Harry Potter and the Secret Treasures

It was obvious that Ron was very unhappy with Ginny’s teasing and disrespect.

“Watch it,” he said, warningly. “Just because I’ve given my permission doesn’t mean I can’t withdraw it —”

“ ‘Your permission,’ ” scoffed Ginny. “Since when did you give me permission to do anything?”

“I…” Ron seemed to have no idea how to answer Ginny’s questioning.

Ginny wasn’t listening to him at all. The last time Ron had tried to interfere with her affairs, it ended in a massive argument between the two of them.

As a result, Ron’s reputation worsened, especially among the girls, though Ron himself was still unaware of that.

In addition, Elaine hadn’t spoken a single word to Ron since that incident.

“Anyway, you said yourself you’d rather it was Harry than Michael or Dean,” Ginny retorted bluntly.

“Yeah, I would,” said Ron grudgingly. “And just as long as you don’t start snogging each other in public —”

“Where we snog is our own business, not yours. You filthy hypocrite! What about you and Lavender, thrashing around like a pair of eels all over the place?” demanded Ginny.

“All right, Ginny,” Harry interjected, trying to smooth things over. He didn’t want things to escalate between Ginny and Ron.

But overall, Ron’s opinions clearly had no weight with Ginny. Harry’s earlier worries had been entirely unnecessary.

Ron realized this too, and to avoid further embarrassment, he now tried to stay away from Ginny as much as possible.

But there was a problem here. He could stay away from Ginny, but not from Harry.

If he wasn’t with Harry, he would be alone and had nowhere to go!

The biggest impact of Harry and Ginny’s relationship on Ron was losing Harry…

It was okay when everyone was in class together during the day, but every night, Ron, who had nowhere to go and no one to accompany him, had to join the conversation between Harry and Ginny, competing with Ginny for time with Harry, even if Ginny looked at him with a murderous expression.

The conversation between Harry, Ron and Ginny often ended up with Ginny questioning and refuting Ron, and Harry watched silently on the side. It was really a terrible and weird combination. Sometimes, Evan, Hermione, Elaine, Colin and others would join in the conversation. Everyone could clearly see Ginny’s dissatisfaction with Ron, and Ron’s dissatisfaction with Ginny…

If Ron weren’t Ginny’s brother, she would have hit him with a nasty Bat-Bogey Hex by now.

And judging from the current situation, the possibility of this happening was increasing.

Ginny and Ron were rapidly consuming each other’s tolerance. Fortunately, they didn’t have to endure it for too long.

Ginny’s O.W.L.s were approaching and she was therefore forced to study for hours into the night.

Sometimes, she and Elaine would ask Hermione for advice, or go to the library alone. As for Evan’s Time-Turner and Diadem, they were only used for Elaine alone. Ginny’s grades were not too bad, so she didn’t need the help of these items.

But even with Ginny absent, Ron still couldn’t have Harry all to himself, because Hermione was around…

She hadn’t given up trying to persuade Harry to hand over the Half-Blood Prince’s Potions book, and always seized every opportunity and time to talk to Harry. Normally, when Ginny and Harry were together, Hermione would not go over to disturb them, but when it was just Ron, she had no reservations at all.

She had looked through a vast amount of material and even believed that the Half-Blood Prince was a girl named Eileen Prince — and she brought out a photograph to prove it.

In the moving photograph, Prince was a skinny girl of around fifteen, who looked simultaneously cross and sullen. While at Hogwarts, she had been Captain of the Hogwarts Gobstones team and had led the school to victory in an inter-school competition.

But that competition had actually been boring and unremarkable, and Prince was nothing like the Prince Harry had imagined…

Of course, Hermione hadn’t dug up Eileen Prince from a pile of old records because she genuinely wanted to find out who the Half-Blood Prince was. She wanted to prove to Harry that it was utterly ridiculous and laughable for him to be idolizing someone who might actually be a girl.

Hermione was trying to expose the Prince’s “true face”, a face that she thought was both dangerous and absurd.

Harry naturally didn’t want to believe Hermione’s theory.

“Can’t you just convince her to give it up?” he asked Evan pleadingly, after Hermione had rushed back to the library again to go through all the records of old Potions awards.

“I’ve tried, but it’s no use. Hermione thinks the Prince is dangerous. Besides…” Evan paused, unsure how to tell Harry that the Half-Blood Prince was actually Snape. He’d originally intended to keep that secret, but seeing how persistent both Harry and Hermione were, he began to waver.

The key point was that it was a complete waste of time and meaningless for the two of them to continue the confrontation.

“Besides what?”

“Besides, Hermione thinks she’s doing this for your own good. She thinks the identity of the Half-Blood Prince may be completely different from what you imagine. If you continue to worship him like this, you’ll regret it someday,” said Evan. “In fact, I think so too.”

“You’re prejudiced both because of that Dark Magic spell,” said Harry dismissively. “It’s not like the Prince made me use it.”

“Hermione’s just never got over you outperforming her in Potions,” Ron interrupted, “I think he was a genius, the Prince. Anyway … without his bezoar tip … I wouldn’t be here to discuss it, would I? I mean, I’m not saying that spell you used on Malfoy was great —”

In a sense, that spell was indeed amazing, reflecting Snape’s superb talent in the Dark Arts.

But the reality was that the more impressive the spell was, the worse the situation became .

“I don’t think that spell is great either!” Harry said quickly, “I won’t use it again.”

“By the way, how’s Malfoy? He healed quickly, didn’t he?”

“Yeah,” said Harry; this was perfectly true, although his conscience squirmed slightly all the same. “Thanks to Snape …”

“Snape is very good at healing this injury,” said Evan meaningfully. “Maybe … he knows Sectumsempra. Maybe … he is the Prince. …”

“No way,” said Harry at once.

“Are you crazy, Evan?!” Ron exclaimed, just as alarmed. “How could Snape be the Half-Blood Prince? The Prince was clearly a genius, a good person; while Snape is a greasy, ugly old bat. Of course he knows Dark Magic — he’s always secretly studying that stuff. Just look at what he’s done to Harry. Well, you still got detention with Snape this Saturday?”

“Yeah, and the Saturday after that, and the Saturday after that,” sighed Harry. “And he’s hinting now that if I don’t get all the boxes done by the end of term, we’ll carry on next year.”

“See? That’s Snape,” said Ron at once, with an I-told-you-so tone.

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