My Tale {Book One in the Hermione Granger Series}

Chapter 20

Ron, Neville and I followed Harry, but we hadn't gone far when we heard a doorknob rattle in front of us to the left.  Oh No! I thought.  We are going to be expelled!  I am going to go back home and a school where I didn't fit in.  On the bright side, at least I might be able to see Katrina, Stephanie, and Delequin again.

Something shot out through the classroom door.  It was Peeves.  He saw us and gave a squeal of delight. 

Harry, for once, decided to be the sensible one.

"Shut up, Peeves — please — you'll get us thrown out," Harry pleaded. 

Peeves cackled. 

"Wandering around at midnight, Ickle Firsties? Tut, tut, tut. Naughty, naughty, you'll get caught," Peeves said with a glint of evil in his eye. 

"Not if you don't give us away, Peeves, please," Harry pleaded.

We might get away, I thought hopefully. 

"Should tell Filch, I should," said Peeves in a sanity voice, but his eyes glittered wickedly. "It's for your own good, you know."

"Get out of the way," snapped Ron, taking a swipe at Peeves.

"Ronald.  NO!" I said, but I was too late, for Peeves had opened his mouth and started shouting. 

 "STUDENTS OUT OF BED!" Peeves bellowed, "STU­DENTS OUT OF BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRI­DOR!"

We ducked under Peeves, and ran for our lives, right to the end of the corridor where we slammed into a door — and it was locked.

"This is it!" Ron moaned, as he pushed helplessly at the door, "We're done for! This is the end!"

I could hear footsteps; Filch running as fast as he could toward Peeves's shouts.

"Oh, move over," I snarled at the three silly boys.  I grabbed Harry's wand – as I had forgotten mine - and tapped the lock, and whispered, "Alohomora!"

The lock clicked and the door swung open and we piled through it, shut it quickly, and pressed our ears against it, listening.

"Which way did they go, Peeves?" Filch was saying. "Quick, tell me."

"Say 'please'," Peeves taunted Filch.

"Don't mess with me, Peeves, now where did they go?"

"Shan't say nothing if you don't say please," said Peeves in his an­noying singsong voice.

"All right — please."

"NOTHING! Ha haaa! Told you I wouldn't say nothing if you didn't say please! Ha ha! Haaaaaa!" And we heard the sound of Peeves whooshing away and Filch cursing in rage.

"He thinks this door is locked," Harry whispered. "I think we'll be okay — get off, Neville!  What?"

I turned around, and saw a three-headed white dog, a dog that filled the whole space between ceiling and floor.  This was the third floor corridor, I thought.  This is why it's forbidden.  The dog had three pairs of rolling, mad eyes; three noses, twitching and quivering in their direction; three drooling mouths, saliva hanging in slippery ropes from yellowish fangs  and it was standing quite still, all six eyes staring at us.  I looked at its feet and saw a trapdoor.  It's guarding something, I thought, it has to be.  That's why it's forbidden and it's being guarded.

The dog started growling.  It's not surprised over seeing us anymore, I thought. 

Harry opened the door and we all fell backwards.  Harry slammed the door shut, I locked it back up again, and we ran back down the corridor. Filch must have hur­ried off to look for them somewhere else, because I haven't seen him anywhere, I briefly thought.  We didn't stop running until they reached the portrait of the Fat Lady on the seventh floor.

"Where on earth have you all been?" she asked, looking at our bathrobes hanging off our shoulders and our flushed, sweaty faces.

"Never mind that — pig snout, pig snout," panted Harry, and the portrait swung forward. We scrambled into the common room and collapsed, trembling, into armchairs.

It was a while before any of us said anything. Neville, indeed, looked as if he'd never speak again.

"What do they think they're doing, keeping a thing like that locked up in a school?" said Ron finally. "If any dog needs exercise, that one does."

I realized that they hadn't seen the trapdoor and by this point, I had gotten my breath back and began to feel my face becoming flustered due to anger as the boys don't use their eyes. 

"You don't use your eyes, any of you, do you?" I snapped. "Didn't you see what it was standing on?"

"The floor?" Harry suggested. "I wasn't looking at its feet, I was too busy with its heads."

"No, not the floor. It was standing on a trapdoor. It's obviously guarding something," I said before standing up and glaring at the three boys.

 "I hope you're pleased with yourselves. We could all have been killed — or worse, expelled. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to bed," I continued before heading up to bed.

 "No, we don't mind," I heard Ron say. "You'd think we dragged her along, wouldn't you?"

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NOTE: I DO NOT OWN THE PLACES, CHARACTERS AND IDEAS OF THE HARRY POTTER SERIES. THEY REMAIN THE PROPERTY OF J.K.ROWLING.