I gently wake the Fat Lady, although she's still annoyed. "Let me sleep, you shouldn't be out now anyw—Good Lord, honey, what happened to you?" she exclaims.
"Not now," I beg. "I'm tired. Um, the password...Fried chicken?"
"I can't let you in like that, you ought to see Madam Pomfrey!"
"He already said it wouldn't help."
"He? Who's he?"
"A friend."
"A boyfriend?"
"A friend," I repeat firmly. For an old portrait, she can be quite the romantic.
"Well, fine then." She swings her portrait to the side. I crawl through the passageway and climb up the stairs by the dying firelight of the Common Room.
Someone is sitting up in the bed next to me—Juliana. "Mia!" she whisper-shouts as I bump into the headrest. "Oh, here. Lumos!" A small light, like a flashlight, erupts from her wand. She takes in a breath, seeing my face. "God, Mia, what happened to you? You look like a mess. You ought to see Madam Pomfrey."
"Yeah, the Fat Lady told me the same thing."
"Don't ever compare me to her!" Juli jokes.
"Hey, she has feelings, you know!" I reply.
"She's a portrait!"
"Portraits have feelings!"
"Not Muggle portraits."
"Well, is she a Muggle portrait?" I smirk. "I thought not."
"Fine, you must be exhausted. It's, what, midnight?"
"Probably. Good night."
"I suppose."
I toss and turn all night, still in a fair—but manageable—amount of pain. Finally, morning comes, sunlight streaming through the boarded-up windows.
"Are you awake?" Juli whispers.
"No," I tease.
"Good. Now, tell me everything! I'm worried about you," she tells me.
"Yeah, me too." I resist the urge to touch the unhealed wounds on my face. Stay strong, Mia, stay strong.
"You okay?"
"Not really," I admit.
"I can't believe she did that to you!"
"I can," I reply darkly. "Madison Clark, but it seemed like it was Crabbe's idea. She was the helper. Gods, it was like a movie..." The superhero, in chains, waiting for someone to save them. The thought is reassuring, in a way. Even the greatest heroes need to be saved sometimes.
"But what happened?" she presses.
"It was a spell. Sectumsempra." I look warily at my wand, as if saying the word would make it happen.
"Looks like she hit you with a sword or something! Did she just get your face?"
"Yeah, and that's the general idea."
"God," she mutters. "Was it bad? Never mind, of course it was! But how did you break free? She must have tied you up or something."
"She didn't have to, but yeah."
"What do you mean, she didn't—oh." Oh meaning, the threat of harming Juli was enough. It seemed an awkward topic for her. You know, being kidnapped as bait...
"Anyway, it was this boy, he was—he was a seventh-year!" I realize. "I've seen him in detention. He's a Ravenclaw, I think."
"Wow. That's brave of him."
"Yeah. Seriously, that girl was really scary." It kind of hurts to talk, but what am I supposed to do, stay silent?
"Are you sure you're okay? Maybe you should lie down in the Hospital Wing or something. I could tell the teachers—"
"Thanks, Juli, but I'm fine." I force a smile. "Really."
"You shouldn't have had to go through that. I keep getting into some situation and you keep being the one who gets hurt."
"That's the point," I remind her. "First of all, you'd have done the same, wouldn't you?"
"Well, yeah—"
"And, second, the whole point of these things is to get to me!"
"Well, why me, then?"
"Because if it were Beth, Tiana would take the lead," I state matter-of-factly. "She's much more experienced with spells. And most people think Ralph is like his brother, a Death Eater in training."
She sighs. "I guess you're right. It just makes me so mad that someone's using me and trying to get to you!"
"I know. Me too. Come on, let's get to breakfast." I get dressed and walk down to breakfast okay. Like I said—it's not the most pleasant thing in the world, but it's nothing I can't manage. I ignore the mild pain (and the not-so-mild stares) all through the day.
Until Muggle studies, that is.
"What happened to you, Anderson?" Professor Carrow asks as I walk into the classroom.
"I, um, fell and got stepped on," I mumble, praying I can trick her.
"Ten points for your appearance, and I'd like to shake the hand of whoever did it," she remarks dryly. "Sit down, or it'll be a hundred!"
I sigh, accepting defeat, and take my seat. Ten points aren't so bad, and it's not like it's really my fault. The lesson, as with my Potions and Transfiguration lessons, runs through one ear and out the other, as a Muggle would say. There's probably some wizarding equivalent to the expression, but now's not the time. Professor Slughorn and Professor McGonagall ask me what happened, and I give them the same excuse. While Professor McGonagall doesn't believe me, she leaves it alone for the time being, although I'm certain she'll ask later.
I savor lunch, my break from the headache that passes for modern teaching. Then it's double Herbology and detention, as usual. Just my luck, we're back to regular order: curse or be cursed. The chaos melted away a week or two into January. In case you haven't noticed, luck is quite hard to come by when you're a demigod.
Professor Carrow calls my name (still calling me Amelia, but at this point, I don't really care), then another that I don't recognize. There's still a few people in the small class whose names I don't know.
But I do know his face.
Oh, my gods.
My partner is the boy from last night.
We stare at each other for a moment before he finds his voice. I can't read his face or his thoughts. "No," he says softly. Then he says it again, louder. "No! No way!"
"You're making a mistake," Professor Carrow warns.
"Curse me then," he declares. "Curse me into oblivion. Kill me. I don't care."
"Bad move, Corner," a voice whispers. Corner—Michael Corner. That's his name.
"Shut it, Goyle," a Ravenclaw girl hisses.
"Who gave you the scars, girl?" Carrow takes a step toward me, a lion advancing toward his prey. And here I am, a trapped gazelle.
I step back involuntarily. "I—I tripped," I lie.
"Sure, you did," he snarls, inches away from me. "Don't you walk away from me!" I stop backing up.
"Don't touch her!" I hear Michael say, surprising me, although I don't know why.
I glance behind me to see the terrified faces of Lawrence, Alexander, Lucy, and Claire staring at me. Don't test him, Claire mouths. Not that I would have. Professor Carrow is serious. He's also about ten times my size.
"Who gave you the scars?" he repeats.
"Like you don't know." I say the first thing that comes to mind and build on that. When several people personally want you dead, you learn to lie fast and you learn to lie well. "Your sister was behind it." Michael glances at me, confused. Go with it, I try to tell him with my facial expression alone. He doesn't say anything. I don't want Madison—it's not that I don't want her in trouble, because that would be ridiculous. I just...everything would be easier. I want to pretend it never happened. Besides, she'd murder me if I told anyone, even a teacher who would certainly commend her for it.
"Alecto," he mutters, obviously annoyed that she let me live. "And how are you still alive?"
"I—"
"It was me," Michael tells him defiantly. I look at him fearfully, refusing to say something cliché in protest. He returns my gaze, not saying a word, but I know what he's thinking without even reading his mind.
I don't know what's going to happen to the boy who saved my life. But if he wants to take the fall, then so be it, I won't stop him if he doesn't want me to. I know better than anyone to let the heroes do their hero thing.
I sit down and realize I'm shaking. Last night I dealt with a fourteen-year-old student who couldn't do much to me—at least, that was what I thought. But Professor Carrow was—is—a Death Eater, armed with spells beyond my wildest nightmares and ready to kill. And Michael knows it; I can tell.
I look away as he uses the same curse that Madison used on me. Sectumsempra. Plus a fair amount of public humiliation. Michael doesn't make a sound, doesn't even fall, even as the class gasps in horror, the spell being new to most of them. He looks Professor Carrow right in the eye and doesn't move. I feel tears falling down my face, knowing that it's all my fault. I hate seeing people take the fall for me. Someone's always getting hurt because of me. There's only one solution to this.
It's time to disappear.
Well, another chapter! Is anyone even reading this anymore?
Moving on!
Did anyone catch my Hamilton reference?
That's all. Bye!
~Sasha