Thankfully...
Life finally decided to give them a break. After everything the group had endured over the previous year, it almost felt suspicious.
Every morning Harry woke expecting something to explode. Every strange noise in the corridor made Ron instinctively reach for his wand.
Hermione continued looking over her shoulder whenever she entered an empty classroom.
Draco still unconsciously checked every doorway before Sloane walked through it.
Old habits, born from trauma, weren't easily forgotten.
But nothing happened.
There were no mysterious disappearances. No cursed corridors. No monsters lurking beneath the castle. No secret chambers. No students being attacked. No professors acting suspiciously. No Death Eaters. No Voldemort. No Euan.
Just...
School.
Actual school.
The weeks that followed became wonderfully ordinary. The sort of ordinary every one of them had spent years dreaming about.
Their biggest worries became forgotten homework. Upcoming essays. Practical examinations. Who had stolen Blaise's last chocolate frog. Whether Ron would ever pass Advanced Potions without accidentally setting something on fire.
It was glorious.
Even Harry admitted one evening that he didn't know what to do with himself when nobody was trying to kill him.
"You could revise," Hermione had suggested.
Harry had looked genuinely offended.
The castle itself seemed lighter somehow. Students laughed more freely. Teachers smiled more often.
Even Filch looked...well...
Marginally less miserable.
By the time June arrived, Hogwarts felt alive again.
Not simply existing. Living. Thriving.
Exactly as it should.
The NEWT examinations arrived surprisingly quickly.
The castle transformed almost overnight. Corridors became unnaturally quiet. The library remained packed from dawn until long after curfew. Students wandered around muttering incantations under their breath while clutching colour-coded revision notes.
Coffee consumption reached genuinely alarming levels.
Theo claimed Hermione alone was responsible for approximately eighty percent of Britain's caffeine shortage.
Hermione didn't even deny it.
Sloane worked harder than she ever had in her life. While some students naturally excelled academically, she'd never been one of those people.
She had to earn every grade. Every mark. Every achievement. She revised until late into the night.
Draco repeatedly had to remind her that sleeping occasionally improved exam performance.
She remained unconvinced.
Every evening found the pair studying together. Goose curled up asleep between enormous piles of textbooks. Sometimes Draco tested her. Sometimes she tested him. Sometimes they both became so exhausted that they ended up laughing over completely ridiculous memory aids they'd invented.
Eventually...
One by one...
The examinations ended.
YOU ARE READING
The Hollow Beneath Hogwarts
FantasyThe Hollow Beneath Hogwarts When the war ended, Hogwarts was supposed to be a place of healing. Instead, it became a place haunted by grief. Sloane Sage arrives at Hogwarts carrying scars no one can see. After losing her family in the war, she dedic...
