Bat-Bogey Hexers

29

Of course not! Don't be ridiculous! What ever would make you think that?

The kind and understanding way Ginny had imagined Tom to speak in had disappeared. Now the words sounded false and manipulative.

Ginny didn't reply. She hastily shut the diary. She eyed the little book like it was a monster about to strike at any minute. Fear, suspicion and betrayal rose in her heart.

She had to get rid of it. Now. She should've listened to her dad. She should never have trusted such a obviously magic object.

Ginny snatched up the diary. She stuffed it into the pocket of her robes, then rushed out of the dormitory.

"Where are you going, Ginny?" asked Peggy, as she passed her and Vera by.

Ginny paused to look around at the two. "Er...I've got some studying to do...in the library."

"Want some company?" asked Vera, as she turned a piece of parchment this way and that.

"No!" said Ginny, a little too quickly.

Vera and Peggy looked at her in surprise.

"I mean...it's fine. I'll only be gone a minute," said Ginny.

"Just as well," said Vera, looking down at her paper again. "I've got to make sense of this Transfiguration homework anyway."

Ginny gave her a faint smile, then slipped hurriedly out of the dormitory before anyone else could offer to accompany her.

🦇🦇🦇

"How come you let those other Slytherin kids walk all over you?" asked Hugo.

Viola stopped in her tracks to face him. They were heading down a corridor after the end of classes. A second day they had been discussing when they should go spy on Ginny, but the conversation had taken an unexpected twist.

"Excuse me?" Viola said.

"You do all their homework for them," said Hugo. "I heard you giving out papers in the library the other day."

"I-" it was true that Viola was still doing homework for Morgana and Bertha. She knew if she didn't, they would get revenge. Besides the extra work wasn't all that difficult for her to handle. And it almost felt like having friends. "-you were eavesdropping?"

Hugo shrugged. "Call it what you like. The point is, you shouldn't let them walk all over you like that."

Viola's eyes widened. "Oh? And this is coming from a Hufflepuff!"

"Are you trying to say all Hufflepuffs are pushovers?" Hugo asked calmly.

"Yes!"

"Well then, I think you should've been in Hufflepuff." Viola opened her mouth to say that the hat had almost placed her in Hufflepuff, but quickly shut it again. If she ever told that to anyone, it would be her best friend. And Hugo was not her best friend. Hugo continued. "Don't get me wrong. You're like my favorite person at Hogwarts. Your brilliant! Which is why you shouldn't let other people knock you down."

All Viola could do was stare at the boy. First he called her a pushover, and then said she was brilliant and his favorite person at Hogwarts.

She was saved the struggle of replying when Hugo cried "Look! There's Ginny!"

He elbowed Viola. Viola looked around and just caught a glimpse of red haired passing their corridor by, before Ginny disappeared behind the stone wall.