Detective Was Not in the Job Description

Mystery on the Hogwarts Express

"Kenzie, we have a situation."

The Head Girl turned to face her fellow Head Boy. A third-year was following him, biting her lip nervously. "What's wrong, Brenner?"

Brenner pushed the younger girl in front of him gently, nodding encouragingly. Aubrey said a quick goodbye to the younger Ravenclaws she was talking to and looked at the girl, noting the yellow trim on her robes.

"My brother is missing." The girl stated. Her chin was held high, but Aubrey could see it quivering with worry and fear. "He said that he would check in on me once he got settled on the train, but..."

"It's been two hours since we've boarded." Brenner finished. "I did a quick sweep of the train, and everyone is accounted for, except for Saul Quincy."

Aubrey frowned. Quincy could be a prat, at best, but everyone knew he doted on his little sister Lauren. "I'll get the prefects to start looking." She nodded to Brenner. "Let's try to keep this under wraps. We don't want to ruin the reason why we're on this trip."

The two Heads split ways.

~~

If she had to listen to one more stupid comment from Christina Leon, she was going to slip the Hufflepuff prefect a Ton-Tongue Toffee.

"...honestly, should we even be wasting our time on him? Quincy's a real jerk. He's always showing off and making lewd comments about the girls in our class." Christina jabbered, fiddling with her wand as she watched Aubrey duck her head under a bench.

Aubrey scowled as she picked up an unopened Pumpkin Pasty. "Leon, why don't you go check the compartment next door?" She straightened up, waving a quick cleaning charm over her robes. "Besides, I haven't heard a peep from those Slytherins that were in there in the past five minutes. Better make sure none of them are up to something."

The other girl scoffed and went next door. Aubrey could hear her nasally voice through the thin walls. "Okay, you twits, get out. Official prefect business."

The Head Girl rubbed her head tiredly. When they get back from this retreat, she was going to have a long chat with Professor Sprout as to why Christina shouldn't be a prefect.

"Have you found him yet?" Little Lauren Quincy stood in the doorway, her best friend behind her. Ashleigh Moore, if Aubrey remembered correctly.

"No, Lauren, we're still looking."

"We can help too, you know." Ashleigh piped up.

Aubrey brushed past the two of them. "I know. I have a good team of prefects helping out, and you might get in their way. With the House tensions as they are, I doubt half of them would want a Sl-- I mean, third-years underfoot."

She missed Lauren's scowl and Ashleigh's raised eyebrow at the slip as she found the start of a stand-off between Christina and the group of Slytherins Aubrey had sent the prefect to kick out of the next door compartment.

"When can we get our compartment back, Leon?" One of them complained, supported by the sneers of his cronies around him.

"The next door one is open." Aubrey called. She leveled a stern glare at the group, flashing the Head Girl badge on her chest. "Move along." The group of fifth-years grumbled but entered the compartment that she just searched. At first glance, the one they had just vacated was empty. "Homenum Revelio." Aubrey waved her wand over the room, and a Disillusionment Charm turned into the shadow of a student curled up in the corner. Another wave and muttered spell, and the battered body of Saul Quincy was laid out on the benches. She glanced behind her about to order Christina to run after this compartment's former occupants, but the other girl was nowhere to be found. "Typical." She huffed as she touched her wand to the unconscious Gryffindor. "Rennervate."