LITTLE MISS MUDBLOOD – ACT 1 : SCENE 2 : CHAPTER 23
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The double attack on Justin and Nearly Headless Nick turned what had previously been nervousness into real panic. Curiously, it was Nearly Headless Nick's fate that seemed to worry people most. What could possibly do that to a ghost? People asked each other; what terrible power could harm someone who was already dead? There was almost a stampede to book seats on the Hogwarts Express so that students could go home for Christmas.
"At this rate, we'll be the only ones left," Theodore told them when they had checked up on the potion. "Us, Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, Parkinson, and Bulstrode."
"What a jolly holiday it's going to be," Ron muttered.
Crabbe, Goyle, and Parkinson, who always stuck to Malfoy like glue, had signed up to stay over the holidays, too. Millicent Bulstrode, who was having a riff with her mother, decided to stay as well. But other than the nine second-year Slytherins, only around two or three other Slytherins were staying.
It wouldn't make much of a difference to the common room, though, because the quietness was nothing new. It was the norm for the dungeons to be eerily quiet, but Y/N found it to be quite cozy, in fact, and found the window by the lake to be a great spot to knit. However, with the new generation coming in (aka the first and second year students) Y/N thought the quietness was going to disappear soon enough, because they all had a sort of chaotic energy.
As last the term ended, and a silence deep as the snow on the grounds descended on the castle. Y/N found it peaceful, rather than gloomy, and enjoyed the fact that she, Daphne, Theodore, and Blaise could practice hexes and jinxes on Crabbe and Goyle without facing punishment from the prefects. Parkinson attempted to duel Y/N on many occasions, but after a nasty Pimple Jinx, she resorted to teasing her about knitting. Y/N simply ignored her.
Christmas morning dawned, cold and white. Y/N woke very early, per Hermione's request, and pulled on Fred's Weasley sweater, jeans, and a pair of her favorite pair shoes. She woke Daphne loudly (who reluctantly got dressed) and hurried off to the boy's dormitories, throwing a Slytherin scarf on and stuffing her wand in her back pocket.
"Wake up," said Y/N loudly, shaking Theodore and Blaise awake. "Come on, idiots, wake up."
They groaned and she pulled back the curtains at the window, allowing the distorted light to shine in and wake the boys up. Unfortunately, it also woke Malfoy, who threw a pillow at her.
"What're you doing here, Granger?" he said groggily. Rolling her eyes, Y/N threw the pillow back at him, hitting him smack center of the face. "Oi!"
Theodore and Blaise groaned and moaned as they dressed and Y/N dug through Blaise's closet to pull out a bat. Why he had a bat, she didn't know, but she slung it over her shoulder and hurried back to the common room to where Daphne was waiting.
"Ready?" said Y/N happily, which was answered with a grumpy 'hmph'.
Daphne and Y/N dashed to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom and found Hermione just at the entrance. The three girls entered and immediately started working on the Polyjuice Potion, carefully adding more lacewings to the potion.
"Theodore and Blaise should be here any minute with Crabbe, Goyle, and Bulstrode's uniforms – they should just be dropping them off –"
"Oh, girls!" came Theodore's charming voice from the bathroom door. He and Blaise came into view with three sets of robes. "Three sets of robes for three rule-breaking Gryffindors – and off we go open some presents! C'mon Daph!"
Daphne sighed and waved good-bye to Hermione and Y/N, who were going to wait until the potion was ready to go open their presents. Y/N however, had brought her gift for Hermione to give to her in private.
"Here," said Y/N, enlarging the present and giving it to Hermione. She opened it and gasped. "I saw you eyeing mine last year so I bought you a similar one. The only difference is the leather color."
Y/N had bought Hermione her exact watch, but like she said, in a different color. While Y/N had a hickory-colored leather strap, she had bought Hermione a watch with a more reddish, cinnamon-colored leather strap.
"It's perfect!" said Hermione, and she enveloped Y/N into a hug. "I'm sorry – I already had your present sent to your common room –"
"Oh, that's fine," said Y/N, checking on the potion. "Potion's ready anyway. We'll come back here after dinner?"
"Yes, yes, of course," said Hermione, fretting and finishing up the potion. "Join me in the Potion's classroom at two p.m., please, I need your help with something."
"With what?"
"Something."
Y/N joined Theodore, Blaise, and Daphne in the Slytherin common room, next to the Christmas tree where their presents sat, itching to be opened. They had waited for her, and when she had entered the common room they had already sorted the presents.
They opened their presents all at once, and Y/N was more than satisfied with her gifts. Her parents had sent loads of more yarn and her grandparents sent matching knitting needles to go with it (Grandmother Gertrude sent obnoxiously large knitting needles, which wasn't all-that-strange for her); Hagrid had sent her a large tin of treacle toffee, which Y/N decided to soften by the fire before dropping a clump in her hot cocoa; Hermione had bought her a real emerald necklace, which she put on right away, Ron had given her a book called How to Lose: Chaser Edition, a book giving Chasers some tips on how to lose a Quidditch game, and Harry had sent her a stuffed snake, which she found amusing.
Daphne had given her a pair of diamond earrings, which she claimed to be her grandmother's (Y/N had tried to refuse but Daphne was simply too stubborn) and Theodore and Blaise had tag-teamed to buy her at least thirty new books. Y/N opened the last present to find a six-month supply of sugar quills from Fred and George and six out-grown Weasley sweaters and a proto-type candy of their new business idea, which they decided to call Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes. She'd agreed to be part of their sponsor, but that meant a lifetime of free products and the first to use their proto-types. She'd hoped she wasn't doing this for nothing, but then again, she was talking about the Weasley Twins.
Y/N found Hermione already in the Potion's classroom at two in the afternoon, setting up a cauldron and gathering ingredients. Y/N analyzed the scene.
"Hermione Jean Granger, you are not making a Sleeping Draught!"
"Yes, I am, and you're going to help," said Hermione, briskly opening her Potions textbook and starting. "You're the best Potions student in our year, even better than me, and I need these strong enough to put Crabbe and Goyle to sleep."
"That's what the bat was for," Y/N muttered, but Hermione insisted on the Sleeping Draught.
She sighed and joined Hermione at the cauldron, pulling the textbook closer to her. Y/N was so used to her own textbook that she forgot what it was like to go by the actual book.
"Well, the book says add four sprigs of lavender to the mortar . . . but that's for the average wizard, so in our case we'll add five. . . ." she said, and Hermione quickly gave her five sprigs of lavender. "Two measures of standard ingredient . . . ."
Hermione eagerly dumped the two measures in and Y/N crushed the ingredients into a creamy paste.
"So you said you wanted these to be strong?" said Y/N, and Hermione nodded. "Okay, well, add half a measure of powdered Griffin Claw to the mortar because –"
"Because it's an amplifier!" exclaimed Hermione excitedly, eager to be learning more than what Professor Snape teaches currently. She hurried off and came back with a jar of powdered Griffin Claw, adding half a measure to the mortar. "What's next?"
"Two blobs of Flobberworm Mucus to the cauldron," said Y/N, who reluctantly dug into the bottle of Flobberworm Mucus and extracted the only two blobs left. She threw them in the potion and reluctantly thought she would have to juice more Flobberworms. "And then two more measures of standard ingredient."
Hermione added the standard ingredient and they waited fifty seconds (even though the book said thirty). Y/N continued to add four measures of the mixture in the mortar, rather than the suggested three, and Hermione waved her wand before starting the seventy-minute clock.
"Would you like to juice some Flobberworms with me?" Y/N asked sarcastically, looking through the potion ingredients to find the live Flobberworms. She brought them over to a cleared desk and started to juice them, scrunching her nose at the slimy texture.
Surprisingly, Hermione helped her juice the Flobberworms, and they were done juicing all of the worms within the seventy-minute period of time they had. Quickly, Y/N washed her hands and went back to the potion while Hermione cleaned up.
Y/N added even more standard ingredient and continued to heat on high for one minute. Hermione joined her with the Valerian Sprigs.
"Valerian sprigs have sedative and antispasmodic properties," said Hermione, "so do we add five sprigs so they sleep longer?"
Y/N nodded and Hermione, excited to have caught on with the rules of strengthening potions, quickly added the Valerian Sprigs to the potion. Y/N stirred the concoction clockwise seven times and waved her wand, finishing off the potion.
"Is that it?" asked Hermione, pulling two chocolate cakes from her robe pockets. "I made these earlier for Crabbe and Goyle, but I'm not sure how we're to add the Sleeping Draught to it. Any ideas?"
"A syringe," said Y/N simply, and she dug through the student equipment storage. Weirdly enough, a few different sizes of syringes laid neatly in a row, and Y/N picked an 18 gauge needle and returned to the cauldron. "Cake."
Hermione placed one of the cakes into her outstretched hand, and Y/N filled the syringe to 8 cc's. She filled the cake with it and repeated the same to the other cake, successfully filling them both with the Sleeping Draught.
"Huh," said Hermione, placing the cakes back into her pocket. "Why'd I think that wasn't going to work?"
Y/N shrugged and they cleaned up their area, grabbing glass phials and filling them with the Draught (for personal purposes). And after cleaning out the cauldron they cautiously exited the Potion's classroom, leaving nothing to suggest that they were there, except for the refilled Flobberworm Mucus jar.
The Christmas dinner at Hogwarts was nothing like Y/N's ever seen before.
The Great Hall looked magnificent. Not only were there a dozen frost-covered Christmas trees and thick streamers of holly and mistletoe crisscrossing the ceiling, but enchanted snow was falling, warm and dry, from the ceiling. Professor Dumbledore led them in a few of his favorite carols, Hagrid booming more and more loudly with every goblet of eggnog he consumed. Fred and George, eager to test their very first proto-type, pressured Y/N into eating something that supposedly gave her a nosebleed.
"All right, I'll eat it," said Y/N, finally opening the package and eating the orange sweet. Fred and George awaited impatiently, staring at her nose intensely. Y/N felt a liquidy substance in her nose, and a single droplet of orange blood dropped into Fred's palm.
She stared at it and looked up at the twins.
"Needs a little work," she said matter-of-factly, and they sighed heavily.
Later, during dessert, Y/N watched Harry, Ron, and Hermione exit the Hall. A couple of seconds later she, Daphne, Theodore, and Blaise followed them, catching the last bit of Hermione's sentence.
"– You do want to investigate Malfoy, don't you?"
"Oh, all right, all right," said Harry. "But what about you? Whose hair are you ripping out?"
"I've already got mine!" said Hermione brightly, pulling a tiny bottle out of her pocket and showing them a single hair inside it. "Remember Millicent Bulstrode wrestling with me at the Dueling Club? She left this on my robes when she was trying to strangle me! But she's here for Christmas and she's not as gullible as Crabbe and Goyle –"
"Don't worry, I'll knock her out," said Y/N, who had a nasty grin on her face. Ron turned to Harry fearfully.
"Have you ever heard of a plan where so many things could go wrong?"
Y/N and Daphne tracked Millicent through the corridors, a bat slung over Y/N's shoulder. She figured she could make the most out of this by reverting back to her Muggle roots, when she casually played softball and baseball with her school-friends.
Y/N hid behind a suit of armor on the way to the Slytherin common room, waiting for Daphne's signal. Ready to swing, she watched Daphne like a hawk; and with a sharp nod from her Y/N jumped out from behind the statue and swung with all her might –
"Home run!" Y/N cheered, and an unconscious Millicent Bulstrode fell to the floor. Daphne scurried over and they stood over Millicent Bulstrode, examining the large bruise to her forehead. "Let's hide her in the broom closet over there."
Daphne hurried and opened the broom closet while Y/N pulled out her wand and used the Levitating Charm on Bulstrode to transport her from the corridor to the closet. Finally, they were free to get back to the Slytherin common room to change and sit in the background by the window.
Y/N, per usual, resumed knitting, while Daphne read Witch Weekly, taking quizzes and cutting out recipes. Y/N thought she ought to subscribe to it too, and soon found herself with Daphne's old subscriptions and a subscription of her own while they waited for Malfoy, and the Polyjuiced-Gryffindors.
Theodore and Blaise soon joined them and the four of them sat huddled together in the window seat, cuddled under two thick blankets.
"You really enjoy knitting, don't you," Theodore commented as he dug into the treacle toffee Hagrid had given Y/N. "I mean, I see you knitting almost every day."
"Of course I enjoy it, otherwise I wouldn't be doing it," said Y/N, as if it were obvious. "How's Herbology treating you?"
"I like it, in fact," said Theodore proudly. "I can give you thirty facts about Mandrakes, if you'd like."
"I wouldn't like," Y/N muttered, but Theodore, who wasn't that good of a listener, started listing off facts about Mandrakes.
Finally, Malfoy, "Crabbe", and "Goyle" entered the common room, and imposter Crabbe and Goyle sat in a pair of empty chairs near the four Slytherins by the window. They looked to Y/N and gave the thumbs-up, signalling it was, in fact, Harry Potter and Ron Weasley.
Malfoy returned to them, holding what looked like a newspaper clipping. He shoved it under 'Crabbe's' nose.
"That'll give you a laugh," said Malfoy.
Y/N watched 'Crabbe's' eyes widen in shock. He read the clipping quickly, gave a forced laugh, and handed it to 'Goyle', who read it as well.
"Well?" said Malfoy impatiently as 'Goyle' handed the clipping back to Malfoy. "Don't you think it's funny?"
"Ha, ha," said 'Goyle' bleakly.
"Arthur Weasley loves Muggles so much he should snap his wand in half and go and join them," said Malfoy scornfully. "You'd never know the Weasleys were purebloods, the way they behave."
Y/N watched 'Crabbe's' face contour with fury.
"What's up with you, Crabbe?" snapped Malfoy.
"Stomachache," Ron grunted.
"Well, go up to the hospital wing and give all those Mudbloods a kick from me," said Malfoy, snickering. "You know, I'm surprised the Daily Prophet hasn't reported all these attacks yet," he went on thoughtfully. "I suppose Dumbledore's trying to hush it all up. He'll be sacked if it doesn't stop soon. Father's alway said old Dumbledore's the worst thing that's ever happened to this place. He loves Muggle-borns. A decent headmaster would never've let slime like that Creevey in."
Malfoy started taking pictures with an imaginary camera and did a cruel but accurate impression of Colin: "'Potter, can I have your picture, Potter? Can I have your autograph? Can I lick your shoes, please, Potter?'"
He dropped his hands and looked at the imposter Crabbe and Goyle.
"What's the matter with you two?"
Far too late, Harry and Ron forced themselves to laugh, but Malfoy seemed satisfied; Crabbe and Goyle were actually always slow on the uptake.
"Saint Potter, the Mudblood's friend," said Malfoy slowly. "He's another one with no proper wizarding feeling, or he wouldn't go around with those jumped-up Granger Mudbloods" – he stole a look behind him at Y/N, who pretended not to hear – "And people think he's Slytherin's heir!"
Y/N dropped her her project and huffed angrily. She said, "I'm going to go check up on Hermione." and headed off and out of the common room, hurrying up to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.
"Hermione?" Y/N called, looking around the bathroom. "Where are you?"
"Go away!" Hermione squeaked.
Y/N frowned.
"What's the matter?" she said. "What's gone wrong?"
Moaning Myrtle glided suddenly through a stall door and Y/N hurried over. She's never seen her looking so happy, and that didn't settle well with Y/N.
"Ooooooh, wait till you see," said said. "It's awful –"
Y/N heard the lock slide back and Hermione emerged, sobbing, her robes pulled up over her head.
"What's wrong?" said Y/N, concerned.
Hermione let her robes fall and Y/N held back a laugh at her sibling.
Her face was covered in black fur. Her eyes had turned yellow and there were long, pointed ears poking through her hair.
"It was a c-cat hair!" she howled. "M-Millicent Bulstrode m-must have a cat! And the p-potion isn't supposed to be used for animal transformations!"
At that moment, Harry and Ron, dressed in baggy Slytherin robes, entered the bathroom, chatting. Hermione tried to hide but it was too late; they'd already seen her.
"Hermione!" Ron exclaimed, and he and Harry scurried over. "What happened?"
"C-cat hair!" said Hermione dreadfully, in a very Moaning Myrtle type of way.
"Uh-oh," said Ron.
"You'll be teased something dreadful," said Myrtle happily.
It's okay, Hermione," said Harry quickly. "We'll take you up to the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey never asks too many questions. . . ."
It took a long time to persuade Hermione to leave the bathroom. Moaning Myrtle sped them on their way with a hearty guffaw. "Wait till everyone finds out you've got a tail!"