The Storm | The Sister book #3 | A Harry Potter Fanfiction

chapter thirty-one

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Crack

I watch the body slump to the floor, unmoving. I let out a silent scream and reach an arm out towards it as the world around me flies away in a swirl of black smoke.

So weak

I sit up straight in bed, my fingers digging into my palms as my eyes fly around the room. I can feel a layer of sweat covering my face and gasp, taking a breath of cool air. I hug myself, slowing my breathing and pushing away the images of that body lying there on the floor. How still it was. Not even the slight movement of the chest or the small movement of fidgeting hands. That crack.

I blink, glancing at the clock on the wall across the room from me. It looks to be about midnight- I only slept a few hours. Draco will still be awake. I slip out of bed, pulling on a sweater over my pajama top. Shakily, I start to walk out of the silent dorm room and towards the common room. I can hear the grandfather clock chiming midnight as I walk, and I tangle my fingers together behind me.

When I reach the doorway to the common room I catch movement in the corner of my eye. I shrink back, seeing someone dressed in black exiting the common room. I frown. What is Draco doing? I walk quickly across the room, reaching the door and opening it slowly, peeking out just in time to see him disappear around a corner. I bite my lip, stepping outside and hurrying after him. When I turn the corner I see walk around another, and I kick off at a run, my feet quietly hitting the floor as I round another corner. I slow, stepping sideways and leaning against the stone wall. I gasp.

Draco stands at the end of the corridor. He glances both ways, and my eyes flicker up when I see a large door appear in front of him. The Room of Requirement. As the door materialises I hurry silently up behind him, keeping against the stone wall, since I know if I take too long I won't be able to follow him in. He opens the door, stepping inside. I bolt towards it the moment he steps over the threshold, grabbing the door just before it closes.

I wait for a moment before following him inside. I hold my breath as I let the door shut behind me, glancing bewildered at the room around me. I've been in the Room of Requirement before, of course, last year, but never like this. I press myself up against what I discover to be a dresser, one of many, piled up in heaps of relics and furniture and god knows what else. The room is vast, so much so that I can't see an end, it simply disappears into darkness at the edge. I stare wide-eyed around me at the huge piles of things, the small pockets of illumination that peer out from between furniture from lights that still flicker on automatically. Everything seems to be the same colour due to the thick layer of dust.

I can see Draco walk through these heaps, by the small lights that flicker on when they sense his presence. I start to follow him, keeping quiet. What on earth is he doing here? Now? Suddenly, he stops before a large object covered with a heavy rug. He reaches a hand up, grabbing the fabric and pulling it off, a cloud of dust flying into the air at the sudden disturbance. I squint, trying to see it better. It looks like some sort of cupboard. It is tall, with doors on two sides, opening at the corner.

He turns, walking over to a small, circular cage. I recognise it, I think at some point Trelawny entertained the idea of keeping pet birds and they sat in her office, chirping. She soon realised she was not cut out for the ownership of birds. Draco seems to take the small talkative bird in his hands, albeit shakily, and walks back to the strange cupboard. I watch as he opens it and places the bird inside. He closes the door and begins to mutter something under his breath. I hear a strange hushed whirring noise.

Suddenly, the ottoman I'm leaning on falls downward and I stumble to the ground, sending a pile of books toppling from a bookshelf above me and onto my head. Draco jumps, turning and pointing his wand in my direction, but not seeing me. I freeze.