Chapter 14
First Year
I fluttered open my eyes. Where was I? What happened? The last thing I can remember was seeing the basilisk collapse to its death in the water. Was I actually alive? "Hey!" I heard a boy's voice called. "She's-she's waking up!" I opened my eyes and met ice blue ones. My brother Silvius was sitting in the chair next to me. His face flushed with relief as he looked at me. I glanced around. I was in the hospital room and laying in the same bed Madame Pomfrey always put me in. Sitting up, I felt dizzy, so I just sat back down and let my head fall onto the soft pillow. Madame Pomfrey rushed over to me with the same relief as Silvius.
"What happened?" I asked them rubbing my eyes.
"You've been out for three days," she told me. "Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley dragged you here along with Ms. Weasley, we treated her for shock. You had a dangerous fall, luckily you're alive. Mr. Potter said that you landed in water. You broke a few ribs, broke your wrist, and lost a lot of blood. You were very lucky Ms. Nyx." Madame Pomfrey said to me. I just smiled softly, luck seemed to be on my side for change.
"I came as soon as I heard," Silvius added quickly. "Dumbledore sent an owl. My headmaster let me take the Floo network." I smiled at him. I'm glad he came. At least one family member cared, not that I cared the others didn't though. "I thought I told you to stay out of trouble?" he joked. I laughed at that. "You got an award," he handed me a certificate. I took it and admired it. Me? An award? "Special services to the School." I looked around the room, it must have been early. I saw Lockhart looking around the room completely clueless, he was pointing to a picture and telling Madame Pomfrey that it was moving. "Can I ask you something?" Silvius said. I looked at him. "Why did you go down to the Chamber?"
I explained everything to him, from me hearing voices in the wall to running into Harry and Ron in the hallway the night we went down to the Chamber of Secrets. The only part I left out was how Draco has been bossing me around all year. "I see," he responded while nodding. "Our relative that opened the school in Salem was a Parsletongue. Mother's great great whatever." That explains why I could talk to snakes. It was genetic after all. "It wasn't passed down to all of us though, mother and father aren't Parsletongues. Neither are Dane, Avelina, Elvira, and I. Guess it's just you, but you never said anything." I just shrugged. I stopped talking about being able to talk to snakes when I was really young and my parents told me I was crazy. We talked a bit longer but eventually he had to go back to school. "Sorry, but I should probably leave now. Headmaster only gave me two days and you took longer than we expected. I'll get out of it though. See you back at home." Silvius left the room after giving me a quick hug. I know his 'see you at home' comment shouldn't have made me sad, but it did. Going home, we would be going home tomorrow.
Madame Pomfrey wouldn't let me leave right away. She wanted to make sure I stayed awake without any problems. If she saw that I was better she would let me go to the last Feast tonight. I had visitors though, which made it a lot better. Hermione was back to her normal state at least. She, Harry, and Ron came to visit me. Harry told me what happened after I passed out. He destroyed the diary which destroyed Riddle along with it. Ginny was alive and well, just a little shocked at the entire situation. Harry told me that Dumbledore was back, which I was very glad to hear. They left around twelve in the afternoon. Dasha and Eowyn stopped by to see if I was awake. I talked to them for a while as well. I told them what happened and they were fascinated by the whole story. They didn't like Harry and the other Gryffindors, but they still were glad that nobody was dead. Jake, Nico, Cal, and Gabe were here the longest. Jake was teasing me the whole time about my fall, he always found a way to make bad things seem funny. They also came up with a new nickname for me, "Scars". They said it worked in two ways, "Scars" from Scarlett and also because I was always getting hurt. I really hope that didn't stick. They bought me a whole load of candy. Madame Pomfrey kicked them out around four because they were being too loud and disrupting the other patients. I thought I was going to be stuck here bored for hours when the strangest of guest appeared, Draco. He was walking over to me. "Malfoy?" I asked$. "What are you doing here?"
"Quidditch team picked me to come see if you were alive or not," he replied coolly. "Needed to see if you could still play next year."
"How nice," I replied sarcastically. It got quiet for a second and I looked away from him, if that was all he wanted, then it was a waste for him to even come.
"What even happened to you? I only heard from your two friends that you were in the hospital wing and didn't wake up for three days."
"I fell thirty feet into a shallow pit of water in the Chamber of Secrets. Broke a few ribs, my wrist, and almost bled to death," I explained in my usual tone. "I passed out and was brought here by Harry and Ron." He looked speechless and almost as if he was concerned for a second but then snapped out of it.
"What were you doing with Potter anyways? Why did you even go down there? And with him of all people."
"Don't you remember?" I asked him. "It was the night you were being extremely irritating and I left the common room. I ran into Harry and Ron, found out they were going to the Chamber of Secrets and, what the hell! I went with them. Besides, I had to stop them from closing the school down."
"You really don't want the school to close do you?"
"No!" I said like it was an obvious fact. "You try being stuck up in your room all day, living off of extra food and not being allowed to leave."
"Well," he said almost awkwardly. "At least you didn't die." I thought he was being nice for a moment. "Now we can win the Quidditch House cup next year." I just laughed at that response and shook my head. Leave it to him for only caring that someone was alive so he could win.
"Thanks," I replied sarcastically.
"Plus," he added. "You earned the Slytherin house a hundred points for 'Bravery' which put us in front of Ravenclaw, but were still behind bloody Gryffindor."
"Even better," I replied sarcastically.
"Better go tell the team that you can still play next year," he said while leaving.
"Yeah see ya," I told him. I think I was actually getting used to him.
Madame Pomfrey let me leave early to go take a shower and get dressed for the feast. I walked into the common room, it was as if I never left. Nobody even noticed me. Now that they real culprit was caught, no one was accusing me of being the heir of Slytherin. "Nyx," I heard a deep voice call, I turned to see Flint.
"What Flint?" I asked him crossing my arms, he was never a favorite of mine.
"So are you going to be able to play next year or what?"
"Yeah..." I responded confused. "Didn't Draco tell you? You guys sent him down there to ask me."
"No we didn't..." Flint said glancing at me confused. I smirked to myself, so they didn't make him go down. He went down on his own, I wanted to smile, although I wasn't sure why. I didn't like him did I? I mean we could never even be friends, right. I must have hit my head pretty hard.
"Never mind," I covered quickly. "Still a bit dizzy, and yes. I'll be playing next year." Flint just gave me a quick nod and then left to go down to the feast.
When I got down there, people I didn't even know were greeting me. Ginny Weasley waved to me, a few other people I met from Gryffindor told me they were glad I was back, and Ron's older brothers, Fred and George talked to me for a while. People came over to me to apologize for blaming me, even that Justin kid. I walked by the Slytherin table, getting glares from a few of the people. Oh well, nothing I could do about that. Draco Malfoy smirked at me but it almost looked like a smile. I smirked back at him and then took my seat next to Eowyn, who started rambling on how much she missed eating dinner with me and how boring it with just Dasha who was only concerned on the last few exams. Dumbledore gave his speech and announced Gryffindor as the House winners. They beat us by one hundred points, we came in second. All of this made me forget about returning home, at least I wasn't alone though. Harry felt the same way as me about leaving.
The next morning came too quickly. We left the castle and headed for the train. For the first twenty minutes of the train ride I sat with Dasha and Eowyn. We had a lot of catching up to do because of our distant period. "Do you guys want to go sit with Aidan and Zane?" Eowyn said hopefully with an enormous smile plastered on her face.
"Who?" I asked confused but smiled at them.
"Well," Dasha said with a blush. "These two Slytherin boys, they were in most of our classes."
"Hmm," I said. "Never noticed them." I laughed.
"We didn't either until a few nights ago," Eowyn smiled. "They asked us to sit with them on the train. Aidan is from Ireland like me! And Zane is from Australia like Dasha." My two friends both formed wide smiles on their faces. "It's meant to be!" Eowyn while putting her hands on her heart and collapsing on the seat with a big sigh. I laughed at her, she's such a little flirt.
"Well go sit with them!" I encouraged.
"Aren't you going to come?" Dasha asked.
"Nah," I responded. "You guys go, I told Jake I'd sit with him for a while on the train and I also want to say goodbye to Harry, Ron, and Hermione."
"Alright," Dasha said softly. "I'll write to you over the summer!"
"Me too!" Eowyn said springing up from her seat. "You better write as well, maybe we'll be able to see each other. We should meet up in Diagon Alley one day!"
"Definitely," Dasha agreed. "Guess this is goodbye for now!" She said hugging me. Then Eowyn hugged me teary-eyed.
"Bye!" she said her eyes watering. "Say hello to that boyfriend of yours." Eowyn winked and I rolled my eyes. She still thought Jake was my 'secret' boyfriend or something.
"He is not my boyfriend," I answered with a laugh. "See you guys next year!" I told them as we parted in opposite direction. I felt tears building up in the back of my eyes. I was sad to see some of my very first friends leave. It only meant that I was one step closer to being home. I quickly wiped the one tear from my eye as I left the compartment. As I was walking towards Jake's compartment, I bumped into none other than Draco Malfoy.
"Hello again Nyx," he said smoothly. "Don't forget to practice over the summer. You never know when a first year will come and take your position." I think that was his way of saying, have a nice summer. That Donald's girl was walking by, the girl I took the position from, she glared at me as she passed. Draco had perfect timing with that comment.
"Yeah, see you Draco," I responded. "Have a nice summer too." He nodded to me before walking off, Crabbe and Goyle closely on his tail. I laughed to myself as I finished my way. I think I still hated him, or maybe I didn't. We had a complicated relationship.
I sat with Jake and the rest for most of the remainder of the train ride. I retold them the story of the Chamber of Secrets. They were fascinated by it. We talked about Quidditch a lot too. "Do you still want to come over the summer?" Jake asked hopefully. "We all live near each other, basically. Well not really...complete opposite sides of the country but whatever, same country. But that's why we have Floo networks."
"Yeah," Gabe said. "There are two Quidditch games where the Sweetwater All-Stars verse the Fitchburg Finches. You have to see one!"
"Definitely!" I said.
"
Good," Jake said. "I'll write to you once we get back to figure out when you can come."
"There is a game three weeks before school starts," Gabe said excited. "We should all go to that one."
"Sounds good," I agreed. It was going to be difficult to get my parents to let me go but I would figure something out. I survived in the Chamber of Secrets, I can get my parents to let me go to a Quidditch game with a few friends. We only had a half an hour left on the train. I still wanted to go say good bye to Harry, Ron, and Hermione. "Well, I should probably go visit Harry, Ron, and Hermione to say goodbye."
"Alright, see you Scars," Jake joked. I rolled my eyes at their new nickname for me. I hope they forgot about that over the summer. I hugged them all goodbye before leaving, once again not allowing any of my tears to fall, this wasn't goodbye after all.
"See you soon," I said to them. Hopefully, I wanted to add. My parents will probably never let me leave the house after they find out I was a 'school hero'. Weird right?
Earlier I saw Hermione walking near the front of the train so I went in that direction. As I walked I quickly peered in each compartment until I spotted them. I slid open the compartment door and walked in. "Hey guys," I said as I walked in and sat down.
"Hey Carlie," Ron said. "Finally you decide to show up." He smirked. I laughed and sat down. The compartment was packed but it was all right, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Fred, George, Ginny, and I were all crammed together tightly. There was candy covering the entire compartment.
"You know," Fred said while eating an acid pop. "For a Slytherin, you turned out to be alright."
"So I've been told," I laughed.
For the remainder of the trip we played games and set off Fred and George's fireworks out the window. Harry was trying to explain to Ron what a telephone was, confusing if you ask me. Apparently it's a muggle contraction used to communicate and you use it by entering a number. Muggles and their ideas these days. "Your aunt and uncle will be proud though?" Hermione said to Harry. "Won't they?"
"Proud?" Harry repeated. "All those times I could have died and didn't manage it? They'll be furious." I laughed with him knowing exactly how he felt.
"Don't worry about it Harry," I said. "It will be the same with me when I get home." We walked off the train together when it came to a stop. I finally got to meet Mrs. Weasley. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley were waiting at the gate for their kids. Ron introduced me to her as we stepped off the train. She hugged me and said she was glad I was alive. I've never even met her, but I liked her that instant. I thanked her for the sweater and said that I really liked it. I hugged Harry, Ron, and Hermione goodbye, it was the last goodbye I'd have to make. Then I made my way over to the Floo network and felt myself being brought back home, already wanting to return to Hogwarts.
All finished. Now, should I post the sequel? Let me know. Thanks for reading!