In Between Two Worlds (HP/PJO Crossover)

Chapter 108: There's Good News and Bad News. But The Bad News Is Really Bad.

No one in Gryffindor Tower slept that night. We knew that the castle was being searched again, and the whole House stayed awake in the common room, waiting to hear whether Black had been caught. And I really hoped that he hadn't. Professor McGonagall came back at dawn, to tell us that he had again escaped. Yay!

Throughout the day, everywhere we went we saw signs of tighter security; Professor Flitwick could be seen teaching the front doors to recognize a large picture of Uncle Siri; Filch was suddenly bustling up and down the corridors, boarding up everything from tiny cracks in the walls to mouse holes. Sir Cadogan had been fired. His portrait had been taken back to its lonely landing on the seventh floor, and the Fat Lady was back. She had been expertly restored, but was still extremely nervous, and had agreed to return to her job only on condition that she was given extra protection. A bunch of surly security trolls had been hired to guard her. They paced the corridor in a menacing group, talking in grunts and comparing the size of their clubs.

I couldn't help noticing that the statue of the one-eyed witch on the third floor remained unguarded and unblocked. It seemed that Fred and George had been right in thinking that the teachers didn't know about it.

"D'you reckon we should tell someone?" Harry asked Ron.

"We know he's not coming in through Honeyduke's," said Ron dismissively. "We'd've heard if the shop had been broken into."

Ron had become an instant celebrity. It was clear that Ron was rather enjoying the experience. Though still severely shaken by the night's events, he was happy to tell anyone who asked what had happened, with a wealth of detail.

"...I was asleep, and I heard this ripping noise, and I thought it was in my dream, you know? But then there was this draft...I woke up and one side of the hangings on my bed had been pulled down...I rolled over...and I saw him standing over me...like a skeleton, with loads of filthy hair...holding this great long knife, must've been twelve inches..." Last time it was ten. "and he looked at me, and I looked at him, and then I yelled, and he scampered.

"Why, though?" Ron added to Harry and me as the group of second year girls who had been listening to his chilling tale departed. "Why did he run?"

"He must've known he'd have a job getting back out of the castle once you'd yelled and woken people up," said Harry thoughtfully. "He'd've had to kill the whole house to get back through the portrait hole...then he would've met the teachers..."

Neville was in total disgrace. Professor McGonagall was so furious with him she had banned him from all future Hogsmeade visits, given him a detention, and forbidden anyone to give him the password into the tower. Poor Neville was forced to wait, outside the common room every night for somebody to let him in, while the security trolls leered unpleasantly at him. None of these punishments, however, came close to matching the one his grandmother had in store for him. Two days after Black's break-in, she sent Neville the very worst thing a Hogwarts student could receive over breakfast-a Howler.

The school owls swooped into the Great Hall carrying the mail as usual, and Neville choked as a huge barn owl landed in front of him, a scarlet envelope clutched in its beak. Harry, Ron, Bailey and I, who were sitting opposite him, recognized the letter as a Howler at once.

"Run for it, Neville," Ron advised.

Neville didn't need telling twice. He seized the envelope, and holding it before him like a bomb, sprinted out of the hall, while the Slytherin table exploded with laughter at the sight of him. They heard the Howler go off in the entrance hall-Neville's grandmother's voice, magically magnified to a hundred times its usual volume, shrieking about how he had brought shame on the whole family.