Daphne saw it coming, and her lips started to mouth "Pris-" but it was already too late.
Three blasts of brilliance slammed into Susan at once, she had her wand raised as though she could counter them and there was a white flash as the hexes struck the magical wood, but then Susan's legs convulsed and sent her flying into a corridor wall. Her head hit with a strange cracking sound, and then Susan fell down and lay motionless with her head at an odd-seeming angle, her wand still clutched in one outstretched hand.
There was a moment of frozen silence.
Parvati scrambled over to where Susan lay, pressed a thumb over the pulse point on Susan's wrist, and then - then slowly, tremblingly, Parvati rose to her feet, her eyes huge -
"Vitalis revelio," said Lee just as Parvati opened her mouth, and Susan's body was surrounded by a warm red glow. Now the seventh-year boy really was grinning. "Probably just a broken collarbone, I'd say. Nice try, though."
"Merlin, they are tricky," said Jugson.
"You had me going for a second there, dearies." The seventh-year girl wasn't smiling at all.
"Tonare!" screamed Daphne, raising her wand above her head and focusing harder than she ever had in her life. "Rava calvaria! Lucis -"
She didn't even see the hex that got her.
Hermione felt the jolt of Innervation bringing her awake, and out of some intuitive strategism she didn't roll to her feet right away; it had been a completely hopeless battle and she didn't know what she could do but some instinct told her that leaping to her feet wasn't it.
Just a crack, Hermione opened her eyes, and the thin rays of light that entered them showed Parvati backing away from all three bullies, the last girl standing that Hermione could see.
And her eyes also showed Tracey fallen not far away from her, and Hermione's wand was still in her hand; and so, desperately hoping the Slytherin girl would show more sense than she usually did, Hermione made the wand movements as subtly as she could, and hardly moving her lips, whispered, "Innervate."
Hermione felt the spell working, but Tracey didn't move. Hermione hoped it was because Tracey was being cunning, and waiting to...
What could they do?
Hermione didn't know, and the panic that had waited through the moments of fighting was starting to eat her up inside now that she was still, now that she was trying to think, now that she could see that it was all absolutely hopeless.
That was when Hermione heard a thud, and though it was out of her field of vision now, she knew that Parvati had fallen.
A moment of silence came, and passed.
"Now what?" said the voice of the scary-soft boy.
"Now we wake up the mudblood," said the precise voice of the scary-formal boy, "and find out who's really behind them, not Salazar Slytherin's ghost."
"No, dears," said the voice of the scary-sweet girl, "first we bind them all very securely -"
And then there was a sound like lightning and thunder and Hermione's eyes widened in shock before she could stop herself, and in her widened field of vision she saw the scary-soft boy convulsing as yellow arcs of energy crawled over him like giant blazing worms. His wand flew out of his hand as he collapsed to the ground, twitching, and then a moment later he lay still.
"Is everyone else asleep now?" said a voice. "Good."
Susan Bones rose from the floor near where the scary-soft boy had stood, neck still oddly bent. Then she rolled her head around her shoulders, a casual loose motion, and her head was straight again.
The round-faced first-year girl stood facing the remaining two bullies with one hand cocked on her hip.
Grinning.
And surrounded by faceted blue haze.
"Polyjuice!" spat the bully-girl.
"Polyfluis Reverso!" roared the remaining boy bully.
Something like the form of a mirrored scarf spat out of his wand -
Passed without resistance through the haze surrounding Susan -
For an instant, she glowed in a strange mirror-color, like a reflection of herself -
And then the glow faded.
The young girl still stood there, hand on her hip.
"Wrong," said Susan.
"And this is the truth," said Susan. "In case nobody ever told you -"
In her small hand a wand rose up, blurred by the blue haze surrounding it.
"You don't mess with the 'Puffs," said Susan, and with a grey flash so bright it hurt Hermione's half-closed eyes, the real battle started.
It went on for a while.
Some of the ceiling got melted.
The girl-bully tried to cry a truce, that they would leave and take Jugson with them, and Susan roared out the syllables of a curse Hermione recognized as Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting which was illegal in seven countries.
Eventually the girl-bully lay unconscious and unawakenable on the ground, and the last boy-bully had fled leaving his companions' bodies behind, and Susan was leaned over against one wall, covered in sweat and her scorched robes soaked through with wet spots, gasping for breath, and clutching at her right shoulder using her left hand.
After a while Susan straightened up, and turned to look back at where her fellow witches were sleeping on the floor.
Well, they should've been sleeping on the floor.
Lavender was already sitting up with eyes as wide as watermelons.
"That..." said Lavender.
"Was..." said Tracey.
"What?" said Hermione.
"I mean, what?" said Parvati.
"Cool!" said Lavender.
"Oh, hell," said Susan Bones. Her face had already looked a little pale beneath the sweat, and now it was getting paler, looking almost frighteningly white. "Ah... could I convince you that you hallucinated all that?"
There was a rapid exchange of glances. Hermione looked at Parvati, Parvati looked at Lavender, Lavender briefly locked gazes with Tracey.
The four of them looked back at Susan and shook their heads.
"Oh, hell," said Susan again. "Look I'll be back in a few minutes but I've really got to go now please don't say anything bye!"
And Susan ran out into the hallway, moving surprisingly fast, before anyone could say another word.
"No, seriously, what?" said Parvati.
"Innervate," said Hermione, pointing her wand at Daphne, whose body she hadn't been able to see before; and Lavender pointed her wand at Hannah's body and said the same.
Hannah's eyes opened and she tried frantically to roll to her feet, but collapsed to the ground halfway through.
"It's okay, Hannah!" said Lavender. "We won."
"We what?" said Hannah from her little heap on the floor.
Daphne hadn't stirred, but Hermione could see her chest rising and falling, and the breathing rhythm looked normal enough. "I think she's okay," said Hermione, "but -" She took a moment to swallow, her mouth was still dry. This had all gotten way, way, way out of hand. "I think we ought to take Daphne to Madam Pomfrey's..."