𝗨𝗡𝗘𝗫𝗣𝗘𝗖𝗧𝗘𝗗 ━ Golden Trio Era

━chapter 25

Chapter 24
━━━━━━━━ ✥ ━━━━━━━━

AFTER LESSONS, AS ADHARA, MILLICENT AND ASTORIA WERE WORKING ON ASSIGNMENTS IN THE COMMON ROOM (OWLS WERE NEAR AND HERMIONE'S NAGGING WAS GETTING TO THEM), MALFOY CAME IN RUNNING, OUT OF BREATH.

He rushed to Adhara, eyes wide. She looked at him, confused.

Malfoy has practically shed his haughty personality he had adopted this year ever since he joined the Inquisitorial Squad (not that he never was, only that he seemed to have taken it up a notch). Adhara was honestly growing tired of the boy. Although, oddly enough, he was steering clear of her. Avoiding her, averting her gaze. It was strange. He even stopped showing up to their scheduled defence meetups since they were paired together, which made things even worse because if there was one thing Draco Malfoy cared about, it was his grades.

Now, though. He focused solely on her as he talked to her with bated breaths.

"They found Montague."

Adhara's eyes doubled in size. Astoria grabbed her hand. Bletchley and Goyle, who were also in the Common Room, stood up. Crabbe looked too astounded to stand.

"What?"

"They found him jammed in a toilet. He's in the Hospital Wing. Snape says we can go see him."

Millie pushed Adhara up. "Go!"

"How did he get there?"

Malfoy shook his head. "We don't know. And he sounds confused. We can't really understand what he's saying. And he keeps talking about Quidditch."

"Of course, he is," she said, rolling her eyes. She got up from the table, leaving her stuff behind to stalk out the Common Room.

"Wait! Adhara—"

She looked at Malfoy in shock.

"He named you temporary captain."

Adhara's mouth parted open. She looked at her other teammates, who all had varying degrees of reaction. But mostly, no one seemed to really care about that right now. Montague had been missing for two days with no trace. There were more important matters to handle.

She left the Common Room, her team following right behind.

━━━━

When Remus told Harry about how his dad used to bully Snape, Harry tucked that information to get angry at later. But as he turned the corner towards his professor's office, his stomach sank.

Fuck, he thought. What do I even say? Do I say anything at all? Do I pretend not to know?

Turned out, the universe solved that particular problem for him quite quickly.

Sirius was late, and hadn't shown up, yet. Malfoy had arrived and distracted Snape with something about Montague. And the pensieve was right there.

Snape was gripping his arm tightly, and for a moment, Harry was back at Privet Drive.

"So...been enjoying yourself, Potter?"

"No! No, of course—" the grip got harsher, making Harry flinch.

Snape was baring his teeth at him. His nostrils flared as he breathed heavily. His face had turned white, but a flash of green light illuminated the side of it. Harry felt sweat drip down the back of his neck, which was odd because he was cold all over.