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hey! how is current u feeling?
okay now how is future u feeling?
also vote or i'll tear ur nails out of your fingers with my teeth. anyway, long chapter! it's in celeste's pov
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I'm sprinting off again, except this time I pull my wand out of my robes and mutter a quick Notice-Me-Not charm over myself when I realize that the first floor is usually crowded around this time. Sure enough, when I pass a group of students down a hall, their eyes skip over me instantly, and they go about their day like nothing's odd.
The dungeons, the dungeons. Is that where my locket wants me to go? The dungeons?
I stop in front of the door to the Slytherin common room. If my locket could speak, it would be whispering to me, So close, so close, but not quite. No, not these dungeons...
I walk slower this time, dread settling into the pit of my gut when I realize where I'm going. The door is a bit further down the hall, unguarded, but most definitely magically locked. No Alohomora or magic penknife will open it for me, but I just know that's where I need to be. Not just the dungeons, but the dungeons, one of the parts of the castle where no student is ever allowed nor should ever want to venture.
I stop in front of it, my locket beating with my heart. It'a urging me to keep moving, like if I don't burn its energy, it's energy will burn me. Sure enough, the longer I stand there in front of this door, students passing by me and their eyes automatically skipping over me—a useful charm—the more that burning feeling returns, and though I know that there's nothing I can do to unlock this door, I grit my teeth and place a heavy hand on the doorknob, twisting it.
It unlocks.
I stand there, gaping, staring down at the doorknob. My eyes drift down to the locket sitting on my chest, hot and burning the skin between my breasts through my sweater.
I wait until the two seventh years down the hall walk away before pushing the door open and slipping inside.
"Lumos," I whisper as the door closes, startled by the sound of my voice. It's mine, for sure, but it has this almost echo to it that isn't familiar. It's the first word I've spoken since waking up, and it leaves my throat parched for water.
It's like the darkness of the dungeon soaks the light from my wand until it's just a dim glow, hardly illuminating one foot in front of me. I grip the railing beside the stairs for dear life, ignoring the slime and grime on it and the eerie noises of creatures scuttling about on the walls while walking down carefully. The stairs aren't steady, even worse than those leading to the Slytherin dungeons. I gasp when one crumbles under my foot, nearly sending me tumbling all the way down.
