Can Hogwarts Make a Mistake?

Chapter 5

When we got to the right corridor, said the password in an out-of-breath voice, and stumbled through the portrait hole, I glanced down at our hands and awkwardly let go of his. Rose cocked an eyebrow at me, smiled slyly, gestured questioningly at James, and shook her head, still smiling. I just rolled my eyes and carted her over to our cozy little corner by the fire that we claimed often. James just called it "first years knowing their place". Whatever. Albus glanced at me, and I understood. Where to begin?

"Well?" Rose prompted, impatient.

"Well, you know how I saw Scorpius's dad with - "

"Mr. Evil-Looking Blondie, yes. Go on." Rose said, obviously dying to know what Albus and I did. That was another thing about Rose; She hated not knowing something, like if she didn't know everything, she was intent on it. Also, she'd interrupt you a lot just to tell you to keep going on with your story.

"Yes, well, we found out his name's Yaxley. At least, I think that's what he said," said Albus.

"You saw them again?!" Incredulous, Rose drew some attention to our niche. Looking around, we assured people with looks saying we of course weren't up to something.

"Yes we did." Voice lowered, I told the story, not quite uninterrupted by Rose with "Go on!" and "What?"  and small contributions by Albus when necessary.

"Bloody hell..." Rose whispered, still absorbing all the news. "So all those Death Eater stories Father used to tell Hugo and me at bedtime, the ones where Mother would scold him, were true?"

"We're guessing. Dad told James about this whole thing, I'm pretty sure," said Albus. "Maybe Hermione was right; we should tell him. He might be able to pull it together."

Rose rolled her eyes at me. "I do not think we should tell James. All the information that he might have could just as easily be found at the library."

"Okay, so we don't get James in our business and look it up in the library." Albus pretty much summed it all up.

"When did this become our business? This seems to be between Mr. Malfoy and Yaxley." I did not like the way Albus said our business. I'd much rather never having seen anything and going about my first year at Hogwarts praying that my magical abilities go further than slight explosions every now and then.

"Okay, okay. But when you chose to drag me down behind that pumpkin and eavesdrop on them, it became your choice to make it our business." Albus said in defense. It was the most I'd probably ever heard him say in a sort of sassy way. Rose began to look uncomfortable.

"Whatever. Let's just see what we can find out." I said, resigned. I did not want to get into a fight with Albus. It occurred to me that although he is generally easy to get along with, if you're on his bad side, you were on the losing side.