H E R M I O N E   G R A N G E R

G o b l e t   o f   F i r e   Q u o t e s

Chapter 9, p.121-123
'What happened?" said Hermione anxiously, stopping so abruptly that Harry walked right into her. "Ron, where are you? Oh this is stupid - lumos!"
She illuminated her wand and directed its narrow beam across the path. Ron was lying sprawled on the ground.
"Tripped over a tree root," he said angrily, getting to his feet again.
"Well, with feet that size, hard not to," said a drawling voice from behind them.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione turned sharply. Draco Malfoy was standing alone nearby, leaning against a tree, looking utterly relaxed. His arms folded, he seemed to have been watching the scene at the campsite through a gap in the trees.
Ron told Malfoy to do something that Harry knew he would never have dared say in front of Mrs. Weasley.
"Language, Weasley," said Malfoy, his pale eyes glittering. "Hadn't you better be hurrying along, now? You wouldn't like her spotted, would you?"
He noded at Hermione, and at the same moment, a blast like a bomb sounded from the campsite, and a flash of green light momentarily lit the trees around them.
"What's that suppose to mean?" said Hermione defiantly.
"Granger, they're after Muggles," said Malfoy. "D'you want to be showing off you knickers in midair? Because if you do, hang around... they're moving this way, and it would give us all a laugh."
"Hermione's a witch," Harry snarled.
'Have it your way, Potter," said Malfoy, grinning maliciously. "If you think they can't spot a Mudblood, stay where you are."
"You watch your mouth!" shouted Ron. Everybody present knew "Mudblood" was a very offensive term for a witch or wizard of Muggle parentage.
"Never mind, Ron," said Hermione quickly, seizing Ron's arm to restrain him as he took a step toward Malfoy.
There came a bang from the other side of the trees that was louder than anything they had heard. Several people nearby screamed. Malfoy chuckled softly.
"Scare easily, don't they?" he said lazily. "I suppose your daddy told you all to hide? What's he up to - trying to rescue the Muggles?"
"Where're your parents?" said Harry, his temper rising. "Out there wearing masks, are they?"
Malfoy turned his face to Harry, still smiling.
"Well... if they were, I wouldn't be likely to tell you, would I, Potter?"
"Oh, come on," said Hermione, with a disgusted look at Malfoy, "let's go and find the others."
"Keep that big bushy head down, Granger," sneered Malfoy.
"Come on," Hermione repeated, and she pulled Harry and Ron up the path again.

~

Chapter 11 p.165-167
"Shh!" Hermione whispered suddenly, pressing her finger to her lips and pointing toward the compartment next to theirs. Harry and Ron listened and heard a familiar drawling voice drifting in through the open door.
"... Father actually considered sending me to Durmstrang rather than Hogwarts, you know. He knows the headmaster, you see. Wll, you know his opinion of Dumbledore - the man's such a Mudblood-lover - and Durmstrang doesn't admit that sort of riffraff. But mother didn't like the idea of me going to school so far away. Father says Durmstrang takes as far more sensible line than Hogwarts about the Dark Arts. Durmstrang students actually learn them, not just the defense rubbish we do...."
"So he think Durmstrang would ahve suited him, does he?" she said angrily. "I wish he had gone, then we wouldn't have to put up with him."
"Durmstrang's another wizarding school?" said Harry.
"Yes," said Hermione sniffily, "and it's got a horrible reputation. According to An Appraisal of Magical Education in Europe, it puts a lot of emphasis on the Dark Arts."
"I think I've heard of it," said Ron vaguely. "Where is it? What country?"
"Well, nobody knows, do they?" said Hermione, raising her eyebrows.
"Er - why not?" said Harry.
"There's traditionally been a lot of rivalry between all the magic schools. Durmstrang and Beauxbatons like to conceal their whereabouts so nobody can steal their secrets," said Hermione matter-of-factly.
"Come off it," said Ron, staring to laugh. "Durmstrang's got to be about the same size as Hogwarts - how are you going to hide a great big castle?"
"But Hogwarts is hidden," aid Hermione, in surprise. "Everyone knows that... well, everyone who's read Hogwarts, A History, anyway."
"Just you, then?" said Ron. "So go on - how d'you hide a place like Hogwarts?"
"it's bewitched," said Hermione. "If a muggle looks at it, all they see is a moldering old ruin with a sign over the entrance saying Danger, Do Not Enter, Unsafe."
"So Durmstrang'll look like a ruin to an outsider too?"
"Maybe," said Hermione, shrugging, "or it might have Mugglerepelling charms on it, like the World Cup stadium. And to keep foreign wizards from finding it, they'll have made it Unplottable -"
"Come again?"
"Well, you can enchant a building so it's impossible to plot on a map, can't you?"
"Er... if you say so," said Harry.
"But I think Durmstrang must be somewhere in the far north," said Hermione thoughtfully. "Somewhere very cold, because they've got fur capes as part of their uniforms."
"Ah, think of all the possibilities," said Ron dreamily. "It would've been so easy to push Malfoy off a glacier and make it look like an accident.... Shame his mother likes him...."

~

Chapter 12, p.181-182
"There are house-elves here?" she said, staring, horror-struck, at Nearly Headless Nick. "Here at Hogwarts?"
"Certainly," said Nearly Headless Nick, looking suprised at her reaction.. "The largest number in any dwelling in Britain, I believe. Over a hundred."
"I've never seen one!" said Hermione.
"Well, they hardly ever leave the kitchen by day, do they?" said Nearly Headless Nick. "They come out at night to do a bit of cleaning... see to the fires and so on.... I mean. you're not suppose to see them, are you? That's the mark of a good house-elf, isn't it, that you don't know it's there?"
Hermione stared at him.
"But they get paid?" she said. "They get holidays, don't they? And - and sick leave. and pensions, and everything?"
Nearly Headless Nick chortled so much that his ruff slipped and his head flopped off, dangling on the inch or so of ghostly skin and muscle that still attached it to his neck.
"Sick leave and pensions?" he said, pushing his head back onto his shoulders and securing it once more with his ruff. "House-elves don't want sick leave and pensions!"
Hermione looked down at her hardly touched plate of food, then put her knife and fork down upon it and pushed it away from her.
"Oh c'mon, 'Er-my-knee," said Ron, accidentally spraying Harry with bits of Yorkshire pudding. "Oops - sorry, 'Arry -" He swallowed. "You won't get them sick leave by starving yourself!"
"Slave labor," said Hermione, breathing hard through her nose.
"That's made this dinner. Slave labor."
And she refused to eat another bite.


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