The Young Padfoot *Book One*

Devising a Plan

With the knowledge that Voldemort (well, some form of him) was probably hiding in the shadows of the Forbidden Forest, waiting for Snape to get the Philosopher's stone so he can return, I have no idea how we all managed to get through our exams without him bursting through the doors and killing us all.

Every now and then, we would all take it in turns to make sure Fluffy was still hiding in the third floor corridor, and every time one of us returned, we would give the thumbs up that the stone was still safe.

In the room where we had our written exams, it was absolutely bloody boiling. And to top it all off, much to the dismay of Ron, they had given us anti-cheating quills.

But on top of all of those written exams, we also had practical ones. In Professor Flitwick's exam, we were called into his classroom one at a time so that we could make a pineapple tap dance around the table. However in Professor McGonagall's exam, we had to turn a mouse into a snuff-box and we could obtain more points depending on the prettiness of it. Snapes on the other hand was cruel; While we were all trying to remember how to brew a forgetfulness potion, Snape would be walking around behind us all, breathing down our necks.

And finally, after a week of this torture, our final exam approached: History of Magic. I am willing to bet anything that the only person who actually understood anything in this class was Hermione. So the rest of us spent that hour coming up with names of wizards who had invented self-stirring cauldrons or whatnot. But when Professor Binns announced that we should put our quills down roll up our parchment, I cheered along with the rest of the year group, knowing that we were finally free for a whole week until our exam results came out.

"That was far easier than I thought it would be," Hermione said, as we started walking down to the lake. "I needn't have learnt about the 1637 Werewolf Code of Conduct or the uprising of Elfric the Eager."

As Hermione kept on nattering away, Ron and I shared a glance as if to say... 'How does she know all this?'

When we finally reached the lake, we all collapsed onto the grass and relaxed. I rolled over onto my front and started looking around and what everyone else was doing. They all had the same face as us, contentment.

"No more revision," Ron sighed happily. "You could look more cheerful, Harry, we've got a week before we find out how badly we've done, there's no need to worry yet."

I rolled back over and sat up to see Harry rubbing his forehead where his scar was.

"I wish I knew what this means!" Harry huffed out in frustration. "My scar keeps hurting—it's happened before, but never as often as this."

"Go to Madam Pomfrey," Hermione shrugged.

"I'm not ill," Harry replied. "I think it's a warning... it means danger's coming..."

"Look, Harry, relax," I said, looking over at him. "Hermione's right, the Stone's safe as long as Dumbledore's around. Anyway, we're never had any proof that Snape found out how to get past Fluffy. He nearly had his leg ripped off once, he's not going to try it again in a hurry."

"Plus, Neville will be playing Quidditch for England before Hagrid lets Dumbledore down," Ron added.

Harry silently nodded at us but then he tried, yet again, to explain this feeling he had that something was going to happen.

"That's just the exams," Hermione brushed it off. "I woke up last night and was halfway through my Transfiguration notes before I remembered we'd done that one."

Figuring that the conversation had been put to the side for now, we all resumed to what we were doing before, well, all of us except Harry, who still seemed pretty anxious about this Stone.