Hogwarts double periods usually had a break in the middle.
When the second half began, Professor McGonagall walked through the mistakes students had made earlier, explaining each one in detail.
A few more managed to produce a needle.
Neville produced the eye.
“Combine Mr.
Longbottom’s needle-point from the first lesson with his needle-eye from this one, and he has effectively succeeded,” Professor McGonagall said.
After class, Neville clutched his books and walked over to Hylan.
“Hylan, I want to thank you again.
Really.”
“Don’t mention it, Neville.
We’re friends.
It’s nothing.”
Neville’s fingers tightened on his books, nails scraping the cover.
That word meant everything to him.
“Yes.
We’re friends.
If you ever need anything, please tell me.
I mean, I’d be happy to help.” Neville forced out the words he’d been rehearsing all period.
It was a risk.
Back in primary school, he’d said something similar to kids he thought were his friends.
All he got was laughter.
“If I ever need your help, I’d rather be dead.”
He knew Hylan wasn’t like that.
But he was still nervous.
Years of being pushed around had stripped away almost all his confidence.
He’d even started believing the labels people stuck on him.
“Not that I’d be much help anyway,” he added quietly.
“No, Neville.
You matter.
You’re an important friend to me.” Hylan smiled and held out his hand.
“Oh.
Thank you.
Thank you.”
Neville couldn’t stop grinning, couldn’t stop saying thank you.
It took him a moment to remember he still had History of Magic.
“Bye, Hylan.” He turned to go, still beaming.
Hylan stopped him and pointed the other way.
“History of Magic classroom’s that direction.”
After Transfiguration came History of Magic.
The professor was a ghost named Binns.
Hogwarts’ one and only ghost professor.
His lectures were brutally dry, monotonous enough to put nearly any student to sleep.
But no one could deny the man’s knowledge of magical history was staggering.
Professor Binns had taught at Hogwarts while he was still alive.
Then one day he fell asleep in front of the staff-room fireplace and never woke up.
The next morning he got up as a ghost and went to class, as if nothing had happened.
He didn’t even seem to realize he was dead.
Hylan figured that kind of dedication was exactly what earned a man lifetime job security.
After all, how could Dumbledore fire a teacher who died on the job and still showed up for work?
That would be an awkward conversation.
Admirable as his posthumous commitment was, the lectures were unbearable.
He lectured entirely inside his own head, never checking whether anyone understood.
He just droned on in that wheezing, dragging monotone, reading straight from his notes.
It felt like watching a prerecorded online lecture with bad audio.
The students didn’t really hate it, though.
A teacher who never called on anyone, never asked questions, just talked and left, and didn’t care if you slept or zoned out, might be considered a blow-off.
But no one resented him for it.
Hylan tried to follow along at first.
Then he realized the professor was too lost in his own world, and his voice was too strange.
Like a swarm of bees buzzing in his ears.
He’d rather just read the book himself.
Everyone else was slumped over their desks too.
Catching up on sleep.
Staring into space.
Only one person in the room looked genuinely engaged.
Hermione.
Hylan, meanwhile, had already checked out.
He’d copy her notes for the homework later.
He pulled out his money and counted it.
Twenty Galleons won from Theodore Nott.
One Galleon generously donated by Prefect Rowle.
And what was left of his Hogwarts education fund: fifteen silver Sickles.
Twenty-one Galleons and fifteen Sickles.
A small fortune, by Hylan’s standards.
Exchange rates fluctuated, but normally a Galleon was worth about five pounds at Gringotts.
That put him at roughly a hundred and ten pounds.
In 1991 Britain, a hundred and ten pounds could feed an ordinary family for weeks.
Theodore saw Hylan counting the coins and clenched his jaw like a defeated husband.
He didn’t dare say a word.
That was my whole term’s allowance.
My money.
My money.
But it still wasn’t enough for Hylan.
He liked money.
Just seeing it, even without spending it, lifted his mood.
But he also needed more of it.
Tuition and meals at Hogwarts were free, sure.
But potion ingredients and magical items weren’t.
If he wanted to brew potions, he couldn’t exactly raid Snape’s private stores for materials.
Not yet, anyway.
He was also planning to send the kids at the orphanage to school.
Knowledge was power.
A bunch of uneducated orphans could only help him so much.
Petty schemes, pocket change.
Scraps.
He had bigger goals.
Get them educated, and they’d become his foundation in the Muggle world.
With diplomas and real knowledge, they could handle far more for him.
But the orphanage had a lot of kids.
The money in his pocket wouldn’t stretch.
“Tch.
Need to make more.”
“How, though?
Brew potions and sell them in Hogsmeade?”
“I could squeeze some out of my classmates.
These pureblood families are loaded.
All fat sheep.”
While Hylan was working out how to make money, the story of Theodore’s apology to Neville had already spread across the school.
Students reshaped it into their own version: a Slytherin had apologized to a Gryffindor.
Passed from mouth to mouth, the story was boiled down to its most explosive, most gripping form.
It tore through the student body with brutal efficiency.
While the younger students gossiped, Dumbledore was in his office feeding Fawkes.
The phoenix had been with him a very long time.
It wasn’t near a Burning Day, so it looked magnificent.
Gold and crimson feathers, long tail plumes glittering in the sunlight.
“Well, old friend.
What do you make of Hylan?”
Fawkes kept eating and ignored him.
Dumbledore popped a cockroach-like candy into his mouth and settled back into his chair.
His fingers tapped the desk in a slow, steady rhythm.
By lunch, the story of a Slytherin apologizing to a Gryffindor had reached nearly every corner of the school.
Even Snape knew.
He stood by his office window now, it open just a crack, watching the students outside.
Harry and Ron were passing directly beneath him.
“Well.
He’s certainly made a splash.
Barely started and already as famous as you.”
From above, Snape couldn’t see those green eyes.
He shut the window in silence.
He had a first Potions lesson to prepare for the new students.