You Get What You Deserve

Trelawney was staring into the teacup, rotating it anti-clockwise.

“The falcon... my dear, you have a deadly enemy.”

“But everyone knows that,” said Hermione in a loud whisper. Trelawney stared at her.

“Well, they do, said Hermione. “Everybody knows about Harry and You-Know-Who.”

Harry, Ron and I stared at her with a mixture of amazement and admiration. We had never heard Hermione speak to a teacher like that before. Trelawney chose not to reply. She lowered her huge eyes to Harry’s cup again and continued to turn it.

“The club... an attack. Dear, dear, this is not a happy cup...”

“I thought that was a bowler hat,” I said with a shrug.

“The skull... danger in your path, my dear...”

Everyone was staring, transfixed, at Trelawney, who gave the cup and final turn, gasped, and then screamed. There was another tinkle of breaking china; Neville had smashed his second cup. Trelawney sank into a vacant armchair, her glittering hand at her heart and her eyes closed.

“My dear boy – my poor dear boy – no – it is kinder not to say – no – don’t ask me...”

“What is it, Professor?” said Dean Thomas at once. Everyone had got to their feet, and slowly, they crowded around mine and Harry’s table, pressing close to Trelawney’s chair to get a good look at Harry’s cup.

“My dear,” Trelawney’s huge eyes opened dramatically, “you have the Grim.”

“The what?” said Harry.

Harry wasn’t the only one who didn’t understand; Dean Thomas shrugged at him and Lavender Brown looked puzzled, but nearly everybody else clapped their hands to their mouths in horror.

“The Grim, my dear, the Grim!” cried Trelawney, who looked shocked that Harry hadn’t understood. “The giant, spectral dog that haunts churchyards! My dear boy, it is an omen – the worst omen – of death!”

Everyone was looking at Harry; everyone except Hermione, who had gotten up and moved around to the back of Trelawney’s chair.

“I don’t think it looks like a Grim,” she said flatly.

“Neither do I,” I said.

Trelawney surveyed Hermione with mounting dislike, but seemed not to have noticed me.
“You’ll forgive me for saying so, my dear, but I perceive very little aura around you. Very little receptivity to the resonances of the future.”

I twisted my head from side to side, watching the tea dregs in the cup.

“It looks like a Grim if you do this,” I said, with my eyes almost shut, “but it looks more like a donkey from here,” I said, leaning to the left.

I grinned, and winked, at Seamus, who was laughing silently.

“When you’ve all finished deciding whether I’m going to die or not!” said Harry, taking everyone by surprise. Nobody seemed to want to look at him.

“I think we will leave the lesson here for today,” said Trelawney, in her mistiest voice. “Yes... please back away your things...”

Silently the class took their teacups back to Trelawney, packed away their books and closed their bags. Even Ron was avoiding Harry’s eyes; Ron, Harry’s best friend. I think I was the only one who was still looking at him.

“Until we meet again,” said Trelawney faintly, “fair fortune be yours. Oh, and dear –“ she pointed at Neville, “you’ll be late next time, so mind you work extra hard to catch up.”

We all descended the ladder and the winding staircase in silence, then set off for McGonagall’s Transfiguration lesson. It took us so long to find her classroom that, early as we had left Divination, we were only just in time.

I picked a seat right in the back of the room, were I could place my head on my desk quietly without drawing too much attention to myself. I hardly heard what McGonagall was telling us about Animagi (wizards who could transform at will into animals), and I only just caught glimpses as she transformed herself in front of our eyes into a tabby cat with spectacle markings around her eyes.

“Really, what had got into you all today?” she said, turning back into herself with a faint pop, and staring around at us all. “Not that it matters, but that’s the first time my transformation’s not got applause from a class.”

Everybody’s heads turned towards Harry again, but nobody spoke. Then Hermione raised her hand.

“Please, Professor, we’ve just had our first Divination class, and we were reading the tea leaves, and –“

“Ah, of course,” said McGonagall, suddenly frowning. “There is no need to say any more, Miss Granger. Tell me, which of you will be dying this year?”

Everyone stared at her.

“Me,” said Harry, finally.

“I see,” said McGonagall, fixing Harry with her beady eyes. “Then you should know, Potter, that Sybill Trelawney had predicted the death of one student a year since she arrived at this school. None of them has died yet. Seeing death omens is her favourite way of greeting a new class. If it were not for the fact that I never speak ill of my colleagues –“ McGonagall broke off, and we saw that her nostrils had gone white. She went on, more calmly. “Divination is one of the most imprecise branches of magic. I shall not conceal from you that I have very little patience with it. True Seers are very rare, and Professor Trelawney...”

She stopped again, and then said, in a very matter-of-fact tone, “You look in excellent health to me, Potter, so you will excuse me if I don’t let you off homework today. I assure you that if you die, you need not hand it in.”

Hermione laughed. Ron still looked worried, and Lavender whispered, “But what about Neville’s cup?”