Chapter One
Cassidy Kamos
Harry stared at the book, it's gold cover shimmering in the light from the fireplace. A knock on the door rang through the room.
Harry jumped and ran to the door, no longer transfixed on the book. He turned the doorknob and pulled it open, to find a girl he had never seen before, her silky brown eyebrows raised with hope.
"Have you seen Hermione?" Asked the girl excitedly.
"I'm pretty sure she's in the library," Harry said a little uneasily. There was something about this girl, like he recognized her from somewhere...
"Thanks!" Harry watched as her waist-length ponytail flapped against her back as she ran towards the library.
Harry was about to start back into the bedroom when he saw a figure emerge from the shadows on the far side of the hallway; the direction the girl had walked in.
A wail of distress and pain came from where the dark figure had come. The outburst made Harry's eyes widen and he froze in his tracks. Then Harry heard a loud snap! from the same direction and something falling to the floor.
The dark figure seemed to drift off into the shadows from where it came, and as soon as it did, Harry ran as fast as he could to where all the noises had come from.
As he grew closer, he could make out the shape of the thing on the floor more clearly; it was a person.
As Harry neared the fallen person, he gasped in shock at what he saw. He recognized the silky brown hair; it was the girl!
Even though he barely knew her at all, he felt tears well up in his eyes when he reached her side. Harry held her head, or tried to, for when he placed his right hand under the girl's neck, he felt that it was broken when her head hung limp, her long hair collecting the dust from the floor.
Sticky red blood was drying in two streams coming from her nostrils, and a splintered bone was jutted out of the skin in her arm. Harry placed her hands under her head, so it looked like she was sleeping. Harry had to summon every bit of strength he had in him to keep from sobbing aloud.
Harry didn't know what to make of this. A girl had, a few seconds ago, been just about as peppy as peppy can get, and now she was...
gone.