Hogwarts a History – The eyes have halls
Chapter 05 – Squirrels, squirrels!
…
Some days it hardly paid to get out of bed. This is why cats sleep the majority of the day, and Mrs. Norris was no exception. Getting up meant you had to deal with people, and as a rule Mrs. Norris hated people; which was not unusual for her species, most of whom merely tolerated people for their utility not unlike a cow or a horse.
(Moo, you filthy beast. Good, not let's see the cow do it.)
No, people were not a thing she liked, which is what made Argus Filch so tolerable to her. He didn't like people either and he wasn't afraid to express that in his various ways. It was the primary reason they managed to function as a unit, despite him being otherwise useless.
This night had been rough for the working girl, very much a 'why did I get out of bed' sort of shift. Apart from scaring a bunch of young ones up to their dorms near curfew, she hadn't bagged a single catch all night. Though that didn't mean there wasn't a catch to bag.
She was following a trail; the scent had a hint of familiarity to it. That familiarity included purple daffodils and a tap-dancing whale, which she wasn't really sure what to do with, so she tried to ignore it. Focus; focus on the trail, that was the key.
She had to focus too; it wasn't a good trail. Most trails she had to follow were a relatively straight line, point a to point q, all along a single axis (the floor) with minimal variation.
This trail took a slightly different approach. Rather than go point to point along a single axis, a to q and so on, this one seemed to spread out over several axis with numerous trails shooting out from a single point to reach x, also zed, epsilon, and pi.
Most of them turned out to be false trails which required a lot of backtracking; annoying, since many of them also required a lot of climbing. Some should be told it is very rude to break the laws of gravity so flagrantly, just, rude.
She was in a very poor mood and in dire need of a lie down as she padded the halls, but her determination and overall surliness kept her going. She would find whatever it was that left this trail, and when she did, she'd take their legs off so they never did it again.
Mewing and growling to herself distractedly, she passed by one of the innumerable suits of armor that lined the halls of Hogwarts. Something tugged at her paw which brought her back to the present just in time to leap out of the way as the armor went crashing to the floor.
Heart racing like a juiced-up mouse, Mrs. Norris stared at the fallen metal shell. That had almost hit her.
Not that this was the first attempt on her life. Better tries had taken lives one through three, but the point still stood; someone had just tried to kill and or maim her. The nerve!
Her hackles rose when a wave of verminous chittering swept through the hall. Gone as quickly as it was heard, the feline scoured the hall for a source, but found nothing.
Hogwarts had no shortage of vermin; she'd hunted more than a few in her day, but that sound; the sheer quantity. It would have taken every buck-toothed plague farm in the castle all together to make such a racket, and she knew that was impossible.
The house quarrels were a polite disagreement between gentleman, compared with the factioning that went on among the lower creatures.
With no sign of a culprit coming forth to surrender, she found the trail again and continued the hunt. She must be getting close. Attempted assassination didn't happen when you were getting cold. She must have been hot; yes, she could feel it, hot, hot, HOT!
"MROW!"
With no warning, the floor burned like red hot coals and Mrs. Norris went jumping like a cat on a hot tin roof. With remarkable luck, she got up on a pedestal that did not sizzle when she touched it and took a moment to observe her predicament while her paws cooled.
The floor was divided like a checkerboard, one set heated, one set not, switch at measurable intervals. She never would have noticed being so close to the floor.
With a few moments observation she quickly bounded through the simple obstacle. Barely setting paw to unheated floor, it happened again, washing over her, the chittering; but this time she caught a break, a flash of bushy tail.
Squirrels, the tree rodents. How annoying. Squirrels were one of the few creatures that could scale a tree faster than a cat, and you can be sure the cat resented that fact. It wasn't bad enough they were basically rats with round heads and too much hair on their butts; no, they had to be showoffs too.
It was a small leap to assume they were involved with her quarry. Mrs. Norris did not believe in coincidence. She also didn't believe in Santa Clause but that was a separate issue.
She'd deal with them, in due course. There were no trees inside the halls of Hogwarts. They were frontin on her turf. If they weren't careful, she'd have to smack a bitch down, word.
Feeling very ghetto, she swaggered a bit as she followed the trail around the corner and came to a dead halt. Her feeling of ghetto faded, there was no tea in the ghetto, and there was no fooling her nose at this distance; that was tea in her cup.
"Good evening."
That was a matter of opinion, the feline thought. And this silly child wouldn't be thinking it in a minute.
She let out the ghastly sound that brought her human running, but unlike with others, this human appeared completely unfazed; save perhaps being a little annoyed.
"I had hoped to finish my tea. Ah well."
With a careless snap, her bag opened its mouth and swallowed her tea, the cup, the pot, table and chair; never bulging in the slightest. "We're done here," she said, collecting her bag and strolling away.
Mrs. Norris was not having that, but when she tried to follow, she felt a tug on her tail. She was perplexed at the squirrel, more so by his mask, and even more so by the yellow ball he was holding.
Her confusion didn't last, nor did the yellow ball, and a great epiphany overcame her, shoving away all concerns for tea and the girls who flarged it. Yes, she understood, her mind was open at last.
She was the purple daffodil.
"Oh, Mrs. Norris. Not again."
Silence stinkweed!
