Chapter No. 3

The next morning we woke to Mrs. Hover rapping on the door.

"Oi, you slugs, get up. It's nearly eleven, breakfast is almost finished!" Janey groaned from under a pile of pillow and blanket as I blearily blinked my eyes and nearly soiled myself to find Bimbo starring at me from around a milimeter away on his seat on my pillow.

"Lordy, Bimbo!" I said after a gasp. Janey responded with another muffled groan.

"Come on, you lazy pig, we've got more money to spend!" I yelled, wakened from Bimbos shock I shoved her off the bed with a crash. I began laughing.

"OHHH, HOLLY! YOU ARE THE MOST ANNOYING IDIOT EVER!" She yelled back, untangling herself from the bed sheets on the ground. I was laughing so much at how hard she had fallen I didn't notice her winding up with a pillow till I felt a resounding smack to the face. It was a hard one, too. I stopped short laughing and sat there for a moment in shock, before I got another blow to the back of my head.

"AND YOU'RE TALKING," I roared, lunging at her as she giggled hysterically. BOOM. The door flew open and we froze.

"I said, come downstairs for breaky, you baboons! Get a move on and quit making such a racket!" Mrs. Hover finished crossly from the door way with an angry glare and stormed off. There was a few seconds of silence before we started quietly giggling at Bimbo cowering inside Janey's slipper.

The day ahead was looking promising. Janey had some spending money too, and we were free to lounge around the ally all day as Mr. and Mrs. Hover we're taking a visit to some relatives who owned some shop. The sun was bright, I was looking quite good with some make-up usually used for school and special occasions, and the sound of the twenty one ump galleons in a change bag at your waste was probably enough to make anyone happy.

We stopped and got ice-cream a half hour or so after breakfast; Janey with butternut caramel and triple fudge and I with quadruple berry and bubblegum. As we sat and licked the delicious cones, we observed the people walking by.

A young, stylish wizard sauntered by with his head in a paper, a middle aged couple strolled with arms linked, a suspicious looking witch was skulking in the direction of the forbidden Knockturn Ally.

"Huh. You ever wondered what kind of shop's they've got down there, Holly?" Janey pondered, licking a drip of ice-cream from her fingers.

"Well, I've heard rumours from Ritchy and his friends." I replied thoughtfully.

"Like what?"

"Apparently there's all sorts of queer places down there. Creepy ones. Like, Ritchys friend Todd told me there's this one place that shrinks heads and does voodoo and stuff on people for a fee, and another that sells really rare and dangerous old Dark Arts thingys. Apparently they snuck down there during school shopping one time." I answered her.

"Hmm. You know, I've never been down there… neither have you, right?" Janey asked. Though her look was hesitant, I knew where this was headed.

"Well, no…"

"…You want to?" She asked, peeking up from under her bowed head. Before asking she had become incredibly interested in her fingernails.

"Alright, let's go, you nut. But if something happens, Janey, it was completely your idea." But really, I was quite curious as to what it was like down there, and it would be impressive to say we'd been. Plus as long as we kept our mouths shut and stayed reasonably out of trouble, no parents whatsoever would have to hear about it.

She grinned at me."Finish your ice-cream. What do you reckon we find Snape, or Gild down there, Holly?" Janey giggled. We both shared a disliking for Snape, our potions master at Hogwarts. Gild was a slimeball Slytherin who loved to pick fights with other houses in our year. He and his twit of a sidekick, Olby Nealson, had once attempted to hit on me and Janey to impress his fellow Slytherins in our third year. Although he is quite attractive, we rejected him with venom and the knowledge he had unfairly caused a friend of ours a months detentions. Now he tries to embarrass us as we had him. It's usually to no avail.

I laughed and agreed as we exited the yard of the ice-cream shop. We began making our way through Diagon Ally and I tucked my change bag further under my robes and told Janey to do the same. You never knew what could happen in such an apparently shady place.

As we passed under an over cross bridge between two buildings, things began to get sketchy fast. An old warlock rushed out of the shadows with a wide, horrible grin to offer us suspicious looking pendants that would apparently protect us from vampires and werewolves alike. We politely refused, began walking faster and ignored him as he called after us.

Continuing on, we attempted to decide which shop to visit, getting occasionally distracted. Tall, suspiciously pale and Romanian looking men and intimidating, harpy like woman lurked and leered as we passed. Some people would stare after us for as long as they seemed able to. We were just outside an odd looking potions shop when a stranger really caught my attention.

He was wearing a long, dark robe with his hood partially up. Standing about half a dozen feet away, his eyes captured my gaze with the iciest blue I have ever seen. He had short, dark messy hair and his jaw-line was dotted with stubble. He was tall and seemed quite young, and oddly, he was almost… familiar. Something about his stare intimidated me to the point of feeling an instinct to run. Suddenly, he began to walk towards us with a half grin creeping onto his face. I feared this man. I had absolutely no idea why, but I knew he was no good for me, I felt like he was dangerous. And I was so scared. Why were these feelings so intense? I felt the insane notion to flee or provide some sort of defence growing and growing in my stomach.

"Janey," I whispered, tugging her sleeve and not taking my eyes of the man. "Janey I think we should go. I think we should get somewhere else, now. Janey, c'mon!"

"What?" She replied, slightly annoyed as she looked up from the window poster she had been reading. "Who's that guy, Holly?"

"I don't know but I think we should leave," I began pulling on her as he neared.

"But we haven't even gotten into a shop yet-"

"Excuse me, ladies…" I was gripped by fear as the man came ever closer, pulling his wand out of his robes with a horrible look in his eyes.

"JANEY HOVER! What're you doing in ever a shady place?" It was Lee Jordan, thank goodness. He came out of the potions shop tucking a brown paper bag into his rucksack. Two red heads busied with another bags contents followed him out shortly.

"Lee! I could ask you the same question. Should I be suspicious of a plan to poison me?" Janey replied with a grin and a glance at the sign of the shop. I turned to check on the position of this man, even though I felt a huge shot of relief at the boys showing up. But he had gone… I looked down the streets and craned my neck to check the crowd, and caught a glance of his huge cloak swimming away. It was soon either gone or blended in with the rest of the dark cloaks in the ally. I still felt uneasy.

"Oi, Holly, nice to see you. Glad you're not distracted by anything so you can give me a proper hello."

I turned back around quickly, still extremely spooked. Lee smiled and held out his hand.

"I believe you gals know these two, Fred and George-" After shaking my hand (I was sure it was clammy. Bless him for not making a joke of it.) Lee turned to introduce us to the twins. They were still slightly distracted by their bag, muttering quickly with looks of interest on their faces.

"Fred, George-" Lee repeated, smacking one over the head lightly. "Be gentlemen, you goons." I glanced around the street again as they said hello to Janey, then snapped back as one offered their hand.

"You alright?" He said with a slight grin.

"Oh, yeah, fine… um, Holly." I said.

"Fred." He replied. "Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Catten."

"Oh… How did you already know my name?" I asked as George took my hand in turn.

"Of course we know who you are. Holly Catten, youngest beater Ravenclaw's seen yet." George replied.

"We didn't get the chance to properly face you last year due to unlucky events, but we've seen some of your other games anyways. You're really quite good." Fred said.

"Yeah, you know you're something impressive if the mighty Weasley twins are talking about your game." Lee said with a wink. I blushed and replied,

"Well, it's not like you three are really under the radar either. Extremely authentic and amusing commentator, best beating team Gryffindors have seen for a long time. Not to mention all those fireworks that Filch was sent to the hospital wing by last year… those got you three pretty recognizable in my mind." I grinned slightly. Fred smiled back, glancing into my eyes with a bit of pride, if I wasn't mistaken.

"Well, y'know, we do what we can."

"Filch was basically asking for it," George added.

"Yeah, just filling orders, really." Lee said with a grin.

"So, I'm assuming you lot have been around here enough to know a good shop or two?" Janey asked them.

"Ah, never assume, or you could make-" George began.

"But yes, I believe we have. Lee… what do you say we take these ladies down to Loppes?" Fred cut George off, glancing around with a raised eyebrow.

"I dunno, Fred… Do you think they can" -Lee too raised an eyebrow towards us- "handle it?" Janey and I exchanged very sceptical looks as they began to grin mischievously.

"What's Loppes?" I questioned.

"It's really something, ladies. Quite a frightening shop." George said. "Some of the things they've got in there could make you scream."

"And he's not kidding." Fred added with a serious look. "Poor Lee nearly broke the windows."

"Oh, shut-up, I wasn't the one whimpering." Lee said and punched Fred in the arm as a grin blew over the red headed face.

"Touchy, touchy," Fred teased as he rubbed where he had been punched. "Lee's all nervy. Ohh, George, wonder why eh-"

"Right, so, we taking them or not?" Lee said drastically as he gave Fred another dirty look.

"I dunno, do you think you're up for it, girls?" George said, biting his lip in false worry.

"Alright, where's this Loppes." I said, taking Janey's arm. I saw a flash of worry cross her face as we began walking.

"So, er, what kind of stuff's in there anyways, boys?" Janey asked. I could tell she was trying her hardest to sound as though she really didn't care. George and Lee were much too observant for her though. I knew they realized she was nervous as they shared another mischievous glance.

"CRAZY things, Janey, thing's you wouldn't believe. Terribly frightening things… thing's that you only find in your worst nightmares!" George said, attempting a scary voice.

"Oh, come off it." Janey replied with a frown. I couldn't help but grin.

"How far down this creepy ally have we got to go to get there?" I asked.

"Well," Fred replied, "It's a right creepy place, so it's pretty deep into the creepiness of Knockturn of course. You nervy yet, Catten?"

" 'Course not." I replied smiling confidently.

" 'Course not." Fred repeated, sauntering beside us.

We walked for a few more minutes before the guys pulled us into a small back ally between to bigger buildings. In the shadows was a grungy looking little shop with a painted, greasy sign reading "Loppes- get what you shouldn't find." Janey looked up at me nervously.

"Quit being a baby." I whispered.

"I'm not! But… what if there's like, y'know, stuff that's… dangerous, or something, in there?"

"They wouldn't take us if it was really that much of a risk, Janey…" But the notion Janey brought up was enough to finally get me going slightly. They wouldn't, would they? I mean, although it wasn't any secret they were risk takers, they wouldn't lead a couple of girls somewhere like this when it might be… dangerous. Creepy, of course, but surely not dangerous.

"Well, ladies? You ready?" Fred turned to look at us as we stopped a few feet away from the dark door. Janey, still hooked to my arm, looked at me with a high dose of hesitation.

"Nah, bet you they're too chicken. Not that I blame them, scary shop, I guess. Whatever, let's go then." George said.

"Shame, thought you girls were tougher than that." Lee added. "I guess there's no thrills with you two."

"Oh, stuff it." I said brusquely even though I could tell they were egging us on. With Janey still hooked on my arm, I began marching towards the shop as best I could.

"Holly, Holly wait- wait! Holly, what if we get like a curse on us or something? What if someone poisons us?"

"Oh shush Janey! It can't be that bad, they were probably completely over exaggerating. And if they weren't," I continued before the boys caught up to us. "They only said all that to get us in here and act the brave part! If it's really that scary, you can cling to Lee." I finished in a whisper. Janey remained silent as Fred pushed open the creaky door and the bell over it jingled eerily.

It was very dark, and I felt Janey begin to shiver. She only shook when she was really nervous.

Suddenly, a huge, black, ferocious looking cat skidded out in front of us, hissing like a steam kettle. Janey screamed and it started yowling, its hackles huge and back arched as high as it could. Out of nowhere its claws appeared and its stance changed into that of one for hunting, and a huge, clawed cat like that is not one you want jumping on you. I was about to hide behind the boys, but out of nowhere a huge boot appeared and kicked the cat into/under a shelf to our right. The shelf wobbled and a jar fell and broke. Before I could find who the boot was connected to, I was distracted by Fred's cry of "Bloody hell, those are flesh-eating termites!"

"Ahg!" I yelled as one particularly large bug scuttled towards me, beginning the lead of a confused but hungry looking swarm. I stomped on it quickly and heard a huge, deep voice utter a spell before they all became slightly blue and froze, immobile. I think Janey either nearly fainted or did, because she toppled backwards after a second or so of silence. Ironically, Lee caught her.

"Perkins tries to bother you lot again, just give 'er a good kick." Said the huge bloke who had cast the spell and sent Perkins spiralling. "I'll be cleaning these bug's up if y'need any fin'." I looked up at him in awe. His voice was so deep it was almost hard to understand. He was extremely tall and buff, with a large browny-black beard. He had that look about him of one who could take on basically anything, and was wearing overall's over a stained wife-beater and huge heavy-duty boots. His hair was tied back in a ponytail and one of his eyebrows was pierced jaggedly with what looked like a splinter of bone.

"Th-thanks for that," George said. "We're just going to look around for a bit, see if we can, er, find something."

"Right." The man said gruffly, giving us an intimidating look.

"C'mon," Fred murmured, and we all followed him cautiously around a line of shelves. Janey was still quite close to Lee, and I had my suspicions that the whole faint had been exaggerated, if not made up. I grinned slightly at the thought and made a mental note to ask her.

I began examining the shelves with caution. We had gone the opposite direction of where the termites had been, but apparently there was no sectioning in the shop. Random jars, cages and boxes that rattled and were full of odd and ghastly looking critters were littered among all sorts of books and artefacts. I knew not to touch anything, and held back Janey's hand as it reached for a beautiful yet ominous looking broach with a dark opal in the middle.

"Doing things like that, Janey, is what might get you cursed or poisoned." Her eyes widened with realization and her hand snapped back to her side.

A blood-curdling scream pierced the air as a bird with huge eyes, almost all black apart from the whites, a crimson, bloodshot red. It beat its wings against a cage overhead us. Grey-black feathers littered the air as Fred and I scrambled out from under where the cage was swinging, and another shriek filled the shop. It was the bird screaming. It settled back down quietly, and I wondered why it had started up in the first place.

"Some'n's got a good spotuh bad luck runnin' te'wards em." We heard the shop keeper say somewhere. This place really was something else. We continued down the isle, mostly silent as we gazed at the horrible wonders the shop had to hold.

I found myself staring into an oddly black mirror, and it was so interesting. I saw such queer things flickering in its depths… Something's I knew, some I had no idea, and some that were oddly familiar. I saw things that I loved, but then morphed into things that shocked me. There were flames and spirals of light that I knew had to be spells, and all of these things were whirled together in a manor that made them seem completely logical by my viewpoint but impossible to describe. I saw my family… and my friends… Lou was there, Janey too. My brothers and oddly Fred Weasley. I saw people I didn't know at all, and some who were simply vague to memory.

Suddenly, a face jumped out largely and clearly from my reflection, as though it were right in front of me. It had truly menacing, pale, icy blue eyes, and an evil mouth. The hollow cheeks were taut with an odd, desiring look; and even though the stubble was a short beard and the hair was a longer messy, I recognized the face and the odd familiarity it held. It was the man from the ally. I felt the same unexplainable fear rise in me and began to panic, before an even more frightening face began to take his place, slowly morphing into someone almost entirely different yet all the more so terrible.

It had the palest of features, with fiery snake-like eyes and thin, taunting lips. Its nostrils were slit and there wasn't a single hair on his skin, which was almost scalene. I saw its muscle's contract in a horrible and faint smile, and its eyebrows lower in ruthless mirth. I was completely shocked, even more panicked than I had been before. The faces danced in my plain eyesight and my minds eye, I soon couldn't tell which was which, and the panic grew and grew although I didn't even know whose faces these were! It was unbearable; horrible scenarios filled my terrified thoughts and I was becoming more and more desperate for whatever the hell was happening to end, how had this even begun?

I saw these men and my family and everyone I cared for tangled together with masked individuals who I couldn't even begin to ponder. Then I saw Lou, his eyes were ferocious, slightly desperate. He was panting as he keeled on the floor, face slightly contorted with pain. I saw him speak words that I couldn't here, but I knew their gravity. There were flashes of green light, red light, white light, silver light, horrible, gruesome colors that I didn't know how to describe, and then the worst bit came.

There was blood. I saw Phil sitting and crying in a small pool of it. I saw my father lying in a twisted, broken heap. Tammy lay with a blank stare coming from oddly pale and distant hazel eyes. I saw my mother screaming, my Aunt Percy weeping and bruised, and Ritchy holding his wand with a clouded, blank stare. I was faintly aware of background noise, it sounded kind of crazy, but it couldn't divide my petrified attention from the positively horrible scenes that filled my head. All of a sudden I felt a sharp pain to my temple.

A searing mark of pain on my head made me open my eyes to find Janey an inch away from my face.

"Ooo," I moaned and clutched to the spot on my temple that throbbed agonizingly. "Bloody hell… Cripes, Janey, what happened? Did… Did you see my brothers, Janey? Blimey! Is that man back here, the one from the ally?" I asked her worried face and sat up. I began to panic again, but noticed the boys all held odd expressions too, almost scared. The shop keeper was leaning on a shelf behind them.

"Er, well… The shop keeper, Artemis, sort of had to hit you." Janey replied, biting her lip. I noticed a twisted, odd looking and faintly purple piece of wood in the shop keepers hand now.

"What… why?" I questioned, perplexed. Why in the name of Merlin would some creepy shop keeper hit me over the head? And get away with it as he seemed to be, for that matter. Where was everyone I had just seen? Where they alright? I gasped and felt my stomach tighten as the cogs started turning in my head. Like a puzzle piece falling into place I remembered the mirror. I cursed quietly to myself and began rubbing my head again as I remembered that we were in a Dark Arts shop. With a bitingly sarcastic conscience I noted that that might possibly explain my recent experience.

"Holly, you were looking into this mirror and you started acting really… weird. It was like you couldn't hear us, or even feel us, actually. You had the most terrified look on your face. We were trying to get your attention and then you started hyperventilating, so we raised our voices a tad and poked at you. Nothing worked, we didn't know what to do, and the shop keeper came over and, well…" She trailed off.

"Yeh were lookin' intah Vandalins Mirror. I really oughter get a cover fer that or somthin'. It get's inter yer head. Yer react'n like tha' really ain't too surprisen', a few 'aff before yeah. It's got a backfired curse on ih, n' the only way yeah can get outta it is this here wand. Gotta get some'n to slug yer o'er the head with it." Artemis the Shop Keeper continued. "Sorry bout any bruise. Coulda been worse." He said gruffly as he took the mirror down and carried it back somewhere.

Janey stood and pulled me up. She looked at me with heavy concern and asked,

"Holly, what did you see?"

"Um… some stuff about my family... And, well, they weren't really very nice things…" I answered, looking down.

"Well, we gathered that much." George said quietly with a worried look on his face.

"Listen… It was just, really bad. Like, my worst nightmare." After a slight pause, "I'd rather not talk about it just yet." I replied quietly, still not making eye contact.

"No worries." Fred said calmly. "What d'you lot say we got get some lunch?"

"Yeah," I replied, finally looking up, pleased at the change of topic. "That sounds great."

We exited the shop and I murmured a thanks to Artemis the Shop Keeper. Although George and Lee still seemed a bit spooked, Fred and Janey tried to keep light conversation going until we reached Diagon Ally again. The whole way back through Knockturn Ally I couldn't help but check over my shoulders suspiciously every few minutes. That stupid mirror had me more paranoid than I was before.

We reached a restaurant and sat at an outside table, and as we waited for our food the mood lightened quickly and we were soon enjoying the talk and laughing at silly antics that weren't just on the boy's behalf. Me and Janey did an impression of Marcus Gild and company that was quite ridiculous, and George had a time chucking sopping spit balls onto the umbrella of the table beside us.

"What the bloody hell was that, Martha?" One of the old witch's sitting there exclaimed to her elderly friend.

"Owl shit," The other replied with surprising bluntness. This caused Janey and I to snort into our drinks.

As our meals quickly disappeared, departure was upon us.

"So, I guess you weren't lying about that lunch date then, Lee." Janey said, smiling.

"Course not, what d'you take me for?" He replied, scarfing down the last of some spaghetti. "I've got to run though, supposed to be meeting my parents in fifteen minutes... Nice hanging with you ladies." He gave Fred some money to pay his bill with and pulled out of his chair. "See you lot around, then." I could have swore I saw a small wink in Janey's direction, and with that he left.

"Huh, I guess we've got to scarper too, George…" Fred said, looking at his watch. "We were supposed meet mum twenty minutes ago."

"She's going to be ticked." George replied. "Better get to the hanging before it gets bloody."

"Never heard that expression before." I said.

"Yeah, well, it hold's too true with our dear mother." George replied. "Thanks for an interesting afternoon, ladies. See you at school."

"Yeah," Fred added, lazily calling a waiter over to split the bill. "Try to stay out of trouble."

They paid and left with waves and grins, and as it was now two thirty, Janey and I decided to spend a bit more money and call it a day.

We went into Burgundy Petals, the beauty shop, and bought some new make up. We also stopped in the less visited new and used book store, Emeralds, which had arguably better deals and variety than Flourish and Blotts. You could get an amazing novel for five knuts here, if you put in the effort of finding it. Mr. and Mrs. Emerald, the elderly shop keepers, were as pleasant as could be. To finish for the evening, I dragged Janey into the Quiditch shop to buy a new Scotland Sabres poster. They were my favourite team.

We made our way back to the inn and discovered Janey's dad sitting by the main room's fire. Bimbo was curled into a ball on Mr. Hover's stomach. Stroking Bimbo sleepily with his eyes closed, Mr. Hover didn't notice us as we snuck past them, giggling up to our room.

As we unpacked, examined and tested our new buy's, I remembered my planned interrogation about Lee.

"Right," I said, turning from the mirror I had used to apply my nice new liquid-liner to one eye.

"What was us with that fainting fit in the shop?"

Janey began to go red as she flipped through a book she had bought at Emeralds.

"You were so faking it for Lee!" I chided, grinning at her.

"Come off it, Holly, even I'm not that tactless!" She exclaimed, looking up.

I raised a disbelieving eyebrow.

"Well, I might have been slightly over dramatic…"

The eyebrow got a bit more height.

"Oh, alright Holly, here-" She gave up, shutting the book with a snap. "I was right in shock from that freakish cat and those horrible bugs, so I was woozy! Not fainting woozy, but that's not what they think. Besides, it was more of a stumble, you know. Not a full fledged faint." She explained, a mischievous grin sliding onto her face.

"Oh Janey, you dog, I can't believe some of the stuff you get away with, honestly! But I was right again, they only wanted us in there to play the hero act." I said, matching her grin.

"Well… they weren't really over exaggerating, were they though, Holly…" The grin was slowly fading from her face. "Holly, I'm sorry but I've got to ask again… What the hell did you see in that mirror?"

My smile disappeared and I felt my eyebrows knit together in anxiety. I decided to tell Janey. She was going to find out sooner or later, being my best friend and all. Now the whole scenario was just like a horrible nightmare past. I still couldn't help but wonder who that man was, though. I now had my suspicions about the second, the one who looked so snake like.

"Well… at first, it was weird. Kind of just random things bobbing around, some I knew and some I didn't. Then I started seeing all these people… some I didn't know, some who were just sort of familiar, like I'd seen them in the hallways at school once or something. And then everyone I really cared about, all my family, you, some others. Then, out of nowhere, that creepy guy from the ally loomed out at me, that one who was trying to get to us till Lee called you? Yeah… Then his face turned into someone else's… I think it might have been You-Know-Who's face it turned to." At this Janey's face grew even more worried. "But that wasn't the worst bit, I don't think it's why I was scared like you said. After that, I saw Lou. He was tied on the floor, and then he said something, and then…" I felt my throat contort, like I was going to start crying or something. I hated that stupid mirror for putting that stuff in my head. I just told myself it wasn't real, it was just a curse, it was over now. Didn't happen. Didn't matter. "Everyone I love, everyone I saw before was in this crazy mess with You-Know-Who and the ally guy and all these masked people, I think they might have been Death Eater's. There were all these flashes of light, like spells, and then… then everyone looked horrible. Or dead. My mum was screaming, Phil was sitting in a pool of blood… it was like my worst nightmare. Maybe that's what the mirror get's at. Your worst nightmares. Kinda like a boggart." I finished softly.

"Oh, Holly…" Janey said sympathetically. "That's horrible." She came over and placed a comforting hand on my shoulder. "But your right, just think of it as a bad dream… But, if it was a nightmare to you, you must know that man in the ally." She said curiously.

"No, I have absolutely no idea who that man is, but he's been scaring the breath out of me since I saw him in Knockturn. It's weird. I mean, You-Know-Who was in there as well, but I've always been kind of frightened he'd come after my family if he were to return or something..."

"Mm." Janey replied thoughtfully. "Well, I doubt there's any use dwelling on it. The shop-keeper didn't say the mirror was dangerous or anything, so who knows."

I agreed and we continued to chat until dinner, the mood slowly lightening. Then, after a few games of wizard chess between Janey, her parents and I, it was time to get to sleep in preparation for a busy school shopping day.

The following sunlit hours were pretty uneventful. We woke around nine and were out by ten thirty with Janey's mum. I decided to take Bimbo along, and Janey tucked Tim into her pocket, too.

We spent the morning picking up books and potion's ingredients, and Bimbo wasn't a bother at all. He simply sat on my shoulder, occasionally scampering down to lay and be pet in my arms. Once or twice I let him down for a bathroom break, but otherwise he was perfect. Until after lunch, that is. We were just finishing at the apothecary when the door jingled and Bimbo began to hiss and spit quietly, pawing my shoulder with unease.

Waltzing in was none other than Gild. His mother, who resembled him with dark brown hair, high cheek bones and almond shaped eyes, continued towards the clerks counter. But Gild, seeing Janey and I were alone, came over to us. Mrs. Hover was somewhere else in the store.

"You're such a brilliant ferret, Bimbo." I said, scratching his ears to calm him as I faced Gild with a contemptuous stare.

"What the hell kind of name is Bimbo, Catten? Ugly little rat… not surprising you keep it for a pet." Gild smirked.

"I'm afraid you must have mistaken him as one of those things you need for friends, because I'd never be caught dead near something resembling you so much." He stared back venomously. I always got to him, I wasn't surprised that he might be getting a tad frustrated.

"What the hell do you want, Gild?" Janey asked him in an annoyed tone.

"Just in here to buy some potion mixings, you know. Pick up the usual for school, see what else I can get away with." He replied as he picked up a small jar of a metallic powdered black dust, looking at it with interest.

"Then why'd you come over here to bother us." I demanded with impatience.

"Oh, no reason really… Just wanted to see how you were holding out." He answered, looking up halfway with a faint grin, as though he was anticipating a reaction.

"What are you on about now?" Janey asked. I knew we were thinking the same thing, suspicious of some sort of obnoxious plot to embarrass or annoy us.

"Nothing." He replied, oddly decisive. I was just about to question him again when his mother called him over. Janey and I went back to our previous conversation as he went.

After another few minutes, we left the shop with Mrs. Hover to get new school robes and a few last mismatched items for different optional classes we were taking.

By the time we were done and back at the inn, it was nearly five. Janey and I packed our things and ate dinner. We were into bed by nine thirty, tired from such a long and demanding shopping day. It was just as well since we had to catch the train tomorrow. I was excited to return to Hogwarts, as was Janey. We couldn't help but talk about the coming year for an hour or so before dropping off to sleep, and I caught myself thinking of the Weasley twins as I drifted into unconsciousness.