The silence in the courtyard lasted long enough for the birds to become impossible to ignore.
They were somewhere in the trees beyond the practice ground, calling to one another in the cool morning air. Usually, Hermione would not have noticed them. Now every chirp seemed too loud. Ulrich had turned to face them and then stopped speaking, and she found herself wishing he would say anything, even if it was to ask what they thought they were doing in his old clothes.
Her face burned. She fixed her eyes on a patch of ground just beside his boots, unable to meet his gaze but painfully aware that it moved from one sister to the next. The shirt she had finally chosen had felt perfectly comfortable upstairs. Under Ulrich's silent inspection, she could suddenly feel every fold of it.
