I was bored, so I decided to work on another chapter. And Celi, thanks for pointing out the thing about Melody. I fixed it; she is now a Gryffindor. This is just kind of a random chapter, explaining a few things and giving more insight into the characters.

Chapter 8 Breakfast

Albus' POV

"Albus Potter, will you please get this cat off of me?" Erik called across the room. Lifting his head from his pillow, Albus reached to the table beside the bed for his glasses. When he could see, he looked over to Erik's bed and saw that the cat was lying on Erik's stomach. Erik was trying to move, but every time he did, the cat would hiss at him. Albus laughed but made no move to help the older boy.

"Albus!" Erik called louder. "Fine, don't get up." He decided to change tactics and yelled for Emmett instead. "Emmett! Come get your stupid cat!"

"You don't have to talk so loud!" James' muffled voice came from under his pillow. "It's hard for a bloke to get any sleep with all this noise."

Albus glanced to where Emmett lay on the bed beside his. The dark skinned boy was dead to the world. The only way to wake Emmett up was to shake him. Albus knew this from experience because he had done it before to keep Emmett from being late to class more than once.

Erik's complaints didn't stop, and now that they were joined by James', Albus knew he wasn't going to get much sleep if he didn't get the cat. So he got up. Erik was still trying to move the cat. He tried to turn over, but the cat dug its claws into his shirt. Albus reached down and picked up the protesting cat easily. Once in his arms, the cat quieted.

"Was that really so hard?" Albus asked, going to sit on his bed with it in his arms.

"Yes!" Erik complained. "That thing tried to claw me to death."

"Don't call him a thing," Albus was affronted. This was met by a muttered, "whatever," from Erik. He had managed to turn over now that the cat was gone and had fallen back asleep. Checking the clock, Albus sighed. It was still dark out, and this was way too early to be awake. But once he had woken up, he couldn't get back to sleep.

Hearing a sound from the table beside his bed, Albus turned to look. The noise Erik made had bothered more than just James and himself. Albus' owl was also stirring. Putting down the cat, he went over to comfort the owl.

"Loki, it's okay," he assured her. "Shush girl." Loki was anxious to get out of her cage. Albus hadn't let her out as much since they had gotten to Hogwarts; he had been too distracted with other things. But now he saw that Loki was hungry and ready to hunt. Albus quietly unlocked her cage and pulled the small door open. Smiling at his bird, he stepped back as she climbed out.

Loki had belonged to Albus for two years and the two almost always got along, but there were rules to be observed. When she was in a mood, the spotted owl could be temperamental. She deserved the name he had given her, for she was a trickster at heart. Right now, Albus could tell that if she didn't get food soon, his bird would be in a mood. He went to the window and opened it to let her out. She hopped from the desk to the sill and spread her wings. Then, she soared out of the widow across the courtyard.

Watching her fly across the grounds, Albus longed to have his broom with him so he could fly too. He wanted to feel the wind sail past him as he flew higher and gained speed. Shaking his head, he cleared these thoughts from his mind. Being able to fly was all well and good, but he had more important things to do than dream.

For some reason, Albus couldn't help these fantasies that popped into his head at the oddest moments. He was constantly being called a dreamer by his family and teachers. He saw nothing wrong with being a dreamer, but they said it as if it were a bad thing. All except Uncle George. His uncle encouraged him to dream. George told Al that when he and his twin brother Fred were little, they had dreamed of owning a joke shop, a shop designed especially to make people laugh. They had succeeded and so could he, but for now, he resigned himself to schoolwork and other more mundane things.

After all of this thinking, Albus found he was quite hungry. He dressed in his school robes and let himself quietly out of his room. He started to close the door but was distracted by a meow from the cat. He turned to see the little black animal staring up at him.

"All right, you can come too," Albus told the cat. He realized that saying this was unnecessary because the cat would have followed him anyway. It had a disconcerting tendency to show up at the most random times.

The cat trailed no more than a few steps behind him as he made his way to the Great Hall. He saw only one student in the Gryffindor common room. The boy was scribbling madly, obviously trying to finish a late essay. He continued past the boy and slipped out of the portrait hole. The corridors were deserted this time of day. It wasn't until he made it to the great hall that he began to see signs of life.

Albus had never been to the great hall this early. Neither had he seen this few people there. There were less than a dozen people scattered throughout the room. Leaning against the wall, he studied the people seated at the four tables. At each of the areas where students were sitting, the table was covered in food. It amazed Albus how house elf magic worked.

The Gryffindor table had only one student seated at it, his cousin Rose. At first glance, Rose appeared to be studying the book propped on the table in front of her. Watching her, Albus noticed that every few minutes, she dropped the pretence and sent glares across the room to the Slytherin table. Her glares were aimed directly at the Malfoy boy. What she didn't notice was that when she looked down, he would send them back. They continued this behavior as Albus watched. He would have found it comical if he hadn't disliked Malfoy so much.

Unhitching himself from the wall, Albus went to sit down beside his cousin. "Hey, Rosie," he said. As he sat down, more food appeared in front of him.

She looked up from her textbook. "You of all people should know better than to call me that." He should, but he couldn't resist. Once when they were little, Rose had gotten mad at him for saying that and he had ended up in a pond. But Rose hadn't touched him. Her parents were so proud that her magic was beginning to show itself that she hadn't been punished.

"So what's the deal with you and Malfoy?" he asked reaching for a plate and piling it high with food.

"He's annoying."

Albus frowned. "But you've only met him three times," he pointed out through a mouthful of food.

Rose glared at Albus. She was the logical one, and she did not appreciate her cousin pointing out flaws in her logic. "That's all it takes. Don't pretend like you don't agree, Al."

"Malfoy is bad news," he agreed. "You know what, I don't really want to know what he did that bothers you so much. But if he does it again, tell me. I'll take care of it."

"Nice of you to be all protective Al, but I don't need your protection." Albus wanted to protest, but he knew Rose well enough to realize that protesting would get him nowhere. She was probably right after all. If it came to a magical fight, she would do better than Albus would, and if it was a physical one, she knew how to throw a punch as well as any boy.

When he looked back at her, he realized that Rose was no longer paying attention. Her gaze was focused on the ground beside him. Turning to see what she was looking at, Albus saw his cat. "When did the cat get here?" Rose asked.

"He's been here the whole time," Albus told her. "He follows me around."

"Really?" Rose asked. "Why does it follow you around? Why not Emmett?"

"First of all, he is not an it," Albus told her. "And he follows Emmett around sometimes too."

"Well, does he have a name?" Rose emphasized the word to make fun of her cousin.

"No, actually, he doesn't." Albus and Emmett could not agree on a name for him, so they continued to call him the cat.

"How about Blackie?" Rose suggested.

Albus gave her an incredulous look. "You're not serious, are you?"

"Okay then, how about Shadow? You said he follows you around. He is black, so he blends in like a shadow."

"That's not much better than Blackie," Albus told her. The cat was a boy after all, and it didn't need a sissy name.

"I'm trying to help you, Al. If you don't want my ideas then don't ask for them." He was about to tell her he hadn't asked for them, when he saw something that distracted him. He saw the ghost of the girl from Ravenclaw. She wasn't crying the way she had been when he had last seen her. Instead, the ghost was staring vacantly into space as she floated over the Great Hall.

"What's wrong?" Rose asked, interrupting his train of thought. "You look like you just saw a ghost."

Albus raised his eyebrows. "That's because I did," he told her. He motioned to the ghost that was still staring into space.

"It's just a figure of speech, Al," she snapped.

"A muggle figure of speech," retorted Albus. Rose used muggle sayings every now and then; it was something she had picked up from her mother.

Rose was not about to be deterred so easily. "What's wrong, Albus?" she repeated.

"It's nothing," he told her.

"Don't give me that load of poppycock, Albus Severus Potter," Rose said. "Tell me what's bothering you."

"You sound like my mom when you say that," was all he said.

"Hello, Albus. Rose," they looked up to see their cousin Fred. He sat down beside them, and reached across Albus for a plate of food. Albus looked down at his own food which had begun to grow cold.

"Hello Fred," Rose replied. Fred was their Uncle George and Aunt Angelina's son. He was a third year, and Rose and Albus didn't see much of him.

The room began to fill up with people who gathered around the tables with their plates. Albus and Fred struck up a conversation as Rose went back to studying. Albus thought it was funny that she had forgotten all about Scorpius now. When breakfast was almost over, Albus thought he was going to get away without an interrogation. Just as he started to get up, Rose leaned over to him and said, "I still expect you to tell me exactly what is bothering you."

Oh, great. He sighed. Now he had to explain to her about the insane ghost that warned him someone was coming. He wondered if someone really was coming or if the ghost was just traumatized and freaking out. There was one way to find out, and he was going to need Rose's help to do it.