"Guess who found Millicent Bulstrode hiding in the broom closet with Blaise Zabini yesterday?" Penelope asked, as she sat down across from me. I looked down the table towards Millicent and Pansy, who were sat with Crabbe, Goyle, Blaise and Draco.
"I don't know. Do enlighten me," I said in a sarcastic voice, although she appeared not to notice.
"Harry Potter."
"Eww!" I called loudly, earning odd looks from the people around me. "Sorry," I grumbled and they turned back to their meals. I'd expected it to be someone we knew, or at least a Slytherin. "What did he do?"
"I don't know. It's not as if I care though. That's not the important bit, is it?"
"You mean that's not the gossipy bit."
She grinned, "Exactly." There was still no news on Lavendar Brown, so I headed off to Muggle Studies.
"Zabini!" I called down the hall. He turned around and upon seeing it was me blushed wildly, but waited for me all the same. When I finally reached him, he turned on his heels and we walked in unison. "So, what's up?"
"Nothing much," he mumbled.
"Nothing? Not even Millicent Bulstrode?" I teased him. I was rather willing to add 'toad-face' as an after thought, but decided against it.
"I'm sorry Asia! I really I am. I mean I don't even like her... I just thought what with you and-"
"Honestly Blaise it's fine. I'm glad you've moved on. As for me and-"
"-Draco." I smiled at him.
"Right, Draco. There's nothing to it. It's not like I want to. I don't even like him."
He gripped my hand in his own like an older, protective brother would and he walked me to my lesson.
...
"Lavendar?" I called out into the common room, albeit rather quietly. "Lavendar I know you're in here. You know you're in here. We both know you're in here. All I want to know now is why." I'd figured it out last lesson. A cold hand, the missing girl. There was really only one explanation. For whatever reason, Lavendar Brown was in the Slytherin common room. Now all I wanted, needed, to know was why.
She revealed herself, all being that for whatever reason she was only an aura with her spirit. "Lavendar. What has happened? Why are you like this?"
"I knew I could find you here. I need your help. I've seen the way Trelawney looks at you. It's as if she envies you."
"I don't even take Divination!"
"No, you don't need to. She looks at you in the halls, at meals. You're a really talented seer."
"I sense auras, there's nothing to it."
"So how did you know I was here?"
"How could I not? The clues were right there in front of me, staring me in the face. Why didn't you just come outright and say what you wanted to say the first time?"
"You had to figure it out yourself."
"Why?"
"I don't know. It's the rules I guess. It's in the rules of the spirit world."
I paused and took in what she told me. "Ok, so what am I going to do? Why are you a spirit? Spirit's do not have auras."
"I'm dying." That was a great explanation, really great. She began to fade and I sighed, pulling a hand roughly through my hair. I minded that she was dying of course. Lavendar had never really been the brightest crayon in the box, but that didn't mean that I wanted her to die! I needed to come up with a plan.
At that precise moment, who other than Draco Malfoy came down the staircase? Of course it was Draco, it had to be. Oh, the perfect cliche.
"Whom are you speaking to?"
"I'm speaking to the fire Draco. I'm speaking to myself, I'm speaking to the walls."
"So either you're going crazy, or there was someone important in the fire? One of the Dark Lord's followers perhaps. Or even the Dark Lord himself!"
"Draco."
"Surely not, he would never appear in the fireplace himself, he would never come here, to Hogwarts and walk among us."
"Draco."
"Though of course his head in the fire is not walking among us and he would have a disguise..."
"Draco!" I shouted at him and he seemed to jump, quite literally, out of his trance.
"Huh?" I laughed at him.
"I wasn't speaking to anyone. Why if I'm speaking does it have to be to someone in particular?"
"I just thought that-"
"Just think nothing. Trust me? And go back to bed." He headed towards me, and I was not eager to see what he was about to do, so I climbed the stairs towards my bed for a long awaited rest.
...
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