He panted and wheezed and prayed that even if they stole it from him completely, they wouldn't destroy it; his grandmother had sent it to him and it was precious to him.
He was a trembling pile of pathetic teetering back on to his feet after the terrible trio finished their fun when Potter appeared out of nowhere and helped him to his feet. He had never seen her look anything but cheerful and unbothered; the fierce expression on her face was one that resembled McGonagall looming over misbehaving student and it put him off balance.
He tried to brush off the situation when she asked about it, telling her he'd go talk to a professor about it later even though he wouldn't. Potter didn't accept the brush off and sent him a stern look that would have sent him crying if it was him she was upset with.
"We're going to get it back right now," Potter told him, setting her unwavering sight in the direction Malfoy had went. Neville had seen a similar expression on his Gran after Uncle Algie had dropped him out a window. "And I'll be having some words with Draco Malfoy."
Neville wasn't sure what Potter was meaning to do; she was a mild-mannered girl from Hufflepuff and Malfoy was an aggressive elitist from a family with a shady background, a Slytherin to boot. Surely she didn't think she could talkMalfoy into returning Neville's property?
The conversation went along in the same manner as Neville had expected: Potter firmly but politely requested Malfoy to give Neville his Remembrall back, and Malfoy let his condescension fly freely by degrading Neville, insulting Potter, and tried to coerce Potter into going to the dark side. Malfoy had spewed such abuse against Neville that Neville became dispirited enough to begin to believe that Potter might actually just give up on him and accept Malfoy's offer.
Such a thought was tossed out the window when Potter seemed to snap and flung out the filthiest invectives Neville had ever heard into Malfoy's gobsmacked face. She used words he'd never even heard of before! Neville had never witnessed a lady cuss before and the experience was increasingly singular.
He thought they were going to wind up in a sticky end when Potter threatened Malfoy with physical violence, which the blond boy responded to by reminding her of Crabbe and Goyle's presence. Neville had tried to convince her to walk away but Potter wasn't having it.
The situation became hostile the moment Goyle actually laid hand on Potter. Neville thought he was going to have to live the rest of his life knowing he had been too cowardly and weak to do anything as a girl was hurt right in front of him, but it was not so. Potter released a furious flurry of blows against her attackers the likes of which Neville would have imagined coming from jungle animal. He watched without comprehending as the small girl not even five feet tall laid waste to the hulking ogres that were Malfoy's thugs.
But she was not finished there! Potter bodily dragged Malfoy into the brawl with a punch to the jaw Neville felt sympathy ache for. She whaled on Malfoy like a bear mauling its dinner.
"I warned you, Malfoy," she had hissed when she had him in a hold of submission. "Did you think I was kidding?"
Neville hadn't thought she was kidding, but he hadn't expected her to follow through with her words in such a shocking way. Judging by the looks on the other Slytherin first-years faces, they hadn't been expecting it either.
"Psychotic bint!" Malfoy snarled, renewing his struggle.
Neville might have felt honour-bound to challenge the blond boy to a duel for such an insult to a lady if it hadn't been for the fact that Potter flung him down like he was something dirtying her hands and all but stomped on his privates in retaliation. As the idiotic boy keened, Neville felt that sympathy ache again.
The confrontation ended with Malfoy admitting defeat and returning the Remembrall. Potter returned to her normal self after advising the other Slytherins in how to lessen Malfoy's suffering and walked off like a boss with Neville trailing behind her.
Neville Longbottom didn't so much believe in gods as he did natural forces in the world far out of his control, but at the moment pretty Heri Potter handed him his precious gift with a sweet smile on her face, Neville became the high priest of a new religion with her as the supreme goddess.
The Slytherins that had witnessed the beat-down Heri gave Malfoy and his meatheads edged around her as if she were a ticking bomb for weeks. She ignored it pointedly. (Honestly, could they be any more obvious? They were supposed to be the crafty ones!) She made no mention of the incident since and had assumed what she now considered her school persona. When asked about it by her friends, Heri claimed ignorance. For the most part, no one tried to confront her about it.
It was only 'for the most part' since Malfoy had made it his life's ambition to get her in trouble in whatever ways he could manage. He didn't succeed, of course, none of the professors took him seriously because of how non-confrontational Heri came off, nor would any of his housemate back him up after the first time when Heri put the fear of God in them.
"What do you mean you're staying out of it?" Malfoy had snapped at Theodore Nott when the gangling boy refused to help. Nott was the only person Malfoy talked to as an equal. "You're just going to stand there while a Hufflepuff makes fools out of us?"
Nott sent Malfoy an unimpressed look.
"You mean make a fool out of you. I'm not putting myself on the line just because you don't know when to admit you're beaten. I like to live my life without injury."
"When my father hears about this—!"