A Hogwarts Legend: Round Two [2]

Chapter Twenty Six

Unedited

Chapter Twenty Six - "Spider enthusiasts."

Summer is creeping over the grounds around the castle; sky and lake alike turn periwinkle blue and flowers large as cabbages burst into bloom in the greenhouses. But with no Hagrid visible from the castle windows, striding the grounds with Fang at his heels, the scene doesn't look right to me; no better, in fact, than inside of the castle, where things are so horribly wrong.

Harry, Ron and I have tried to visit Hermione, Elinor and Maya, but visitors are now barred from the hospital wing.

"We're taking no more chances," Madam Pomfrey tells us severely through a crack in the hospital door. "No, I'm sorry, there's every chance the attacker might come back to finish these people off ..."

I've moved into the boys dormitory, into Harry and Ron's room (I added a bed using magic), because looking at the three empty beds is depressing.

With Dumbledore gone, fear has spread as never before, so that the sun warming the castle walls outside seems to stop at the mullioned windows. There's barely a face to be seen in the school that doesn't look worried and tense, and any laughter that rings through the corridors sounds shrill and unnatural and is quickly stifled.

That's why I've made it my mission to get a little bit of laughter into lesson. I'm hiding my sadness behind a smile.

I'm constantly repeating Dumbledore's final words to myself. "I will only truly have left this school when none here are loyal to me ... Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it." But what good are these words? Who exactly are we suppose to ask for help, when everyone is just as confused and scared as we are? Who invented chocolate?

All important questions.

Hagrid's hint about the spiders is far easier to understand - the throw me is, there doesn't seem to be a single spider left in the castle to follow. I look everywhere I go, helped by Harry and (rather reluctantly) by Ron. We're hampered, of course, by the fact that we aren't allowed to wander off on our own, but have to move around the castle in a pack with the other Gryffindors. Most of my fellows students seem glad that we're being shepherded from class to class by teachers, but I find it really annoying.

One person, however, seems to be thoroughly enjoying the atmosphere of terror and suspicion. Draco Malfoy is strutting around the school as though he's just been appointed Head Boy. I don't realise what he's so pleased about until the Potions lesson about a fortnight after Dumbledore and Hagrid have left, when, sitting right behind Malfoy, I overhear him gloating to Crabbe and Goyle.

"I always thought Father might be the one who got rid of Dumbledore," he says, not troubling to keep his voice down. "I told you he thinks Dumbledore's the worst Headmaster the school's ever had. Maybe we'll get a decent Headmaster now. Someone who won't want the Chamber of Secrets closed. McGonagall won't last long, she's only filling in ..."

Snape sweeps past me, making no comment about Maya and Elinor's empty seat and cauldron.

"Sir," says Malfoy loudly. "Sir, why don't you apply for the Headmaster's job?"

"Now, now, Malfoy," says Snape, though he can't suppress a thin-lipped smile. "Professor Dumbledore has only been suspended by the governors. I dare say he'll be back with us soon enough."