Arlene was such a bad influence.
"Come on 'mione." Arlene begged her friend.
Hermione bit her lip, clearly conflicted.
"You'll have a quieter place to study." She offered, knowing which buttons to push when trying to convince goody-two-shoes like Hermione and Sage to break the rules.
She stared at her for a few seconds, weighing the positives against the negatives, then she finally sighed "Okay."
Arlene grinned from ear to ear and jumped off the bed "Brilliant," she exclaimed as she clapped her hands together "Knew you'd come around."
Arlene turned and started walking away, leaving Hermione to scramble to grab her book and catch up with her.
The party was still going on strong when they entered, the Weasley twins were absolutely wasted and a couple seventh year had passed out on the couches. Nobody noticed them as they left.
It turned completely silent once the portrait closed, showing off the silencing charms.
"This way." Arlene whispered, excitement rolling off her like a waterfall.
Hermione, on the other hand, reeked of anxiety "This was a bad idea."
"Never claimed it was a good one." Arlene replied smoothly, grabbing her wrist and pulling her along.
Suddenly, she paused, then she pulled Hermione into one of the empty classrooms and signalled for her to be quiet.
Two prefects walked side by side, chatting and seemingly not noticing the two girls.
Arlene stayed in her place until the footsteps had completely vanished.
"It's safe." She declared silently as she left the classroom.
"How did you know they wouldn't check here?"
Arlene grinned "I memorized the prefect schedule, and I happen to know that the two prefects who patrol here –Jane and Felix- are absolutely balls at their job."
They walked together in silence, careful not to cause any echoes in case a prefect or Flinch was nearby.
To be quite frank, she had no idea what she was doing. If she was caught sneaking Hermione into the Slytherin common room, she would be in big trouble.
"Wait." Arlene instructed, Hermione was still wearing her red yellow stripped tie and the shirt with the Gryffindor crest.
Arlene took off her blazer and tie then handed them to the girl, instructing her to put them on and hide the other tie in her bag.
She stepped back, cocked her head to the side and looked her, "Here," she finally said, pulling her hair out of her ponytail and handing her the hair tie "pull your hair up."
Hermione did as told and Arlene was shocked at how different she look in Slytherin attire and a different hairstyle.
She smiled softly "Come on."
Hermione's reaction once they entered was instant, the sunlight reflection on the water alone was magical, if you add all the marble, roman stone and mermaids, and it looked like something out of a Fairy-tale
."Wow." Hermione whispered, her eyes wide as she took it all in.
Arlene's grin widened even more at Hermione's awe. They were alone in the room, so she wasn't worried too much about her friend acting like an excited first year.
"C'mon," she told her, sitting on a random couch that was directly under the glass and patted the empty spot beside her.
Hermione sat and took off her bag, but didn't pull her books out to study like he had been promised, she just stared at the glass.
"Is it always like this?" she whispered.
Arlene nodded "The ceiling is the same in the dorms as well."
"All Gryffindors have are birds and annoying boys." She complained playfully.
Arlene laughed "Makes you wish you were a Slytherin, doesn't it."
Hermione hummed "Maybe. But I'm a muggleborn."
"So is Jade." She countered.
"I would get seasick all the time, anyway, don't the dimmed light hurt your eyes?" Hermione retorted, still looking at the fish swimming by.
"Plus," she added "I was stupid enough to attempt to fight a mountain troll, I think Gryffindor is the place for me-"
Hermione suddenly stopped talking, Arlene looked at the glass and discovered the reason why. A mermaid.
Arlene smirked at the opportunity to show off, she held her hands up and started a conversation with the mermaid.
Hermione turned to her friend and stared in awe "What...?"
"Sign language," she explained "that's how we communicate with Mermaids and sometimes Selkies –not Sirens, though, it's best to leave them alone- all First Years are taught by Prefects." She explained.
"Brilliant." Hermione whispered in amazement "What's she saying?"
Arlene turned to the Mermaid, "She's saying that she hasn't seen you here before."
She signed back to her SHE'S NOT A SLYTHERIN, SHH
The mermaid chuckled, or what was the mermaid version of chuckling and continued.
IS THAT THE GIRL YOU TOLD ME ABOUT? She asked DID YOU GIVE HER A CONCHELL LIKE I TOLD YOU?
Arlene giggled, mermaids meant well, but it was a lesson they all learned early on that they gave shit love life advice.
I DON'T THINK SHE'LL APPRECIATE THAT
The mermaid frowned, as though she had offended her THE MERMEN SEEM TO LIKE IT
She turned to the other girl and waved, Hermione, who was still dumbstruck, could only raise her hand and wave back meekly as the Mermaid swam away.
It took a while for Hermione to snap out of it, once she did that, they got out their books and started studying.
She had to admit, it was plenty of fun, Hermione would explain the lesson in great detail, and then they would spend the next half hour or so questioning each other.
Two hours later, they were done with Protective Runes, Opening Runes and Runes Across Mythology, only one lesson left and they would be finished revising everything that would be in the next Ancient Runes exam.
Right then a literal snake started crawling up the couch and onto their books.
"Er... this is my first time in the Slytherin Common Room, do snakes normally just randomly walk around?"
"'Course not." she replied, gently grabbing snake and let it Slytherin on to her shoulders as a Second Year came into view "They crawl."
"Will!" he yelled in relief, throwing all the effort she and Hermione made to keep everyone asleep down the toilet "Thank goodness, how many times do I have to tell you to stay in your glass?" the boy said farantically as Arlene gave him back his pet.
"You named your Snake 'Will'?" Hermione questioned.
"It's short for 'William Snakespear'." He told her.
Arlene giggled at the pun "You officially have my undying respect."
"What is going on here?" a voice that Arlene knew all too well asked.
She looked in the direction of the speaker and was greeted with the cursed image of Professor Snape standing in front of the House Head's Room.
"And what," he asked, his lips curling back "is Granger doing here? After curfew?"
Arlene cleared her throat "Well, you see Professor, there is a very simple explanation for all of this."
He gave her a look "Pray do tell."
Arlene swallowed "Well, you see..."she started, obvious that she had no excuse, she turned to Hermione and grabbed her hand "Run!"
"COME BACK HERE BLACK!" Snape yelled after them as they ran out of the Common room, Hermione grabbing the strap of her bag on the way out.
They didn't listen, they just kept running and running, even if it was safe, even if Snape would find them the next day anyway, even if Hermione had left some of her books back there, they didn't stop until they reached the Gryffindor tower.
Arlene's throat was cold and her side cramped, but it didn't matter as she started laughing.
Hermione, who was inarguably feeling the same, started laughing as well.
It was a wild day from start to finish, but it was about to become even wilder.
They entered the Common Room at six in the morning to find everybody standing around in their pyjamas, Professor McGonagall standing in the middle talking firmly.
"-I was just telling them all to get back to bed! My brother Ron here had a nightmare-"
"IT WASN'T A NIGHTMARE!" Ron yelled, causing Arlene to flinch "PROFESSOR, I WOKE UP, AND SIRIUS BLACK WAS STANDING OVER ME, HOLDING A KNIFE!"
They all stared at him.
"Don't be ridiculous, Weasley, how could he possibly have gotten through the portrait hole?"
"Ask him!" said Ron, at first Arlene thought he was pointing at them, but then she realized he was pointing at the portrait "Ask him if he saw!"
Glaring suspiciously at Ron, Professor McGonagall pushed the portrait back open and went outside "Sir Cadogan, did you just let a man enter Gryffindor Tower?"
"Certainly, good lady!" cried Sir Cadogan.
There was a stunned silence, both inside and outside the common room.
"You- you did?" said Professor McGonagall questioned "But the password!"
"He had 'em!" said Sir Cadogan proudly "Had the whole week's, my lady! Read 'em off a little piece of paper!"
Professor McGonagall pulled herself back through the portrait hole to face the stunned crowd, she was white as chalk.
"Which person," she said, her voice shaking, "which abysmally foolish person wrote down this week's passwords and left them lying around?"
There was utter silence, broken by the smallest of terrified squeaks. Neville, trembling from head to fluffy slippered toes, raised his hand slowly into the air.
Professor McGonagall had sent Arlene back with a letter to Snape, which had thankfully distracted him from giving her detention.
Since it was now seven in the morning, the girls were waking up, and they all demanded to know where Arlene was.
So, as they walked to the Great Hall, Arlene recalled the events of the previous night, Millicent Bulstrode on her left holding a tiny mirror as she applied her lipstick, and Daphne Greengrass on Pansy's right holding a tiny book and somehow managing to read it and still be aware of where she's going. All three girl girls occasionally speaking up whenever they had a question or a remark to make.
Once they entered the great hall they went over to Draco, who was sitting with Theo opposite Blaise.
Crabbe and Goyle sat far away from the tiny group, obviously still not over Draco ditching them at the game.
Daphne, still not taking her eyes off her book, sat next to Theo, who scooted over to make place for Pansy, who had decided to seat herself between him and Draco.
Millicent plopped down on the empty spot on Blaise's right, immediately sparking a conversation as Arlene sat on his left
She poured herself a cup of tea and turned around, resting her back on the table. Since the Hufflepuff table was right next to the Slytherin, so the two girls would often sit reversed and talk as though they were at the same table.
Arlene frowned when she noticed the Look on Sage's face "What?"
"That looked like a scene in Mean Girls." She simply said, taking a sip from her tea.
"No," Arlene said, shaking her head "I know what you're getting to, I am not becoming part of Pansy's posse."
"Sure." Sage simply said, obviously not convinced.
"I'm not!"
"I said okay."
Arlene shook her head in frustration, causing Sage to laugh "Anyway, heard about what happened?"
If Arlene hadn't come straight from the Tower to the Dungeons and immediately to the Great Hall, she would have spent the entire night thinking about it.
"Yeah, I was there." Arlene simply said, which made Sage spit out her tea.
"You- what? When?"
"Went to the Gryffindor after party, it was too loud for Hermione to study, so we stuck out and went to the Slytherin Common Room, spent a few hours studying, ran back because Snape saw us, found everyone standing around talking about Sirius Black and knives."
Sage shook her head in disbelief "Why is it," she said "that when something happens, you're always there?"
Before Arlene could answer, everybody went silent so she followed their gaze to see what they were looking at.
A red envelope had been dropped on the Gryffindor table, right in front of Neville Longbottom.