The Children Who Lived and The Philosopher's Stone

Chapter Thirteen - The Alchemist.

Dumbledore had convinced Nellie and Harry not to go looking for the Mirror of Erised again. And for the rest of the Christmas holidays, the invisibility cloak stayed folded at the bottom of her trunk.

Nellie wished she could forget what she'd seen in the mirror, but she couldn't.

She started having nightmares. Over and over again she dreamed about their parents disappearing in a flash of green light, followed by a piercing scream. One night after she woke with a shout, Harry tried to comfort her and tell her that he'd been having the same dreams. The two of them would often wake each other in the middle of the night after a nightmare, then go wait in the common room for the sun to rise.

"You see, Dumbledore was right, that mirror could drive you mad," Ron said when he'd caught the twins asleep in armchairs, and Harry had to tell him about the dreams. Hermione, who came back the day before term started, took a different view of things.

She was torn between horror at the idea of Harry and Nellie being out of bed, roaming the school three nights in a row, and disappointment that they hadn't at least found out who Nicolas Flamel was.

Once term had started, they were back to skimming through books for ten minutes during their breaks. Nellie and Harry had even less time than the other two because Quidditch practice had started again.

Wood was working the team harder than ever. Even the endless rain that had replaced the snow couldn't dampen his spirits. The Weasleys complained that Wood was becoming a tyrant, but Nellie was on Wood's side.

If they won their next match against Hufflepuff, they would overtake Slytherin in the house championship for the first time in seven years. Quite apart from wanting to win, Nellie found that she had fewer nightmares when she was tired out after training.

During one particularly wet and muddy practice, Wood gave the team a bit of bad news. He'd just gotten very angry with Nellie and the Weasleys, who kept dive-bombing each other and pretending to fall off their brooms.

"Will you stop messing around!" he yelled. "That's exactly the sort of thing that'll lose us the match! Snape's refereeing this time, and he'll be looking for any excuse to knock points off Gryffindor!"

George Weasley really did fall off his broom at these words.

"Snape's refereeing?" he spluttered through a mouthful of mud. "When's he ever refereed a Quidditch match? He's not going to be fair if we might overtake Slytherin."

The rest of the team landed next to George to complain too.

"It's not my fault," Wood said. "We've just got to make sure we play a clean game so Snape hasn't got any excuse for anything."

Which was all very well, thought Nellie, but she had another reason for not wanting Snape near her or Harry while they were playing Quidditch....

At the end of practice, Nellie and Harry headed straight back to the Gryffindor common room where they found Ron and Hermione playing chess. Chess was the only thing Hermione ever lost at, something Harry, Nellie and Ron thought was very good for her.

"Don't talk to me for a moment," Ron said when Nellie sat down next to him. "I need to concen—" He caught sight of Nellie's face. "What's the matter with you two? You both look terrible."

"Thanks, Ron. You say the nicest things," Nellie said.

Speaking quietly so that no one else would hear, Harry told the other two about Snape's sudden, sinister desire to be a Quidditch referee. Ron and Hermione looked at the Potter twins, fear filling their eyes.

At that moment, Neville toppled into the common room. How he had managed to climb through the portrait hole was anyone's guess because his legs had been stuck together with what they recognized at once as the Leg-Locker Curse. He must have had to bunny hop all the way up to Gryffindor tower. Everyone fell over laughing except Nellie and Hermione, the latter who leapt up and performed the countercurse. Neville's legs sprang apart and he got to his feet, trembling.