Amaranth (Harry Potter Fan Fiction)

Chapter 11: October Fun!

The school year has gone by so quickly and I can’t believe I’ve been at Hogwarts for 2 months already and it is almost time for Halloween.

Our classes are much more interesting now and we’re actually doing magic! Rose and I mastered Wingardium Leviosa on our first try and got 10 points for Gryffindor, each. Potions has been fun, since apparently Professor Slughorn has a soft spot in his heart for the Greengrass family because of our grandparents, who were some of his first students. Professor McGonagall is an excellent teacher even though she is getting old. In Transfiguration I managed to make my stick turn into a needle!

I have become even closer friends with Loopy, Alice and Lydia. Quidditch is awesome and I’ve gone to all of the games so far! I’ve visited Selena a lot over the past months and we have gotten to be good friends, she is like the older sister I never had, as is Isabelle.

Today is Friday and classes are over, so I’m going to go visit her. I skip down to her room and say the password to the door. She knows that I come and visit her every Friday, so she usually has a snack or something planned. Today, she stands in the stable getting Snowfall ready. It snowed last night so she hands me a long blue cloak and a hat. I pull on my gloves and the hat. This is going to be so much fun and so beautiful. We mount Snowfall, like we have done many times and Snowfall canters out into the forest.

Then we are in the air and everything is white, snow-covered and beautiful. The snow is falling from the sky again. I stick out my tongue and a piece falls on it. Hogwarts looks beautiful. I can see Hagrid at the edge of the woods, cutting wood and I can see students having a snowball fight. We fly through the sky and over the lake. I can see different animals in the woods trying to find safety. Soon the snow is falling heavily and it is getting hard to see, so Selena pulls Snowfall back towards Hogwarts. He lands just as the snow starts getting larger and hail starts falling. We canter through the snow and quickly reach Selena’s rooms. We dismount and I take off Snowfall’s saddle, while Selena goes into the main chamber and starts preparing a snack.

I take off the cloak and hang it on a chair to dry. Selena sets a mug of warm coco in front of me and I sip it carefully. We eat chocolate chip cookies and drink our coco while we talk about Halloween.

“Julia, dear what are you going to be for Halloween?” Selena asks me kindly.

 “Um…Rose and I were thinking about going as a fairy and a dragon.” I say to her.

 “That sounds wonderful,” she says wistfully, “I’m sure dear Hermione could help you with costumes.”

 “Yes, Rose sent an owl to her mum and to her uncle George asking for some help, they haven’t answered yet, but I’m sure they will soon.” I say to her happily.

 “That’s wonderful dear,” she says and suddenly her eyes light up, “Julia, I just had a marvelous idea. I remember when I was a young student; I used to prank people, would you like to prank some people?”

 “That would be fun,” I say happily, “But I would get caught, since you’re invisible, and I’m not.”

 “Oh, Julia, Julia, Julia, dear,” she says, “My magic can cover both of us and we can both be invisible…now who shall we be pranking?”

 “Remember when I told you about the lake incident,” I start telling her and she nods, “Well when I was running, this boy tripped me and I want to get him back. And then there is Vilaina, who is annoying and mean to everyone. And of course Filch.”

 “Ok I’ve had these different pranks made up for years,” Selena says happily, “Ok number one, this one we can use on Filch, we make Mrs. Norris chase a flashlight’s light and then we lock her up and hide her. Then we create a map that leads Filch to different places and then he has to solve clue to know where to go next!”

 “That sounds good!” I say happily.

 “Number two is…”

We discuss all of the different pranks we will be doing. First we decide to do one on Professor Forestius. I stick a note that says, “Pull door to open” on a door that you need to push to open. Professor Forestius walks and pulls the door. Then he sighs and pushes it.

 “Silly students.” he says chuckling.

That one wasn’t that funny but the next one was hilarious. Selena made me invisible and then I stole Joshua’s book bag and started running away. Selena’s invisibility covered me, but not the book bag, so Joshua just saw his bag flying away from him.

 “Hey give that back!” he yelled, causing everyone in the hallway to stare at him as he chased the book bag around.

Finally I threw it up on a statue’s hand and he had to climb up the statue to get it. As he was sitting on Salazar Slytherin’s hand and getting his book bag, Neville walked into the hallway.

 “Mr. Aechner, down from there immediately. I don’t know what has gotten into you, young man but that is not acceptable, 50 points from Slytherin and detention for a month. Get yourself down from there, you and I are going to have a talk with your head of house and Headmistress McGonagall will know about this. Come along, young man.” he says to Joshua strictly.

Selena and I sat in a corner and laughed and because of her magic, no one heard us, so we could sit and laugh our heads off as Joshua reluctantly walked next to Neville with Neville’s hand firmly on his shoulder.

Then we decided that we were going to prank Vilaina. We found her in a hallway bullying some other first year Hufflepuffs so Selena transfigured a strand of my hair into 10 water balloons full of different colored dies that would stain her clothes. We floated right over Vilaina and as she bullied them we threw them down at her and she screamed. Her clothing was dyed all sorts of colors, blue, yellow, red and pink, but not green or black. She shrieks and runs back to her common room, leaving the Hufflepuffs, Selena and me laughing.

Then we decided that we are going to prank Filch, we followed the plan and when Filch was looking for Mrs. Norris we followed him around. When he found Mrs. Norris, the relief on his face is so amusing that Selena and I started cracking up.

After our fun, Selena decided that it would be nice to cook something and have me in her chamber for dinner, since she often gets lonely.

 “Can I look in your study?” I ask her as she pushes a chicken into the oven.

 “Oh yes of course.” she says.

I go into the study and open a drawer, looking for something interesting to read. All of the notes appear to be about the same thing. There are drawings of a vine and there are many notes detailing something. Then I come to a page that says, “The Periculosi Amaranthi has returned, all ghosts are needed at Hogwarts, please help us!”

Has Selena been hiding something from me?

“Selena!” I call to her.

She puts her face around the corner and says, “Yes?”

“Is there something you’ve been hiding from me?” I ask her.

She gulps and her eyes widen. Oh no.

Author’s Note: What did you think? Was it good and what is Selena’s secret?? This is dedicated to the wonderful sailorinblue, for the comments on the last chapter and for being awesome! Please comment and vote! :)