Chapter 389 Harry Potter's Secret Heartbreak
Professor Snape was writing the ingredients for the Potionon the blackboard when he heard whispers from below and immediately flung half a piece of chalk.
"Ouch!"
Ron cried out in pain, looked up, and met Snape's icy gaze, swallowing hard.
"Whispering in class, Gryffindor, ten points deducted."
"Hahahaha…" Draco couldn't help but sneer, "Professor, I suggest you ask them what they're discussing; I guarantee you won't be disappointed."
"Oh really?" Snape raised an eyebrow, looking playfully at the three of them, who had their heads down, "What are you doing?"
"N-nothing," Ron stammered, pressing his arms tightly against the desk, refusing to let go.
But this action caught Snape's attention. He walked straight over and pulled a newspaper out from under Ron's arm.
"Reading magazines in class, Gryffindor, another ten points deducted," Snape said indifferently, but his gaze was quickly drawn to the headline of the weekly, and a glimmer of excitement even appeared in his eyes.
"Harry Potter's Secret Heartbreak," Snape's tone was full of teasing, "Potter, what's wrong with you now?
He may be an extraordinary boy, but he is also experiencing the usual pains of an adolescent boy… He found emotional solace in Hermione Granger, a Muggle-born from Hogwarts, but little did he know that in his painful experiences, he would soon suffer another emotional trauma…"
"What? This is too exaggerated!" Aaron's eyes widened in surprise. He turned to look at the three embarrassed, flushed faces and was speechless for a moment.
"Gaius." Snape stopped reading the newspaper, a little displeased that his enjoyment had been interrupted. He turned around and placed the newspaper on Aaron's desk, "If you're interested, you can read it yourself, but next time, don't interrupt the Professor in class."
"Understood." Aaron nodded blankly, then focused on Harry Potter's Secret Heartbreak, reading on from where Professor Snape had stopped.
But as he read, the corners of his mouth and his face twitched uncontrollably. Rita Skeeter had twisted the pure friendship between Harry and Hermione in the newspaper into a melodramatic story of a plain-looking but ambitious girl toying with two boys' affections, even dragging in love Potions. It was ridiculously exaggerated.
Aaron's eyelids twitched as he read, and he secretly congratulated himself for putting Rita Skeeter under a hypnotizing magic; otherwise, this melodramatic story would have one more male lead.
The two objects of Hermione's alleged affection in the newspaper were Harry Potter and Ron Weasley.
Although it was fabricated, to an uninformed person, their relationship really did seem like a love triangle.
Aaron turned around and glanced at the three of them. Harry had his head down, his expression unreadable, but his ears were burning red, as if on fire.
Ron was silent, but his eyes were dull, and the words 'no will to live' were practically etched on his face.
Hermione, on the other hand, was relatively calm, but her red eyes fully conveyed her anger.
It wasn't until the end-of-class bell rang that the three of them recovered from their mortified state.
They didn't linger, grabbing their books and rushing out of the classroom, while the Slytherins scoffed.
"Ahem!" Aaron cleared his throat, and the classroom immediately fell silent, "Perhaps you've forgotten, Hermione Granger is my date to the Yule Ball.
I can't control other Houses, but I ask Slytherin to give me some face."
As his words fell, the Slytherins looked at each other, but then nodded in unison.
Slytherins respected strength. Aaron's performance in the Triwizard Tournament had brought Slytherin great honor, and his current prestige was second only to Dean Severus Snape.
Gaius's face certainly had to be given. Although they lost a bit of fun, it didn't matter to them at all.
As the students left the classroom, Snape stopped Aaron, looking at him meaningfully. "You're quite good to her, Hermione Granger."
"Professor, you seem to have misunderstood something.
I simply don't want a girl to suffer reputational damage due to some baseless rumors."
Snape chuckled, "Mind your own business!"
"How inexplicable."
…"I told you not to provoke Rita Skeeter, but it seems you didn't listen to me," Ron said glumly, "First Harry, then Hagrid, and now it's you. Oh, right, I wasn't left out either.
It was clearly a pure friendship, so how did she twist it into a melodramatic love triangle? Do I look like someone who would be completely swayed by beauty?"
"Yes," Hermione said expressionlessly, "weren't you the one who couldn't even speak properly after being rejected by Fleur?"
Ron's face flushed with annoyance, "I was indeed quite embarrassed, but Fleur and you are completely different."
"You…" Hermione's eyes widened. Ron's meaning was quite direct: he was saying she wasn't as pretty as Fleur.
"Alright, stop talking, everyone knows that scoundrel is spouting nonsense.
As long as we ignore it, it'll blow over in a while."
"That won't do," Hermione shook her head, "What if she keeps hounding us? Harry has already reported it twice."
"This time, he's only half a protagonist," Ron said with a strange expression, "Harry Potter's Secret Heartbreak, you're the crucial one."
"That's not important. What's important is how she knew the things in the newspaper?"
"She just made it up!"
"She could make up things about the three of us, but what about Hagrid?" Hermione said seriously, "Dumbledoredoesn't want Rita Skeeter to provoke Hogwarts, but she always manages to find some unknown secrets. This can't be a coincidence."
"Whether it's a coincidence or not, let's not worry about it for now. We need to prepare for tomorrow," Harry said, "Two o'clock tomorrow afternoon, meet him outside Hogsmeade Village."
"And we need to bring more food," Ron added.
"And Dobby, we need to buy him a gift too.
Thanks to him for the second task, otherwise, I would never have passed that stage."
When House-elves were mentioned, Hermione immediately perked up. Giving gifts to House-elves, this was a big step for her Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare.
The next day, Great Hall.
As lunchtime was nearing its end, the three of them arrived just in time.
They ordered two or three times more food than usual, and then, when no one was paying attention, they quietly stuffed the food into Harry's backpack.
They thought they had been very discreet, and no one should have noticed at this time.
But no one noticing didn't mean no foodies noticed. Abe had been glancing at the trio from time to time while eating, and his drool uncontrollably dripped onto his plate.
"Are you feeling unwell today?" Aaron asked with some concern. This guy had never been so distracted during meal times.
"So many chicken legs," Abe said, wiping the drool from his mouth.
"What are you talking about?" Aaron looked at Abe's plate, which was licked cleaner than his face, and was a bit confused. Where did these chicken legs come from?
"Over there."
Abe pouted in the direction of the three.
Aaron turned to look, and the corner of his mouth twitched involuntarily.
A large plate of chicken legs was neatly stacked, at least a dozen of them. Even if their appetite had grown, it shouldn't have suddenly increased several times over!
Something was wrong, definitely something was wrong.
Aaron thought with great certainty, then winked at Abe.
The holy dragon's eyes immediately lit up. He didn't even bother to wipe his drool, jumping directly onto the Gryffindor long table and starting to devour his favorite food.
The three of them were dumbfounded and only reacted when Abe had finished a third of it.
"Stop, no, stop eating," Ron said hastily.
Harry instinctively wanted to stop Abe, but then he remembered that his small stature couldn't compare to a dragon's, and his outstretched hands stopped in mid-air.
Hermione picked up Abe, helplessly saying, "This isn't for you. If you want to eat, come tomorrow."
"So… who is this for?"
A playful voice suddenly came from behind, startling all three of them.
"No, this is for us to eat," Ron immediately said.
"Oh, come on, do you believe that yourself?" Aaron rolled his eyes at him, "Eating it yourselves and stuffing it into a backpack, and so much of it.
Even if you're turning your grief into appetite because of the newspaper, you wouldn't act on it until the next day!"
"Ah, this…"
Harry was silent for a moment, then said, "We're going to visit Sirius; he's back."
"What the heck! He still dares to come back?" Aaron said incredulously, "Although the Ministry of Magic has relaxed its hunt for him, it doesn't mean they'll turn a blind eye to a murderer."
"That's why we decided to go see him secretly," Harry said.
"Understood." Aaron nodded, then picked up Abe and prepared to leave.
"Wait," Hermione said hastily, "you can come with us."
"Forget it! If he's taking such a big risk to return to Hogwartsto find you, it must not be a small matter.
Big matters are often very troublesome, and I don't want to get involved."
"It might be related to You-Know-Who," Harry suddenly said, "I told him about my dream."
Aaron suddenly stopped. If it had been half a month ago, hearing this would only make him leave faster, but now the situation was different. The change in the Dark Mark indicated that You-Know-Who would soon return.
The more information he knew before You-Know-Who's complete resurrection, the more security he would have.
"When are we meeting?"
"We're about to leave."
"Is it discreet?" Aaron said in a deep voice, "Or rather, is it safe?"
"Definitely safe. Sirius has been hiding outside for a year without being discovered, and few people know he's an Animagus," Harry said, "It's just that his situation might not be very good, otherwise he wouldn't remind us to bring him more food."
Aaron pondered for a moment, "Get the Invisibility Cloak ready."