The Young Padfoot *Book One*

Blending In

Words completely failing us, we followed Filch to Professor McGonagall's office. I know I said that I could probably get us out of trouble, but I was seriously starting to doubt that even I could. How could we possibly explain to McGonagall why we were on top of the Astronomy tower which was forbidden unless for lessons. Add into the mix the invisibility cloak and Norbert and we might as well be packing our bags now.

And just as I thought that things couldn't get any worse, we walked into McGonagall's office to see Malfoy slumped up against and Neville standing there nervously. When he saw us, he turned to us with wide eyes.

"Harry! I was trying to warn you, I heard Malfoy saying he was going to catch you, he said you had a drag—" Neville rambled, but I shook my head frantically for him to stop.

He did stop but McGonagall saw our interaction and looked between the four of us in such anger I had never seen before. I wouldn't have been surprised if she started breathing fire.

"I would not have believed it of any of you. Mr Filch says you were up the astronomy tower. It's one o'clock in the morning. Explain yourselves," McGonagall ordered us.

This was the first time I had seen Hermione unable to answer a teacher's question. Harry looked over at me desperately so I opened my mouth to try and come up with a convincing story.

"Well, the thing is—" I began but McGonagall had already had enough.

"That's enough, Miss Black. I think I already have a good idea of what's been going on. It doesn't take a genius to figure it out. You fed Draco Malfoy some cock-and-bull story about a dragon, trying to get him out of bed and into trouble," McGonagall predicted. Malfoy looked over at us sneering nastily. "I suppose you think it's funny that Longbottom here heard the story and believed it, too?"

Neville looked at us in disbelief and shock, but without being too subtle, I noticed Harry trying to tell him it wasn't true. Poor Neville—he'd just been trying to help us and now he was in big trouble, too.

"I'm disgusted. Five students out of bed in one night! I've never heard of such a thing before! Miss Granger, I thought you had more sense and Mr Potter, I thought Gryffindor meant more to you than this. And as for you, Miss Black, well, I guess I can't say I'm particularly surprised but that is still no reason for this foolish behaviour. 50 points will be taken," McGonagall said.

"50?!" Harry repeated.

"Each. And to ensure it doesn't happen again, all five of you will receive detention," McGonagall said.

"Excuse me, Professor. Perhaps I heard you wrong. I thought you said... 'the five of us,'" Malfoy said.

"No, you heard me correctly, Mr Malfoy. You see, as honourable as your intentions were, you too were out of bed after hours. You will serve detention with your classmates," McGonagall told him.

Malfoy looked mad that his little plan to get us in trouble had backfired.

But not even that little delight could make up for the dread that rested in the bottom of my stomach as I thought about the next morning. It took me hours to fall asleep that night as I kept thinking about how everyone was going to react to a loss of 200 house points!

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At first, the Gryffindors who passed the hour-glasses that counted the points assumed that there had been a mistake. I hoped that that was what everyone was going to continue to think. Of course it didn't, though.

By lunch time the next day, the story of our little night-time adventure had spread throughout the school, faster than wildfire. The story was along the lines of four stupid first years, wandering around the corridors at night and were foolish enough to get caught. Let's just say, the rest of Gryffindor house had turned on us. Even the Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs seemed annoyed with us; they had also been desperate to see Slytherin get beaten.

Harry had it worse than the rest of us. He was the most well-known out of all of us and as he walked past the Slytherins, they would all cheer for him or clap for him. Neville, Hermione, and I remained quiet and sat at the back of all our classes in silence. Even Hermione had stopped answering questions.

Luckily, exams weren't too far away, meaning everyone kept to themselves anyway for work. The four of us spent every waking moment revising potions, dates, and charms.

About a week before our first exam, Hermione, Ron, and I were sitting in the library testing each other on astronomy when Harry came rushing in, rambling quickly about something he had just witnessed.

Apparently, Harry had overheard Quirrell sobbing in an empty classroom and it sounded as though he had given in and told Snape the last puzzle to getting to the Philosophers stone.

"Snape's done it, then," Ron exclaimed when Harry had finished his explaining. "If Quirrell's told him how to break his Anti-Dark Force spell."

"There's still Fluffy, though," I said.

"Maybe Snape's found out how to get past him without asking Hagrid. I bet there's a book somewhere in here, telling you how to get past a giant three-headed dog. So what do we do, Harry?" Ron asked, the same excitement burning in his eyes as mine.

I turned to Harry expecting an answer, but instead Hermione answered.

"Go to Dumbledore. That's what we should have done ages ago. If we try anything ourselves we'll be thrown out for sure."

"But we've got no proof!" Harry reminded her. "Quirrell's too scared to back us up. Snape's only got to say he doesn't know how the troll got in at Halloween and that he was nowhere near the third floor—who do you think they'll believe, him or us? It's not exactly a secret we hate him, Dumbledore will think we made it up to get him sacked. Filch wouldn't help us if his life depended on it, he's too friendly with Snape, and the more students get thrown out, the better, he'll think. And don't forget, we're not supposed to know anything about the Stone or Fluffy. That'll take a lot of explaining."

After his little rant, I looked over at Hermione who looked convinced that Harry was right. Ron, on the other hand, was not. And me... well, I was somewhere in between.

"If we just do a bit of poking around—" Ron began, but Harry put his foot down.

"No. We've done enough poking around."

Without saying anything else, Harry pulled his map of Jupiter towards him and started making notes on the different moons. Our last night-time adventure clearly was still playing on his mind.

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The next morning, as owls flew through the hall, four identical letters were dropped in front of Harry, Hermione, Neville, and me. Even from the front of it, I knew what they were and who had sent them.

Written in her typical swirly writing, the letters said...

'Miss Black,

Your detention will take place at eleven o'clock tonight. Meet Mr, Filch in the Entrance Hall.

Prof. M. McGonagall'

I sighed to myself and looked up at Hermione and Harry, half expecting one of them to complain about it. They didn't. None of us said anything as we sort of knew that we deserved this, although if you asked me, taking 200 points from Gryffindor should have surely been a sufficient punishment.

But oh well, guess we can't always get what we want.

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