neck.
"Hello there," Hagrid said, dropping into a careful bow, eyes hopeful. "I'm Rubeus Hagrid. Kevin's mate."
Snowdrift studied him for a long moment. Then she bowed back.
"Oh, Snowdrift!" Hagrid beamed so wide it looked like it hurt. He shuffled forward, reaching out to stroke her neck with enormous, gentle hands. "Lovely to meet you."
No surprise he'd been asked to teach Magical Creatures next year. The man understood animals in a way that wasn't taught.
Snowdrift trusted him within minutes.
"Got another hippogriff I'd like you to meet sometime," Hagrid said, still stroking her feathers. "You'll like Buckbeak."
Snowdrift tilted her head — half-comprehension, half-distraction. Her eyes had drifted to the chicken in Hagrid's jacket pocket.
She wanted it.
Kevin knew the feeling. Terrible name, Buckbeak. He'd always found it difficult to say naturally. That was the problem with fancy pet names. Snowdrift, Orange — something simple that actually rolled off the tongue.
Hermione arrived at the hut with Crookshanks under one arm, having been tipped off about the hippogriff visit. She stopped in the doorway and stared.
"She's beautiful," she said, softly.
"Go on — bow, then give her a stroke."
Snowdrift bowed back with great dignity. Hermione stepped forward and ran her hand along those silver feathers, expression unguarded with delight.
Crookshanks was rather less delighted. He'd gone rigid the moment he saw the hippogriff. Hermione quietly stowed him inside the hut first.
"Why'd you bring him today?" Kevin asked. She usually didn't.
"Ron's rat, Scabbers." Hermione's expression soured. "Crookshanks keeps going after him, and Ron won't stop complaining. I needed a break from the drama."
"A cat that catches rats is a good cat," Kevin said, entirely unbothered. It would at least put Wormtail on edge early.
"They'll work it out. Come on — want to try riding?"
Hermione brightened immediately. Then her eyes flicked to him. "Are you sure? With your... flying thing?"
"A man has to say yes." He offered her a hand before any doubt could take root and helped her up onto Snowdrift's back, then swung up behind her.
"Snowdrift — up!"
Snowdrift neighed, spread her huge wings, and launched.
"Oh — oh, this is incredible!" Hermione laughed, the wind tearing her hair back, pressing into Kevin's chest. Below them, the forest became a carpet of dark green, the castle a spire of grey stone catching the winter light. Every weight she'd been carrying seemed to lift off her shoulders all at once.
"Told you I could," Kevin said.
She laughed against him. "Your voice was shaking."
"..."
No use arguing. Three points in flying talent, maximum. Flying instructor — had there ever been a more obvious candidate to befriend?
He immediately decided against it. There were some depths a man couldn't sink to.
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