My little Malfoy Girl

The Voices in the Hall

We had barely set foot in the cool entrance hall when a voice rang out, "There you are, Potter — Weasley. Ms. Malfoy." Professor McGonagall was walking toward us, looking stern. She turned to the boys, completely disregarding me. "You will both do your detentions this evening."

"What're we doing, Professor?" said Ron, nervously suppressing a burp.

"You will be polishing the silver in the trophy room with Mr. Filch," said Professor McGonagall. "And no magic, Weasley — elbow grease."

Ron gulped. I sucked in a breath. Not Filch, I thought.

Argus Filch, the caretaker, was loathed by every student in the school.

"And you, Potter, will be helping Professor Lockhart answer his fan mail," said Professor McGonagall.

"Oh n — Professor, can't I go and do the trophy room, too?" said Harry desperately.

"Certainly not," said Professor McGonagall, raising her eyebrows. "Professor Lockhart requested you particularly. Eight o'clock sharp, both of you."

We, (well, Harry and Ron, anyway), slouched into the Great Hall in states of deepest gloom, Hermione behind us, wearing a well-you-did-break-school-rules sort of expression.

Both Harry and Ron felt they'd got the worse deal.

"Filch'll have me there all night," said Ron heavily. "No magic! There must be about a hundred cups in that room. I'm no good at Muggle cleaning."

"Oh, me neither! Father made us Muggle-clean one time, and it was awful. He said it was a punishment for-"

"Okay, okay, we get it, Leila." Ron grumbled.

"I'd swap anytime," said Harry hollowly. "I've had loads of practice with the Dursleys. Answering Lockhart's fan mail ... he'll be a nightmare. ..."

Saturday afternoon seemed to melt away, and in what seemed like no time, it was five minutes to eight, and the boys went off to their separate detentions. Harry looked miserable as he walked away.

"Well, they did break school rules, you know," Hermione said behind me.

"Oh, hush up, Hermione," I said.

"I'm going for a walk. See you later."

I climbed out the portrait hole, leaving Hermione standing in the middle of the common room alone. The the portrait swung shut.

I felt alone in the corridor as I listened to the echo.

🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁🐍🦁(So cute! Okay, sorry!)

I jerked awake. I realized that I had fallen asleep on the corridor floor. How long have I been out? 

Suddenly, I heard something. A...voice? But it was impossible. There was no one in the corridor, unless someone had an invisibility cloak.

But the voice...

It sounded like pure evil.

"Come ... come to me. ... Let me rip you. ... Let me tear you. ... Let me kill you. ..."

I gave a start.

"What was that?!"  I whispered to myself.

I got so freaked that I practically ran back to the common room. I hurriedly said the password, ignoring the complaints of the Fat Lady portrait. I sat on the armchair, and waited for someone to come down so I could tell someone about what happened. 

Luckily, Harry came in a couple minutes later, looking very anxious and scared. 

"Harry! I heard a voice in the hall!"

"What?! But, I heard a voice in Professor Lockhart's classroom!"

"Really? So we can both hear the voice. But who was it? Where did it come from? D'you think Ron heard it, too?"

"Maybe..."

Ron came climbing through the portrait hole a good twenty minutes later.

"Let's go up to one of the dormitories to talk about this," Harry said.

Ron complained the whole way up.

"My muscles have all seized up," he groaned, sinking on his bed. "Fourteen times he made me buff up that Quidditch Cup before he was satisfied. And then I had another slug attack all over a Special Award for Services to the School. Took ages to get the slime off. ... How was it with Lockhart?"

Keeping our voices low so as not to wake Neville, Dean, and Seamus, we told Ron exactly what we had heard.

"And Lockhart said he couldn't hear it?" said Ron.

I could see him frowning in the moonlight.

"D'you think he was lying? But I don't get it — even someone invisible would've had to open the door."

"Which is why I ruled that out once I heard Harry's story. Because I was in the corridor, and I thought it was someone invisible. But if Harry heard it at the same time, the door didn't open, and Lockhart didn't hear it, then it couldn't have been a person. So what could it have been?"

"Like I said, I don't get it," Ron said.

I went back to my dormitory, got undressed, and turned the light off. 

"I don't know," I whispered, lying back in my four-poster and staring at the canopy above me. "I don't get it either." I said, unknowingly echoing the exact words Harry just said to Ron.