Black and Potter | H. Potter

34 ⋆*⋆:⋆ a step from death.

☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ:✧*⋆.*:･ﾟ✧.: ⋆*･ﾟ: .⋆ ☾

| A STEP FROM DEATH |
song: euphor by novo amor.

☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ:✧*⋆.*:･ﾟ✧.: ⋆*･ﾟ: .⋆ ☾

EVERYBODY GOT UP LATE ON BOXING DAY. The Gryffindor common room was much quieter than it had been lately, many yawns punctuating the lazy conversations.

Ron and Hermione seemed to have reached an unspoken agreement not to discuss their argument. They were being quite friendly to each other, though oddly formal. Ron and Harry wasted no time in telling Ara and Hermione about the conversation they had overheard between Madame Maxime and Hagrid, but they didn't seem to find the news that Hagrid was a half-giant nearly as shocking as Ron did.

"Well, I thought it was quite obvious," Ara said, shrugging. "He couldn't be a pure giant because they're about twenty feet tall."

"Honestly, all this hysteria about giants. They can't all be horrible. . . . It's the same sort of prejudice that people have toward werewolves. . . . It's just bigotry, isn't it?" said Hermione.

Ron looked as though he would have liked to reply scathingly, but perhaps he didn't want another row, because he contented himself with shaking his head disbelievingly while Hermione wasn't looking.

It was time now to think of the homework they had neglected during the first week of the holidays. Everybody seemed to be feeling rather flat now that Christmas was over.

Though the holidays were overall cheerful, the arising anxiety due to the second task drawing near was inevitable. Harry was nervous, that much was obvious as Ara observed him go upstairs to his dormitory almost every night and then heard the incessant screeching coming from the egg. Ara had borrowed books from the library, hoping that she could find something that would help them figure out what the clue was but she came up empty. She'd offered to hear it with him one night but she'd happened to already have a migraine and the noise simply worsened it, causing her to grab the egg and throw it across the room to shut it up. Thankfully, it was quite durable.

Even though Harry was resistant at first, claiming that Cedric's clue that he'd given him the night of the Yule Ball could be a prank, Ara managed to convince him to consider it by threatening to throw him into the Black Lake since they were running out of time and options.

It seemed like time was flying by and suddenly the first day of the new term arrived. Ara tried her hardest to concentrate solely on helping Harry with the egg, which seemed to weigh him down each day with worry. But as much as she wished she could shove her own issues into the deepest part of her brain, it was nearly impossible to overlook what was happening inside her head; She'd had more dreams. . .though they always contained the same elements, an old manor, a snake, and cold whispers lurking in the shadows against the worn walls. She'd tried to listen to what they said but they were too quiet, too cracked and too eerie for her to comprehend.

She would wake up with sweat lining her forehead and a rapidly beating heart each time, quietly gasping for air so she wouldn't wake up her roommates. She'd usually grab her dog plush, snuggle up with Venus, who was always there by her side, and light up her wand so she could read the night away. Though Ara couldn't deny her nature, she was an overthinker at heart and during those sleepless nights, she couldn't travel to the wonderful worlds she read about and get lost in them, because she remained in reality. Most times she would give up on falling back asleep and she'd grab the Marauders Map and tiptoe towards the library in the dead night.

Once, she'd gone to read about the Auclair family. She knew it was basically an invasion of Atlas' privacy to be reading about his family without him knowing but Ara wanted—needed—to know more.