𝕄𝕆𝕆ℕℂℍ𝕀𝕃𝔻

𝟘𝟞 | ℍ𝕆𝔾𝕊𝕄𝔼𝔸𝔻𝔼

The end of October approached hand in hand with the first-ever visit to Hogsmeade for Jane's year. If she wanted to actually go and see Honeydukes and Zonko's, she had to watch her step. Snape still had his eyes fixed on her, so much in fact that neither Harry nor Neville nor Ron heard a single word from Snape. The potions classroom was a mess- the Grindylows had taken the entire room and Snape's office apart until they were finally stopped by an entire group of teachers and older students, and carefully retrieved back into the lake.

With almost two entire months having passed, Jane would've usually started skipping boring classes and sleeping in by now, however with almost every teacher, including her own father, watching her like hawks, she found herself in the miserable position of actually attending classes and even worse, doing her homework. That was especially frustrating now that Hagrid's class had become such a dull experience. No more flying around on a Hippogriff's back and instead of endless torturous hours of Flobberworm care.

On the day of Halloween and the first visit, Jane squeezed as many Galleons from her father's pocket as possible and looked forward to a teacher-free day down in the village, with only her friends and some Butterbeer. The only dampener on her mood was that Harry couldn't come along. Jane tried to convince her father to just go with her and Harry, but he had a lot of work to do and was also feeling rather sick, with the full moon quickly approaching.

"You know, it's really not fair that he doesn't get to go because of those Dursley tossers," she said on the way down to the village.

"Oh, he'll get to go eventually," said Fred.

"Yes, besides it's really not that special," said George.

"Maybe, but he's not only missing out on the very first trip but also the entire year of Hogsmeade visits. That's downright cruel."

"Ah life." said Lee "A series of unfortunate events. Tragic."

"Mhm..." said Jane, suddenly very distracted. A big, black dog stared at her right from between the trees, before running off into the woods.

"What's the matter, Lupin?" asked Fred.

"You guys... do you believe in the Grim?"

"Of course we do," said George before Fred could stop him.

"Not." he laughed "Of course we do not."

"Ah." said Jane "So- Harry saw a big black dog, back during the holidays, and then he got the Grim during Divination... a big, black dog. Not a week later, I also get the Grim and now-" she pointed at the trees "Just there, a big, black dog stared directly at me before running off."

"Life is full of coincidences, isn't it?" said Fred "I mean wow, how crazy..."

"Yes," said George "so many coincidences... like when-"

"Or when-" agreed Fred.

"Or that time when we-" said Lee.

"Oh, funny." said Jane "Y'know, if I die, I'll haunt all three of you? Proper Shrieking Shack haunting."

"I think the Shrieking Shack myth is nothing but bollocks anyways." said Fred "I'll cope."

"Asswipes," muttered Jane. The rest of the way she kept glancing into the woods surrounding them, trying to catch another look at that dog. It had looked rather normal, except for its striking grey eyes and painfully starved appearance. "Maybe... maybe we should try to find the dog." she said suddenly "It might've been lost, y'know? It looked really sick, maybe Hagrid could take care of it."

"Oh brilliant idea." said Lee "Let's go into the forest, but while we're at it, should I ask one of your cloaked best friends to join us?"

"He means the Dement-"