Depths of Despair ✶ Theodore Nott

eight. when danger moves too close

An almost eerie atmosphere lingered across the castle. Stood at the bottom of the many moving stair, chaos could be comprehended stemming from outside the Gryffindor common room.

     Kieran — stopping his cheerful recollection of their Hogsmeade visits earlier that same day — could be seen furrowing his brows, leaning to the side to attempt and piece some sort of knowledge meant of what was happening together. A deep sigh could be heard expressed aloud as he considered himself unsuccessful mere minutes later.

     "We could just walk up there", Valerie proposed with an accompanying shrug of her shoulders. Kieran, looking with distaste toward the many stairs, shook his head.

     "It's not necessary", he then explained while once again joining her side — the two friends about to pick up their intentions of heading to the Slytherin common room. "I'm sure it's nothing."

     While traveling downwards in the castle, the temperature seemed to significantly drop. Had she not been used to it, Valerie might have shivered at the shift, however it had gotten to the point where she welcomed it with a familiar sense of comfort passing through her chest.

     Their footsteps echoed throughout the dungeons, although it mainly was Kieran producing the noise — not very graceful in his strides after growing at least fifteen centimeters over their summer break. He seemed not aware of his own fault, too caught up in a package of candy he'd purchased while in Hogsmeade.

     Valerie did, however, take notice to how unusual emory the pathway to their common room was. When reaching the entrance, not a single person had passed them on the way; and she could do no else than ever so slightly frown. Something was up, yet she seemed unable to figure out what.

     Before able to walk inside the Slytherin common room, however, a hand suddenly gripped her arm — holding her back. Frightened, she winced in uncomfortable surprise, reaching for her wand and gripping it tightly in her left hand.

     Many thoughts passed through her mind at once, Peter Pettigrew being the very first of them. Had the murderous man somehow successfully gotten past the many Dementors surrounding the Hogwarts grounds? Had he managed to sneak past the gates and into the castle — hence the hands now grabbing her, holding her back?

     Taking a moment or two to consider her options, she readied herself to struggle. A single launch in the opposite direction of the person behind her was enough to free her arms — Valerie stumbling forwards, only able to stop herself when dangerously near crashing into the nearest wall.

     Yet, she recovered quickly, and half a second later she stood with her posture straightened out, wand aimed directly at the person only moments before grabbing a hold of her. Almost an instinct was it to deeply sigh in both relief and utter frustration, for before her stood Theodore Nott — not Peter Pettigrew as she had previously imagined.

     "Merlin, Nott", she exclaimed and ran a hand through her hair; inhaling and exhaling some times in a row to calm down.

     He did not answer, nor did he apologize for severely startling her. Instead, he turned toward Kieran only. "No one should be down here. Apparently there's some trouble by the Gryffindor tower, and Dumbledore is gathering everyone in the Great Hall", he explained — Valerie easily ignored.

     "What? Do you know what happened?" Asked Kieran, tone displaying curiosity.

     "It shouldn't be too difficult to figure out, right?" Theodore replied and turned around; waiting for them both before settling into a walk. Both him and Kieran being significantly taller than her, Valerie found herself in a struggle with trying to keep up — sometimes pinching her best friend's arm to signal for him to slow down.