Secrets Only Trouble Knows - George Weasley

26 - Missing Puzzle Piece

After Professor McGonagall left, George was able to be looked at my Madam Pomfrey. She told him his jaw hadn't been broken, which was fortunate, and then cleaned up the blood that littered his face and hands, healing the cuts and bruises his actions had left. I was thankful that he'd been returned to health, although he'd pulled off the messy, rugged look before he'd been tended to more than I'd like to admit.

Professor McGonagall made good on her word to fetch Jasper and Fred for the two of us. When they entered the infirmary, they couldn't believe their eyes and worriedly demanded we explain everything at once.

After doing so, Jasper, in a fit of explosive rage, almost went over to where Graham Montague was laying in the hospital bed on the other side of the room, but Fred and George pulled him back and reminded him here wasn't the place to brung him justice since Madam Pomfrey was in sight. Jasper refrained from tackling the boy right then and there, but I had a feeling his anger wasn't resolved and wouldn't be until he gave Graham a piece of his mind himself, which worried me. I didn't want him to serve a detention for coming to my rescue either.

To limit any more fighting, I took the first opportunity we were given to leave the hospital wing and return to our dormitories for the night. However, while I'd initially found the tension of being in the same room with three large, protective, Quidditch-playing boys and my attacker they each wanted to murder to be high, the walk back to Gryffindor Tower was even worse. It was almost unbearable. Jasper was still so mad about the situation that he was shaking, and George and Fred weren't much better. It was safe to say we didn't talk the whole way.

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When the morning came, I greeted my girl friends, the trio, and Ginny Weasley at our usual table for breakfast. I had half a mind to pretend everything was fine and refrain from informing them of the previous night's encounter with Graham, simply because I didn't want them consumed with worry for my safety either. But then I remembered the last time I kept something from them all, and figured the truth would come out eventually anyway.

So, hesitantly, I told them. I quickly determined I'd never seen so much anger on any of their faces before. Even Hermione, as much of a rule-follower as she was, looked like she'd curse Graham to hell the next she saw him.

It was then once I'd finished telling the story that  I realized none of the older boys in our group had come down to join us for breakfast yet. Adrian was missing too. Part of me found that to be slightly concerning, but in hopes nothing was up and they weren't currently taking turns shoving Graham Montague's head into a toilet bowl, I tried to convince myself they were just running late.

But of course that wasn't the case. Not with friends like mine with strong moral compasses and too much blind courage for their own good.

Several minutes after noticing the boys' absence, every single student that sat close to the entrance of the Great Hall suddenly jumped up from their tables and ran out of the room, rounding the same corner. What followed nearly instantaneously was the sound of yelling and jeering coming from the entrance hall, just as if a fight of some sort was starting to break out. With haste, my friends and I looked to each other with concern before following after to see what was going on.

Once outside the Great Hall, we discovered a large group of enraptured students had begun to form a crowd in the corridor. With an immediate gut feeling that this had something to do with last night and why my guy friends were nowhere to be found this morning, I wasted no time in pushing through all of the excited spectators. The closer I got to the center of all the commotion, the more angry shouting I could hear, and the clearer the voices became.