When Celeste Heartsthorne finally joined Hogwarts in fourth year, she was on the lookout for an old friend, a blond haired boy with silvery eyes and a Slytherin crest on his chest. What she found however was someone else, Draco Malfoy was no longer...
"Who's there?" Celeste stood slowly from the sofa in the Hufflepuff common room, night had fallen and the entire castle was sound asleep, but sleep seemed to evade Celeste and so with her book in her hand she climbed out of bed and decided to sit by the roaring fire in the common room. The room had been completely silent, there wasn't another soul in sight, even the portraits on the walls were fast asleep, the only noises that could be heard was the crackling fire, Celeste turning the pages of her book, and the light snores from the portraits and the dormitories, despite all of that, Celeste would have heard a pin drop.
And so the sound of someone entering the common room was clear, what startled Celeste was that it wasn't coming from the dormitories, someone was entering the common room through the barrel passage, and since all the Hufflepuffs were in bed, it meant an intruder had gotten in. It was at this point that Celeste mentally kicked herself for leaving her wand under her pillow, what if she needed to protect herself? She had heard gossip that last year escaped mass murderer, Sirius Black, had found his way into the Gryffindor tower to kill Harry Potter while he slept. Celeste couldn't think of any escaped killers that were possibly on the loose this year, but at Hogwarts anything was possible.
"Who's there?" She called out again into the darkness, usually the Hufflepuff common room was the brightest part of the castle, but at night it was dark and anyone could hide in the shadows. The fire was only illuminating a portion of the circular room, and considering the rooms shape the intruder had to be hiding behind something "look, this isn't funny, who are you? Why are you here?"
There was no reply, perhaps Celeste had been hearing things, in any case the room had fallen silent once more and she was desperately listening for any other sound besides the cracking fire and the light snoring, despite there being no signs of any other presence, Celeste held her book firmly in her hand in case it needed to be used as a weapon. She waited a few more minutes before she theorised that she had gone mad and sat back down on the overly stuffed sofa, she had never known anyone break into the common room before, so it was highly unlikely that anyone had done it now.
Silently Celeste read for another half hour before her eyes finally felt heavy, and as she was closing her book to leave she heard another noise and jumped from the sofa like a bolt of lightning, only when she listened it sounded like someone leaving. Through pure impulse she stalked her way towards the barrel door, absolutely furious that someone had broken in, and climbed into the small passage after whoever the intruder was.
When she reached the other end and looked about the kitchen corridor, she saw no one, not a sound or sight of anyone creeping around or running away, it was either that they had evaporated into thin air like smoke, or that they were hiding strategically in the shadows, concealed by darkness. Celeste walked up and down the corridor twice and found nothing, whoever it was was long gone, so she turned and went back to the barrel, but quickly realised that she was now locked out, she needed a wand to enter "damn" she muttered under her breath.
She could have gotten the Hufflepuff head of house, but she wasn't entirely sure where she was at that time, and so she realised she probably wouldn't be able to get back in tonight unless another teacher happened upon her. With a sigh she collapsed to the floor and stared at her book, the truth of the matter was that she was rather frightened, too frightened in fact to read. Someone had invaded her common room, someone from the outside, and then like a stalker they sat and just watched her read for half an hour before leaving, then disappeared like a puff of smoke, and to add to all of that she was now locked outside of her common room in her pyjamas, in the cold and the dark, sitting completely alone on the hard stone floor, without a wand.
For a little while she managed to read the book, there hadn't been any sign of a person and so her fear slowly dissipated until she was lost in the pages of her story, and when she heard footsteps approaching she didn't know whether to feel relieved or frightened. Again Celeste was frustrated that she had left her wand behind, what if it was some kind of mass murderer who broke in before? And what if they were coming back to finish her off? She stood up quickly, the panic slowly rising until she was forced to hold her breath.
A red head appeared from around the corner with an illuminated wand and a piece of parchment in his hands, immediately Celeste relaxed and launched herself at the familiar face after he said "nox" making the light at the end of his wand go out completely.
"Am I glad to see you!" She breathed into him, it was George.
"What are you doing out here?" He said as he wrapped his warm arms around her cold body.
She pulled away and tried to explain what had happened "... like a wandless idiot I ran out after them and realised I couldn't bloody well get back in! I honestly thought someone like Sirius Black had broken in to kill me"
George laughed and ruffled her hair "it was probably just some prat trying to scare you, a Slytherin no doubt"
Celeste smiled and then narrowed her eyebrows "what are you doing down here? The basements a little far from the tower" she was sure George had never ventured to this part of the castle before, not so far this year anyway.
"Harry's a bit of an insomniac too, he was reading this map I gave him last year and spotted you on it, he figured you were probably locked out or something and he sent me down, took me a while though, I've been avoiding Filch. That bloody man never sleeps" she could see by his eyes that he'd not long been woken up, and although everything he was saying about the map made no sense she was still relieved to see him.
"George..." she started, looking up at him with wide eyes "... I was really scared, before, I don't know what I was thinking coming out after them"
He opened his lanky arms and pulled her into another warm hug "come on, let's get you in front of a fire, how'd you do this again?" Not that he knew to begin with, Celeste trusted him with her house secret and took his wand from his hand, tapping a rhythm onto the correct barrel to gain entry "I'm walking you in, make sure everything's okay" his girlfriend smiled warmly up at him and the two of them entered the common room one after the other.
"I swear, George, someone was in here, but they're long gone now..."
"Well-" George looked down at the map in his hands and searched every corridor "-there's no one out and about except Filch. But, if it were me, I'd have left some kind of prank behind or something"
Celeste nodded in agreement as George said "lumos" lighting his wand again, the two them turned around and Celeste was the first to gasp at what she saw, her hands covered her mouth as George's wand lit up the wall behind the sofa, before it had been cast in shadows and so Celeste hadn't noticed what was written there when she left "bloody hell..." George said with his mouth slightly hanging open.
" 'Half-blood' " Celeste chocked out, reading the words written in some kind of red substance, made to look like blood, though it was easy to tell it wasn't. Her heart thumped in her chest like it was threatening to rip itself out as Celeste stepped backwards a little "it's meant for me"
George wrapped an arm around Celeste's shoulders, pulling her to his side, he knew that it was meant for her the moment he saw it, because people routinely reminded her that she was unworthy to attend Hogwarts, though George easily didn't share this view "we should find someone" he whispered, his eyes glued to the words just like Celeste's were.
Celeste nodded slightly and the two of them hurried out of the common room, they had to find a teacher before the other students woke up and saw it there "it's the bloody Chamber of Secrets all over again"
"What's that?" She had heard of it in the Daily Prophet, but they didn't know enough to give a detailed report, Dumbledore kept the whole thing hushed.
The ginger went pale for a moment "nothing good"
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