A couple of evenings later, when Harry and Ron left for Quidditch practice, an owl came flying through an open window in the Gryffindor common room.

"Look," called Hermione. Ben looked up from his nearly finished History of Magic homework. "It's for you."

"Oh, hi, Timothy," he tickled the owl's head, earning a high-pitched hoot from him. He was carrying a letter, as usual, so Ben took it as carefully as possible.

"Who's it from?" asked Hermione.

"Audrey," he whispered, beginning to open the envelope. "Come read it with me."

Hermione sat on the armrest of the couch, right next to where Ben was sitting, and leaned over him so she could see the letter, causing a brown strand of hair to hit him in the face. "Oh, I'm sorry!"

He laughed as she quickly put her hair back on a ponytail, and they both began reading the letter in silence.

'Hello, Ben.

I just found out what happened, and I'm still in shock. I refuse to believe it happened naturally, I simply can't. I don't know what you think, but I'm quite suspicious of them. You know who I mean by 'them', so I won't write it down, just in case.

I just wish I would've been there when it happened. If I hadn't left that afternoon, I wouldn't have allowed her to hurt you, and Ebony wouldn't have been on her own when she came back. None of this would've happened, and I'm honestly so deeply sorry for it.

I'm not letting you and Alycia be alone with them this summer. I won't let you go back there, actually. There's a couple of things that need to be sorted here in Ireland, but, as soon as it's all settled, we'll be coming back. Steve and I think we might be able to do it after Christmas.

Once again, I repeat that I'm sorry for everything.

I hope you and Alycia are alright.

See you soon.

Love you,

Audrey.'

———————————————

The next morning, Harry told them he had had an encounter with Dobby that night and he had come up with an idea of a place where their Defense Against the Dark Arts group could practice.

So, at half-past seven Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ben left the Gryffindor common room, Harry clutching a certain piece of aged parchment in his hand. Fifth years were allowed to be out in the corridors until nine o'clock, but all four of them kept looking around nervously as they made their way up to the seventh floor.

"Wait," said Harry, unfolding the piece of parchment at the top of the last staircase, tapping it with his wand, and muttering, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

A map of Hogwarts appeared upon the blank surface of the parchment. Tiny black moving dots, labeled with names, showed where various people were. Ben leaned over his shoulder to have a better look at it.

"Filch is on the second floor," announced Harry. "And Mrs. Norris is on the fourth."

"What about Umbridge?"

"In her office."

They hurried along the corridor to the place Dobby had described to Harry, a stretch of blank wall opposite an enormous tapestry depicting Barnabas the Barmy's foolish attempt to train trolls for the ballet.

"Dobby said to walk past this bit of wall three times," said Harry, "concentrating hard on what we need."

They nodded, and did so, turning sharply at the window just beyond the blank stretch of wall, then at the man-size vase on its other side. We need somewhere safe to practice.

"Harry," called Hermione sharply, as they wheeled around after their third walk past.

A highly polished door had appeared in the wall.

"Wow!"

Harry reached out, seized the brass handle, pulled open the door, and led the way into a spacious room lit with flickering torches like those that illuminated the dungeons eight floors below.

The walls were lined with wooden bookcases, and instead of chairs there were large silk cushions on the floor. A set of shelves at the far end of the room carried a range of instruments that reminded Ben to the ones Moody had showed them the previous year.

"These will be good when we're practicing Stunning," said Ron enthusiastically, prodding one of the cushions with his foot.

"And just look at these books!" exclaimed Hermione excitedly, running a finger along the spines of the large leather-bound tomes. "A Compendium of Common Curses and Their Counter-Actions...The Dark Arts Outsmarted... Self-Defensive Spellwork... Wow!"

There were hundreds of books there. Hermione's face was glowing. "Harry, this is wonderful, there's everything we need here!"

And without further ado she slid Jinxes for the Jinxed from its shelf, sank onto the nearest cushion, and began to read. Ben chuckled to himself, receiving a quick glance from Harry.

There was a gentle knock on the door; Ginny, Neville, Lavender, Parvati, and Dean had arrived. "Whoa," said Dean, staring around, impressed. "What is this place?"

Harry began to explain, but before he had finished more people had arrived, and he had to start all over again. By the time eight o'clock arrived, every cushion was occupied. Harry moved across to the door and turned the key protruding from the lock; it clicked in a satisfyingly loud way and everybody fell silent, looking at him. Hermione carefully marked her page of Jinxes for the Jinxed and set the book aside.

"Well," Harry cleared his throat. "This is the place we've found for practices, and you've, er... Obviously found it okay-"

"It's fantastic!" exclaimed Mei-Xing, and several people murmured their agreement.

"It's bizarre," commented Fred, frowning around at it. "We once hid from Filch in here, remember, George? But it was just a broom cupboard then..."

"Well, I've been thinking about the sort of stuff we ought to do first and, er," began Harry, though he stopped talking at the sight of Hermione's raised hand. "What, Hermione?"

"I think we ought to elect a leader."

"Harry's leader," said Mei-Xing at once, looking at Hermione as though she were mad.

Harry went pink.

"Agreed," Ben announced loudly, and sounding far angrier than he had intended.

Harry looked at him, and Ben frowned, looking away.

"Yes, but I think we ought to vote on it properly," said Hermione, unperturbed. "It makes it formal and it gives him authority. So... Everyone who thinks Harry ought to be our leader?"

Everybody put up their hands, even Zacharias Smith, though he did it very halfheartedly. "Er, right, thanks," said Harry, whose face was now bright red. "And- What, Hermione?"

"I also think we ought to have a name. It would promote a feeling of team spirit and unity, don't you think?"

"Can we be the Anti-Umbridge League?" said Angelina hopefully.

"Or the Ministry of Magic Are Morons Group?" suggested Fred.

"I was thinking," Hermione frowned at Fred, "more of a name that didn't tell everyone what we were up to, so we can refer to it safely outside meetings."

"The Defense Association?" suggested Mei-Xing. "The D.A. for short, so nobody knows what we're talking about?"

"Yeah, the D.A.'s good," nodded Ginny. "Only let's make it stand for Dumbledore's Army because that's the Ministry's worst fear, isn't it?"

There was a good deal of appreciative murmuring and laughter at this.

"All in favor of the D.A.?" said Hermione bossily, kneeling up on her cushion to count. "That's a majority, motion passed!"

She pinned the piece of paper with all of their names on it on the wall and wrote DUMBLEDORE'S ARMY across the top in large letters.

"Right," said Harry, when she had sat down again, "shall we get practicing then? I was thinking, the first thing we should do is Expelliarmus, you know, the Disarming Charm. I know it's pretty basic but I've found it really useful-"

"Oh please," Zacharias Smith rolled his eyes and folded his arms. "I don't think Expelliarmus is exactly going to help us against You-Know-Who, do you?"

"I've used it against him," said Harry. "It saved my life last June."

Zacharias Smith opened his mouth as though he was about to say something, but he closed it again.

"But if you think it's beneath you, you can leave."

He didn't move. Harry turned to the others again. "Okay. I reckon we should all divide into pairs and practice."

Ben turned to Ron, but he seemed to be mentally debating whether to say something to Hermione or not, so he slowly moved away from them, smirking to himself. Thomas with Theodore. Right when he caught a glimpse of Neville, who was alone, and he was about to walk up to him, Marina appeared.

"Hi," she greeted. "Want to practice with me?"

"Sure," he said. "I thought you'd do it with your friends."

"Delilah's with Leah, and Marietta's with Mei-Xing," she said, and a smirk grew on her face. "Though I think Mei-Xing would've rathered being with Harry..."

A knot formed on his throat.

"Right," he heard Harry call out. "On the count of three, then... One, two, three!"

Ben's spell hit Marina first, and her wand went flying into the air, and fell to the floor on the other side of the room, near Harry and Neville. The girl smiled at him. "That was cool!"

"Thanks," he smiled back at her, sort of, though his eyes were fixed on Harry, who was approaching them, holding Marina's wand.

"Is this yours?" he asked, barely looking at them.

"Yeah," the girl nodded, taking her wand. "Thank you."

"Well done, Ben, by the way," he congratulated him, glancing up at him and walking past them, his shoulder brushing against his own, before Ben could reply.

He watched his friend approach Mei-Xing, whose eyes had been fixed on Harry for a while, and who had just set Marietta's sleeve on fire.

Ben suddenly spun around, rather aggressively, towards Marina. "Does she?"

"Does she, what?" she frowned.

"Like him."

Marina blinked. "What?"

He sighed, unintentionally in a very impatient way. "Does Mei-Xing fancy Harry?"

"I-" she stammered, her eyebrows still furrowed. "I don't know... Maybe?"

He clenched his jaw. "Alright."

"Why?" she asked softly. "Do you fancy her?"

"Of course I don't," he answered at once. "She was Cedric's girlfriend."

Why did everyone keep asking him if he fancied every single girl he was around? It made him angry, very angry. First Hermione, then Marina, now Mei-Xing. Who was next, Umbridge? How blind could people be? It made his blood boil. Was it really that complicated to spot how madly in love he was with a boy?

Not that he wanted people to find out, of course, but a part of him wished he could let everyone know. He wished he could shout it out in the middle of the day, for everyone to hear.

But he couldn't. Especially not now that Harry didn't like him back anymore.

There he was, chatting to a giggling Mei-Xing, not too far away from them. He was so handsome it was infuriating to look at him. But, at the same time, he couldn't look away.

"Well, let's- er... continue, right?" said Marina.

"Yeah, sure."

Ben wasn't in the mood to practice, and he knew he could perform that spell, so he simply allowed Marina to disarm him. She seemed happy about it and, even though he was a bit bored of people thinking they were dating, he really cared about her, and considered her to be a good friend, so her smile slowly began fading his grumpiness.

However, he was relieved when Harry spoke to everyone. "Well, that was pretty good, but we've overrun, we'd better leave it here. Same time, same place next week?"

"Sooner!" exclaimed Dean Thomas eagerly.

Angelina, however, said quickly, "The Quidditch season's about to start, we need team practices too!"

"Let's say next Wednesday night, then," said Harry, "and we can decide on additional meetings then... Come on, we'd better get going..."

———————————————

Alycia kept trying to join D.A. by following Ben around, constantly asking him why he didn't let her be part of it. She had even tried to get Hermione to convince Ben, but it was no use. He refused to put her into any more risks.

"You do realise that she might need to learn how to protect herself, right?" asked Harry, a couple of weeks after the first meeting, as the four of them were hanging out outside, taking advantage of some of the last days of warmth.

"No, because I won't let her be in danger."

Harry took a deep breath and exchanged looks with Hermione.

Ben frowned at him. "What?"

"You can't be sure that you'll always be able to protect her yourself," he explained.

He clenched his jaw, annoyed. "And why's that?"

"Because, it might shock you, but there's certain things that you can't control, Ben," he said coldly.

Ben looked at Ron and Hermione, in hopes that they'd support him. But they were both silent, eyes fixed on the floor.

"Well, but there's things that I know I can control," he retorted angrily. "And not putting my sister under unnecessary risks by allowing her to be against Umbridge is one of them."

Harry clenched his jaw aswell. "Unnecessary? That's what you think what we're doing is?"

"I think there's no need to make Alycia part of it, she's a kid-"

"So was I when Voldemort killed my parents!" he exclaimed, standing up. "And I was her exact same age when I had to kill Quirrell!"

"Harry," hissed Hermione, trying to get him to sit back down, but failing.

Ben got up at once, too. "Why are you telling me this, Harry? Do you think I don't know?"

"You know what happened, just not how hard it was."

"Well, I'm really sorry your life is difficult while I live a joyful and wonderful one!"

"Ben..." said Ron, in a pitiful tone.

Which, for some reason, made him angrier than he already was.

"I'm just trying to help, Ben!" said Harry, loudly. "And, I don't think you realise that Alycia's her own person, and she can make decisions by herself."

"Of course I realise," he spat. "I know her far more than you ever will. She's my sister, in case you've forgotten."

"I don't need to be her brother to know that keeping her from this is actually putting her in unnecessary risks."

"Oh, you think I'm endangering my sister?" shouted Ben, completely losing his cool.

"I do."

"Harry!"

"You have no idea of what I've done for her, Harry. No fucking idea, so don't you dare imply that I don't care about Alycia's wellbeing-"

"If she wants to join Dumbledore's Army, you can't stop her," he took a step forward.

Ben raised an eyebrow, approaching him as well. "Can't I?"

"No," he stated. His eyes were sparkling in a way that baffled Ben. "Because I am the one who's in charge of it, not you."

So Ben reached inside his pocket for the coin Hermione had put a charm on to communicate with the D.A. members, and tossed it to the floor before looking back into Harry's eyes, that confusing glow on them now gone. "You better not get Alycia in trouble."

Harry reached out to grab Ben's arm and stop him from storming off, but he was faster.

———————————————

Alycia seemed very happy the next morning when he saw her having lunch at the Gryffindor table with Ginny, Hermione, Ron, her friend Rose and Harry, so he assumed they had made her part of Dumbledore's Army. He wondered if she knew about the argument.

"Are you really not going to come to the next meeting?" asked Thomas, from beside him at the Slytherin table.

"I don't want to see him," he replied, tapping a fry on his plate.

Thomas sighed. "Oh, come on, Ben... He's your... I don't even know."

"He's a jerk."

"But you're in love with him," he whispered.

"I'm not, not anymore."

"Oh, don't lie to me."

"I'm not lying."

"You are."

"I am."

He was.

But he was also furious. It was perhaps unreasonable for him to get so mad over an argument like that, but Thomas said it was probably just due to bottling up so many different and strong emotions about him.

Well, he didn't care, he refused to give in.

He was sure that Harry and Hermione expected him to appear for the next meeting, and that was why they still hadn't approached him, because they wanted him to be the one to do it. Like he had the previous year, when he and Hermione had an argument. So he told himself there wasn't a single chance that he'd do that again.

And he stood by his word. He didn't show up for any of the next meetings.

"Are you not going because I'm there?" Alycia asked him one day as he was helping her get to one of her classes.

"No, of couse not."

"So, you're not mad at me?" she insisted, her eyes sparkling hopefully.

"It's Harry who I'm mad at."

"Because he let me join?"

"No, because he's a prick."

Alycia frowned at him. "He seemed quite sad when you didn't show up last week."

"Too bad," he mumbled. "I'm not going, if he can't even try to understand that I was just trying to protect you."

"It's me who insisted on going," said Alycia. "Not him. So get mad at me, not Harry."

Ben didn't answer. Both because he didn't want to continue talking about it, and because he didn't know what to say. He knew he could never be angry at her. His sweet and innocent younger sister... Being mad at her would be impossible for him.

"Here we are," he said, pointing at the classroom door in front of them. "See you."

Alycia hugged him very quickly, as she always did before entering any of her classes every day. Every day except the times where she was with the others, that is. On his way to his own class, he thought of it, and it made him even angrier. They were taking her away from him. What if, someday, it turned out that she ended up preferring them over him?

"How come you're not with Potter?" asked Draco Malfoy's voice from behind.

He spun around, to find out he was on his own. It made him slightly more relaxed. "Why do you care?"

He shrugged. "Just wondering."

Ben adjusted his bag, full of books, but didn't get back to moving. "How come you're not with... anyone?"

"Why do you care?"

Ben shrugged. "Just wondering."

Malfoy stared at him for a second, but the corners of his lips tensed up, and he suddenly let out a chuckle. It had been years since Ben had last heard him laugh.

"You see, sometimes I get bored of being around people like them," said Malfoy. "And, you know, I like to be on my own."

"Why are you talking to me, then?"

"Because I really was wondering why you haven't been around Potter, Weasley or Granger for the past two weeks," he admitted, and began walking down the corridor.

Ben joined him, since they had Potions together now anyway. "We had an argument."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

"No you're not."

"You're right, no I'm not."

Ben chuckled unconsciously. "You're having a match against Gryffindor soon, right?"

Malfoy nodded. "Mhm. This weekend."

"Hope you know you're going to lose."

"Sure," he said. There was an awkward silence. "What was your argument about?"

"That's none of your business."

"Has he broken up with you?"

"No, because he wasn't my- You know, in the first place," he clarified, staring right into Malfoy's grey eyes. "And I mean it. I don't know where you got that from, but it's not the truth at all. It really isn't."

"Alright..." he nodded. "Glad to hear that."

"Why?"

"Because your parents wouldn't like to find it out, if it was true."

"I don't care about what they'd like or wouldn't like."

"But I bet you care about the consequences."

"There won't be any consequences," he said. "Because I'm not going back there."

Malfoy's eyes sparkled enigmatically.

A/N: okay this is a bit short but i've been gone for almost a month due to exams so i'm posting this and then i'll probably disappear again until i finally get the time to write again!!

hope you enjoyed, any thoughts??

love youu