Little Bird

Chapter Sixty

Eve

            The near-silence of the Room of Requirement was deafening in comparison to the screams and explosions from the hallway just outside, the entire room overflowing with piles of forgotten items and the French woman's voice still singing softly through the air—almost as though not a single thing had changed since sixth year. Draco was gently pushing himself in front of me as the door shut behind us, his wand held out cautiously in front of him despite the fact that his wrist was shaking after the fight in the hallway. I could hear his heartbeat pounding loudly through the air, but my own was hammering against the inside of my chest at the same time and it was good to know I wasn't the only one freaked out by what had happened.

            I would never have guessed, as I went to bed in my dormitory earlier that evening, that in six hours everything at Hogwarts would have gone to hell.

            It felt like my breath was trapped in my throat as Draco started forward slowly, his empty left hand automatically reaching out behind himself for me to take. I gripped his free hand with my own as we started down the first aisle between the towers of junk, too afraid to call out for Harry. How would he even react to seeing us? If it was the same way Seamus had, then getting Harry to safety out of the castle was going to be much more difficult than I'd thought.

            We crept down the aisles of forgotten items in silence, carefully side-stepping abandoned trunks and rotten pages of old textbooks. I tried to listen hard for any other footsteps, but the incessant singing of the broken vinyl record from somewhere deeper within the room made it difficult to hear any small noises.

            So when the soft click of a door shutting resounded quietly through the air, I couldn't quite be sure if I had imagined it.

            But Draco had hesitated, too; we had been at the end of one of the rows, glancing past an aged piano covered in a thick layer of dust to look around the corner. He turned back to give me a confused look, his lips silently forming the words, 'You heard it?'

            I was nodding when Draco's eyes slipped past me to look behind us, and as his expression hardened and he started around me, I twisted to see who it was.

            Blaise Zabini was striding down the aisle towards us both, his wand held loosely at his side with just a hint of a grin on his face. Draco stepped around me as Zabini got closer, hissing furiously in a low voice, "What the fuck do you think you're doing?"

            Zabini didn't bother to keep his voice down as he came to a stop in front of us, drawling, "What does it look like? I followed you two here. I know you're after Potter, and I want in."

            "You shouldn't be here," I spat, "and keep your voice down. We aren't after Harry."

            "Well, I am." Although Zabini's expression appeared cool and collected, there was sweat shining against the dark skin of his neck as though he had just been fighting out in the hallway as well. He rolled his eyes at us both, continuing evenly, "You aren't the only ones who want to get on the Dark Lord's good side, you know. I'm going to bring Potter to him myself."

            "You're an idiot," Draco seethed angrily, stepping closer to Zabini and getting in between us. "Get out of here before I kill you."

            Zabini laughed out loud, scoffing easily, "Good one, mate. Just move out of my way so I can—"

            "Who's there?"