Purple Rain.

Chapter Fifty-Two.

"Yeah... fine... I dunno," said Harry impatiently, wincing as pain shot through his scar again. "Listen... I've just realized something..." He jumped into an explanation of all the memories Snape had gone through and he gave an explanation of a windowless corridor ending with locked doors. He then explained his deduction.

"So... so, are you saying," whispered Ron as Madam Pince swept past, squeaking slightly, "that the weapon— the think You-Know-Who's after— is in the Ministry of Magic?"

"In the Department of Mysteries, it's got to be," Harry whispered. "I saw that door when your dad took me down to the courtrooms for my hearing and it's definitely the same one he was guarding when the snake bit him."

Hermione let out a long, slow sigh, "Of course," she breathed.

"Of course what?" said Ron rather impatiently.

"Ron, think about it... Sturgis Podmore was trying to get through a door at the Ministry of Magic... It had to have been that one, it's too much of a coincidence!"

"How come Sturgis was trying to break in when he's on our side?" said Ron.

"Well, I don't know," Hermione admitted. "That is a bit odd..."

"So what's in the Department of Mysteries?" Harry asked Ron. "Has your dad ever mentioned anything about it?"

"I know they call the people who work there 'Unspeakables,'" said Ron, frowning. "Because no one really seems to know what they do in there... Weird place to have a weapon..."

"It's not weird at all, it makes perfect sense," said Hermione. "It will be something too secret that the Ministry has been developing, I expect... Harry, are you sure you're all right?" Harry had just run both his hands hard over his forehead as though trying to iron it.

"Yeah... fine..." Harry said, lowering his hands, which were trembling. "I just feel a bit... I don't like Occlumency very much..."

"I was just as shaky when having my mind attacked over and over again," Hermione said sympathetically. Ron and Harry gave her a bewildered look and Hermione instantly caught her mistake. (Y/n) glared shortly at her before feigning the same confusion as the boys.

"What?" Ron asked. "You know Occlumency?"

"Um... Let's just get back to the Common Room, we'll be more comfortable there," Hermione said, averting the attention.

But the common room was packed full of shrieks of laughter and excitement; Fred and George were demonstrating their latest bit of joke shop merchandise.

"Headless Hats!" shouted George as Fred waved a pointed hat decorated with a fluffy pink feather at the watching students. "Two Galleons each— watch Fred now!"
Fred swept the hat onto his head, beaming. For a second he merely looked rather stupid, then both hat and head vanished. Several girls screamed but everyone else was roaring with laughter.
"And odd again!" shouted George, and Fred's hand groped for a moment in what seemed to be thin air over his shoulder; then his head reappeared as he swept off the pink-feathered hat from it again.

"How do those hats work, then?" pondered Hermione, distracted from her homework and watching Fred and George. "I mean, obviously it's some kind of Invisibility Spell, but it's rather clever to have extended the field of invisibility beyond the boundaries of the charmed object..."

"Miss (Y/l/n)," Professor McGonagall hollered from across the room, where she had just poked her head in through the portrait hole. The whole room fell silent at the sight of their Head of House, whose eyes scanned the room suspiciously before once again landing on (Y/n). "Professor Dumbledore wishes to have a word with you."