Modification || T. Riddle || Completed

Chapter 39: Divulging Desires

                  

Chapter 39: Divulging Desires

With the sound of chirping birds and the wind blowing gently through the trees, Tom and Estela were heading back through the forest towards the Han Humbur to use the Floo Network and get to Hogsmeade.

"How will we get into Hogwarts?" Estela asked as she struggled to keep up with Tom's annoyingly quick pace.

"We'll have to sneak in," he told her over his shoulder, "Some teachers stay there over summer - Headmaster Dippet, for example - so we'll have to get in at night."

Estela shook her head at the idea.

"We're going to get caught," she said under her breath, thinking Tom hadn't heard her.

"We won't get caught," he said insistently. "As long as you follow my every instruction."

Estela rolled her eyes and huffed as she continued onwards towards the exit out of the forest that had just become visible through a clearing in the trees.

After trekking up the steep hill back to the Inn, her skin hot and her legs and lungs feeling far too overworked, she walked over to the fireplace. She couldn't help but cast a quick glance around the lounge, where the two Albanian men had first laid eyes on her, but they were nowhere to be seen.

"Where to?" she asked Tom.

"The Hog's Head," he replied simply as he eyed the empty lounge area warily. Estela nodded and took a deep breath before she took a handful of green dust from a bowl above the stone fireplace and stepped into the space.

"The Hog's Head Inn, Hogsmeade, Scotland." She said, her voice clear, as a swirling rush of emerald flames roared up around her and she was off.

It seemed to take longer this time, the flames tickling her skin as she travelled, and she was growing quite sick of the many fireplaces that zoomed past, but a moment later she found herself standing in the familiar fireplace of the dingy old pub.

A cloud of dust erupted around her as her feet met the ground, and she couldn't repress a loud coughing fit as she breathed it in. After finally managing to compose herself, she found that the very few dodgy looking people who were sitting in the pub were all staring at her as she smiled at them sheepishly, shrugging her shoulders.

Behind her, a glow of emerald and the loud roar of flames announced Tom's arrival. He stepped out of the fireplace and wiped the dust off of his clothes idly as he eyed the people sitting in the pub, but with a single look at him, they seemed to turn their faces away.

He began towards the door and Estela followed without question, but she stopped in her tracks as she saw someone out of the corner of her eye. She looked over towards the bar where she had seen the man, but he had already turned his back and was closing a door behind him. She knew she must be wrong, but she could have sworn that the man looked like Albus Dumbledore.

"Estela!" she heard Tom shout from ahead, and she left the Hog's Head and followed him.

The cobbled street before them was extremely quiet if you compared it to when it was full to the brim with Hogwarts students rushing around and banging into each other. It looked better this way: just one or two people strolling around casually, a cat licking its paws as it lay in the sunshine and the distant sound of chatter from within each little shop and home.

As they made their way up the giant hill towards Hogwarts, she saw the castle looming in the distance against the bright blue sky. It was as though there were a thousand pixies flying around frantically in her stomach as she looked at the castle, and it was a mixture of both happiness and nervousness. She was happy to be here, her favourite place, but the fact that she wasn't meant to be here hung over her head like a grey storm cloud.  She had a bad feeling as they reached the top of the hill and were exposed to the open ground before the castle.