Eliana, on Her Best Behavior

Hermione came back on the last day of the holiday. When she heard what had happened, she was horrified and strongly disapproved.

"What if Filch had caught you? Sneaking out at night three days in a row—"

Harry hung his head miserably.

Ron hung his head too, though he looked less than convinced.

Eliana sat cross-legged in an armchair, cracking walnuts between her teeth, and held her head high.

"Ellie! I haven't forgotten about you! I thought you had the best judgment of the lot—"

"Huh?" Ron dug at his ear in disbelief and turned to Harry for help. "Who did she just say had the best judgment?"

Harry opened his mouth. Then Hermione, standing by the table, and Eliana, sitting cross-legged on the chair, both turned toward him. He closed it again.

He fixed his gaze on the floor, kept quiet, and jabbed Ron with his elbow.

Too caught up in his own disbelief to notice, Ron openly muttered to Harry under two increasingly hostile stares.

"Is she blind? Eliana, on her best behavior? She might as well call Malfoy gentle and kind. What judgment? The kind where she throws a punch whenever she can't decide what to do?"

Harry closed his eyes in despair.

Eliana: ???

She took the walnut out of her mouth and cracked it into eight pieces in her hand. She fixed Ron with a chilling stare. "What did you just say?"

Ron clapped a hand over his mouth and squeezed out through his teeth, "Wasn't I whispering? Has she got donkey ears?"

Harry: ...

Mate, open your eyes and look. None of us is even five steps apart! You might as well be saying it right into their ears!

He cautiously edged a step to the side.

"I heard that too!"

Eliana flung out a hand in a fury. The eight pieces of walnut shell shot like bullets straight into Ron's forehead.

Ron toppled backward into his chair with a thud.

"%￥^#@&..."

He grumbled a string of complaints, but at least he had learned his lesson this time: whatever language he was speaking, nobody else could understand it.

Harry suddenly looked up. "Right, there's something—"

Eliana had already settled back into her chair, cross-legged. She gave him a lazy glance. "Permission granted."

Ron sidled furtively over to Hermione. "Where did she find another weird phrase like that?"

"I think it was in a book about Chinese emperors. She liked the idea of being an emperor, so now she talks like one," Hermione explained with some difficulty.

"I was born to be an emperor!"

Eliana stood on her chair and proclaimed it at the top of her lungs.

Hermione: "..."

"I'm sorry, Miss Eliana, but I have to remind you that even China doesn't have emperors anymore. New China was founded forty-two years ago," she said.

Eliana sat down as though nothing had happened and went back to crunching walnuts.

"I can't believe that in the entire Christmas holiday, you didn't find a single thing about Nicolas Flamel."

Hermione hugged a huge book to her chest, thoroughly disappointed.

"Excuse me—I haven't finished—" Harry raised a hand and interrupted them, unable to bear it any longer. "Do you even know what I'm trying to tell you—"

Hermione buried her head in the book, flipping noisily through its pages.

Ron stared at Hermione, opening and closing his mouth.

Eliana went crunch, crunch on a walnut.

Not one of them was paying him any attention.

Harry burst out, aggrieved, "Snape is refereeing our next Quidditch Match!"

Everything went quiet.

The walnut fell out of Eliana's mouth and landed on the floor.

They all knew by now that Snape was a good man who would save Harry's life from Quirrell. But after half a term of seeing him every day, even Eliana had to admit he favored Slytherin.

And once she heard that Malfoy was Snape's favorite student of the year, she couldn't stand the sight of him.

More than once, Harry had caught Eliana grinding her teeth as she stared at Malfoy, her wand twitching in her hand. He had to stay close and risk his life talking her out of it, or the Gryffindor Hourglass might have ended up filled with black gems for negative points.

Harry still remembered the first time he had tried. It was Potions Class, and platinum-haired Malfoy had taken his potion to the front for Snape to inspect. Maybe he really had done well. Malfoy was grinning so broadly his eyes had nearly vanished, and even Snape's expression had softened for once.

Then Harry heard the unmistakable sound of teeth grinding beside him.

"Hah. Does he have to show off like that? It's one lousy bottle of potion, and he has the nerve to flaunt it in front of the professor?"

Harry turned and found Eliana beside him, hunched over and practically writhing with dark resentment.

She gave Harry a terrible fright.

Then Eliana sprang up from the floor and appeared at his side.

"Harry, you don't like Malfoy either, do you?" Eliana asked ominously.

"Of course not. Who likes Malfoy?"

Harry answered without thinking.

"Good!" Eliana slapped his thigh. "Tonight, we'll sneak into the Slytherin Common Room and blow up Malfoy's dormitory!"

Harry clutched his thigh and sucked in a breath. His eyes went wide. "Sorry, you said what—?"

Had he heard that right? Blow up what? The Slytherin Common Room?

Eliana's eyes blazed as she spoke. "Make sure you eat plenty at dinner. Once I'm done with detention with Professor Snape, I'll have the password to the Slytherin Common Room. We'll go tonight!"

Wait. No, wait.

"Shouldn't we think about this some more?" Harry asked weakly, full of dread.

Eliana's eyes gleamed like a wolf's. "First we'll scout the place and find out where Malfoy sleeps. Then we'll put on your Invisibility Cloak and take him down in one go!"

Harry ventured, "Couldn't we use the Invisibility Cloak for something better...?"

Eliana seemed to ooze venom. "Or we could lure Malfoy out, throw a sack over his head, and beat him up! Then toss him into the Black Lake!"

Harry grew more worried. "Er... isn't that a bit too violent...?"

There might as well have been a demonic shadow rising behind Eliana. "Speaking of the Black Lake, isn't the Slytherin Common Room underwater? In a few days, we could blow out Malfoy's dormitory window from the lake! Flood Slytherin! Woo-hoo!"

Harry snapped, "Eliana, are you listening to me? We can't do that!"

Eliana stared at Harry in disbelief, looking utterly heartbroken. "Harry, you've changed!"

Harry: ...???

"Are you even the Harry I know?" she asked, shaking her head as she backed away.

Harry came to his senses and hurried to explain. "No, I mean, wouldn't that break too many school rules? How many points would Gryffindor lose? Malfoy isn't really that awful... We all go to the same school, so there's no need to..."

His voice dwindled under Eliana's stare. Then he froze.

Use the Invisibility Cloak for something better...

Too violent...

We can't do that...

Don't break school rules...

Gryffindor will lose points...

Malfoy isn't really that awful... Ugh! Blech!

Wasn't that exactly the sort of thing Hermione said when she lectured him, the very thing he found most annoying? How had that last sentence even come out of his mouth?

Harry, Harry, you've become the kind of person you can't stand!

Harry nearly burst into tears. He wiped his face and declared firmly, "I'm going with you!"

"You most certainly are not! Harry, don't join Eliana in this nonsense!"

In the end, Hermione grabbed a cauldron and whacked each of them once, killing the plan before it could get off the ground.

Harry had even heard that, before going to sleep, Hermione cast an Alarm Charm at the door of the dormitory she shared with Eliana. She also conjured a long rope and tied one end to Eliana's wrist and the other to her own.

To be honest, Harry had been enormously relieved.

He really was afraid that one day he would wake up to find the Slytherin Common Room blown up, the Gryffindor Hourglass black with negative points, and himself dragged off to Azkaban just for being Eliana's friend.

With that in mind, Harry gave Eliana a wary look. He had almost forgotten that Snape had a devoted fan right here.

"Maybe Professor Snape wants to protect you," the devoted fan said, just as he had expected.

Ron protested, "Sure, Professor Snape will protect Harry when he's in danger. But when Harry isn't in danger, Snape is the biggest danger!"

Eliana opened her mouth, then closed it again.

"Maybe you shouldn't play," Ron said. "Say you're ill."

"Pretend you've broken your leg," Hermione suggested.

"Actually break your leg," Ron said.

"I'll break it for you." Eliana rolled up her sleeves, eager to get started.

"Could you wish me a little luck instead?" Harry said irritably. "Gryffindor doesn't have a reserve Seeker. If I don't go, our team can't play!"

"Then you'd better go." Eliana rolled her sleeves straight back down. "I want our house to come first."

Harry: ...

Couldn't you have kept caring about me for even one more second?