The atmosphere at Hogwarts had changed.
A month remained until final exams, and it weighed heavily over every corner of the castle like a silent, suffocating fog. The Quidditch pitch, once alive with laughter and cheering, now stood abandoned. The once-coveted training slots were forfeited without protest, brooms left to gather dust in the school lockers. In their place, dusty tomes and thick parchment scrolls became the daily companions of the student body.
The library—so often neglected or mocked—transformed into a war camp. Tables overflowed with stacks of textbooks on Charms, Transfiguration, and Potions. Study groups occupied nearly every corner, murmuring incantations and scribbling answers until parchment wore thin. Ink pots ran dry faster than Madam Pince could restock them.
Even the ever-lively common rooms became subdued. Students who normally boasted about skipping revision were now hunched over spell diagrams and theory charts. Only the tapping of quills and the occasional stressed groan broke the silence.
And yet, no group felt the pressure more acutely than those sitting for their O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s.
The exams had always loomed large in the Hogwarts calendar, but this year, anxiety reached new heights. For seventh-years, sleep became a rare luxury—barely three hours a night, if they were lucky. Dark circles adorned even the proudest pureblood faces. Slytherins skipped breakfast to review wand movements; Ravenclaws skipped dinner to recite magical theory in whispers that bordered on madness.
Students began keeping time not by the chime of bells but by the sound of someone breaking down in tears in the corridor or someone's wand misfiring during a nervous breakdown.
Even Harry found himself caught in the current of it all.
Despite being a first-year, the tension had a way of creeping into the bones. He didn't have the crushing burden of standardized testing like the upper years, but the recent events involving Quirrell and Voldemort made studying feel... oddly insignificant in comparison. He didn't say it aloud—especially not around Hermione—but he couldn't help thinking it.
What's a written Charms exam next to surviving a duel with the Dark Lord?
Still, he played along.
With his wand-hand draped lazily over his parchment, Harry scribbled answers during mock exams and answered Professor Snape's increasingly difficult oral questions with bored precision. Hermione, of course, thrived under the pressure. She'd become the queen of flashcard quizzes and study schedules, dragging Harry into study sessions with an iron will and muttering facts in her sleep.
Daphne, on the other hand, took a different approach. She studied efficiently, never overextending herself, and took long walks alone or with Harry after dusk, preferring clarity over panic. She even found time to mock the older years' "studying-induced madness," as she called it, though she spared Hermione the worst of her barbs—most of the time.
And then, finally, after weeks of tension and sweat and sleepless nights...
After the exam ended
The change was immediate.
As if a spell had been lifted, the air lightened. Laughter echoed through the stone halls once more. The Whomping Willow trembled under the weight of a dozen daring students climbing it in celebration. Even Peeves, who had spent the last month in hiding from anxious prefects, returned with renewed enthusiasm, flinging dungbombs and humming bawdy songs about burnt cauldrons and students crying over spilled ink.
Hogwarts bloomed with joy again.
The week after the exams became a golden reprieve. Students roamed the grounds freely. The Black Lake was crowded with groups dipping their toes into the cool water or lounging on sun-warmed stones, wands discarded for the first time in weeks. Even the castle ghosts seemed less moody.
But not everything was carefree.
Not after what happened.
The Aurors had arrived within forty-eight hours of Quirrell's death.
Dressed in black robes and bearing sharp eyes and sharper questions, they moved through the halls with an efficiency that made students scatter like flobberworms. They combed through Quirrell's quarters, interrogated witnesses—especially Harry—and pored over every magical trace left in the Forbidden Forest.
But there was little they could say. Dumbledore had already written the story.
He told them of an imposter—someone who had assumed Quirrell's form and smuggled dark magic into the school. A rogue threat, an anomaly, a shadow in the wind. Voldemort's name was mentioned only once, whispered in private, then sealed away.
The official story released to the press:
"A brave first-year uncovered a sinister intruder attempting to steal a powerful magical artifact from the school. The intruder, disguised as a professor, was ultimately destroyed in a confrontation. The artifact has since been relocated for safety."
The Daily Prophet ran the article on the front page of the second edition that week. By the next morning, Harry Potter's name was once again on every tongue in the magical world.
And yet...
The Ministry of Magic did not name Voldemort. The Minister himself, Cornelius Fudge, made a quiet visit to Hogwarts, walking the halls with Dumbledore in whispered conversation. When he left, the decision was final:
Voldemort's name would not appear in any official report. The threat would be labeled unknown, unspecific, and unrepeatable.
"There is no evidence that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was involved," Fudge said to the press. "While we remain vigilant, there is no cause for public panic."
An ostrich policy, some called it—head buried in the sand. But Dumbledore had expected nothing else.
For Harry, the fame was nothing new. He ignored the staring, the questions, and the whispers. The real victory was silence.
For now.
The evening of the End-of-Year Feast arrived, and Hogwarts gathered once more in the Great Hall. The air buzzed with celebration. Platters of roast meats, pies, fruit charmed with glittering sugar, and bowls of magically chilled pumpkin juice filled the tables.
Harry sat at the center of the Slytherin table, posture relaxed, confidence unshaken. To his left sat Hermione, radiant in dark green robes and high ponytail, her eyes dancing with light as she playfully nudged his shoulder with her own. She was close now—closer than before—and everyone knew it.
To his right, Daphne Greengrass watched him with her usual half-smile, cool and calculating. She wasn't one to giggle or blush, but there was something in her gaze when it rested on Harry—something possessive, something daring.
Across the hall, Lavender Brown was seated among the Gryffindors, her cheeks flushed, lips bitten raw. Whenever Harry glanced her way, she looked down quickly. But she always looked back. And she always smiled.
At the staff table, Aurora Sinistra raised her goblet to her lips but kept her gaze firmly locked elsewhere. She hadn't spoken to Harry since that night , hadn't acknowledged him directly even once.
But he knew.
He could feel the tension in her shoulders. He could feel the weight of memory pressing against her skin, igniting nerves with every accidental glance. And he wasn't done with her—not yet.