When I woke up I signed and ran my fingers through my hair. Hagrid's words kept replaying through my mind the hole night through, and the guilt kept rising inside of me and now I felt like I was going to explode.
I was tired of trying to find out the rediculous clue. It was a Golden Egg that wouldn't touch fire! And Cedric gave me the worst clue ever - take a bath!
What kind of boyfriend tells their girlfriend to 'take a bath'?
So when I went to the Great Hall for breakfast I marched straight to Cedric with my business face on. He looked up at me in amusement.
"Am I in trouble?" Cedric raised on eyebrow.
"No," I sniffed. "I just need another clue."
"Take a bath," Cedric said, like always.
I had no idea how long a bath I would need to work out the secret of the golden egg, so I scolwed and wondered how to phrase a question that would most likely take away my dignity.
"How... Do... I find out... the... clue," I said, as though I was in physical pain.
Cedric laughed merrily. "All you had to do was ask, you know."
I kept my business face.
"You open it in-"
"Water!" I finished triumphantly. "That's the answer, isn't it? It is! It is! I found out the clue!"
Cedric chuckled cutely at me. "Sure, Nix. I would do it at night, if I were you, so no one would walk in..."
"Thanks," I smiled.
"No problem," Cedric chuckled before turning to a red haired girl with a large nose.
On Thursday night, I got out of bed and went to the bathroom. The door creaked open and I winced. If Hermione woke up she'll talk about how excited she was when I find out the clue, then she'll never let me sleep because till we found out what the clue ment. I slipped inside, bolted the door behind me, and signed.
I moved forward to the tub and turned on the hot water. After stripping off my clothes I crawled into the large tub and sunk in until only my nose was poking out.
It felt as though all the stress left my body, and I felt my muscles ease.
I clutched at the egg and sunk it down with me. The tub was so deep I hardly touched the bottom tiles, so I wasn't in any way uncomfortable. I opened the egg wearily, scared that it might start to wail and startle the girls awake. But no wail came, in fact, the noise that came out of the egg was actually suthing...
"Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you re searching, ponder this:
We've taken what you'll sorely miss,
An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour- the prospect's black,
Too late, it's gone, it won't come back"
I let myself float back upward and broke the bubbly surface, shaking my red hair out of my eyes.
The song was stamped in my mind already, but to ease my doubt that I remembered every word, I listened to it three more times.
"Something that can't speak above water..." I pondered. "But speaks inside..."
I got out of the tub and redressed myself. My mind was still working when I climbed under my warm blankets and closed my eyes to fall asleep.
It wails above water... something with a beautiful voice. My last thought was a mermaid, but the next morning, I forgot all about it.